A sexual harassment lecture is scheduled, which the team manages to get out of. I guess they hold them at least once a year? (1.3)
To complement the German Sheppard that is dubbed Jethro in season five’s Dog Tags, we have a German Sheppard named Tony in this episode. Tony assumes that the dog is a real stud, but is told that he’s neutered. (1.3)
Tony says he doesn’t like pirate movies. But in season seven’s Jurisdiction, he seems pretty into them, and even watches one with Ziva. (1.4)
One of the guys in the teaser calls the other guy “sweetcheeks”. That’s the name Tony called Ziva in season three’s Under Covers. (1.7)
Tony says that when he was a kid, he’d pour his dad a Macallan 18, three fingers, one ice cube. This is the exact same drink that he ordered for his dad in season seven’s Flesh and Bone. (1.16)
Kate says that the boyfriend is always to blame. That’s a nice little juxtaposition to Tony’s “It’s always the wife” theory that he pushes so hard in season seven. Tony thinks Kate’s “The boyfriend is always to blame” theory is sick and twisted. Man, I’m sure I just watched this conversation happen between Tony and Ziva. (1.22)
Gibbs dreams about seeing Kate in a body bag with a bullet in her forehead, and Ari smiling in the corner. (1.23)
When Ari shoots Martha, it’s with a shot between the eyes, just like he kills Kate. (1.23)
When the captain tries to explain why he arranged for his wife and daughter to be kidnapped, Gibbs goes postal and shoves him against the wall. “Don’t you dare tell me that there’s a reason for you throwing away what you had.” This is one of the first references to something happening in Gibbs’ family life in the past. (2.1)
An FBI agent asks Tony, “How would you feel if it was one of your agents lying on a slab?” Tony says it depends on who it was. He’s just being a smartass. (2.5)
The cell Fornell is kept in is the same cell that Tony’s kept in during season three’s Frame Up. (2.5)
When the team discovers evidence that could put Yost away for life, Tony wonders aloud, “Do we have to tell [the JAG lawyer]?” Gibbs responds sarcastically, “Well, no, Special Agent DiNozzo. Here at NCIS we just report evidence we like.” Yeah, you’ll change you tune, buddy. Let me introduce you to season seven’s Mother’s Day. (2.7)
Tony asks about Kate’s pleated skirt from Catholic school. She’s wearing his version of that skirt when he imagines talking to her after she dies. (2.9)
Kate stands on Tony’s shoulders to prise open a vent in the ceiling with her knife. She’s wearing pants, thank God. Even still she says, “You realize what would happen if I dropped this knife, Tony?” Tony replies, “Yep. I’m still deciding if it’s worth it or not.” This is similar to what he says to Ziva in season four’s Sandblast when she’s trying to defuse a bomb, and he’s looking down her shirt. (2.9)
The nurse Tony hits on is Lieutenant Pam Kim, one of the women who is dragged in for questioning when Tony is framed for murder in season three’s Frame Up. (2.9)
While in Paraguay, Tony complains about never getting sent to places like Paris and Hawaii. Tony does get sent to Paris with Ziva in season seven’s Jetlag. (2.17)
Abby stares at the caricature Kate drew of her back in season one’s Marine Down with the vampire teeth and wings. (3.1)
Tony references the last time Ziva drove in the previous episode (Silver War), and that her driving style made him throw up. (3.5)
Ziva mentions that Tony gives all his girls honeydust as gifts. That’s a call back to season two’s SWAK, where Tony told Gibbs, McGee and Kate that he always sends it to girls (no card) at Christmas. (3.6)
Tony steals an apple off McGee’s desk on his way down to the lab, where Chip is. Chip later uses the dental impressions from the apple to frame Tony for a murder in Frame Up. (3.7)
Tony throws his bloody tissues in his bin in front of Chip. This is more set up for the episode Frame Up. Abby also tells Tony that she had Chip pull Tony’s car right around front, so we know that Chip got inside Tony’s car. (3.8)
They bring in Lieutenant Pam Kim for questioning after she had an affair with Tony. We met her in season two’s Forced Entry, where Tony hit on her and she waved her engagement ring in his face. (3.9)
Ziva brings up Tony’s ex-girlfriend Monica, from season three’s The Voyeur’s Web. (3.9)
Fornell references the time he was framed for murder in season two’s The Bone Yard. (3.9)
Ziva says that after being sent one of her friends’ head in a box, she decided that she would never be captured alive. Which really says something about her frame of mind and what she’d been through emotionally when she allowed that to happen in season seven’s Truth or Consequences. (3.15)
Tony references that Ziva doesn’t know how to say “porcupine”, which she had trouble with in Silver War. (3.17)
