‘Her Mind Is Definitely A Weapon’

Stop us if you’ve heard this one before: There’s a new partner in town for Stuart Scola.

In Monday’s “FBI,” Juliana Aidén Martinez debuts as Eva Ramos, the office’s newest agent who makes a considerable splash in the case of the week. When a young man is found beaten to death on federal land, the FBI’s case intersects with a DEA operation already in motion, testing Ramos’ intelligence and skills in the field, an exam she passes with flying colors.

“Eva is someone that used to work in the New Jersey FBI field office, and she worked in violent crime and narcotics, so she knows that kind of world,” Martinez tells TVLine. “But what also drew me to her character is that she was previously a prosecutor for the Newark U.S. District Attorney’s office, and so she has what I like to call the lawyer’s mind. She’s very sharp. She’s clever. She moves through the world with that type of creative thinking, and finding solutions and different ways [that are] always a few steps ahead.”

So how’s she going to mesh with Scola, who’s still grieving his dearly departed last partner, Dani Rhodes?

“I feel like they’re two positive ions moving through space,” says Martinez. “They’re both sharp and clever, and there is a bemused, intellectual way of seeing the world that I think will resonate with Scola. Her mind is definitely a weapon for her. But I’ll also say she’s excited to keep someone on their toes. It’s going to be an interesting dynamic.”

Whether these two agents will play nice or hit roadblocks along the way remains to be seen, but the actress hints that the partnership between them will “be like all relationships.”

“It’s going to mutate and it’s going to change. There’s going to be moments of tension, and then moments of connection and understanding, as any partnership would have,” she says. “I’m really excited for them to get to know each other and go through that journey of a partnership.”

That journey begins in Episode 3, with Ramos and Scola in hot pursuit of a murder suspect who is later picked up by a man Scola recognizes from the DEA. But Ramos wastes zero time getting her feet wet chasing down bad guys, leaping over shipping containers and flying under railings. Martinez says Ramos’ ability to hit the ground running (literally) comes from her rugged past experience.

“It’s such a dangerous, consistently changing type of atmosphere, that type of field work, and there’s a tenacity and grit to her that I really like,” she says.

However, she also wanted her character to be someone that’s “classy and sophisticated.”

“There’s a few episodes I’m excited [for] and just what she gets to wear, her femininity, which is fantastic, but also this tenacity in her field work. She goes straight in and it’s a lot of fun.”

After cracking this week’s case wide open — which involves Scola’s former colleague, DEA Agent Bobby Galloway, who is under cover with a biker gang called The Lost Sons — we learn our first juicy piece of Ramos’ backstory: She was in a relationship with someone from her past field office, but her now-ex turned out to be a member of Forefront. That broken trust and Ramos’ desire to work with the team that defeated the extremist, anti-government faction is the reason why she accepted the move to 26 Fed.

“When I was first talked to Mike [Weiss], our showrunner, about her and just started reading that first episode, the initial impulse I had for her is a woman who was heartbroken from that type of relationship,” adds Martinez. “She’s not only a field agent, she’s a woman that was betrayed by someone she loved, and that was something I found really intriguing and also relatable. It’s something that’s important to her humanity, that I do think created a crack in her trust, not only in her relationships with people, but also in herself. She’s someone who is so smart and thought the world was black and white, and then suddenly it’s gray.

“She’s yearning to trust again,” she continues. “She’s yearning to find a partnership and someone that she could feel safe with. That’s going to be an interesting journey for her.”

What was your first impression of Special Agent Ramos? Drop all of your Episode 3 thoughts in the comments below.