SEASON SEVEN EPISODE EIGHTEEN

JURISDICTION

I went into this episode with fairly low expectations as from what I'd read/seen the 'sub-plot' (for want of a better term) was going to be an exact copy of Doppelgänger that is the team meet another team who are identical to them and I couldn't see why they'd want to rehash a sub-plot like that. Also, from the wee bits I'd seen of DiNozzo I thought he was going to be ultra-annoying and back to the 'old' DiNozzo. I'm glad I was wrong on both points; the 'copies' were really only two people and in truth only one in any great depth and the 'annoying DiNozzo' whom I wanted to slap was only there from the couple of bits I'd seen - so that was good.

However, I did want to slap Special Agent Abigail Borin every time she appeared/opened her mouth. Can NCIS really not write a woman in a position of authority well? She was just ultra-annoying - even more so than Mann - and nearly as annoying as ELC! I had to grit my teeth every time she appeared and opened her mouth. She was not a good character at all and I really hope we don't see her again.

On the plus side - a case, a real, live, actual naval case - wow. That's two in a row, what's happening? *g* Okay, so as always they over-played one aspect of it and it was clear from very early on that the dead guy wasn't the man they thought he was. They kept making such a big thing about Master Diver this and Master Diver that, that it was obvious it wasn't him. And we get the bowties back! Yes. Thankfully, that was short lived. There were some great team moments overall, some nice shippy moments especially for Gibbs/Ducky and DiNozzo/Ziva fen and also for Gibbs/Abby or as I see it Gibbs & Abby fen. So for an episode from which I was expecting very little, I enjoyed it.

We begin with Marines running on a beach. One stops and the Sergeant stops them all and is not happy with the man who stopped; but he has a jolly good reason for stopping, well he is a Marine, he would have. He's seen a dead body on the beach and from the state of it, he's been dead for some time. The name on him is Lieutenant Jensen.

In the squad room DiNozzo is frantically looking for something duly watched by McGee and Ziva (whose hair is wavy and her older style rather than straightened, it looked very nice) who are also looking for something, albeit less frenetically (very in character). Ziva finds a box of chocolates left over from Valentine's Day and instantly DiNozzo is on it and wanting to know show sent it to her and saying that clearly the person wasn't important as she hadn't eaten them.

A great DiNozzo/Ziva moment as it showed his jealousy that someone else might have sent chocolates to Ziva. He covers it slightly with a comment that he's glad he wasn't her valentine and she agrees she is glad too, but the under-currents of much more were there. Having said that though, equally it can be seen by non-DiNozzo/Ziva fen as DiNozzo just being DiNozzo and not liking the fact that one of his colleagues has any kind of secret from him. Whatever it was very in-character.

DiNozzo does find McGee's 'motivational CDs' and McGee comments he'd been looking for them, but wouldn't have thought to look in DiNozzo's drawer (a nice bit of continuity there as we saw DiNozzo with them a while back).

Then we discover what it is they are looking for: the van keys. McGee says whoever drove it last has to have them. It turns out that DiNozzo had them last, he took it to get a pizza (he took the van? Why not a car?) He remembers throwing the pizza container into the rubbish bin and thinks he must have dropped the keys in there too. And the rubbish is collected that day. He's just about to go off to the quipsters when Gibbs appears; he's found the keys in the lift. DiNozzo owns up to it being him (nice one, Tony, very mature of you) and says he won't do it again, to which Gibbs replies: "Oh, I doubt that." Such fun and so perfect; he knows DiNozzo. He says he'll meet them downstairs and throws the keys into the air - they all scramble for them.

On the beach Ducky and Jimmy arrive and Ducky is singing and still in those darn ties. Singing? What have they done to Ducky? Very out of place and inappropriate. Not the fact that he was singing, I'm more than happy for Ducky to sing, but the time and place, was 'off' rather like his touches of inappropriate humour and behaviour in earlier episodes - clearly all a reaction to his mother's death, which he still isn't over. But it does lead him to tell Jimmy of how he and his mother used to meet up with friends who insisted they ate winkles; Ducky has never eaten that kind of thing since (I don't blame him, I've never had them and would never want them). Jimmy says he prefers oysters (not that I'd want to eat those either) and DiNozzo calls him 'Jimbo' and says he would because they are nature's aphrodisiacs. They banter about Jimmy's new girlfriend who has won an award and whom DiNozzo seems to approve of. A nice little scene that could be seen as DiNozzo/Palmer.

