It would not be an exaggeration to say that Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD has been the most eagerly anticipated new series of the 2013 television season.

Ever since the show was first announced, fans of both Joss Whedon and the Marvel cinematic universe have been waiting to see whether the show would live up to its impressive pedigree.  Every casting announcement has been analyzed and every clip on Youtube has been viewed and debated.

Questions were asked: how would Phil Coulson (played by the wonderful Clark Gregg) manage to be the main character in this series when his death was a major plot point in The Avengers?  Who was the man who was seen jumping out of a burning building and landing without a scratch on his body?  Would Marvel’s Agents Of SHIELD be a prequel or a sequel to The Avengers?  Would the TV show even acknowledge the films from which it spawned?  Would Samuel L. Jackson show up to utter a few badass quips on network television?

But the most important question of all was this: Would Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD live up to all the hype or would it be another case of a show being smothered by the weight of high expectations?

Having just watched the first episode of Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD, I can now answer some of those questions.

How is Phil Coulson still alive?  Well, it turns out that he never died in the first place.  As he explains to newly recruited S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Grant Ward (Brett Dalton), he nearly died when he was attacked by Loki but ultimately, he survived.  Nick Fury told the Avengers that Coulson had died because he understood that Coulson’s “death” would cause the heroes to bond together.

After the end of The Avengers (or, as the show puts it, “the Battle of New York,”), Coulson spent a while recuperating on a beach and “reading Travis McGee novels.”  Now Coulson’s back and he’s in charge of the highly secretive Level 7.  (The Avengers, we’re told, are only Level 6.)  Level 7 investigates “special and strange” cases involving super powered individuals.

Who was the man that we saw jumping out of the burning building?  A lot of people online assumed that he was Luke Cage but instead, he turned out to be Mike Peterson (J. August Richards).  Mike is the show’s first “case,” a decent man who has recently lost his job and is struggling to deal with suddenly being super powered.  In a neat twist, the more powerful Mike becomes, the more easy it is for him to rationalize being destructive.

Coulson and Level 7 track Mike down with the help of Skye (Chloe Bennet), a forcefully recruited hacker and anti-government activist.  At the end of the episode, once Mike has been subdued through a combination of Coulson’s humanity and a tranquilizer dart fired by Grant, Skye is recruited into Level 7.

How direct a sequel is this show to the Marvel films?  It’s such a direct sequel that it would probably be unintelligible to anyone who hasn’t seen the films.  Not only is Mike’s origins story indirectly related to Capt. America’s (both of them owe their powers to a form of the super soldier formula) but the entire series takes place in a world that has been massively changed by the events of The Avengers.  Agents of SHIELD takes place in a world that now knows that there are super powered beings walking among us.

The show is also full of little comments and throw-away references to the characters and events of the films.  Those references are a nice gift to those who have seen all of the films that have seen all of the films that led up to Agents of SHIELD.  At the same time,  I have to admit that pretty much all of my knowledge of the Marvel universe comes from watching the films in the Avengers and X-Men franchises.  My boyfriend, however, grew up reading Marvel comics.  He assures me that, for every film reference that I picked up on, there were dozens of other references that would only be significant to those who have read the comic books.  If nothing else, this shows that Whedon and the show’s other writers respect their audience.  As a result, Agents of SHIELD invites its viewers to join the exclusive club of people who understand the importance of tweeting, “COULSON LIVES!”

No, Samuel L. Jackson does not show up but Cobie Smulders reprises her role from The Avengers, interviewing Grant and introducing him to Agent Coulson.  However, guest star power isn’t necessary because Clark Gregg is such a compelling and likable actor that he perfectly anchors the show.  Gregg brings a much-needed everyman quality to the role of Agent Coulson and, as such, he serves as the perfect guide through the world of super powered flamboyance.

Finally, did the pilot of Agents of SHIELD live up to all the anticipation?

In a word — yes.

Now, I should admit that I am a long-time fan of Joss Whedon’s and a good deal of my positive response to Agents of SHIELD has to do with the fact that it’s clearly a Whedon show.  Not only is the show populated by characters that’ll be familiar to any Whedonite but the self-aware and relentlessly quippy dialogue suggests that, on some level, they are all aware that they are characters on a television show along with being agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.  Along with Clark Gregg, the cast superstar so far is Chloe Bennet, who has a way with a one-liner and, on the basis of the pilot, an appealing chemistry with Brett Dalton.  Personally, I’m hoping that we’ll learn more about the appealingly eccentric Agents Fitz and Simmons (played by Ian De Caestecker and Elizabeth Henstridge).  I’m also hoping that J. August Richards will return in a future episode.  He generated a lot of empathy for the character of Mike and, as the result, prevented Agents of SHIELD from turning into an elaborate inside joke that would appeal only to us Whedonites.

Pilots are strange things.  Not only does a pilot have to introduce all the characters and justify the show’s existence, it also has to find the time to tell a fairly compelling story that will hopefully inspire people to tune in the following week.  Agents of SHIELD succeeded in doing all of that and I look forward to seeing in which direction the show ultimately heads.