Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. ups Jeff Ward to series regular

Deke Shaw (Jeff Ward) is officially sticking around — even if the future has changed.

EW has exclusively learned that Ward’s character, the scavenging grandson of Fitz (Iain de Caestecker) and Simmons (Elizabeth Henstridge) from a dystopian future timeline, will feature as a series regular in season 6. During EW’s Comic-Con 2018 video studio interview above with the cast of ABC’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Ward revealed that his character, last seen in the season 5 finale leaving to see the world after encouraging Daisy (Chloe Bennet) to unite the team, will return in the series’ next season.

“I’m very excited, because all these people are incredible and very good at what they do,” Ward said during the interview, before joking that he rehearsed the statement — to which Ming-Na Wen, who plays Melinda May, then quipped: “Yeah, that was coming off really natural.”

Watch the video above. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., which also stars Clark Gregg, Henry Simmons, and Natalia Cordova-Buckley, will return in 2019.