Ziva references season three’s Boxed In, when Tony said he used to take piano lessons. (3.20)
Ziva makes a comment about suicide only being an option when you know you are going to be captured. This complements her statement in season three’s Head Case that she has decided that she will never be captured alive. (3.20)
Ziva makes vague reference to the extensive suspect list they had to run down when Tony was framed for murder in season three’s Frame Up. (3.21)
McGee references the time he shot the cop in season three’s Probie. (3.22)
While he’s unconscious, Gibbs dreams about when Mike Franks told him that Pedro Hernandez was the man who shot the driver of Shannon and Kelly’s car, causing the car to crash and kill them. We also see the newspaper report of their deaths, and Hernandez’s Wanted poster. They’re all exactly the same as were used in season seven’s Rule 51. Also, the hill Gibbs remembers himself setting up on to snipe Hernandez, and the church Hernandez was driving near, are the same as were visited in season seven’s Borderland. (3.23)
Ducky suspects that Gibbs would have killed Hernandez for killing Shannon and Kelly. Which I guess is why he wasn’t so surprised when it all came to a head in the last few episodes of season seven. (3.24)
Gibbs says that Franks quit NCIS. Franks replies, “I didn’t quit, I retired.” Which is the line Gibbs pushes in season four after he quits. Sorry, retires. (3.24)
McGee is playing the same shoot bin Laden computer game that Tony was playing in season one’s Missing. (4.1)
FBI Agent Sacks returns to investigate Ziva. He’s the guy who investigated Tony when he was accused of murder in season three’s Frame Up. (4.1)
Ziva comments to Officer Bashan that Eli “found a solution” to the problem of Ari. I don’t think this gels with what we were fed in season three’s Kill Ari Part 2, but it starts to set up what we find out in season six’s Aliyah. (4.1)
Ziva refers to when she was framed for murder by the Iranians in season four’s opener Shalom. (4.9)
Gibbs makes reference to the coma he was in during season three’s Hiatus Part 1. (4.10)
Ducky references the time he shoved a policeman off a cliff. We first heard about this in season one’s Seadog. (4.10)
Tony references McGee withholding evidence that could have implicated his sister in a murder in the previous episode, Twisted Sister. (4.10)
FBI Agent Sacks returns, and Tony still hates him for trying to put him away for murder in season three’s Frame Up. (4.10)
Reference to Tony having the plague in season two’s S.W.A.K. (4.11)
The team go to a bowling alley, which I’m sure is the same bowling alley location they used in season two’s Witness. (4.13)
They revisit the case of Mamoun Sharif, which started a few weeks ago in the episode Sandblast. (4.13)
Tony talks about having a campfire discussion, which was his way of talking through cases in the season opener, Shalom. (4.13)
Gibbs has two flashbacks to season three’s Hiatus part 2. (4.13)
Abby references Roy Sanders, Ziva’s love interest
from Dead Man Walking who died. (4.17)
Abby breaks up with her boyfriend, Marty Pearson, who
we first met in Once a Hero. (4.17)
Ziva’s orange hat belonged to Roy Sanders, her luurve interest who died back in the aptly named Dead Man Walking. (4.19)
This episode is one big reference to the book McGee wrote called Deep Six that we first found out about in Twisted Sister. (4.20)
McGee calls a campfire like Tony used to when he was in charge back in Escaped. (4.20)
Ducky references that La Grenoille gave him cognac in the episode Blowback. (4.21)
Tony says that he was an Alpha Kai Delta in college. He first told us that in season two’s Bikini Wax. (4.23)
McGee references his nom de plume Thom E Gemcity, which we found out in the episode Twisted Sister. (4.24)
Gibbs and Fornell’s shared ex-wife Diane turns up to deliver a single line and glare at them both. It’s not Melinda McGraw, who was cast for the role in season nine’s Devil’s Triangle. (4.24)
Ducky catches on that the burned body on his autopsy slab might not be Tony because Tony’s lungs would be scarred from the plague he had in season two’s S.W.A.K, and the corpse’s lungs only have minimal scarring. (5.1)
Gibbs asks Jenny whether she would have killed La Grenouille if he hadn’t been there with them, and if La Grenouille hadn’t taken the bullets from the gun. She replies, “I guess we’ll never know.” That’s the line Ziva fed Tony in season six’s Aliyah when he asked her if she loved Michael Rivkin. In both cases I suspect the line was another way of saying, “You bet your ass.” (5.1)
Tony references his time spent with the pneumonic plague in season two’s S.W.A.K. (5.6)
Tony references his car blowing up in Bury Your Dead. (5.6)
FBI Special Agent Brent Langer becomes an NCIS Special Agent at the beginning of season six. He started out working for Gibbs at NCIS before the FBI, though. (5.11)