Jensen was a navy diver and he didn't run out of air. Jimmy comments that the fish had had a jolly good go at him and Ducky points to where a propeller had cut off his lower arm. DiNozzo comments it's like Jaws and Gibbs and Ducky share one of 'their' looks. Ducky places time of death between two and three days ago (I thought longer when I first saw the body, so that surprised me, but then I'm no ME). Gibbs says that divers don't go out alone and he's surprised no one reported Jensen missing. Ziva says maybe his body wasn't meant to be found. Gibbs asks McGee for more information. Jensen was 36 and a US Master Diver working for the Experimental Diving Unit - he was on leave, hence the reason no one missed him. He has no wife or kids. DiNozzo finds a puncture wound. Gibbs asks Ducky if it's from a spear gun and Ducky snaps at him, causing Gibbs to look slightly surprised. The next second Ducky is Ducky and he says Gibbs is correct, Jensen was not diving alone; whoever was with him, stabbed him, pushed him overboard and left him to die.

Gibbs and DiNozzo go to Jensen's house; DiNozzo says that Gibbs could have sent McGee, but Gibbs wanted to see the house. DiNozzo says you can tell a lot about a person by his house and comments on Gibbs's. He says it's clean, no-nonsense and stoic. Gibbs queries the 'stoic' asking if his house is stoic, DiNozzo suggests 'understated' instead. Gibbs says he planted some red roses at the weekend and asks if they are stoic. DiNozzo starts to dig himself into a hole by saying they are prickly and thorny. But he's saved by Gibbs finding the door open.

And we get yet another little 'throw away' thing, like the fish, the clean house, the pillow on the sofa, the 'lack of spare room' (although I'm convinced still that was Kelly's room as it was when she died),Gibbs using his whole house and not just the basement, that is maybe meant to be leading us somewhere in red herrings or to a real something. Gibbs planting roses? Okay, maybe he planted them at Shannon and Kelly's graves, but the inference was at his house. Or maybe he planted them in memory of them; maybe he really has finally letting go (after he finally let go in Requiem only for it to all resurface) of them? A meaningful snippet or a red herring? I still think it's all going to come down to Mexico and Gibbs having killed the man who killed his girls.

They pull their guns and go in. Part of the way down the hall Gibbs goes off to check another part of the house and DiNozzo calls 'clear'. The next second a gun is in his back and he's declaring it not quite clear. Gibbs appears and has his gun pointing at the woman who is pointing the gun at DiNozzo and then another man appears and has a gun on Gibbs. There is stalemate, until Gibbs pulls out his ID, he won't let the other man take it, but shows it. The woman , Special Agent Abigail Borin, says they are from CGIS. She tells her man, CGIS Special Agent Kyle Omagi, to put his gun away and hits him round the head. DiNozzo comments on the head slap.

In the squad room, Ziva obligingly asks what CGIS is. It's Coast Guard Investigative Service. DiNozzo and McGee do a nice little double act explaining about them and how they are a legitimate sibling agency.

Meanwhile Gibbs and Borin are in the conference room; he offers her coffee; she accepts. She wants to talk to Vance, but Gibbs says it's his case as it's a naval person whose been murdered. She says it still could be hers if Jensen was the killer she's looking for. CGIS were on a re-con mission and saw a salvage vessel with only the captain on-board. The Captain - Limb - had been murdered. She had video footage of Jensen and Limb talking and her gut *rolls eyes* told her Jensen might be worth questioning, but still Gibbs stands firm. She goes on to say that a body found on a boat is the jurisdiction of either CGIS or the FBI. Gibbs asks where the FBI are and she admits they told her to call when she was close. He stands up and she asks what his problem is, is it because she's a woman, works for CGIS or because she got the drop on him. He says, none - it's because he doesn't know her. And that's Gibbs, he doesn't share easily, even with fellow agencies, until he knows them.

