Nick Fury And Phil Coulson Have A "Meet-Cute" In 'Captain Marvel,' Clark Gregg Teases

When we first meet fan-favorite character Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) in Iron Man, he barely blinks an eye at the sight of metal flying men and gods of thunder. "This isn't my first rodeo, Mr. Stark," he says calmly to Robert Downey Jr.'s billionaire superhero.

But Captain Marvel will take us back to that first rodeo — or at least one of Coulson's early rodeos. More importantly, it will show us the first meeting between Coulson and his longtime boss, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson). And more exciting than the '90s fashion and de-aging that we'll get to see in Captain Marvel is the prospect of what Gregg teases as a "meet-cute" between Coulson and Fury.

Captain Marvel takes us back to the '90s, when Nick Fury is still just a desk jockey and Coulson is a fresh-faced agent at S.H.I.E.L.D. And that means we get to see him cut loose a little, especially when it comes to fashion, Gregg revealed in an interview with Entertainment Weekly.

"He's a relatively new S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who is obsessed with MC Hammer and dresses just like him, and it makes Director Fury so angry. The genie pants don't really go with the Armani."

Coulson in hammer pants? That seals it, Captain Marvel is the best Marvel movie. But still, it seems an odd choice of uniform for an agent who regularly works with otherworldly elements. However, EW reveals that this is before Coulson has learned that there are extraterrestial forces at work in the world. He's in for a rude awakening with the introduction of the Kree, who lend Brie Larson's Captain Marvel their powers, and the Skrulls, the shape-shifting aliens that infiltrate S.H.I.E.L.D.

He's also in for a rude awakening when it comes to working with his superiors — namely Fury, who is still a lower-level bureaucrat (with two eyes) at the time of Captain Marvel. Coulson and Fury's first meeting is a "meet-cute moment," Gregg describes, though, he adds with a laugh, "I don't think Sam will put it that way."

So what else can you expect from a young and fresh-faced (literally, with the de-aging technology used in this film) Coulson? "There was something really special about going back to the early days when he was just kind of coming up the ranks," Gregg says. "I had to take innocence workshops and go back to when he was a little less crusty and jaded!"

It's worlds away from the cynical Coulson we know in ABC's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and even from the mild-mannered badass who becomes the heart of the Marvel Cinematic Universe until his "death" in 2012's The Avengers. But mostly I'm excited to see Coulson in hammer pants.

Captain Marvel opens in theaters on March 8, 2019.