NCIS season 15: Rocky Carroll directing his fifth episode

Rocky Carroll is starting to establish himself as a familiar director on NCIS — after all, he’s in the process of doing his fifth episode!

In a new post on Twitter (see below), series star Pauley Perrette confirmed that the man behind Leon Vance is going to be getting back in the chair for one of the upcoming episodes. The last time that he directed the show was for the episode “Off the Grid” this past season; before that, he also took on the role for “Deja Vu,” “Viral,” and his directorial debut “We Build, We Fight” back in 2015. Directing episodes is an opportunity that is often afforded to actors who spend some time on the show shadowing and picking up the craft. We see Joe Mantegna do it often these days for Criminal Minds, Mariska Hargitay has taken on the role on Law & Order: SVU, and it’s been a regular occurrence for some time from Jensen Ackles over on Supernatural. We’re even starting to see this more in the DC – CW universe, with Tom Cavanagh directing his second episode of The Flash.

Once an actor directs an episode, they tend to make it into either an annual or semi-annual tradition over time. One of the few reasons that you don’t see it happen too much beyond that is the simple fact that directing takes time, in addition to the work that goes into acting on the show. We do also want to see some great Vance material in front of the cameras, as well! He had some interesting material last year as he contemplated a political future.

There’s no official word on which episode Carroll is directing just yet, but anticipate it being among the early batch that start airing this fall. NCIS season 15 started filming weeks ago, and there is a good bit to be excited for in between the resolution to the Gibbs/McGee cliffhanger and also the arrival of Maria Bello as a full-time cast member a handful of episodes into the season. (Jennifer Esposito is departing, and hopefully her character of Alex Quinn is written out in an interesting way.)

You’re also going to get some notable guest stars. Cheryl Texiera of Girl Meets World is appearing in the early going, and 90210 alum Trevor Donovan will be stopping by not too long after that. Hopefully, there will be some more great announcements in the weeks ahead, and we’ll get a chance to see something else exciting this season like a crossover with NCIS: New Orleans. This is something that is starting to become a tradition. The more you expand the universe without making NCIS feel like a different show, the more exciting that it is.

Are you glad to see Rocky Carroll stepping behind the camera for another NCIS episode? Be sure to share in the comments below!

Meanwhile, head over to the link here in the event you want to get some additional news when it comes to the show. We’ll of course have more updates over time as we always do. (Photo: CBS.)