NCIS – Would arms dealers have to be serious gamers in order to get the codes?

I’m not sure what to call it … is it misdirection, or just a “funny story?” I’m referring, of course, to the awesome way in which NCIS opened its mystery last night. In fact, like a good cold open on The Office, the opening mystery reveal is something that NCIS excels at more often than not. Last night’s just happened to be one of the best ones yet.

I think the last few episodes must have been doing this really well, too, because I found myself leaning forward during last night’s opening scene trying to intuit the reveal before it was revealed to us. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what The Artful Dodger would have to do with what is generally the discovery of a dead body on the show; I loved how his stealing a purse caught the cop’s attention. I wonder, though, if the cop really had probable cause to open the purse — today there are many reasons why a guy might be carrying a purse, not least of all that it’s a gift for his girlfriend — but I loved how Dodger argued that it was his … until it spilled open and fingertips and teeth rolled out. Deny, deny, deny.

Who else thought of that old episode with the drawer full of cell phones for Gibbs when Gibbs started attacking his computer screen? I loved when he pulled out the bat and smashed it, but Gibbs, what works on televisions may not work so well on computers.

I think we need to start keeping a tally of all the random things that Palmer knows about. First was the basics on knockoff handbags, and then was his primer on zombies for Ducky. Jimmy is so great, it’s a shame he can only get shoehorned in for a one-liner here or there.

Was it just me, or was this week’s episode particularly gruesome? The fingertips and teeth are obvious, but how about the fact that Corporal Armstrong seemed to have been stretched to death on a medieval rack? Did they ultimately determine whether that assumption was correct?

I enjoyed seeing Jason Beghe as Blake Martin, private security investigating hacks into the Pentagon; he is best known by me as the respected author that Hank pushed off the wagon in the beginning of season three of Californication. Remember when he jumped out the window naked?

But I was kind of disappointed that Blake was the killer. Can you imagine how funny it would have been watching McGee get investigated for his illegal hacking? I could see it going on for weeks, with McGee sinking lower and lower into the dark place, and then Gibbs showing Blake some authorization from the Secretary of the Navy that sanctions McGee’s actions … something he could have shown Blake upfront had he not been enjoying watching McGee sweat. They threw that away to make him the killer?

I don’t think we’ve ever heard of Agah Bayar (Tamer Hassan) the arms dealer, but whether we have or not I was very intrigued by how he approached Gibbs, reading his dossier before dealing with him. I see a lot of potential there for an adversary on some later episode, and I hope that that’s the writers’ intent.

I was not happy to see Beth Riesgraf; Parker on Leverage is awful. And I didn’t get Maxine being hoisted on McGee like she was. His horoscope shouldn’t have been what was standing in their path to love … it’s the fact that she was a person of interest in a murder. It’s ironic, though, that her persona here fits more with Parker’s personality — I’d more expect to see Parker, with whatever social problems she has, as a shut-in gamer nerd — while Parker’s thieving ways would make a lot more sense for Maxine, ala Charlize Theron in The Italian Job. Odd.

I love that McGee is so into laser tag. CBS totally needs to do a cross-promotional something, with Barney (How I Met Your Mother) and McGee teaming up to rule the laser tag universe. Yes, I’d watch that.

Anyway, my recall on this stuff isn’t great, unlike many of you. So if you can remember them, share some of your favorite opening scene NCIS mystery reveals in the comments below!

Clacked by Aryeh S.
on Feb 23, 2011 @ 12:00 EST5EDT