‘NCIS’ Boss Previews Episode 500: ‘You Can’t Keep Our Team Down’

For 23 seasons and now 500 episodes, NCIS has been a viewer favorite, and it’s easy to see why: a solid cast (led by Mark Harmon for the first 19 years), great teamwork and chemistry (even through several cast changes), and compelling cases.

In the March 24 episode, titled “All Good Things,” CBS teases, “When the son of a Marine that Gibbs once helped comes to NCIS in desperation, the fractured team reunites off the books. But chasing justice without a badge may cost them more than their careers.”

When it came to honoring the show’s history in this milestone episode, executive producer Steven D. Binder, who wrote the script, says, “I wanted to go back to the beginning and make sure it was filled with things about our characters that longtime fans would recognize and love.”

Below, he previews more about the big episode. (Note: This interview was conducted prior to the episode’s description being released.)

With it being such a notable episode, how did you settle on the story you wanted to tell in it?

Steven D. Binder: I’ve done a bunch of the hundred episodes and I did write the 1000th [of the franchise], but I always kind of keep going back to the same idea that this should be for longtime fans and that this should in some way go back to the beginning. And for the 1000th, we went back to the pilot, “Yankee White,” Air Force One. We went back to the same crime, the same plane, so, we couldn’t quite do that again.

But I wanted to go back to the beginning. I wanted to make sure it was filled with things about our characters that longtime fans of the show would recognize and love and have their hearts warmed by. And I also wanted to show that there was still a lot of gas in the tank and I wanted it to be forward moving. And of course on top of that, I wanted it to be a good story. I wanted to have extra special twists and turns and shocks and mystery. And really at the end of the episode — this is before I even had an idea, by the way, this is just my list of what I wanted — I wanted people who were watching it to remember why they loved the show and I wanted them to feel really deeply and be reminded that this show can create these deep feelings in you.

Matthew Taplinger/CBS

So, with all that in mind, what can you preview about the story of the episode?

Well, I wish I didn’t write it. Now this feels so self-aggrandizing. I think we did all that. I can preview that it’s going to be shocking, heartwarming, very surprising. I think even if you think you know what’s going to happen, you don’t know what’s going to happen. It’s almost spoiler proof in that regard. I think you should have the tissue box handy.

What can you say about the case?

Something that always gets me reaching for the tissue box is whenever I see soldier reunions on Instagram or whatever and stuff like that, and the dad drops his bag and the little girl goes running across the classroom. There will be a nice nod to that sort of energy and our service people. There is a happy ending for the audience with the case. I can preview that it’s going to end well for the people involved in the case. I can also tell you that it involves someone who claims they’re wrongly accused who may or may not be. As often is the case just when they look innocent, you find they’re the guiltiest person of all. There’s going to be someone guilty in this episode. There always is, and they’re going to get theirs.

We’re going to see that you can’t keep our team down, that even when they’re at their lowest and you think that — there’s just no stopping them. They’re so good at what they do. You watch the horror movies and the bad guy never seems to be killed and you’re like, “Let’s cut ’em up into 1000 pieces and separate the pieces all around the globe.” You could do that to our team, and they keep going. You can’t stop them.

I’ve heard that NCIS is in jeopardy, so what can you preview about that? Is that tied to what you told me at the beginning of the season, how Vance (Rocky Carroll) is now not that guy who is like, no, you can’t do this, but then leaves the file on the desk and walks away because there’s something else going on?

That’s a different story. The agency is in jeopardy and I think we’ve been laying pipe all season that things are just being shut down and whether or not your agency gets shut down, if another agency gets shut down, it can affect you. That’s happening in the real world to some degree. We’re going to continue that storyline.

Which characters are the focus of this episode and what can you preview about their storylines?

They all have their moment in the sun. I think if I had to pick someone, I’d say Vance. We get to see Vance’s Papa Bear in a way we haven’t necessarily seen him before. He cares about this agency and would do anything to protect the agency. And yet he’s also vulnerable. We don’t necessarily see Vance — we have, like when his wife got killed 10 to 12 years ago now we saw a vulnerable side of Vance. We don’t usually see a vulnerable side of Vance, so being the head of NCIS has always come at a cost for him and we’re going to see more of that vulnerability in this episode.

Robert Voets/CBS

McGee (Sean Murray) and Jimmy (Brian Dietzen) are the characters who’ve been around since Season 1. How are we going to see them highlighted in the 500th?

It remains to be seen how much — I wish we had another five minutes to air this episode, but one of the things that 500 will do is it teases their futures or sets up what their futures could be. And we’re going to touch all the characters in that regard. And at this point, I think Torres [Wilmer Valderrama] says it in an episode, “Hey, I’ve been here nine years already.” I think he gets called the new guy. They’ve all been there for so long at this point. I guess Knight [Katrina Law] is relatively new and Parker [Gary Cole], but I mean, Parker and Knight came on in Season 19. We’re hitting Season 24. That’s five years. That’s a pretty good run for anybody on any TV show.

