NCIS Crossover: Get Scoop on That Surprise Cameo (and How the 3-Parter Was Filmed Backwards) — Grade It!
The following contains spoilers from the Jan. 9 NCIS 3-way crossover event-palooza.
When the agents of NCIS, NCIS: Hawai’i and NCIS: Los Angeles banded together to uncover a killer conspiracy, they received a rather unexpected but entirely welcome assist.
The 3-way crossover event saw an assembly of Parker, Torres, Palmer, Tennant, Tara, Callen, Blye and many others canoodle their noodles to get to the bottom of a beloved FLETC instructor’s shocking suicide. Long, three-hour story short: Said prof was privy to top-secret information about “Simon Williams,” a Carlos the Jackal- (or, Dread Pirate Roberts!)-like network of CIA assassins who years ago operated under that one pseudonym. Now, a rogue faction was aiming to resurrect “Simon,” for even less scrupulous reasons.
In the crossover’s closing NCIS: LA episode, while trying to draw out the bad guys (and in doing so hopefully locate a kidnapped Rountree and MIA Kilbride), Callen and Sam each received cryptic texts that, when put together, unlocked an audio message — from a garbled but distinctive voice.
“Sounds like you’ve got yourself in a bit of a pickle,” Hetty noted. “I warned Hollis that his Simon Williams days would come to bite him in the ass.
“You are all quite capable, and far be it for me to tell you what to do,” she continued. “But you might want to contact an old friend, Gwen Johns….”
In addition to noting that Alden still owes her $600 for “the Monaco fiasco,” Hetty’s message led the agents to a Hollywood casting agent who years ago found a ringer for Kilbride, to double as the admiral on numerous occasions. Callen & Co. in turn used that actor to lure the baddies to the boat house and take down some of ’em, eventually leading NCIS to a remote airfield where Rountree was being held — and where Kilbride was laying in wait, ready to take a case-closing sniper shot at the rogue group’s leader.
Speaking about Hetty’s surprise, audio cameo, NCIS: LA showrunner R. Scott Gemmill (who wrote Part 3 of the crossover), tells TVLine, “The triple crossover was such an important event for all of our NCIS families that it was important to have Hetty (played by Linda Hunt) be a part of it, even if she was physically unavailable.
“In true Hetty fashion, she proved not only to be on top of what was going on,” Gemmill added, “but she even offered some cryptic advice to help get them out of a jam.”
Another fun fact about the NCIS universe’s first-ever 3-way crossover? The ending was filmed at the beginning… and the beginning was filmed at the end.
“We shot it backwards, which really made for ‘interesting’ acting choices,” NCIS: Hawai’i front woman Vanessa Lachey shared with TVLine.
“We shot the end first, then we shot Hawai’i, and then we shot the OG, the mothership,” Lachey explained. And because of that inverted order, the cast members of the different shows sometimes need to remind themselves whether their characters were meeting for the first time or not!
“Literally, we came into one of the offices and I was like, ‘Have we met yet, at this point?’ And [NCIS:LA‘s] Chris O’Donnell was like, ‘I don’t think so….’ We had already shot the finale, but I was like, ‘OK, but this is the point where I’m first seeing you.’
“And when Todd [LL Cool J] came to Hawai’i, I said, ‘This is your first time in our bullpen,’ so he changed his acting when he walked in. He made sure to take it all in. We just had to kind of remind ourselves, ‘Have we met yet at this point?’ Since we shot it backwards.”
Want scoop on any NCIS show? Email InsideLine@tvline.com and your question may be answered via Matt’s Inside Line.
I loved every minute of it! The Gibbs reference, the Hetty Cameo. Anyone realize that Kilbride pulled a Hibbs in the camouflage sniper suit? The pair ups were good too.
I think they should have it annually as long as th shows last.
Maybe have full NCIS Mondays like FBI Tuesdays?
My 1 thing is seeing as Mcgee is OG NCIS ( a part from Ducky & Vance) I would have liked to have seen him in all 3 like Sam & Callen. Nick n Parker especially are fairly new. Also correct me if I miss heard, when Jimmy said that he’d never been to Hawaii or LA Mcgee said him too but he’s been to LA for multiple Xovers?
