A Year of NCIS, Day 145: Endgame (Episode 7.7)

Episode: Episode 7.7, Endgame

Air Date: November 10, 2009.

The Victim: A civilian, Elan Cirreaux, M.D. 

Emotionally Traumatized, But Ultimately Irrelevant, Witness Who Finds the Body: We start off with Hawkeye, still on house arrest on his farm. He’s teaching his daughter to shoot a bow and arrow.  We’re meant to assume this is happening right before Avengers: Inifinity War, where Thanos snaps…

Ah, sorry…wrong Endgame.  Ahem.

We have some servicemembers running a cross country course.  There’s some interservice rivalry going on between the Army and the Navy.  But they stop when they find an abandoned car filled with significant drug paraphernalia.  There’s a key in the ignition.  And then a body.     

Plot Recap: In the squad room, we find Tony, who is very excited.  You see, he is going through McGee’s desk and he found McGee’s self-help CDs.  Ziva does not approve of Tony’s shenanigans, and it seems we really are getting back to normal.  Ziva suggests Tony needs self-help, but Tony is comfy with who he is.  “I am DiNozzo.  Hear me roar.”

Gibbs doesn’t roar. Usually.  What he does say is, “Grab your gear!” and apprises the team of a dead civilian doctor on Naval Academy grounds.  Dead with a gunshot wound.  Gibbs tells Tony to stop violating the HR manual and to get out of McGee’s desk, but then wants to know where our resident Elf Lord happens to be.

We switch scenes and find McGee getting coffee.  A lot of coffee. I guess for the team.  A pretty girl named Amanda offers to help him carry the coffee and starts flirting with him.  Turns out she attends grad school nearby and comes to the local coffee house to work.  Right on time, McGee’s phone rings, but it’s a good thing because he’s so encumbered with coffee that Amanda has to reach into his pants to get the phone.  Attaway to get to first base without even trying, McGee.  Tony would be proud.

And it’s Tony on the phone telling McGee to get his ass to work.  McGee closes the deal, though, getting Amanda to put her number into his phone AND put the phone back in his pants.  Hot.

At the crime scene, the team identifies our dead physician as Dr. Elan Cirreaux, divorced no kids, practices in DC and Paris.  Nice work if you can get it. 

McGee catches some grief from Gibbs for being tardy and Tony can tell he was with a girl.  McGee keeps the details to himself, probably because his last significant relationship involved Tony catfishing him.  See Love and War, Episode 6.14.

Ziva finds the doctor’s surgical tools and they are wiped clean of prints.  There are strands of surgical threads on the carpet of the car.  So Ziva surmises our victim attended to someone.  But why not in a hospital?

Director Vance opines that off-site treatment occurred because the patient did not want to be seen.

Yeah, that makes sense.

Wait, Vance?  What the hell is Vance doing at a crime scene?  Is it Assistant Editor’s Month?

The team is similarly confused by this departure from form.  Vance plays it off and says he has seen similar crime scene details before and wanted to see these for himself.  Gibbs asks about a copycat, and Vance wishes.  He’s clearly concerned about something, but our huddling agents can’t figure out what.

Vance chats with Ducky, who, comically, thinks he’s talking to Gibbs at first.  Ducky says he thinks the killer intentionally shot his victim in such a way that he slowly bled out.  Meaning the killer was going for torture.  The victim fell back into the brush so that a second bullet could be delivered into the base of the brain stem.  Vance is not surprised.  “It’s her signature,” he says.  “Always delivers a second shot to finish the job.”

Gibbs [and the audience]: “Who is she?”

Vance exposits that our bad girl is Lee Wuan Kai, a North Korean operative.  She was just in Los Angeles.  See NCIS: Los Angeles, Episode 1.5: Killshot.And now Vance is concerned she’s in DC.

Vance recaps that Kai was hurt in her last fracas with Naval investigators (and small wonder- the NCIS: LA guys don’t f$#%k around).  So, she would have carjacked the doctor, forced him to treat her, and killed him.  Gibbs thinks that’s a lot of theorizing (especially for wounds sustained 3,000 miles away), but Vance has been hunting this doe a while and he doesn’t think finding the doctor’s body in his jurisdiction is a coincidence.  Then he sees an Asian woman just beyond the tree line.  But nobody else reacts so Vance seems to assume he’s hallucinating.  Either way, he tells the team to find Kai and to not be afraid to use deadly force.