Down in Autopsy Ducky is quoting Bleak House to Jimmy about the body. Jimmy admits he prefers Treasure Island, which Ducky admits to liking too. Jimmy goes on to say how he used to bounce on his bed and pretend to be Jack Hawkins. Ducky asks if that was when he was ten or eight and Jimmy confesses to being twenty-three. Ducky blinks and then says: "The boy's story, the best ever told." Gibbs walks in at that moment and knows Ducky is quoting Dickens and asks what Jensen's story is. Ducky admits it's a bit of a mystery and not all dead bodies tell him their tales. Gibbs asks how he died and Jimmy chips in with being shanked by a screwdriver didn't help, which of course earns him looks by both Gibbs and Ducky. He says sorry, and Gibbs returns his full attention to Ducky. In short Jensen drowned; Gibbs comments that the master diver drowned whilst trying to swim ashore. And that was the first little twitch for me that maybe, just maybe, this wasn't Jensen, because Gibbs had made a big point of 'reminding' us that Jensen was a master diver. Ducky adds that Jensen was injured and everyone meets their match. He tells Gibbs that Abby has Jensen's things but also warns him to tread softly as Abby isn't herself. A lovely scene with lots of long looks and closeness between Gibbs and Ducky.

Abby is frantically hitting keys on a laptop and trying to get in, but she keeps coming up against a block. By the time Gibbs arrives she is frantically shaking the laptop and finally hits her head on it. She asks Gibbs what he's doing there and he tells her he works there - nice one, Gibbs. She knows that but as she hasn't got anything, she can't get into Jensen's laptop, he shouldn't be there. She can tell him Jensen still had nitrate in his tanks, hence he had no reason to drown, but she was still processing the small rubber things. She says she's off her game; Gibbs gives her a Caf-Pow! and hopes it'll help, but she's already had two and they haven't. She says maybe a hug will help her get into Jensen's laptop and gets one; but it doesn't. So she says she'll just have to go on banging her head. Gibbs kisses her head and says he needs what's in there. A lovely father & daughter scene, even if Abby was a wee bit annoying. But for Gibbs/Abby fen a delight with the hug and a kiss.

Meanwhile McGee, DiNozzo and Ziva are looking at Borin's details - well DiNozzo is reading them out. Borin is 34, an ex-Marine who did a tore of duty in Iraq, has no kids and isn't married. He is comparing her to Gibbs. Ziva asks if he's obsessed with her because she reminds him of Gibbs or because she is quite attractive. He says he hadn't even noticed. Borin arrives at that moment and asks him 'noticed what'. He hastily flicks her details off the screen and says they were talking about the case. She says Gibbs is avoiding her, but she isn't going away. She asks 'what you got'. After a moment McGee and Ziva tell her; we learn that Jensen had two Purple Hearts, a spotless record and no links with Limb. The only slightly 'off' thing is that he's had a storage locker for three years, all duly paid for. Borin wants to know when CGIS will have access to the records; Ziva tells her the next day. DiNozzo asks if she has any siblings and Borin says she's an only child from a small town in Ohio - okay we get it, we get it; she's meant to be a female Gibbs. Enough already. I was bored with this part of the plot at this point.

Gibbs, Ziva, Borin and Omagi go to MTAC and they link to a lab in Quantico where CGIS have outsourced to a lab. The lab person Ms. Troy tells them Jensen's prints were found all over Limb's boat, as was his blood. They might be looking at a double homicide.

Down in the squad room Borin shows them Limb's boat. McGee asks if it had GPS, Borin said it did and it had been going round and round in the same area - clearly it was looking for something. McGee suggests that Jensen killed Limb and then jumped overboard. Gibbs asks if there are satellite photos of other boats and Borin says her team are on it. Gibbs asks what his team are on. Cue McGee and DiNozzo to hurry to their desks to tell him. DiNozzo has traced several large payments into Limb's Bank Account; McGee has recovered the phone records and has found repeated ones to a Missy Dawkins, who is coming in and he'll see her. At that second the warrant to search Jensen's lock-up comes through. Gibbs and Borin talk together; she's suggesting she and Gibbs go, but Gibbs tells DiNozzo to take Ziva and go - DiNozzo seems delighted to get out of there and scurries off to find Ziva. And by this time I was close to throwing things at the screen *g* That woman needed gagging. Gibbs asks Borin to walk him through the evidence; she says he can call her Abby; he says 'that'll never happen'. Go Gibbs!

