Is history about to repeat itself? Stop us if you’ve heard this before: Team boss’ family is murdered, and he kills the murderer out of revenge. (Sure, Mark Harmon‘s Gibbs wasn’t the boss when he did it, but it’s similar enough.) At the end of last season, Special Agent Alden Parker (Gary Cole) found his father Roman (Francis X. McCarthy) shot dead in his home. Parker is confident his long-time nemesis, mob boss Carla Marino (Rebecca De Mornay), pulled the trigger because she blames him for her son’s death. His motorcycle accident occurred right after Parker informed him of Carla’s illegal activities.
For over two decades, NCIS has been a consistent, entertaining presence in CBS’s primetime lineup that really ups its game when it gets personal for the agents. When the drama picks up in Season 23, we’ll see flashbacks of Parker in his teen years as he goes rogue. “He was a rough kid — in juvie homes, in trouble, arrested all the time, breaking the rules, not caring about who was between him when he wanted to go from A to B,” executive producer Steven D. Binder explains. Now, “he is pissed.” Flashbacks to 1977 will show a younger Parker (played again by Harrison Leahy) and his relationships with his father (Mark Lawson as a young Roman) and sister (Alexa Nisenson as a young Harriet).
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“The dynamic between Parker and his sister [Nancy Travis] as adults is going to revert to the dynamic between them when they were [younger]. Alden Parker is a competent former FBI, current NCIS agent who seems pretty squared away,” notes Binder before pointing to his aforementioned past as a troubled youth. “His sister was the good child. He was causing a lot of problems for himself, for their family, for their father, which is a regret he has now. If you’re a family member, his actions have gotten dad killed. Take that dynamic from childhood and bring it to the present with a brother and sister, and sparks are going to fly.”
Parker’s team — agents Timothy McGee (Sean Murray, the longest-running cast member, having recurred in Season 1 and upped to series regular the following year), Nick Torres (Wilmer Valderrama), Jessica Knight (Katrina Law), forensic scientist Kasie Hines (Diona Reasonover), and chief medical examiner Dr. Jimmy Palmer (Brian Dietzen) — will face a dilemma when it comes to helping him. “The team is specifically told to make sure he doesn’t go anywhere and do anything,” says the EP. Will they follow those orders or join Parker in his pursuit? Our exclusive photos (above and below) suggest the latter, with Torres and Knight meeting a man who may have information about Roman’s murder. “You’ll like the answer,” Binder promises. Palmer also has to decide when to tell Parker what he found in his mother’s original death certificate.
In the past, Director Leon Vance (Rocky Carroll) has helped his agents in similar positions. Not this time. “We’ve often played Director Vance telling his team they need to get back in the box, then he goes, wink, wink, nudge, nudge, and leaves the file on his desk while he leaves the office so they can look through something they need to. That’s not the case this time,” warns Binder. There are “mysterious reasons” for why he’s going back to being “very by the book.” The resulting conflict between Parker and Vance will still affect them beyond the episodes that resolve the Carla arc.
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Following that — “We feel like this storyline is nearing its conclusion, and we are going to hasten that,” says Binder — the other characters will get their own arcs in line with Season 23’s theme, “NCIS on fire.” The EP teases, “At various points, they’re all going to have their explosive moments.”
For McGee, it’s “something that is shocking to him but also wonderful and really scary” involving family. Who specifically, Binder won’t say. Torres is going to get back into dating “in a way that’s going to cause a lot of problems for everybody,” but, adds the EP, “the heart wants what the heart wants.” Knight gets picked for NCIS Elite — the team Sam Hanna (NCIS: LA‘s LL Cool J) ran that was ambushed and killed on Hawai’i — but it will “blow up in her face in a really emotionally charged way,” he warns. There are some things “outside the creative” that must fall into place for that “Kill Bill arc” to happen, he admits. That doesn’t involve getting LL Cool J back (he guest starred last season), and there aren’t any firm plans to have any past or spinoff cast members appear this season.
Kasie’s going to get out of the lab more and will build something that causes “a lot of problems,” leading to her becoming a target. “She’s not going to take it lying down,” says Binder. “What we’re hoping to see is a badass Kasie. She’s in the right.” And just like Season 10’s “Detour” followed Palmer and Ducky (the late David McCallum), there’s going to be a similar episode for the now-chief ME. “We’re hoping to see a day in the life of Jimmy,” the EP says, “the world through the eyes of Jimmy — hopefully written by Brian Dietzen.” (He’s co-written three episodes with EP Scott Williams, including the powerful Season 21 tribute to McCallum.)
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NCIS has never been the most romantic of shows, but Knight and Palmer’s relationship has changed that. They split because they needed different things: her, someone who could chase down job opportunities around the world, and him, stability. In Season 23, they can best be described as, “It’s complicated, and it’s going to get even more complicated,” according to Binder.
Overall, expect a season filled with energy. There will always be cases-of-the-week (the show’s “bread and butter”), including a couple of two-parters. “We’re planning on stirring the patriotism that this show was founded on. We always talk about who you care about,” explains Binder. “We’re really trying to dial in on engaging people’s feelings, whether they’re happy tears or sad tears, to make this a season that people can get emotionally invested in.” We’re ready for the fireworks.
NCIS, Season 23 Premiere, Tuesday, October 14, 8/7c, CBS
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