‘NCIS’ Team Grieves & Gets Back to Work in New Sneak Peek (VIDEO)

Meredith Jacobs March 25, 2026, 11:00 am

What To Know

The NCIS team mourns the shocking death of one of their own in the March 31 episode.
The team also must tackle a new case, back at work after the decision to shut down their agency was reversed.

“The world goes on,” Parker (Gary Cole) says in the NCIS preview for the Tuesday, March 31, episode. But that’s not going to be easy.

The show’s milestone 500th episode featured perhaps the most shocking moment to date, as it killed off Director Leon Vance. Rocky Carroll had played that character for 18 seasons, debuting in the fifth. But he also helped save his agency, with the decision to shut it down reversed. Now, as the video, which you can watch above, shows, those left behind — Parker, McGee (Sean Murray), Palmer (Brian Dietzen), Torres (Wilmer Valderrama), Kasie (Diona Reasonover), and Knight (Katrina Law) — grieve and toast his empty desk.

It wasn’t Carroll’s decision to leave, he told TV Insider. “It was basically presented to me that the studio and the network wanted to do something really spectacular, really big, and something that would really send shockwaves through the NCIS fan base and the community,” he said. “When they did tell me the whole plot line and the story, my first thought completely candidly was, it’s actually a terrific story. It’s going to be a great shocking story.”

The description for this episode, “Fleeting,” teases the case that the team will be tackling (the first we see after their return following the brief shutdown) while “carrying the weight of recent events.” That’s also the focus of the rest of the sneak peek. “Navy Week turns electric when a stolen squad car flips and reveals a sailor stabbed in the trunk. As D.C. spirals into chaos, the team chases a killer,” according to CBS.

'NCIS' Shocker! Longtime Star Speaks out About Exit After 18 Seasons

We will see the team grieving, executive producer Steven D. Binder confirmed to TV Insider. “But we felt it important that, at the end of Episode [500], the team is just as focused on Vance’s sacrifice as they are on their loss. Vance died to protect them all. And they are going to honor that by putting one foot in front of the other, and just continuing on their mission to protect and safeguard their country.”

Plus, Rocky Carroll hasn’t ruled out seeing him onscreen again (he’ll be back to direct this season). “I don’t think you’ve seen the last of Director Vance,” he told us. “I think NCIS has cornered the market in the ghost stars, people returning, being, and playing significant characters. We do more ghost stars than we do flashbacks.”

What are you hoping to see from the team’s grief in this episode? Let us know in the comments section below.

NCIS, Tuesdays, 8/7c, CBS