NCIS

NCIS (2003+). In between the episodes of The Tudors, another series I’ve started watching on DVD rental is NCIS, short for Naval Criminal Investigative Service. The series is based on the investigative cases by a fictitious team of special agents from the real-world naval agency.

I got into this series cold-turkey. The series’ lead star, Mark Harmon, had a guest appearance in The West Wing as a Presidential Secret Service agent assigned to protect C.J. Cregg, the series’ White House Press Secretary. His guest role in The West Wing spanned just four episodes though – his character is tragically killed while attempting to stop a convenience store robbery – but left me with a deep enough impression to search for a series where he shows up as a lead.

The NCIS series is a little different from the usual law enforcement shows on account that it’s not really about law enforcement but about investigation of criminal cases. There’s rarely violence, gun battles, explosions and car chases. Rather, the team of agents, headed by Jethro Gibbs (Harmon’s character), spend each episode’s running length gathering clues, analyzing evidence, talking to witnesses and suspects, with each case reaching its conclusion at the episode’s end.

Harmon’s Gibbs is terrifically fun to watch. He’s all business when it comes to investigative work, but displays also cynical and dry wit. His small team of special agents all come with their own eccentricities but are all nonetheless likable. There’s one, Anthony DiNozzo, who thinks he’s God’s Gift to Women but really is a womanizer-lite. His spoil is fellow agent Caitlin Todd, an ex-Secret Service agent. The pair is fun to watch as DiNozzo constantly tries to bait Todd with innuendos.

There’s also a pair of agents who handle the forensic and scientific backend of cases: a Abby Sciuto who’s the techno-whiz-girl but dresses up in pig tails, tattoos and likes all things Gothic, and the fatherly “Ducky” Mallard, a medial examiner who talks to dead corpses and rambles to the living, especially Gibbs LOL.

NCIS as a series has been running for six seasons now, and according to the series’ Wiki entry, the team of agents has stayed relatively the same throughout the years with just one or two personnel changes.

I haven’t got very far into the series yet though – just perhaps half of the episodes in the first season – but I really like what I’m watching.:)