‘FBI’: Juliana Aidén Martinez Teases Eva ‘Has Some Deep Reasons’ for Wanting to Join the Team

“Everyone’s just on their toes in this whole episode,” Juliana Aidén Martinez, who joins FBI as a series regular and debuts as Scola’s (John Boyd) new partner in the Monday, October 27, installment, says.

Their first case together is a complicated one: A young man is found beaten to death, and they hit a roadblock when their case intersects with a DEA operation. Meanwhile, there’s a potential shake-up at the JOC. Below, Juliana Aidén Martinez introduces Eva Ramos, teases her and Scola’s partnership, and more.

We know she’s very qualified. She has her time as a prosecutor, then she was with the FBI and violent crime and narcotics. What else should we know about her?

Juliana Aidén Martinez: I think Eva is someone that is extremely clever. She’s witty. She moves through the world with a prosecutorial mind. So she’s just someone that’s just a few steps ahead of whatever room she’s in because she’s had to be when she was working on these complicated legal cases. And so I think that’s going to be a very interesting dynamic with Scola. But also I’ll say is that I think she’s someone that has a lot of purpose and joy in the mission of being out with the field and with this team. And so she’s someone that kind of is classy and sophisticated, but she has no qualms about getting down on the field, and I think we’re going to see that in episodes and that’s going to be a lot of fun.

Yeah, I was going to say, she gets right in the action right away and she leaps into action, which I like.

She’s not shy. She’s not shy.

Does she prefer that, that she can jump into the action after her time as a prosecutor?

I just think that, at one point, Eva was like, “Man, this is boring, this job.” It is just so much paperwork and obviously there’s a purpose to what she does, but I do think she gets a lot of adventure and fun in being out in the field, and I think that’s just a part of why she just jumped right into it because she never got to have that before, and so it’s kind of like she gets to go out and play, and that’s just a lot of fun to play.

You said she’s witty, and we see that when she meets Scola. She can go toe to toe with him. What’s the first impression of him?

I felt like her first impression was — I mean, it’s not the warmest introduction to be honest. She’s coming in and she makes jokes with Jubal [Jeremy Sisto] and she’s looking to have a place at the table, if you will, and be a part of this team because she has some deep reasons of coming to this team and Scola, without her knowing too much of the history, is just like, you can’t sit there. So I think there’s a little tension straight from the jump, but I think that’s also really intriguing. We’re going to see that both of these people, they just keep each other on their toes, and I think it was kind of like, “OK, that’s not the warmest welcome, but you know what? I’m going to give you something right back.” And we see that in that first encounter.

Who has the easier time adjusting to being partners?

It’s hard to say. I would say that Eva has a bit of mischief to her, and she is a little — I think we’ll see that there’s a warmness to her and a mischief about her, and I think she’s seeking to trust someone and she’s seeking to partner with someone. So maybe her slightly, maybe, I don’t know.

Her first case with the team, they have to deal with being mixed up with a DEA operation.

We have a murder that took place in federal land, and they find that it collides with this undercover DEA operation. And so it becomes a lot more complicated than just a standard homicide type of case, and we start joining forces with the DEA in a way to solve this, but it becomes a lot deeper and complicated as the episode goes on. And so yeah, I think it’s going to be a very interesting case. We have fantastic guest actors that I’m really excited for the audience to see, and also a potential up with the JOC, which is very cool.

Bennett Raglin/CBS

What’s the appeal of working on this specific team for Eva?

I think there’s a few things that entice her about joining the team. She is coming from the New Jersey field office and she has five years of experience working with violent crime and narcotics, and so she had a team out there and she has a field experience and a way of learning how to be a competent and really badass field agent, but she comes to this team with a deeper reason than just a transfer, if you will. She’s coming in to find someone or people that she can be a part of, and I think we see that in the episode, that she’s someone that is heart-oriented and she does have a warmth and just a big-heartedness about her, and we see what her reasons are at the end.

Then in the fifth episode, we’re going to get Eva and Maggie (Missy Peregrym) teaming up, which I’m excited to see. What is that dynamic like with the two of them working together? I feel like they’re just going to get a lot of stuff done, to be honest.

Well, women rule the world, right? It is a really cool episode. I was curious as an actor, too, because it was going to be my first time working with Missy as well, so I thought it was meta, if you will, that was like, oh, wow. Eva’s working with Maggie for the first time, and then I’m getting to work with Missy, and it was a blast. It was honestly so much fun and we got along so well. There’s a lot of things that we have in common as people and I think as characters, and it was to a point that I was like, we got to do this again. This is too much fun. There was a really great dynamic there. It was, honestly, it was really fun, and I think the audience is really going to like it.

FBI, Mondays, 9/8c, CBS