We get our fist inkling that something is medically wrong with Jenny when Ducky runs secret blood tests on her. (5.12)
Gibbs asks Jenny about her health after his discussion with Ducky in Stakeout. It’s setting up revelations towards the end of season five. (5.13)
La Grenouille’s body surfaces after we saw it floating in the ocean in the episode Bury Your Dead. (5.14)
There are lots of flashbacks to La Grenouille-related chicanery from seasons four and five. (5.14)
Jenny prepares herself for a big gunfight by cleaning her gun methodically. Ziva did the same thing in season three’s Under Covers. (5.18)
Michael Rivkin is in the bar in Morocco where Ziva is singing. He and another woman leave right before the bomb goes off, and his sudden exit seems to tip Ziva off that something hinky her way comes. She doesn’t seem to hold a grudge later in the season though (or even later in this episode), and I’ll just leave it at that before this vein in my forehead starts bulging with frustration. (6.1)
The photos of Tony, McGee and Ziva that Abby has on her wall are the photos she took in season five’s Requiem. (6.1)
Ziva is furious with McGee after finding the bikini photos Tony took of her in season five’s Judgment Day Part 1 on his computer. The photos also turned up in Agent Afloat and were referenced again in season nine’s Playing With Fire, where we learn that Tony still has them four years after they were taken. (6.6)
Ziva references the fact that Tony once donated his sperm, which we found out about in season three’s Probie. (6.6)
Abby refers to her stalker ex-boyfriend who we met in season three’s Bloodbath, and Chip from season four who tried to frame Tony for murder then tried to kill Abby, and McGee’s crazy fan from season four’s Cover Story who was going to shoot her. (6.6)
Vance refers to Special Agent Langer from Last Man Standing, and—spoiler alert—the story surrounding him isn’t over. (6.7)
At a cop bar there’s a wall of photos of cops and agents who have died in the line of duty. Among the photos is Paula Cassidy, who was one of Tony’s fuck buddies before she died in season four’s Grace Period. (6.7)
The whole episode brings the storyline of Agent Langer’s supposed betrayal of NCIS in Last Man Standing back. (6.8)
The team reference various cases from the past that involved their suspects either breaking in to places or robbing places, etc. Among those name checked is the case from season five’s Stakeout and when Ari Haswari infiltrated NCIS in a body bag back in season one’s Bete Noire. (6.8)
Tony references his time on the USS Seahawk in Agent Afloat. (6.8)
Michelle Lee references the case involving McGee’s sister, Sarah, from season four’s Twisted Sister. (6.9)
Ziva references Tony’s undercover mission from season four when he fell in love with Jeanne Benoit. (6.9)
There’s a vague reference to Vance being a bit of a tech-head, which was first referenced in Last Man Standing. (6.9)
Franks translates Spanish for Gibbs, which is consistent with Gibbs needing Tony to translate Spanish for him in the past. (6.15)
There are references to all the times in the past that Tony has been accused of murder. (6.16)
Tony references Gibbs’ “Mexican sabbatical” between seasons three and four. (6.16)
In charge again, Tony calls a campfire like he did in season four’s Escaped. (6.16)
Tony references when Trent Kort blew up his car (and tried to kill him) in season five’s Bury Your Dead. He still seems to be holding a grudge. I guess that’s fair. It was a really nice car. (6.20)
Gibbs tells Kort that he didn’t read the file on Vance that Kort gave him in Broken Bird. (6.20)
Abby references when Jenny Shepard got killed in Los Angeles in season five’s Judgment Day. (6.22)
We find out more of the long-running storyline surrounding Gibbs’ murder of Perdo Hernandez, the Mexican drug lord who had Shannon and Kelly killed. Apparently Macy was the young MP lieutenant who investigated Gibbs for the crime. She had all the evidence to charge him, but ended up burying it because she decided that the murder was justified. Gibbs didn’t know until this episode that she’d been protecting him for the last 18 years. (6.23)
Vance notes that the last time he and Eli saw each other was in Amsterdam. That storyline is explored in season nine’s Enemies Foreign and Enemies Domestic. (6.25)
There’s lots of talk about Ziva killing Ari back in season three’s aptly-named Kill Ari – Part 2. (6.25)
Abby references that she’s had bad experiences in the past with people who have been assigned to her lab. This is probably mostly referring to Chip from season three. (8.2)
Tony does not appear to believe in clairvoyance in this episode, but in season two’s Black Water he told Gibbs about a psychic he used to help find a missing girl when he was at Baltimore PD. (8.2)
