This is one half of a dueling column. Read the argument against Grant Ward here.
Grant Ward from Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD has under gone a major character shift. Many debate whether he is redeemable or forever lost to Hydra.
Childhood/Past
Grant Ward had a cruel and unusual childhood. From the information we have been given, Ward’s older brother was an abusive bully who made his younger brothers beat each other up. In a conversation with Skye, Ward reveals the nature of his family.
“My older brother, he didn’t beat up my younger brother. He was crueler than that. He made me do it, and I let him. I was afraid.”
“What about your parents?”
“They were worse.”
Ward’s childhood definitely shaped the man he would become. As a child Ward was powerless against his family. An incident in particular that had an intense effect on Ward was when his older brother threw his younger brother into a well and tried to prevent Ward from rescuing him. Ward managed to rescue his younger brother without his older brother knowing.
Another incident regarding Ward’s family was revealed on the latest episode. Ward was set to be tried as an adult because he set his house on fire. Unbeknownst to Ward his older brother was in the house and almost died. Previous to this incident Ward had been sent to military school for unknown reasons.
The choices he made were based on fear, and that pattern of behavior followed him into adulthood. Ward had no power as a child. He has spent his whole life in a weak, powerless position and that’s all that he has ever known. So it’s not that he’s evil, he’s just trying to survive. He has a different set of morals and guiding philosophies based on the environment he was raised in. He follows the power in hopes of one day actually having some.
Influence of Garrett
Garrett found Ward during the darkest time of his life and extended a life line. Garrett played the role of savior to a naïve boy with no family, desperately in need of someone to show him even the slightest bit of attention. Ward was emotionally fragile and Garrett played on that for his own purposes.
Garrett shaped Ward into the perfect soldier all while keeping him powerless, especially in the early days of their acquaintance. Garrett taught Ward a specific set of rules which seems to define the Ward we know today. From the background we got on Ward it looks like he has never been cared for a day in his life. Even when Garrett arrives, he doesn’t care for Ward; he manipulates him and lies to him. After a while, Ward becomes the lie because it is all he knows. He hardens himself to the past and anything that may arise in the future. This doesn’t make Ward a character beyond redemption it makes him broken.
Ward knows nothing of compassion or trust, beyond what Garrett has taught him, until he is on the bus with the team. They confuse him and the feelings they bring out in him scare him. Ward mistakes his feelings of compassion for the team members as a weakness. Garrett has essentially brainwashed Ward into believing that attachments are a complication which should be ended like Buddy. Garrett used this as ultimate control tactic — prove to me that you will do what I say, that you are not weak, kill what you love and care for. Ward proved that he couldn’t do it. He set Buddy free demonstrating that there is still something left of the real Ward that isn’t controlled by his misguided loyalty to Garrett.
The Team
When Ward joined Coulson’s team it was because Garrett needed him to, there is no question about it. Ward is a good soldier and he was following orders, however, once on the bus with the others, Ward began to change. No longer under the constant conditioning of Garrett, Ward gets a glimpse of what it is like to have a family and people who care for you unconditionally. Thus begins the conflict in Ward’s character.
Throughout the first half of the season we see Ward change from a stoic loner who only views his time on the bus as a job, to someone willing to train the others and befriend them even if it goes against everything he has been taught. Ward begins to find comfort in people and open up to those around him.
This is especially true with Skye. Ward begins to connect with Skye and tell her things that he hasn’t shared with the others. To some extent Skye is very similar to Ward. She had no family and began to fight for herself at a young age. She has a strength that a young Ward needed desperately. He cares for Skye and tries to hide that perceived weakness from Garrett who will exploit it.
Ward even admits some of his failings to Skye, trying to warn her off in a way. A bad person doesn’t admit to being bad because they don’t actually identify their behavior that way. Only a person who has some level of conscious, no matter how repressed, can admit to the fact that they have done bad things.
In conclusion, Grant Ward was never truly evil. He was taken in by a man who was manipulative and controlling at a time when he was fragile and desperate to belong anywhere, to anyone. Ward didn’t know that Garrett was Hydra until he had already become indebted to him, making it impossible to walk away.
Grant Ward is not irredeemable. He was broken and fixed by a man who used him as a pawn in a much larger game. Under the influence of caring for people, Ward began to change and shift what he believed. There is good in him and the possibility for him to do the right thing is definitely brewing beneath the surface.
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