McGee and Missy are in the conference room; he's told her Jensen is dead and then uses the word 'deceased'. She thinks it's something totally different and says 'he's deceased as well'. Talk about the 'typical' dumb blonde. She says Jensen was a fun guy, but didn't have much money and she was a runner up in a beauty competition so was used to money. But apparently Jensen had told her that when he came back from his mission, he'd have enough money to make all her dreams come true. The idea that this master diver was genuinely attracted to a woman who had no brains didn't seem likely to me.

DiNozzo and Ziva are at the lock-up and being escorted by a man in a disabled buggy. He had no idea whether Jensen was alone when he last visited; admits the cameras are broken; he and DiNozzo exchange jibes; he flirts with Ziva and then goes off. DiNozzo and Ziva go inside and find a treasure hunters trove and also charts showing the position of Limb's boat. Ziva says it looks like David Jones locker, DiNozzo corrects her to 'Davy' and says David sang with the Monkeys. Ziva asks if they were real monkeys and DiNozzo says he envies her her brain sometimes. A fun little exchange and a very believable 'Ziva-ism'.

Abby has the stuff from the lock-up in her lab when Gibbs arrives; she comments she's heard he has his own problems and then Borin appears. She offers Abby her hand and they both say 'Abby'. Borin asks Abby what she has, but Abby just ignores her and looks at Gibbs who gives her the usual 'What you got, Abbs'? So well done and so consistent with the whole series. Abby has managed to get into Jensen's laptop and the most exciting find is a load of emails to and from a Dr. Mavrey, a big local surgeon. She thought at first they were talking about sport, but then discovered that the term they kept repeating was an anagram of Calafuego, the ship Jensen was investigating. Abby then deliberately plays Borin by suggesting it might be a coincidence and Borin says she doesn't believe in them *yawns*. It appears Jensen was looking for the Calafuego and maybe found it, but needed a partner to finance the salvaging of it. It would cost a lot to get the ship up. Gibbs kisses Abby's cheek again - hah!

Gibbs and Borin go to Mavrey's house and boy what a house! He is clearly a very, very, very rich surgeon. They see his wife who tells them he's away on a doctors' charity conference, she can't reach him as he turns everything off when he travels. They ask about Jensen and if she knows him and how he's connected with Mavrey; she says she doesn't know who he is. Borin is pushy, Gibbs less so, he simply tells her to tell Mavrey they need to speak to him. They go. Borin says they should pull her in, but Gibbs says they have no grounds to do so. They'll wait; it's the smart way.

DiNozzo is looking at a list of swashbuckling films and in true DiNozzo fashion is pretending to be a pirate and lunging his sword at McGee, who isn't that impressed. Instead of looking at film and fake stuff, McGee has been digging into actual ships that have sunk. If the Calafuego really has been found it could contain an absolute fortune. Gibbs and Borin arrive back and Gibbs asks McGee for a rough guess: $250 million. Jensen needed a backer. McGee has also found out that whilst Mavrey has a huge house and a great practice and lot of patents pending, he also has a lot of law suits as something he used in his heart operations turned out to be faulty; so he actually needs money.

Vance appears to tell them he's had a call from the Attorney General; Mavrey's doctors' group never left the country; Mavrey is still there. Gibbs tells McGee to put a BOLO out, and McGee gets an instant hit: Mavrey has logged onto his own website to perform an on-line by-pass operation that for just under $20.00 people can watch - it's DiNozzo who sees that part, which he would. Gibbs and Borin go off and DiNozzo is telling McGee to 'click there'.

At the facility they ask to see Borin, but a nurse says he hasn't been there for a week. They ignore her, go to the operating area but it isn't Borin, it's a man who covers for him; he's the one about to do the operation.

Back in the squad room Ziva is showing Omagi and McGee and DiNozzo are together. McGee has found that Mavrey had booked a flight on his credit card. He hired a private jet to fly to Mariana Island in Guano, part of the US Commonwealth. Borin steps up and says she can get a CG plane to intercept and tell the pilot he could be harbouring a criminal; Gibbs seems a tad impressed by that piece of power. Then Ducky calls Gibbs.