McGee pulls up Tony’s mug shot from season seven’s The Inside Man. (8.3)
Fornell references that he and Gibbs have been married to the same woman. We first found that out in season two’s Twilight. (8.3)
Tony and McGee talk about the time Tony and Ziva went undercover in season three’s Under Covers. There’s another call back to that episode later when Ziva is lying on top of Tony and he tells her what she feels poking her is his knee. And Ziva tackling Tony and lying on top of him is itself a call back to season three’s Boxed In. I just had a fangasm. (8.5)
Senior refers back to season seven’s Flesh and Bone, where Tony paid for Senior’s hotel room and flight to Monte Carlo. (8.7)
Gibbs says that Tom Morrow called him about lunch. That was the director (played by Alan Dale) before Jenny Shepard. (8.8)
Eli vaguely refers to Gibbs killing Ari back in season three’s aptly titled Kill Ari, Part Two. He says that Gibbs has a way of making his family disappear. (8.8)
Vance is doing advanced cryptography at college in 1991. This is a nice nod to the Vance/McGee relationship, I think. In the past, Vance has been impressed by McGee’s computer cryptography skills. There’s also a reference later to Vance being the guy responsible for updating the San Diego office’s Y2K compliances in 1999, which sounds like a McGee kind of job as well. (8.9)
There’s another reference to inconsistencies in Vance’s history. This was first hinted at in season five’s Judgement Day, Part Two, and again in season six’s Knockout. (8.9)
In last week’s Ships in the Night, Ziva said she was going to take comp time to see her Miami friend…and she did! She actually spends half of this episode on vacation. Oh, continuity! How you warm my icy heart! (8.12)
Vance is still recovering from the surgery post-bomb blast in Enemies Domestic. I guess that was supposed to be about two months ago. I am most impressed that they’ve kept this timeline realistic. Snaps to you, show. (8.12)
McGee’s identity is stolen again. The first time that
happened was season three’s Switch.
(8.13)
Tony references that he worked in Baltimore in the
late 1990s. Yes! Yes, show! That absolutely fits with the timeline you’ve given
us in the past. I’m so happy! (8.13)
Ducky references that Ziva has been through things
that he and Gibbs can’t imagine, which is an obvious reference to her time in
Somalia before season seven’s Truth or
Consequences. I’m sure is also refers to her time pre-NCIS. (8.13)
This
entire freaking episode belongs in this category. Here are the episodes that
get the flashback treatment: Season eight: Recruited, Enemies Domestic,
Broken Arrow, The Spider and the Fly. Season
seven: Rule Fifty-one, Moonlighting, Endgame, Truth or Consequences. Season
six: Aliyah, Legend Part 2, Cloak. Season
five: Designated Target. Season four: Singled out, Hiatus
Part 1. Season three: Silver War, Kill Ari Part 2, Kill
Ari Part 1. Season two: Twilight, SWAK, Hometown Hero,
See No Evil, An Eye For an Eye. Season one: Reveille,
Yankee White. (8.14)
Tony
references the time he got the plague in season two’s SWAK. (8.15)
Tony’s
Mighty Mouse stapler and McGee’s Deep Six book make appearances. (8.15)
Ziva
reminds us that McGee has a Masters in Computer Forensics from MIT. We first
found that out in season one’s Sub Rosa (the first McGee episode). (8.15)
Referring
to Gibbs, McGee quotes Tony’s awesome “functional mute” line from season seven’s
Truth or Consequences. (8.15)
McGee
references Tony’s Rota offer from season four’s Singled Out. (8.15)
I don’t
have the benefit of hindsight yet, but I’d put money on this exchange playing
into the final episodes of season eight: Ziva and McGee talk about Team Gibbs,
after Ziva asks him how long he thinks they’re all going to be together.
“You’ve been here seven years, Tony’s been here longer.” McGee replies, “I do
think about that myself sometimes. Tony turned down a post in Spain four years
ago. Career-wise, he can’t do that again.” Ziva asks if McGee would ever want
to lead his own team. McGee says, “Yeah. Someday, sure.” (8.15)
Abby
references that Tony donated his sperm in college. We first found that out in
season three’s Probie. (8.15)
McGee references his brief and doomed dalliance with
Adriana Gorgova in last week’s Defiance.
(8.16)
Agah Bayar, the arms dealer that Ziva and DiNozzo
Senior saw at the party in Broken Arrow,
makes another appearance. (8.16)
McGee says he’s never had a good time in a women’s
prison, which is a reference to season six’s Caged. (8.17)
Tony calls McGee “McGemcity,” a reference to McGee’s
nom de plume from when he wrote The
Adventures of LJ Tibbs book in season four. (8.17)
Plenty of references to Jenny offering Tony the team
leader position in Rota in season four’s Singled
Out. (8.17)
