Marvel Studios has dominated the big screen. Now it has rolled out its first foray into television in the form of the hugely anticipated series Agents of SHIELD.
For this spin-off, we're in the world of SHIELD, a government agency put together to investigate the emergence of superheroes on earth.
Geek god Joss Whedon wrote the first episode, in which agent Coulson (a charmingly wry Clark Gregg) takes centre stage. You might believe he died in the battle for New York in The Avengers , but he was actually swiftly resuscitated and sent to recover in Tahiti, or so he thinks.
The opening plotline is simple: the agency wanted to bring in a new, unidentified superhero who's running loose.
The big question is whether it was anyone from The Avengers. In a word, no. Yet we can cling to the possibility of this happening in future episodes.
This is much less a superhero series than a secret agent series - there's certainly enough here to turn into a solid series once it hits its swing. When the show premiered in the US , it became the country's biggest TV debut in four years (since the revamp of V ) .
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