The question plaguing NCIS producers may have been how to follow up last week’s fabulous milestone 300th episode with something exceptional.
The answer? The always-debonair Robert Wagner.
Returning tonight as Anthony DiNozzo, Sr., Wagner has a chance to reprise his role as Tony’s dad before Junior’s portrayer, Michael Weatherly, exits the show later this season.
When Senior’s life becomes a bit boring, he decides to take on a project. His first thought is to pitch in at NCIS, but then fate intervenes. A homeless woman approaches him and claims to be his daughter.
Gibbs (Mark Harmon) urges Senior to determine if the woman is, indeed, his daughter, and the elder DiNozzo asks his son for help.
Meanwhile, the NCIS team is involved in a case of a slain Navy Public Affairs officer who has been shot twice. The wife and the mistress both are suspects, and each is accusing the other of murdering the man that she loves.
Is this a case of “she said, she said” or are the women trying to give each other an alibi for killing the cheating officer? In a court of law, a jury cannot convict if the prosecution does not offer proof beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused is the only person who committed the crime.
Two shots and two suspects could negate that burden of proof.
Tonight’s episode, “Reasonable Doubts,” was written by Executive Producers, George Schenck and Frank Cardea.
And for those who enjoy a great inside joke, Trivial Pursuit or the “Six Degrees Of Kevin Bacon” game…
Schenck and Cardea produced a television series, HACK, with Bob Singer and Phil Sgriccia (both of SUPERNATURAL).
Singer and Sgriccia produced a show called REASONABLE DOUBTS, which…wait for it…also starred Mark Harmon.
Sgriccia also worked on MAX HEADROOM with tonight’s director, Tom Wright.
To my knowledge, none of the above actually has worked with Kevin Bacon yet, but Singer, Sgriccia and Wright all directed SMALLVILLE, which co-starrred Aaron Ashmore, twin brother of Shawn Ashmore on Bacon’s series, THE FOLLOWING.
NCIS also stars Pauley Perrette, Sean Murray, Rocky Carroll, Brian Dietzen, Emily Wickersham and David McCallum.
NCIS airs tonight at 8:00 p.m. on CBS in the U.S. and on Global TV in Canada.