Anyway, for me it was fantastic
McGee did mention that he hadn’t been to LA since they changed where that team worked out of, which was correct. The only time he was in LA was back in season 6 for the planted spin-off.
The only mothership stars who’ve had multiple appearances on NCIS: LA are Rocky Carroll and Pauley Perrette. Tony didn’t appear until his final season on NCIS. Everyone else was only part of the back-door pilot.
Yes Ducky and McGee are OG NCIS but Vance isn’t.
The moment I read about that audio Easter egg, I knew it just had to be Hetty. It wouldn’t be a real crossover without her! Very impressed to see that I actually got something nice for once! ❤
I’m pleased that the showrunner actually did the right thing for once. Now he just has to make sure that the whole LA team is fully reunited before this Season ends! 😉😉
Yup. I thought so too.
And when Callen disappeared for a time, I wondered if we were going to get a scene of Callen arriving at an unknown address, and as he approaches the front door, we hear those famous words of hers
“Oh Bugger”
Still, the audio message was a nice touch.
But of course they had to go and ruin it because out of all the people in that room, the one person who knows Hettys voice better than anyone, and should have recognized it instantly, is Callen. Her phrasing, and terminology is unmistakable.
But yet it wasnt until she mentioned an outstanding debt with Parker that Callen thought it might be Hetty? And even then, he didnt sound completely convinced. Which was absolutely ludicrous!!!!
Better than I thought it would be (I just don’t like crossovers). I thought the first episode was best at incorporating the cast members from the other shows into what was going on. Maybe because as the article said it was because it was filmed last. I would have liked to have had more of Robert Picardo, and wish that they had ended with some callback to the character he played – it felt like there wasn’t quite closure there. Also if there had been mentions of other characters from the other agencies would have made it feel more cohesive. Would have been nice if they had thrown in reference to the New Orleans show. But it was overall fine. Still doesn’t make me love crossovers or have a great desire for them to do more of these.
Yes, it seems a bit of a disservice to the character of Dwayne Pride not to at least get a shout-out.👎
💯 agree!
I’ll third that sentiment! Loved and still miss NCIS:NOLA
IF THEY ACTUALLY DO ncis~ origins someone does need to play a young dwayne pride since HE WAS PART OF GIBBS TRAINING GROUP WITH MIKE FRANKS AND SINCE GIBBS HAD WORKED WITH CALLEN IN THE PAST THERE MUST ALSO BE A VERSION OF A YOUNGER CALLEN AND YOUNGER HETTY AS WELL!
They had the perfect opportunity to have a call out to NOLA and they wasted it with a joke about NCIS:Great Lakes instead.
A NOLA shoutout would’ve been great, a cameo would have even been better but understandably it was a very tight crossover.
Loved it! Great choices, even including Gibbs cabin in the woods and his rules that everyone knows….albeit differently. LOL!
I know i’m going to get heat for this, but I really thought that with all three shows together for the first time, they should have had some major happen. Mainly, I’m a little disappointed that there wasn’t an important character death like in the arrowverse crossovers
I loved it. It was fun to see all the interactions between the various cast members, was glad to see Fatima get a larger than usual part, and the reference to NCIS Great Lakes was a hoot. Also good to see TnT together again, and the sort of cameo from Hetty was delightful.
The FLETC driving instructor was the same woman who played Sheriff Charlene “Charlie” Dupray who kept hitting in Gibbs in the Season 1 episode “Good Samaritan”. There were a lot of Gibbs references and callbacks to old episodes. All of which added to a really well done story arch over the three episodes.
Haha, that’s right…she made Gibbs so uncomfortable! 😄
I thought the driving instructor looked familiar
Thank you. I knew I had seen her before on the show. I recognized her voice the minute I heard it and then she looked so familiar, but I couldn’t place her. Now I remember!
Stephanie Hodge is her name for anyone who may be wondering
The crossover was great.
