6 Things Joss Whedon Hated About The Avengers
2. Coulson Died
Whedon knew it had to happen. The Avengers were wildly different people, each an alpha in his or her own way, and Loki barely even needed his magic scepter to get them to start snapping at each other.
Coulson was the glue that held the team together without their realizing it. He was the one person whom Steve, Tony, Thor, Nick and Natasha all liked and trusted, and his death gave the team the unity it so badly needed. His dying words might as well have been Whedon narrating: "This was never going to work, if they didn't have something... to..." Avenge.
The only problem was that Whedon had a certain... reputation for killing off his most lovable characters. His body-count could inspire a list of its own: Buffy's mother Joyce Summers, Jenny Calendar, Tara Maclay, Winifred Burkle, Anya, Shepherd Book, Hoban Washburne, Penny from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog... and those are just the ones who didn't get better. Oh, and Quicksilver. As he started Avengers, he'd hoped to get away from that tic, but Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige convinced him it was necessary. Whedon agreed as long as Feige would be the one taking the bullets.
In our first meeting Kevin Feige said, "This is what were gonna do" and I said, "Oh, but you have to go out there and tell everybody that it was your idea because this is going to get me so much sh*t. Because they are all going to be like, 'Oh, he did it again!'"