Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: Laws of Nature (3x01)

I'm so happy that this show is back. Honestly. So, so happy. I literally just watched the episode, and I'm already impatient for more. Let's get started.

Cons:

No May! This isn't really a serious flaw in the episode, since I know she'll be back soon, but still. It was sad not seeing her.

I think I was missing May so much because I don't find myself particularly interested in Bobbi or Hunter at the moment. Maybe their little romance was just distracting me from the better stuff in this episode. It wasn't awful by any means, but it wasn't holding my attention like everything else was. I'm curious about where Hunter is about to run off to, as we didn't get a lot of answers about that here. But other than that, I could have done without these two.

Pros:

We start off our episode with Joey Gutierrez, an ordinary man who suddenly finds himself with the ability to liquidate metal. He is out of control. Just as the Advanced Threat Containment Unit shows up to capture Joey, S.H.I.E.L.D. arrives and saves him. The extraction team is led by Daisy Johnson, formerly known to us all as Skye. Daisy tries to help Joey understand what he's going through, but Joey is anxious and upset when he learns he can never return to his old life. I loved the character of Joey. He hasn't had much to do so far, but I do adore the fact that he's a gay motorcycle enthusiast. I wish it wasn't still so rare that I had to point it out specially, but it's awesome to see a casually gay character here. I also loved seeing Daisy take charge and do what she does best. The new short hair is awesome, and I think I can dig the new (old) name, too.

When Daisy realizes that she's not getting through to Joey, she wants to recruit Lincoln to help. Turns out, Lincoln wants nothing to do with S.H.I.E.L.D. or any other part of the effort to gather up the world's suddenly expanding population of Inhumans. I love the idea that we're getting more and more Inhumans cropping up all over the place, while at the same time the various infrastructures to contain these Inhumans are scrambling to assemble themselves. Lincoln was a really interesting character from last season, and I'm excited to see them do more with him.

Speaking of interesting new characters, Coulson and Hunter meet up with the leader of ATCU, a woman named Rosalind Price. We've tried a couple different versions of Coulson's S.H.I.E.L.D. butting heads with other similar agencies or sub-groups, but so far I think this one is the best. Rosalind was awesomely bad-ass. I loved that she pulled a double-cross on Coulson, so that while Coulson thought he had tracked her down, she had in fact been luring him into a trap. Of course, our good guys get the final say, which is also fun.

We've also been introduced to a new villain, an Inhuman named Lash who looks to be quite the prosthetic adventure for the makeup artists. He looks cool, but so far he's just a monstrous raging enemy with no real meat to back it up. Still, I loved the scene in the hospital, when Skye-oops, I mean Daisy- has to try and escape. Lash vanishes after this exchange, and so does Lincoln. He still wants no part of anything that's going on.

Of course, then there's my darling Fitz. He has apparently gone to a pretty dark place, tracking down lead after lead that could reveal answers about the Monolith that swallowed Simmons at the end of last season. The rest of the team are hesitant to give Fitz a reality check. They've all pretty much accepted that Simmons is dead, but not Fitz. While he should be helping the team with the Inhuman problem, he instead tracks down "one last thing" to try and help him figure out what happened to Simmons. He gets mixed up with some pretty bad guys, who almost kill him, but he manages to escape with a Hebrew scroll that's supposed to have information about the Monolith. It has only one word: Death. Fitz, refusing to accept this, approaches the Monolith and angrily demands that it do something.

Honestly, Fitz was breaking my heart this whole episode. He's certainly grown up since he lost Simmons, becoming a harder and more ruthless kind of person. He really will go to any lengths to get Simmons back, with or without the help of the rest of his team. Serious props to Iain De Caestecker here. The scene where he angrily screams and pummels the Monolith was intense, and so heartbreaking to watch. Even though he knew he was asking for danger when he approached it, even though for all he knew it was going to suck him up too, he was willing to risk that for the chance of seeing Jemma again. He also tells the random bad guy with the scroll that he loves her, which of course we all knew, but was still awesome to hear.

We do get a brief glimpse of Simmons in this episode. She is, surprise, surprise, not dead. She's on some hostile alien planet, being chased by an unknown foe. It was nice to see this glimpse of her, because it teases the ultimate reunion between our beloved Fitzsimmons. I cannot wait.

That's basically my message for this whole episode: I cannot wait. I can't wait to see May. I can't wait to find out what Hunter's going to go after. I can't wait to see Fitz continue his desperate search for Simmons. I can't wait for Simmons to be saved. I can't wait to see Daisy become more and more confident in her role as an Inhuman. I can't wait to see what Lincoln gets up to. This season is promising so much awesomeness, and I think it can definitely deliver.

9/10