There is a bomb threat on a Navy warship.
The President's nuclear missile advisor dies.
There will be terrorist threats, military kidnappings, and a celebrity will die in the middle of a reality show at a naval base.
They will all be jobs for agents of the United States Navy Criminal Investigation Service: the protagonists of
NCIS
, the most successful and longest-running procedural series, which arrives on
Netflix
this February 15.
NCIS
was born on September 23, 2003, is in its 21st season and has an unbeatable record.
In 2023 it was the CBS network's fiction with twelve episodes - a record - among the 100 in the Top of prime time on free-to-air TV in the United States.
NCIS
is a procedural series: it repeats the same investigation structure chapter by chapter.
And in this format is the hook.
Each episode of
NCIS
will resolve a case, in the next there will be another, and, thus, the conflicts can extend without limits.
In
NCIS (Naval Criminal Investigative Service)
, created by Donald P. Bellisario and Don McGill, federal agents will be able to deal with any criminal event or terrorist attack, as long as they are related to the Marine Corps or the Navy.
From its headquarters at the Naval Arsenal in Washington DC, the Major Case Response Team does not rest.
Three days before its arrival on Netflix, season 21 premiered in the United States on February 12, 2024.
A key NCIS
fact
: this final season operates as a tribute to
David McCallum
, who played the remembered coroner Dr. Donald “Ducky” Mallard until his death in September of last year.
One of the icons of
NCIS
along with former sniper Leroy Jethro Gibbs (actor Mark Harmon), who was in charge of the team from seasons 1 to 19 of this military police.
Agents Mc Gee, Bishop and Torres (Wilmer Valderrama), in "NCIS."
And the sustained success of
NCIS
, on the CBS network in the United States, led to the announcement of a new spin-off of the franchise,
NCIS: Origins
, focused on the young version of Leroy Jethro Gibbs.
The plot of this sequel goes back to 1991 and presents Gibbs when he had just been assigned as a special agent, in the nascent NCIS office, at Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton in California.
In
NCIS: Origins
, which will only arrive in 2025, the young Gibbs - with an actor to be defined - will join a team led by Mike Franks (the young version of the actor Muse Watson).
But there is one detail that will connect
NCIS
with its spin-off
NCIS: Origins
.
Veteran actor Mark Harmon will provide his voice as narrator, to generate a connection with the character he played between 2003 and 2022.
NCIS: Origins
will have joined the extensive
NCIS
franchise , which is completed by the series
JAG: Military Justice
,
NCIS: Los Angeles
,
NCIS: New Orleans
,
NCIS: Hawai'i
and
NCIS: Sydney
(which was released in 2023 and it is the only derivative still on the air).
For now, the mother of all series,
NCIS
, can be enjoyed on Netflix starting this Thursday.
Wilmer Valderrama, as Agent Nick Torres, in the series.
Between the suspense, the various conflict hypotheses, latent terrorism and the most intricate cases,
NCIS
remains on the podium of open television in the United States.
One step below the twelve episodes that were the 100 most viewed in 2023, the second series in the Top was
Blue Bloods , with five, and, in third place, with four episodes, the fictions
Young Sheldon
,
Chicago Fire
and
FBI
tied
.
Looking ahead to the premiere -last Monday, February 12- of season 21 of
NCIS
, just three days before Netflix uploaded the entire series, the president of CBS Entertainment, Amy Reisenbach, said: “It's a fantastic cast with a team of fantastic screenwriters.
As long as they want to continue, we're happy to be on the
NCIS
train .
We hope to continue for quite some time.”
Born in times of paranoia
The procedural
NCIS
arose in the midst of paranoia due to the fall of the Twin Towers, on September 11, 2001. It went through successive US administrations and the anxieties of global multipolarity because it knew how to reinvent itself by touching, with the same fiber, fashionable themes such as cybersecurity, artificial intelligence and countless other threats in the 458 episodes of the 21 seasons.
David McCallum, in the presentation of a previous season.
The actor behind "The CIPOL Agent" died in September of last year.
And that
NCIS
can now be seen in full on Netflix will be a way to go back, from the 1st season, in 2003, to the nascent “golden age of TV”, when streaming platforms did not yet exist.
At that time, the ratings were in dispute in the United States between iconic series such as
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
(also on CBS),
The West Wing
(on NBC),
24
(on FOX) and
Six Feet Under.
and
The Sopranos
(both from HBO).
Today, with
NCIS
and
Six Feet Under
also on Netflix, streaming seems more nostalgic than ever for quality series from the “golden age of TV.”
It is no coincidence that this same February 15, Netflix incorporates another legendary criminal-procedural fiction:
Law and Order: Special Victims Unit
, from 1999, and which in its country is already in its 25th season. If the success multiplies in platform, perhaps all the other seasons of
Law & Order: SVU
can be expected .
Vanessa Lachey plays Jane Tennant, the first woman to lead an NCIS team.
Even with its sustained success, the legendary
NCIS
suffered the passage of time.
In December 2023, its protagonist, Mark Harmon, who eternalized the former shooter and special agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs (the most skilled in handling violent confrontations), was consistent with the aversion to bureaucracy that his character had always shown: he presented his resignation.
Harmon confessed why he decided to leave
NCIS
in the 19th season, in 2022: “For a long time I was just tired.
Part of accepting the job was being at home more, with a young family, and not traveling as much filming the series.
The first day we worked 22 hours, so I thought 'this is not exactly what I thought it was going to be'.
We had a lot of days like that during the first four years of
NCIS
.”
But Harmon did not move away from his role as producer, which he will maintain in this
NCIS: Origins
sequel .
Another spin-off, and at the same time a prequel, that will function as a tribute to Gibbs, Harmon's character, and the entire mystique of
NCIS
.
“In
NCIS: Origins
we will reintroduce fan-favorite characters, now younger,” said CBS Entertainment president Amy Reisenbach.
"We look forward to building on the rich legacy of NCIS
Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs
."
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