In the squad room, the team backgrounds Kai, who is a very prolific North Korean assassin with 27 hits in 7 countries.  Tony thinks she’s hot: “No wonder Vance is obsessed.”  Tony moves on and asks McGee if he’s ogling the phone number of his new girl.  Since she’s a redhead, Tony compliments McGee for pulling a page from the Gibbs playbook.

The team looks into other suspects in Cirreaux’s death.  He was the subject of a lawsuit, received some death threats, had his home broken into, a nurse accused him of sexual assault. Tony wonders if maybe the killer isn’t Kai.

I doubt Vance agrees, and we move to his office, where he wants to add more agents to the case.  Gibbs is fine with it, but he’s not sure it’s warranted or that the killer is even Kai.  Also, because he’s Gibbs and he’s not about to dance to someone else’s tune, even his boss’s, Gibbs asks for the whole story.

So, we get more Vance-position.  17 years ago, Vance was tasked to a UN peacekeeping force in Yugoslavia.  Near the Belgrade opera house, someone took a shot at a local politico.  The assassin was a young girl: Kai.  Vance and Special Agent Neil Wilson were first on the scene.  Vance put one in Kai’s chest, but she got up like nothing happened.  Kai returned the favor, tagging Vance’s shoulder and killing Neil.  Vance can still feel Kai’s gun up against his neck, and he remembers waiting and praying.  But Kai wandered off.  Vance understandably has survivor’s guilt and thinks about Neil’s wife and baby (probably not a baby anymore) every day.

Gibbs would still like actual evidence that Kai is the suspect, but Vance says that’s unlikely.  The Serbs called Kai, “The Phantom.”

Gibbs gets a call, saving him from further exhibiting skepticism of his boss, and leaves Vance to his thoughts.

Tony and McGee are en route to question Nurse DiMarco, who filed the assault claim against our victim.  McGee is texting and Tony asks if it’s “Amanda the coffee vixen.”  She wants to see McGee tonight, but he has to work.  Tony thinks that’s the wrong thing to tell her. 

Nobody answers the door at the DiMarco residence, but the boys hear a shotgun cock and dive out of the way before a blast tears through the door.  They pull their guns and let Ms. DiMarco know this aggression will not stand.  She thinks Cirreaux sent them, but calms the hell down when she realizes she just assaulted two federal agents.  Tony and McGee are understandably pissed and cuff her.

We get a shot of Ms. DiMarco in interrogation as the boys inform Gibbs in observation that her alibi checks out.  McGee wonders if they should check further, but Gibbs is convinced.  McGee is annoyed about being shot at, but Gibbs calls it an occupational hazard and tells Tony and McGee to turn Ms. DiMarco over to Metro so they can fine her and take away her toys.  True to form, Tony and McGee argue over who calls Metro and who uncuffs the crazy lady. 

Down in autopsy, Ducky and Gibbs catch up.  Ducky has found what the Scooby-Doo gang would call a clue: a solitary black hair on the victim’s ring finger tied in a perfect bow.  A bow made of DNA that the killer wanted NCIS to find.

Abby appears on a nearby monitor to report that the blood on the hair shows an elevated white cell count, as if the person was fighting injury or illness.  She also ran the DNA through CODIS, and it’s a match for Kai.  I guess the feds got her DNA from that time Vance shot her.  Or after her kerfluffle with the OSP team in Los Angeles. 

We head to the Vance home, where the Director examines photos of his family.  His wife, Jackie, tells him dinner is almost ready.  But Vance isn’t hungry.  Jackie senses his mood and they move from small talking to her lecturing him about grieving over Neil and obsessing over Kai.    

The phone rings and the voice on the other end says, “Hello Leon.”  It’s Kai and she and Vance do that thing where agents and spies small talk at each other while one tries to trace the call and the other knows the call is being traced.

Gibbs gets a text from Vance and tells McGee to trace the call to the Vance’s home phone.  Ziva leaves to reinforce Vance, but it’s rush hour, and Kai chose this time on purpose.

Back at the house, Vance tells Kai that he knows she’s hurt, and she should turn herself in.  They go through all the times they’ve done this dance: Munich, Prague, Tokyo, and, most recently, LA.

Back at NCIS, McGee completes the trace and announces that Kai is right in front of Vance’s house.

Just in time for us to see Jackie Vance walk outside with the trash.  A tense scene develops as Jackie sees Kai on the phone half blocking the Vance driveway and walks out to inquire.  And since Jackie is a bit of a redshirt, there are genuine stakes here.

