NCIS Pilot Episode Review: Friends Meets Air Force One

Originally a spin-off of JAG, NCIS has become a legend as the show is now 18 seasons deep into its run and has spun off three separate shows itself expanding the universe with NCIS: LA, NCIS: New Orleans, and NCIS: Hawaii. Just as recently as April Nielsen reported NCIS as being the top-rated show in streaming as an estimated 890 million minutes of NCIS reruns were streamed in between April 19-25 alone. Over the years NCIS has attracted millions of fans across the globe especially since the show got into syndication skyrocketing the trajectory of the show’s success while the show was already 7 seasons in with its eccentric characters, compelling and suspenseful dramatic storylines, and of course the bread and butter of the show its humor. NCIS has never been satisfied to be merely a police procedural as the writers behind the scenes strive to create a character drama that just happens to take place in the world of military criminal investigations, however, the focus is always on the characters and the rich character development and humorous situations that evolve out of those threads and long-form overarching storylines. But just how did NCIS become the juggernaut in the sophisticated mystery thriller comedy space that it is today? Well as is usually the case with any iconic show it all started with the pilot episode entitled “Yankee White” that aired in the fall of 2003 just a couple of years after the events of 911 and during the final season of Friends’ run on TV. The show was previously established in a JAG two-part backdoor pilot but the series premiere was the episode that set the tone for the series as its high-octane suspenseful action thrills and comedic antics worked together tonally as a sort of a cross between Air Force One and Friends. 

 

 

JAG Backdoor Pilot: “Ice Queen/Meltdown”

Now I can’t very well talk about the pilot episode of NCIS without first discussing its two-part backdoor pilot on JAG which established the main trio of Gibbs, Dinozzo, and Ducky for the decades of NCIS stories to come. “Ice Queen/Meltdown” is an ambitious beginning to the NCIS saga as it builds off the serialized storyline involving the infamous Lt. Singer’s ongoing drama that saw the driven career-minded to a fault JAG lawyer disappearing from the scene after becoming pregnant by quite possibly Commander Rabb’s half-brother. The NCIS team discovers her body in the woods and connects her back to JAG which brings a heated investigation into play with Rabb quickly becoming the No. 1 suspect. The backdoor pilot covers a lot of ground in that it tackles what would become the typical case-of-the-week style story with the murder investigation of a naval lawyer and simultaneously explores suspense thriller territory as the NCIS team works to take down a terrorist who is an imminent threat. The tone very much evokes a cross between The Fugitive and A Few Good Men as Rabb is falsely accused of murder and put on trial and becomes dependent on the JAG legal system as NCIS combats the war on terrorism at the same time. 

 

 

Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs, played by Mark Harmon makes a stellar introduction in this two-parter as he fully embodies the modern-day John Wayne/Clint Eastwood-esque character who will stop at nothing to get his man. In that way, he is a lot like Tommy Lee Jones in The Fugitive as he hunts down a terrorist but at the same time even though he arrests Rabb for murder he remains open to getting to the truth and evolves on his perception of the man as things progress in determining who really murdered Lt. Singer much like Tommy Lee Jones eventually saw things from Harrison Ford’s point of view. Anthony Dinozzo played by Micheal Weatherly is the affable ladies man with a penchant for an eccentric sense of humor and as Gibbs’s right-hand man he not only provides comedic levity to the show but keeps the action moving as a legendary agent in the making. Dr. “Ducky” Mallard played by David McCallum is more than a welcome addition here as he makes his debut as the character at the age of 70 but with the enthusiasm and energy of a much younger man. Ducky, while a crack medical examiner, is known to get off topic with his many long-winded stories and he is a long-time friend of Gibbs having worked with him for the better part of a decade. The combination of elements in this riveting backdoor pilot is of a high-caliber cinematic quality as mystery, suspense, and humor are all well employed in the telling of this engaging introduction to the NCIS universe at the tail end of JAG’s eighth season. The juxtaposition of getting to see these iconic NCIS characters upending the lives of these JAG lawyers with pivotal characters such as Rabb, Mac, Bud, and Admiral Chegwidden is really something special as its shows just how strongly written and performed these characters were from the very beginning of the NCIS saga and as later on various JAG characters have gone on to cross back over with the NCIS characters on NCIS and its own spin-off NCIS: Los Angeles. I’m highly anticipating the day when Mark Harmon as Gibbs meets David James Elliot as Captain Harmon Rabb Jr. again as seeing how that dynamic between them would be flipped on its coin nearly two decades later would be an iconic payoff considering the epic beginning to the NCIS franchise with this backdoor pilot that aired in the spring of ‘03 and the saga of adventures that followed it as established by its series pilot “Yankee White” that following fall. 

 

 

 

 

“Yankee White”: Friends Meets Air Force One 

The fact that NCIS got to introduce itself to audiences not once but twice with its backdoor pilot and then pilot episode at the beginning of the season is outstanding, to say the least and they certainly didn’t waste the opportunity as the series painted the picture of NCIS being the underdog federal agency in the criminal investigation world as it re-introduced us to the likable characters of Gibbs, Dinozzo, Ducky, and Abby with one new addition as they swapped out their previous female lead Blackadder by casting Sasha Alexander as Secret Service agent Caitiln Todd. The series created by JAG and Magnum PI creator Donald P. Bellisario was imagined as a character-driven murder mystery/action thriller show with a high emphasis on comedy. Bellisario knew NCIS had to differentiate itself from all the other crime-solving shows saturating the marketplace already including CSI and NCIS’s strong focus on humor certainly does that in spades. In assembling a character-driven ensemble Bellisario knew he needed great actors to fill the roles of the NCIS team and so he sought after an extensive search to do just that. 

Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs leads the NCIS team in an unflappable manner and as such a strong serious actor was needed that could embody those values of honor and virtue required of the character. Harrison Ford was reportedly offered the role of Gibbs but he passed on the role and someone suggested Mark Harmon to Bellisario and as Bellisario recounts:  

 

 

“So I go looking for Leroy Jethro Gibbs and somebody said to me on this search.... Mark Harmon… and I said Mark Harmon no,no,no... too good looking... and they said have you seen him lately in a role he played on West Wing and I hadn’t… and they brought me a tape or DVD on West Wing, I put it in and I saw him… I didn’t see ten seconds of Mark Harmon. I said wow he’s matured so much and he is Gibbs.” 

 

Micheal Weatherly came to the role of Dinozzo in a very much Dinozzo style as he pursued the role by seeking a meeting with Bellisario who was about to leave the country for a trip and ended up getting invited to dinner with his family at the pier which turned into a 4-hour conversation, Bellisario reminiscing with Weatherly over the making of Magnum PI which Weatherly was a big fan of. And thus Micheal Weatherly became Anthony Dinozzo the ad-lib king and everybody’s favorite goofball comedian and skirt-chasing ladies man. Over time the character became famous for his charming movie-buff personality as just as Ducky tends to get off track on cases with his long-winded stories more often than not Dinozzo will reference some classic movie in connection with what's going on much to the dismay of Gibbs. David McCallum the former The Man from Uncle star decided the Ducky character was something he would be interested in playing after reading the script and finding the words and the character jumped off the page as he read them. And as his peers have noted McCallum doesn’t take playing the medical examiner lightly as he studied the job intensively, learning the process so thoroughly that he has a large working knowledge of how to handle instruments that he needs to use onscreen and essentially ended up becoming a technical consultant for the show itself. The role of Abby Sciuto the forensic scientist is filled by Pauley Perrette who plays Abby as a Goth scientist but not Goth in the way you would imagine but rather the most enthusiastic good-hearted funny person you could possibly imagine. Perrette and Weatherly hit it off quickly after Perrette was initially worried he was the shallow good-looking type but quickly learned the opposite was true and the two promised each other to strive to make the show as funny as possible. 

 

 

 

 

The role of Secret Service Agent Caitlin Todd or Kate was a very important role to cast as the leading lady of the show informed so much of the dynamic of the team in those early days. Originally Jennifer Aniston was interested in pursuing the role but her commitment to filming the final season of Friends conflicted with the beginning of filming on NCIS Season 1, so that wasn’t an option unfortunately. Instead, Sasha Alexander was cast in the role who after clicking with Bellisario in their initial meeting did chemistry tests with Harmon and as a result, landed the role. Kate is a Secret Service Agent who quickly butts heads with NCIS as following a murder on Air Force One Gibbs, Dinozzo, and Ducky very stealthily hijack Air Force One from the FBI resulting in a turf war between the formidable Secret Service Agent and Gibbs. She reluctantly agrees to work together with them and gradually over time begins to develop a respect for what NCIS does being unfamiliar with their work. Gibbs introducing the concept of crime scene investigation to Kate doubles as an introduction to the procedure of the work to the audience in a way that plays off as cool and sophisticated. Sasha Alexander wasn’t involved with the backdoor pilot but she saw it ahead of starring in the series pilot and recognized that the dialogue had the potential for great comedy which goes into full effect here in “Yankee White”. 

 

 

 

NCIS’s investigation into the murder aboard Air Force One with the reluctant teamwork of Secret Service Agent Caitilin Todd is a tight and suspenseful mystery thriller as well as comic gold at the same time. The interactions between these richly developed characters is so unique and specific that you just can’t lift lines from one character and swap them out with another as you lose the essence of that character in doing that. Nods to Air Force One the movie are made by Harmon in the episode alluding to the fact that Harrison Ford was almost Gibbs and the action very much parallels some of the suspense and action elements from the movie. The comedy evokes a Friends-esque tone to it as Kate very much feels like a character who could have existed on that sitcom as she is a young single career-minded woman trying to figure out her life and enters a whole new world to her in NCIS much like Rachel did on Friends when she ran out on her wedding to begin her new adventure with Monica and her gang of friends in the Big Apple. 

 

As Kate gains a respect for Gibbs as a mentor figure throughout the pilot a subtle love interest angle in the form of a will they/won't they type dynamic plays itself out between them but in an interesting twist at the end after the high-octane action resolves itself and the dust settles with Kate having resigned from the Secret Service Gibbs offers her a spot on his team but quips that if she ever gets involved with a co-worker like she did as seen in the fallout of her involvement with the murder victim aboard Air Force One earlier in the episode that he wouldn’t give her a chance to resign. As established later Gibbs has a rule, as he has a rule for everything, against dating a coworker. It's not till later that we learn that Gibbs has this rule in place based on personal experience thus the reasoning behind his decision not to go down that path with Kate. 

 

 

“Yankee White” does a lot to establish the legacy of NCIS moving forward as it introduces the core central characters as well as faces we would see again and again over the years including Special Agent Tobias Fornell (Joe Spano) who would go on to become a great foil and best friend to Gibbs. The introduction of all these rich characters is done in a way where we know who these people are at their core and we get to see their personas come to alive and jump off the screen at us as the eccentric ensemble interacts with each other with such great chemistry but at the same time, plenty is left on the table in terms of development for the characters to come and exploration of their backgrounds thus adding fuel to the mystery surrounding this extremely skilled and likable group of people. “Yankee White” is just the beginning as this pilot episode sets the tone for the decades of NCIS stories that have come afterward with NCIS now gearing up to head into its 19th season this fall with Mark Harmon still leading the charge. 

 

COMING SOON: NCIS Season 19: The Beginning of a New Era for the Mystery Thriller Comedy Saga