The last episode of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. ended on a doozy of a cliffhanger when Daisy Johnson and Jemma Simmons entered A.I.D.A.'s framework reality to try and retrieve their pals. We saw almost all the characters out and about in the framework reality in very unexpected roles, but Simmons was nowhere to be seen. In fact, all we've had to go on since the episode aired back in February was her gravestone and showrunner Jed Whedon's assurance that she's not dead. Now, we finally know how long we'll have to wait before she's back, and it's surprisingly not all that long. Jemma will turn up again in the very next episode.
According to the episode description for the "What If..." episode that will bring S.H.I.E.L.D. back to the airwaves, Daisy and Simmons will both be working to uncover hidden truths and root out the lies in an upside down world controlled by Hydra. Given that our last glimpses of Coulson, May, Fitz, and Mack showed them living oblivious lives within the framework, we can bet that Daisy and Simmons have their work cut out for them in trying to wake them up to the false reality.
Unfortunately, the description doesn't say that Daisy and Simmons will be working together, so "What If..." may well feature the women working separately to try and figure out how to get everybody out of the framework. We still don't know what happened to Jemma when she entered the framework or how the framework version of Jemma died, and Daisy will probably have enough on her plate trying to deal with a brand new version of Ward back in her life. I wouldn't be surprised if we have to wait a while before Simmons and Daisy are able to work as a team once more. At this point, I'm just hoping neither of them is captured and tortured by Hydra.
Considering how long we've had to wait before finding out the deal with Simmons in seasons past, I'm pretty happy that she'll be back in the next episode. Back in Season 2, we had to wait a while before seeing a version of Simmons that wasn't a hallucination from poor Fitz, and then poor Simmons spent most of the early episodes of Season 3 off-screen and stuck on another planet. S.H.I.E.L.D. could have kept us in the dark on the Simmons front for a while; instead, she'll be back in the fight sooner rather than later.
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. will finally return to ABC on Tuesday, April 4 at 10 p.m. ET, and we'll get to see Simmons in action in the framework reality. The ratings for S.H.I.E.L.D. in Season 4 haven't been great, but we shouldn't count the series out just yet. Be sure to take a look at our midseason TV premiere schedule and our summer TV premiere guide to see all the other great TV shows on the airwaves now and in the not-too-distant future.