Inside, Kai, tells Vance, “You know this won’t end well.  When it does, will you miss me?”

Vance gets a text from Gibbs: “She’s outside.”  Vance moves to the nearby gun cabinet to get a firearm, and we switch to Jackie approaching the car: “Hello! Can I help you?”

Vance emerges from the home, gun drawn, and yells, “Jackie get back!”  You would think she would be a little better trained by him, but, instead of dropping to the ground, she just sort of stands in the line of fire with a weird look on her face, saying “Leon?” 

Kai peels out.  No redshirt for Jackie today.  Instead, she gets a hug from her very frightened husband, who leads her inside.

We shift to the aftermath, where Gibbs tells Vance that Ziva will spend the night at the residence.  “No, she won’t,” Vance responds.  Haha. Vance has seen what happens to NCIS Directors when Ziva is on security details.  Judgment Day, Parts One and Two, Episode 5.18, 5.19.  Gibbs suggests a safe house, but Vance still isn’t a fan.  Vance excuses Ziva, and then points out that there’s no point in running if they can’t hide.  Kai is so good she’ll find them anywhere.  He tells Gibbs he can handle himself and to put Jackie and the kids on a plane.  Now it’s Jackie’s turn to say “%$&^ that,” in so many words.  So, because Jackie won’t leave, Vance then agrees to ‘round the clock agent security. 

Maybe they won’t use the main cast for the security detail so that the Vances have a shot at living through this.

In the squad room, Tony reports that the partial plate from Vance’s house matches a car that was stolen from a nearby airport.  McGee links it to a pilot from CA who disappeared after landing there a few days back.  So yeah, he’s dead.  Gibbs tells them to have Abby process the plane.

Gibbs then tells the team to find anything on Kai.  Tony has feelers out to other agencies.  Gibbs says to call in Agent Dunham (See e.g. Truth or Consequences, Episode 7.1) and tell him it’s Kai.  Although, unless Kai operates in the Middle East or North Africa, I’m not sure how Agent Dunham can help.

Meanwhile, McGee abandons this very important, Director-driven case to meet Amanda for dinner.  But not really.  He’s late and he only has 15 minutes.  He could have called.  But he wanted to see her.  He asks if she want to go for a walk.  They chat briefly and she says she’ll be up late writing a paper, so they can get something to go now and decide on desert when he’s finished working.

If this show had a studio audience, this is the part where they’d go, “OOO-WOO-WOOOOOO…!”

And, back in the squad room, we see a happy McGee.  Turns out he was gone for an hour and it’s left ambiguous whether he got laid.  Tony is jealous all the same.  McGee is non-committal.  Ziva couldn’t care less.

In the conference room, the actor who plays Agent Dunham continues to draw a paycheck.  He and the agents small talk in reference to the mission to rescue Ziva in North Africa (Truth or Consequences). Ziva thanks Agent Dunham and he says, “Anything to help a lady.”  Tony is threatened by this and is sure to remind everyone that Agent Dunham was just the desk help on that particular caper.

Gibbs arrives, and we get some dialogue explaining why Agent Dunham is consulting on the case.  Dunham had first-hand exposure to Kai.  On his second field assignment, he was in the DMZ between the Koreas monitoring sweetheart deals where the Chinese and North Koreans exchanged opium for free passage of operatives.  One operative was Kai and Agent Dunham says she was impressive even then. 

They examine an early 80s photo of a North Korean training camp for orphan girls. Tony says Kai was brainwashed- she started off innocent but when the other girls cracked, she didn’t.  Ziva calls it stubborn and Tony says she would know.

Ziva wonders if Kai is here to kill Vance.  Agent Dunham says no.  Tony butts in, again with something to prove.  He made some calls to CIA and Kai’s not what she used to be.  She’s not as reliable an operative for the North Koreans.

Agent Dunham identifies, Pak Su Ji , an old North Korean lieutenant and part of Kai’s education program.  He’s now retired, at least militarily, and part of a UN mission.  Agent Dunham doesn’t think it’s a coincidence that Pak is in DC when Kai is present as well.

We shift to the NCIS women’s room, where, this time, Tony visits Ziva.  They have a comical misunderstanding.  Tony is thinking she’s trying to figure out how she’d assassinate Pak if she were in Kai’s shoes.  Ziva thinks Tony’s talking about her going after Agent Dunham romantically.  That messes with Tony a bit.  “He cleans up nice,” she says.  Tony responds, “I thought he was kind of creepy.” 

