One of the things to look forward to for the remainder of the fifth season of
NCIS is seeing the special agents in a new location apart from their headquarters at the Washington Navy Yard. Tonight's installment lives up to that promise as it sends agent Tony DiNozzo (
Michael Weatherly) and analyst Nikki Jardin (Susan Kelechi Watson) traveling to Baghdad.
The 15th episode of season 5 called "In The Zone" centers on a mortar attack in Baghdad that becomes the crime scene for a murder investigation.
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According to show runner Shane Brennan, who has managed to pull off a rarity during his first year with the show by attracting its biggest audience ever for an episode last November, he didn't want to turn this Baghdad-themed episode into a war movie.
"They're investigating a crime scene, which happens to be in Baghdad. It's not about the fighting in Iraq. It's about someone we know, Tony, and someone we don't know as well, Nikki, in an extreme situation," Brennan said.
The scenes for this episode were filmed in a rural area not far from the Valencia soundstage where
NCIS normally shoots, on a couple of days when swirling wind and bare ground made for rough conditions.
"I'm still cleaning sand out of every crevice and orifice," said Watson, whose character provides an emotional kick at the end of the episode when it's revealed just why a mysophobe, normally desk-bound analyst would want to make the trip to Iraq.
Meanwhile, the rest of the NCIS special agents are working the investigation from back in Washington, D.C. where jealousies and squabbles usually arise.
NCIS, which airs tonight at 8pm on CBS, also stars
Mark Harmon,
David McCallum, and
Pauley Perrette,
Lauren Holly,
Cote de Pablo and
Sean Murray, just to name a few.
-Kris De Leon, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
Source: CBS, TV Guide
(Image courtesy of CBS)