‘NCIS: Origins’: Mariel Molino Previews Mark Harmon’s Return for Season 3

The NCIS: Origins cast is getting back to work, with Season 3 set to premiere on CBS this fall.

Mariel Molino shared her reaction — “I’m buzzing,” she wrote — on Instagram Stories after the table read on Wednesday, July 15 — including to Mark Harmon, who will be appearing in all 10 episodes as part of a season-long arc. “We just did the table read for NCIS: Origins Season [3], and everyone was there, you know, the crew’s all back. And Mark Harmon was there. And I heard Mark Harmon, just with his beautiful voice usher these beautiful words and I got full body chills, and we’re all just like, [amazed], and he’s just like… You know what I mean?” she said in the video, which featured a photo of Harmon as Gibbs from NCIS in the bottom corner (see a screenshot below). “And I’m so, so, so excited and the Lala and Gibbs … This is gonna be really good.”

Mariel Molino / Instagram

Tyla Abercrumbie also shared a look at the table read on her Instagram Stories, including the cover page of the premiere script — and it reveals that it’s titled “Don’t You Forget About Me,” written by David J. North and Daniel J. Egbert, and directed by Niels Arden Oplev. And Kyle Schmid is starting to look like Franks in his photo celebrating, “We’re back!” See those below.

Tyla Abercrumbie / Instagram

Kyle Schmid / Instagram

At the end of June, it was announced that Harmon will be appearing in all episodes as part of a major arc involving Gibbs. (He has, until now, only narrated every episode and been onscreen in two.) The only details we know so far is it’s “part of a present-day mystery tied to his ‘90s Camp Pendleton days in an action-packed story that unfolds all season long.”

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When the NCIS prequel returns, it also has a lot to address in that ’90s timeline. Gibbs (Austin Stowell) and Lala (Molino) finally kissed in the Season 2 finale, but what will their relationship — which, given NCIS canon, we know doesn’t last — look like? How will it play into the “story of her” being one that Gibbs hasn’t talked about until now? Meanwhile, Randy (Caleb Foote) was kidnapped, tied to his work digitizing agency files.

NCIS: Origins, Season 3, Fall 2026, Tuesdays, 10/9c, CBS