The audio cameo was great to include Hetty. It sounded like her words were spliced together. Still it was a fun surprise.
The Admiral (retired Navy) in a ghillie suit was a shout out to Gibbs (retired Marine). Unfortunately, that would’ve been a great Mark Harmon cameo. I call that a ‘miss’
Slow start, I almost fell asleep, also, for the way it was touted, I was expecting bigger things.
How did Roundtree know that there would be anyone at the boathouse? That was arranged after he said it and he had no clue about the doppleganger.
Disrespecting Hetty Really Parker.
I really loved Hetty surprise and the callbacks. it was good except treating LA as amateur not highly skilled UC.
I get Tannet out rank them but why she was treating them as rookies not knowing a thing with their plan in part 3?
Parker and Callen both have the same rank so why he was bossing him?
I know right? Makes me question how Scott Gemmill keeps his job as Show Runner on NCIS LA. When all he does is make the long-running OSP look like the most disrespected and disfunctional joke of a Unit ever assembled, with Agents so incompetent, you wouldn’t dream of putting any of them in charge of an operation, Case in point, Gemmill wanting viewers to believe that the 14 year Veteran Agent G Callen, cant even recognize the voice of a Woman he’s known since he was 5? Please for the love of God, can we get a new Show Runner asap. Chris O’Donnell should have stormed off the set in protest!
I wish he would leave too. He clearly doesn’t get why this show became so popular in the 1st place and thinks most won’t notice if everyone starts acting dumber and more reckless (it’s a wonder no one’s gotten killed yet from all their crazy risks in the past few years!).
But at this point, it’s probably too late to change showrunners and hope it makes a difference.
It’s not too late. the cast is clearly comfortable working the show as no one left for 14 seasons mostly, good rating so improving the writing could give it more seasons if cbs interested.
Honestly… I wanted more Knight. Found it odd that Palmer gets kidnapped and she disappears. I know the whole got be professional but you would think she’d push to at least help out..
Otherwise, towards the end I got lost. I didn’t hate it but I didn’t love it.
Do another crossover. Bring Gibbs & Hetty physical appearance into that story line
It was okay, not as seamless as I’d hoped. It got confusing because I was trying to figure out the actual plot. I was wondering why Tennant, who is supposed be over the entire Pacific, didn’t know who Callen and Sam and the entire LA team were. How did Parker take charge of everything? Wouldn’t Vance, who is over ALL of NCIS, have checked in at least once for a status update? Why was Torres in LA, and where was Knight? Will Jimmy’s thumb be healed by next week’s ep? (And a badass Jimmy is always welcome.) Loved the Hetty cameo and the Kilbride double (he’s got some stories). I knew it was Kilbride who took the final shot. But for a first crossover, it wasn’t too bad. They have something to build on.
I enjoyed every single minute. I hope they do more of these crossovers.
Absolutely outstaanding. Loved the entire 3 hours and will watch it again!
I enjoyed it very much. But agree there were parts that did flow. I was hoping for a major crossover event within the NCIS universe. Hopefully they continue to do so in the future.
I missed the last hour. Where can I find it to watch?
Paramount+ or On Demand on your cable.
I really don’t like to see cross over
To me was not interesting to watch
Prefer NCIS LA only
I’ve always heard that too many cooks spoil the soup. Last night’s 3-parter was proof of that old adage. Sorely needed tight writing was apparently the last thing considered for this unwieldy mix.
I’m giving it above average because the NCIS:LA part was terrific but the first part was kind of weird. I feel like maybe the wiring was off. Everyone acted a little too stiff I felt. We’re each shows writers in charge of each show or was ther one set of writers for all 3? Or maybe the actors of the first two shows just aren’t as good as the NCIS:LA actors? Not sure. The storyline was great though. I loved the Hetty twist too. I am wondering if Fatima and Roundtree have feelings that are stronger than just “partners”. She was really emotional!
Watched the Crossover last Night. And it was Great. How the diffrent actors & actresses got along. Wonderful Chemistry all the way.
Awesome!!!