So then is this setting up the possibility of an exit?

No, just things the fans know, but putting it in a forward-looking way, and some things that people don’t, fans don’t know about our characters, we find out. They’re growing and they’re changing. We’re going to learn some things about what they feel. We’re not setting up any of our long-running — I didn’t mean to say that we’re setting McGee and Jimmy up for an exit.

Just wanted to confirm!

Not that I know of.

You previously told me that Episode 500 changes everything in some ways. Can you expand on that?

It’s going to be a traumatic experience for everybody, and I think their attitudes are going to change as a result of that. It’s a tough case and it involves some elements from the very beginning of the series. I think a tough experience can change you, and I think that’s what’s going to happen. It’s going to touch everybody. I wanted to give everyone a moment in the sun, talk about everyone where their characters could go. Everyone’s going to be affected by this.

So the case involves a murder…

Well, it’s NCIS. It always involves murder. You know what, does this one involve — There is a body. There is a body. We don’t spend too much time with the body, but there’s always someone dead.

But is that kind of just kicking off the investigation more so than it being about the murder itself then?

Yeah, sometimes we’ll do stories where —  I just jumped back to the episode with McGee’s sister [Troian Bellisario] …

“Twisted Sister”?

Right. There was a Marine who was killed and that gets us into the case. But really, when you think about that, who can remember anything about the body in that episode? It really was about McGee and his sister and the crime. So, the body functions that way in this case as well. It gets us into the case, but we don’t spend a lot of time with it, and you may not even remember it in another 16 years.

When we last talked, you said that there will be a bunch of characters from the past coming back in the 500th, not as big as Bishop (Emily Wickersham, who appeared at the end of the fall finale and in the midseason premiere), giving some nice nods to some fan-favorite episodes. What else can you preview about that and can you say anything specific about which of these characters we’ll be seeing?

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It’s not a bunch anymore, although we will get a chance to see some faces from some old characters without them actually being in the episode, which was similar to the 1000th episode. We had some fun flashbacks. So, some characters will be showing their faces in that way. I think almost everyone will make an appearance. I can tell you that it’s nice to see their faces even if it’s not for long or it’s not as much as I’d initially hoped. And in some ways less is more. It’s nice to see them all there is what I can tell you. And they show up at just the right time, too, I think.

So these are going to be more flashbacks.

Yeah, not completely, but nothing too exciting about that — no big surprise appearances from any previous actors.

I was going to ask if we’ll see Mark Harmon and about nods to Gibbs…

There are a bunch of Easter eggs throughout the episode that are nods to as many characters as we had space for. Gibbs has a couple fun ones. But there’s a lot of Easter eggs in the background. There’s a couple that are only there for a few frames, but they’re there. I think there’s maybe five to 10 fun Easter eggs hidden throughout the episode.

And then the same thing for Ducky (David McCallum), Tony (Michael Weatherly), Abby (Pauley Perrette), Kate (Sasha Alexander), Ziva (Cote de Pablo), characters like that from the earlier seasons?

Yeah, there’s all characters — not all, but characters great and small have their moment in the sun and concepts. There will be a rule hidden somewhere in the show that’s relevant to the show.

And this is a rule that we’ve heard before?

It is.

Which episodes should fans rewatch ahead of the 500th?

Episode 2, I think.

Was that “Hung out to Dry”?

Yeah, I’m impressed. Yeah, they should watch Episode 2.

Can you say why? 

No, but I think it will land. I think that’s a really good one to watch.

Is there anything else you can say about this episode?

I can say this, and it’s not necessarily in terms of content, but so many times you stand there on the set and something will be either really funny and everyone’s laughing really hard, or really emotional and everyone’s crying in the moment. And then it’s sort of, you had to be there when you actually cut it together and put it on screen. It’s there, but you don’t have that same feeling. And when I was standing on set, there was a lot of laughing and a lot of emotional moments and I just kept thinking, “Oh, it’s a bummer we’re not going to get this in the cut,” because you never get it. You’ve got to be there. It’s like a picture of a sunset. Maybe I was there, but when I watched the episode, I laughed and cried as much as I did when I was on set.

What does it mean to you to reach this milestone?

It’s a testament to the unbelievable hard work that I’ve watched this crew put in over the decades. They’ve given up a large portion of their lives to NCIS. I think I made that comment earlier, that Vance gave up a lot of his life for the agency and a lot of people in his life, his loved ones as well. And to see all that hard work and that sacrifice rewarded by just being able to still do it is the best part of reaching 500.

NCIS, Episode 500, Tuesday, March 24, 8/7c, CBS