Gibbs goes down to Autopsy and Ducky is sitting at his desk; he expresses pleasure that Gibbs is alone; Gibbs asks who he was expecting to be with him and Ducky says 'her' and says the whole building is talking about it. Then he admits to being somewhat depressed as his mother had departed to another world and then last night -

Gibbs: "You broke up with Sophie?"
Ducky (touching his bowtie): "You noticed?"

Yes, the bowties are back and Sophie has gone! Ducky admits she wanted to change him so much, he was beginning to lose his identity. Gibbs says: "Yeah, you're real protective of that." Ducky also says that as well as everything else, Sophie had put some of his mother's silver into the dishwasher - sacrilege!!!!! Bad woman, you do not do that. However, Gibbs just looks at him and finally asks him if Ducky called him down to actually tell him something. Ducky says he'd asked for Jensen's medical records to be sent over as he's taken a mould of Jensen's teeth and there is a huge overbite and Ducky is sure he suffered a seizure, he gently pushes past Gibbs and shows him how tight the jaw is. He bit right through the mouth-piece. Ducky says he must have panicked and tired to pull the mask off, but again Gibbs 'reminds' us that he's a master diver. Then Ducky says he's found evidence that Jensen had a history of hemochromatosis, hereditary in his case, which is basically the retention of iron. Ducky believes that such a thing would have precluded him from training as a diver, unless someone expunged the records. So more evidence that Jensen wasn't er. Jensen. I'm sorry they had to labour that point so much.

However, nothing can detract from the wonderfulness of that scene. So much closeness, so many looks, Ducky 'opening up' to Gibbs, getting rid of Sophie, Ducky admitting what we knew: she was trying to change him far too much and thus we get his lovely bowties back - I was very, very happy with this scene. Maybe we can also hope that Ducky isn't going to move out of Reston House now? Isn't going to sell it and buy the brownstone in Georgetown.

In Abby's lab she's looking at some results; Gibbs thinks it's Jensen's blood, but actually it's a break-down of Caf-Pow! Apparently they are thinking of changing the recipe just to save money, which explains why Abby is so twitchy. She says she's going to start a letter writing campaign and asks if Gibbs wants to help. He pulls her back to the case and she says again she found nothing when analysing Jensen's blood. And again she draws attention to the nitrox which is good in deep water, but Jensen was coming into shallow and didn't adjust. Abby comments about there being 'Something rotten in Denmark' (which is actually a slight mis-quote as it's 'State of Denmark, although it is a popular mis-quote). Please, please, please writers, we got it, okay? A long time ago: we didn't need hitting over the head with it. We got it: the body is not Jensen's because he was a master diver and this person behaved like a non-diver. McGee then arrives to say fishermen had found a punctured Zodiac near where Jensen's body had been found and CGIS intercepted the plane only to find it empty - it was a decoy. Gibbs tells DiNozzo to go and get Mrs. Mavrey and bring her in.

At the Mavrey house the door is, naturally, opened by the maid. Mrs. Mavrey is coming down the stairs and says she will help in any way. She swears she'd tell if she knew anything.

DiNozzo and Borin are with Mrs. Mavrey in interrogation. DiNozzo asks about the legal suits, Borin interrupts (slaps Borin) and points out Mrs. Mavrey could be in trouble. Mrs. Mavrey shows DiNozzo an email from Mavrey saying when he came back the law suits would all be sorted out. She says he's a good husband and a dedicated doctor and she loves him. DiNozzo wonders if she still will if she knew he killed two people; he shows her Limb and Jensen's pictures. And Borin says they can charge her as an accessory if she doesn't help them.

Back in Autopsy, Gibbs is with Ducky who has Jensen's medical records. There is no evidence of the disease. Gibbs suggests they could have been falsified.

Ducky: "Sometimes desire to serve can override better judgement."
Gibbs (smiling at Ducky): "But you don't think that, huh?"
Ducky: "No."

And he goes on to explain how he'd rung the doctor at the experimental diving unit who said he'd checked Jensen many times and there was no evidence of hemochromatosis. Yet the body has all the evidence. Ergo the body isn't Jensen's. Wow, have they only just figured that one out?

