In tonight’s show, the NCIS team races to uncover whether the killing of a petty officer is traceable to the “Tri-State Serial Killer”, or if a copycat is on the loose. Margo Harshman returns as Agent Timothy McGee’s girlfriend, Delilah Fielding. Rocky Carroll, who plays Director Vance, gets another chance to direct an episode. How do you think he did weaving in the multiple plots?

This episode has a little of everything that we viewers like to watch. A “whodunit” is combined with timely victimization of women in the military. Plus a second plot examines what Special Agent Eleanor Bishop is made of. As the drama unfolds within the NCIS family, Ellie must face the terrible likelihood that her husband Jake was injured or worse in a terrorist attack in Dubai. As the team works to find out if Petty Officer Adam Meyer was killed by a woman who he admitted to victimizing or by someone else, we are entertained by Tony’s affliction with a bad case of poison oak. His line, “My skin feels like 10,000 suns” is astute and memorable. Ellie and Tim are smart enough to avoid the vicious rash.

As is typical with NCIS writing, we are sent down various rabbit trails, suggesting that first a female victim killed Meyer, then veering to his supervisor from the ship is the killer. In the end we discover the real killer is set up by a technique David used to use. Is the ship’s commanding officer willing to help the real killer avoid justice? The ending to this plot is superb in many ways. How many of you thought the ship’s Captain was really sympathetic to the killer? Then we discover he’s working in cahoots with Gibbs and Company.

The final scene with Mark Harmon as Leroy Jethro Gibbs and Ellie says it all. He rocks as a team leader, and as a father to the entire team. We need more like him. Let us know what you enjoyed about tonight’s show!

If you have a comment, make it quickly, as we will be going dark for about a week, and won’t be able to respond. That means we’ll not be critiquing next weeks’ episode.

Be Blessed, Diane and David Munson