The old Ziva would have let Tony twist.  Ziva 2.0 reassures him.  She calls Agent Dunham a nomad and says she has had enough of that.  She came back to NCIS to settle down and to make a home for herself, and the last thing she needs is a Chad Dunham. Tony is indeed reassured, but Ziva leaves him wondering a little bit, suggesting that sexually acquiring Agent Dunham via brute force might make for a good time.

Yeeeahhhh.  Thankfully, we head to the lab.  Abby reports to McGee that the bullets from the Los Angeles team’s encounter with Kai are different than the slugs used to kill Cirreaux.  Then she notes that McGee looks happy and confident and she wants to know if there’s anything he wants to tell her.  McGee plays it off, but then tells her about Amanda.  Abby is thrilled for McGee because she is now past the point of being threatened by him dating women besides her.  Which is a better look for the character.  Especially after six years.  Of course, that doesn’t stop her from obliquely mentioning her interactions with Eric Beale from the OSP team in Los Angeles, but that goes over McGee’s deliriously happy head.

In Vance’s office, Gibbs thinks Vance should call North Korea and warn them about Pak.  Vance doesn’t buy the assassination theory, though.  Vance thinks Kai is playing a game, and it’s making him nervous.

Ziva enters and tells them to turn on the TV.  The news reports sniper fire at the Capitol, and that Pak Su Ji was hit and taken to nearby Monroe hospital.

(Yeah, in real life, none of that information, beyond, “Shots fired at Capitol,” would be publicly available).

We see Vance get on the phone and the scene breaks for commercials that I don’t have to watch (thanks Netflix).

When we “return,” we’re still watching the news, but now we’re in the squad room.  Pak is still alive.  He was hit by two long range sniper bullets and is in surgery.  Again, not information to which the public would be privy in real life.

The agents discuss Kai’s acumen.  Tony thinks she’s the best.  Gibbs, the ex-sniper, disagrees and scoreboards Kai’s failure to notch a kill.  McGee wonders if she is off her game.  Ziva wonders who is next.  The agents try to determine Kai’s objective and whether she’s still working for the North Koreans.

Vance gets call from State Department.  There’s a message for NCIS from North Korea.  We head back to Vance’s office, and back channel communications from the North Koreans indicate that Kai has gone rogue and they’ll assist with her capture. 

Back in the squad room, the agents eat pizza and continue to speculate as to Kai’s game.  Tony wonders if she’s just trying to impress Vance.  Ziva 2.0 informs Tony that there is nothing impressive about killing people.  I miss old Ziva.  Amanda, for her part, thinks that…

Amanda?  How the hell did Amanda get into the squad room?

McGee is shocked too, but we learn security called and Tony let her come up.

Amanda tells McGee she got his text but wanted to come say good night.  Tony looks on with glee and takes a giant bite of pizza.  McGee introduces Amanda.  Tony offers her a slice of pizza, but when she says yes, Tony has second thoughts and tells McGee to give her the tour.  McGee, ever responsible says he has a lot of work to do and that he will have to take Amanda downstairs. 

They leave, and Ziva thinks Amanda and McGee look good together, “Like it was meant to be.”  Tony responds, “If you believe in that kind of thing.”  They look at each other, and he smiles.

In the elevator, Amanda wonders if she embarrassed McGee.  He says she did not, and she believes him.  She thinks Tony and Ziva are nice and figures they can all go out some time.  McGee figures that will be fine when they’re done with the case.  Amanda asks about the case but when McGee balks, she smiles and says, “No questions.”  They make plans to have coffee in the morning.

We shift to Vance’s official car.  He tells the driver to take him home, but then finds a note in the car with his name on it.  It’s a photo of Kai as a girl with “Why?” written in red.  Vance’s phone rings and it’s Kai, letting him know that Pak is dead.

We’re back at the lab, where Abby reports that blood analysis demonstrated that both Pak and Cirreaux had a history of hand foot and mouth disease.  Which is weird, because it’s usually something kids pass along (I hid from mine when she contracted it).  But that’s seemingly apropos of nothing and Abby moves on.  Pak did not die from his gunshot wounds.  Something in his blood stream triggered a massive heart attack.  Abby confirms that the bullets were dipped in poison.  Moreover, whoever shot Cirreaux also shot Pak and wanted to make sure that either the bullet or the poison killed them.

Abby asks Gibbs what he’s hiding behind his back.  He pulls out a Caf-Pow.  Abby says it’s way too late to drink that, so Gibbs also pulls out a No-Caf Pow from behind his back.

