‘NCIS: LA’: What Did You Think of Insurance Broker Katherine Casillas? (POLL)
Spoiler Alert
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Season 11, Episode 5 of NCIS: Los Angeles, “Provenance.”]
It’s not often that someone can throw the NCIS: LA agents for a loop, but insurance broker Katherine Casillas (Moon Bloodgood) does in “Provenance” — particularly with Sam (LL Cool J).
When the team must find a painting worth $40 million before it’s sold on the black market — and used to fund terrorist activity — Sam and Callen (Chris O’Donnell) cross paths with Katherine at a crime scene where it was last seen. Though they initially think she could be a lawyer, they settle on someone in insurance, and she sticks by their sides for most of the rest of the case.
It’s a good thing she does, because without her, Jean Chu, the painting’s owner, wouldn’t tell them anything except to read the report. Once Katherine joins, however, we learn just how careful Jean was about the purchase and delivery; no one knew she had it, yet two weeks after she got it, it was stolen.
Katherine is also the one to help them figure out the connection between Jean and the couple, the Garcias, who got it after it was stolen: auction house Bouchier. (Katherine notes perfume, wine, and a brochure for a painting sold in an auction in the Garcias’ house.) Throughout the episode, we see a team of highly capable agents out of their element (but still getting the job done, as they always do), aided by an insurance broker who knows the art world.
Katherine knows which auctioneer the Garcias must have dealt with. She knows how to guide Kensi (Daniela Ruah) through going undercover, from what she wears to what she says, at an art gallery to get a connection to the middleman brokering exchanges of that painting.
(Bill Inoshita/CBS)
And, as Sam and Callen learn at the end of the episode, she’s not just an insurance agent. “Katherine is the insurance company,” Jean reveals. “The whole thing is her show.” She worked the case because she cares and “still likes to get [her] hands dirty.”
We’ll see her again, as Bloodgood will return as Katherine in the November 10 episode, “Concours D’Elegance.” In that episode, the team links the theft of an undersea drone prototype to a video game streamer’s elaborate party. She insures the gamer’s property and processions. We can only assume — and hope — that she decides to get her hands dirty again because her dynamic with the team, and especially Sam, was quite interesting. She certainly kept him on his toes.
Let’s also hope that she works with Kensi and Deeks (Eric Christian Olsen) more, considering that her impressions of them — Kensi would work to go undercover, while she described Deeks by his hair — could make for quite the entertaining conversation.
What did you think of Katherine? Are you looking forward to seeing her again? Vote in the poll below.
NCIS: Los Angeles, Sundays, 9/8c, CBS
