It was certainly great to see some action and nice to see some humour coming from somewhere other than Tony and Palmer, though Tony spouting rubbish at the “snowy” crime scene did make me want to cringe. I agree that if they can’t come up with better original ideas (maybe they should go read some of the immensely innovative & well written fanfic that’s out there) then re-visiting some of the old plots isn’t necessarily a bad idea, though perhaps a wise use of Bishop would be to ask Tony or McGee a few pertinent questions – eg, what was the relevance of the way Diane died, as there was no actual flashback or mention of Kate’s death, if you weren’t familiar with the early episodes you wouldn’t have known that Diane was killed in the same manner as Kate.

On the Tony front – I honestly don’t understand why there was such a shift with regards to his character. Way back the original premise was Gibbs, backed up by his loyal SFA (and St Bernard :-) ) Tony, the best agent he’d ever worked with and one who, judging by the beer & steak scene, he appeared to even be friends with. That took a bit of a back seat in later Ziva seasons, but since she left McGee seems to have stepped up to the SFA role and into Tony’s old relationship with Gibbs leaving Tony out in the cold and with very little to do. Seems to me just as well that Weatherly has started up his own production company. An actor is generally perceived as good as his last role and off the back of the last couple of seasons I can’t see casting directors considering him for leading roles any time soon, which is so sad – when given something to really get his teeth into he is as Don Bellisario described him, “one of the most underrated actors in television”.

For me the outstanding moment of the episode was Palmer refusing to take part in the autopsy. Whilst describing Diane as a “friend” was a bit of a stretch I thought Brian’s performance was stunning and the first time NCIS has moved me to tears in a long long time. I’d like him to have had one more line before Gibbs’ interruption, but that’s probably just me.

But they are still below season 6 for average viewership, 17.74 million to 17.97 million. The final numbers will bring them closer no doubt but I don’t think they could catch up. This episode would need to be adjusted up to 22 million to raise the running average up to season 6 level and it’s only 19.49 million at this time. I sympathize with the Tony fans because, this is definitely the Gibbs show and that is not likely to change. Weatherly has his own production company maybe someday, he will step out of Harmon’s shadow.

The only other character who was given an opportunity to reveal how they were feeling was Palmer and particular credit should go to Brian Dietzen. It’s a long time since NCIS has brought so much as a tear to my eye and he did it with just a couple of lines.

However as a Tony fan what I really didn’t like was the fact that once again Tony was in the shadows in favour of McGee. I have nothing against McGee, but eleven episodes in and what’s Tony really done this season? Tony didn’t even spot the similarities between the two diner crime scenes and it was he (and Ziva) who found Jenny’s body at the desert diner. And it was so obvious even I spotted it! And forgive me if I’m going mad, but watch the first few scenes again. For the most part you could take McGee out and put Tony in and you wouldn’t need to change the dialogue at all. In fact it would actually work better. e.g., in the first scene there’s the talk about cats, lists and Tim being lonely. It was Tony who briefly adopted a cat a few episodes ago; Tony’s the one who’s always writing lists, and Tony who’s supposedly still without a girlfriend. When has McGee ever mentioned anything about cats and why’s he lonely – hasn’t he got Delilah? I know she’s away from DC, but according to previous episodes their long distance relationship is going well. Is McGee now Gibb’s SFA? It’s McGee and not Tony who rang Gibbs with an update; McGee who collected Gibbs from his house and McGee who joined him at the crime scene where I for one thought he was so Tony like I seriously was starting to wonder if the scenes had actually been written for Michael Weatherly and then changed at the last minute. Years ago Don Bellisario said that one of the great things about NCIS was that everyone spoke with their own voice, that if you took away the names in the script you would still know who was speaking. I guess the way you identify Tony now is he’s the one who’s saying something cringingly stupid.

Sadly couldn’t agree more! And did you see that Christopher Silber has left to join NCIS-NOLA so any hope of seeing more of the Tony from “Once A Crook” and “Admiral’s Daughter” would appear to have been dashed! :-(