Like a good Marine, Gibbs is always prepared.

The next morning, we join McGee and Amanda at the coffee place.  McGee looks nervous and Amanda wants to know what’s wrong.  McGee is suddenly putting something together, and he asks Amanda, “How do you know where I work?”  Amanda tries to play it off: “You told me.”  But McGee knows he never tells people where he works.  He gives them cell phones and beepers, but never the location. 

Amanda, figuring you can only fool some of the McGees some of the time decides not to insult his intelligence.  Instead, she shifts to an accent, pulls a gun, and asks where Kai is.  “Tell me where she is or I swear I’ll…” 

Famous last words.  Amanda gets shot in the back.  McGee yells, “Amanda!” with more concern than I would have in his shoes.  He looks up and sees Kai, holding a vicious looking weapon.  Then she vanishes.

Back at NCIS, we learn that being catfished by Tony is not in fact that worst relationship outcome McGee could have.  Amanda was really Juliet Tippon, a South African freelance assassin.  North Korea hired her to kill Kai before NCIS could arrest Kai.  The North Koreans figured Kai might defect and tell NCIS things the North Koreans would rather them not know.

McGee is despondent that Amanda was going to kill him.  Gibbs is nonchalant, almost indifferent and seems to think McGee should have known better.  Of course, the number of redheads who have assaulted Gibbs is certainly non-zero.  Vance is focused on the obvious: that Kai saved McGee’s life.  Why?

In the squad room, McGee vows to join a monastery.  Gibbs still doesn’t care.  He wants to know the connection between Pak and Cirreaux.  Both are old, rich, own multiple homes in lots of countries.  Both are womanizers, but Tony says neither had kids.  Gibbs wants to know why both had blood markers from a child’s disease.  Then something occurs to him and he leaves.  In a hurry.

Gibbs and Vance are in Abby’s lab, looking at group shot of Kai & Friends at their summer camp.  Pak is there too in military attire.  And look, there’s Dr. Cirreux!  Vance concludes that Kai is murdering the men who turned her into a killer.

We shift to autopsy, where Ducky is now wearing his profiling hat.  But he’s not saying anything too hard to figure out. He basically just repeats Vance’s conclusion about Kai killing the guys who warped her childhood.  Gibbs wants to know where Vance figures into it all.  Ducky thinks it’s a crush.  Kai has never had a relationship, doesn’t know what it’s like to love, and Vance is the only man who has ever chased her.  In Kai’s mind, Vance the one man she can count on.

And on that ominous note, we head back to the Vance house.  Where Vance can’t find Jackie or his security detail.  Then Vance spies the dead agents and we chalk up another loss for NCIS security details.  They’re like the Cleveland Browns.  Jackie enters the room slowly and we see Kai holding her at gunpoint.  Kai was nice enough to wait for the kids to leave the house before liquidating their bodyguards.

Oh, it turns out the agents are all tranquilized.  That’s cool.  Thus, like the main NCIS team, they can continue to relive the shame of letting the bad guys win. 

Vance has more immediate problems than needing to re-staff his entire agency with effective professionals, however.  “You’re changing Kai,” he says, trying to talk her down.  “Not enough,” she responds.  She doesn’t appear to want to hurt Jackie, though and says she’ll let her go in due time.  She tells Vance that Jackie is lucky to have him.  Vance says NCIS knows about the motives for the killings and compliments her for saving McGee.  He tells her it doesn’t have to end like this.  Kai says her life ended 30 years ago.  She shoves Jackie aside, and now she and Vance are holding each other at gunpoint.

They dialogue, and it boils down to Kai wanting Vance to finish the job he started seventeen years ago.  She pulls down part of the shirt and shows him the scar.  Oddly, Vance’s reaction here is one of vindication: “Everyone said I missed.  You should be dead.”

Kai goes emo: “I was already dead.”  They argue back and forth about how Vance is going to have to kill her.  “You have to finish it Leon.  Do it for me, for your partner.”

A gun goes off, and Kai falls to the floor, dead. 

And Jackie Vance earns her first MVP.  Congratulations, Jackie!

Leon summons his wife.  He looks shellshocked.  We get a long look at Kai, dead and bleeding.

Then, weirdly, we get a McGee voice over as the scene at the Vance house is being processed.  Kai’s body is being rolled away.  Gibbs is looking at pictures of young Kai in an intel file on the hood of a car.  Jackie is giving a statement to Ziva.  Vance nods at Jackie, proud of his MVP. 

But all we hear is McGee.  And it’s awful.  And unnecessary.  It’s like Sean Murray lost a bet and the payoff was having to read trite nonsense into a recorder to then be played to millions of viewers. 

And there’s no reason you shouldn’t have to endure it too:

Anyone can achieve their fullest potential.

Who we are might be predetermined, but the path we follow is always of our own choosing.

We should never allow our fears or the expectations of others to set the frontiers of our destiny.

Your destiny can’t be changed, but it can be challenged. Every man is born as many men, and dies as a single one.

And that’s how we end.  Blech.

Quotables:

(1) McGee: Lee Wuan Kai. North Korean assassin, one-time fanatical nationalist, credited with twenty-seven targeted hits in seven countries, dozens more by association.

Tony: She likes quiet walks on the beach, laughing with friends, and playing Frisbee with her Cocker Spaniel, Rufus.

Ziva: [snatches the file] It does not say that!

Tony: Well, it might as well.

(2) McGee: Think I just read something in the paper about Bingham. Jason Cutler out of Van Nuys, California, flew his private plane across the country three days ago. After arriving safely in Fairfax, family and friends reported him missing.

Gibbs: Tell Abby; dust the plane for prints. It looks like we found Kai’s flight.

McGee: So where’s the pilot?

Gibbs: Dead, most likely.

Tony: He was Kai-jacked.

McGee: Did you really just say that?

Tony: I regret it already.

Ziva-propisms: I’m not sure if Ziva’s reference to roaring like an elephant is an error or has deeper meaning.

Tony Awards:  Tony mentions Planet of the Apes (1968) and White Heat (1948), which McGee mistakes for White Nights (1985).

Abby Road: Abby talks about her second cousin’s wedding and her allergy to avocado.

McNicknames: Tony goes for broke with McLonelyhearts, McGoo, Get a McMove on,  Probilicious, McDigit, and Self-Helpless.  He refers to “Amanda” as McSqueeze.

Ducky Tales: Ducky is barely in this one.

The Rest of the Story:

-The coffee joint makes semi-regular appearances.  See e.g., Cover Story, Episode 4.20, and Dagger, Episode 6.9.

-Gibbs’s deceased wife Shannon was a redhead.  As are all his other wives, since Gibbs was pretty much broken into a thousand pieces over Shannon’s death until fairly recently.

-Special Agent Dunham was last seen in Good Cop, Bad Cop, Episode 7.4.

-Tony and Ziva have a habit of engaging in serious conversations in the toilet.  See e.g., Reunion, Episode 7.2.

-Abby and McGee used to date way back in Season 1-2.  Sort of.  The specifics were never entirely clear and the closest we came to an explanation was their dialogue in Bloodbath, Episode 3.21.

-This won’t be Jackie Vance’s last taste of danger in her home.

-This show almost never delves into the agent’s personal lives unless it relates to a case.  One of the drawbacks of that approach is that it telegraphs plot points when the show does linger in a character’s personal space.  We’re not going to see Amanda at all on this show unless she relates to the case somehow, and that knowledge pulled some of the shock out of the reveal.

Casting Call: Kai is Kelly Hu, who played Lady Deathstrike in X2: X-Men United. She also had a recurring role on Arrow and provides voicework to various super-hero cartoons.

Man, This Show Is Old: Tony asks Ms. DiMarco, “Who do you think you are, Sarah Palin?” after she shoots at them.  Maybe ole Sassy McFrontierPants told some story about shooting guns back when she was virtue signaling backwoods authenticity to the world every other week at the end of the ‘aughts.  Thankfully, she is now very much a wilderness cliché of yesteryear.  

Tony comments that “Little Timmy missed the short bus.”  That’s an unpleasant reference to disabled kids that probably didn’t play well then, let alone now.

MVP: Jackie Vance.  Natch.

Rating: This was one is a little trite, especially the notion of the aging assassin with regrets.  And especially since we have a main character assassin who already traveled this arc.  Kai’s and Leon’s history could have been a lot more interesting if fleshed out over a season, but seemed like a plot device the way the show delivered it.  And McGee’s meet-cute was obviously a ploy.  It’s not terrible, but it’s not mind-blowing either.  Five Palmers.

Actually, no.  Minus a whole ‘nother Palmer for the McGee voiceover at the end.  Four Palmers.  Now go to your room, NCIS, and think about what you did.

Next Time: The power goes out.  All over DC.  And NCIS has to work a case old school without all their fancy electronic doodads.