But again there were so many lovely, intimate looks during this scene. And again I like the fact that Gibbs didn't take Borin with him that time or indeed the time before, but she went pretty much everywhere else with him - but not when he went to see Ducky *g*

Gibbs and Borin want to know who is in Autopsy (How about Mavrey, maybe?). Ziva says Abby has been running the John Doe's DNA, as one Gibbs and Borin say 'any hits' (way, way, way, OTT now). But no, and without a name Ducky's dental mould is useless. Gibbs tells DiNozzo to call Metro for a list of missing people; Borin will call the FBI; Ziva is to get the security footage from the marina where Jensen and Limb met and ID all the people. McGee is to get Mavrey's personal medical records.

McGee has them: unsurprisingly Mavrey had epilepsy as a boy and also a congenital liver disorder (hemochromatosis). The body Ducky has is in fact Mavrey.

Borin, with Gibbs sitting in the corner, talks to Mrs. Mavrey. They tell her that her husband is dead; she's very upset and can't believe it. She says the treasure hunting was meant to be a hobby. Gibbs asks if there's anything she wants to tell them. She says that Mavrey took money, lots and lots and lots of money out of the Corporate account because of the law suits.

Outside Gibbs, Borin and DiNozzo discuss how Mavrey hired Jensen to find the gold as he was hoping for a large payout with treasure as he was desperate. McGee appears to say Missy is there to say she bought two tickets to Mexico one for her, the other for Jensen.

Gibbs and Borin talk to her. Missy asks if she's in trouble; she tells them Jensen was going to meet her, but he never turned up. Again she'd been used, she was a decoy. She says she should have known that it wouldn't work as they had nothing in common and he was always spending time with his rich doctor friend and his wife - the same wife who said she didn't know Jensen!

Abby calls and Gibbs and Borin go down. Abby is happy as she has 'her' Caf-Pow!' back. Gibbs asks about the case. She give him a pair of latex gloves and shows him what she was doing. Basically she put acid in with the so-called old gold Spanish coins that were in the non-secure lock-up and voilà, they turned out not to be gold, but gold-plated. All the stuff in his lock-up was false. He'd been playing everyone. And of course Mrs. Mavrey lied about not knowing Jensen.

Gibbs says the real treasure was the money Mavrey took out for the law suit. He tells DiNozzo to go and search Mavrey's offices and to meet him and Borin at the Mavrey house.

In the house Mrs. Mavrey and Jensen are searching for the money, but to no avail. Gibbs, DiNozzo and Borin arrive - DiNozzo has the money, it was in Mavrey's locker. He makes reference to another film Body Heat where the wife hires the stud to kill her husband. Mrs. Mavrey tries to blame Jensen totally, he denies it. They both get cuffed and take away.

Vance thanks Borin and makes Gibbs thank her to. Vance says how good it is for sister agencies to work together and hopes NCIS and CGIS can work together again some day (not on-air, I hope). Again he makes Gibbs 'agree'.

Down in the squad room everyone else has gone and DiNozzo appears with a large bucket of popcorn and two drinks. He and Ziva are going to watch The Black Pirate together. He asks if she's ready for such a film; she says it's just a film; he says was Mickey just a mouse; she says 'yes'; he says that's why she doesn't have any friends; she says she does have friends. Then he asks her in which case why is she about to watch a film with him on a Friday night; she says he's her friend; he asks 'really?'; she says no and says her date cancelled; he admits his did too. They both drink their drink and she gazes at him with a lot of fondness. It's as if she's about to say something, but she doesn't. And clearly by the look on his face and the faint smile, DiNozzo knew/could see out of the corner of his eye, that she was looking at him. A very nice little DiNozzo/Ziva scene.

OVERALL

I enjoyed the episode far more than I'd been expecting to. I would have enjoyed it a lot more had it not been for Borin and the labouring about Jensen being a master diver. But those aside, it was nonetheless a very good episode; predictable, but good.

A case. A real, live, actual not-just-put-in-to-when-it-could-be-anyone naval case!

The Gibbs/Ducky scenes were superb; we got Ducky 'back' and all in all that was wonderful.

There were some great team scenes overall, although they were somewhat curtailed due to the constant presence of Borin and the fact she had to go everywhere with Gibbs - well apart from Autopsy.

I actually think the episode could have stood on its own two feet without the need to bring in the sub-plot of CGIS and make Borin a female Gibbs - which didn't actually work, as I love Gibbs and his idiosyncrasies, whereas all I wanted to do was to slap her.

And for once DiNozzo got his wish: the wife did 'do it', well was involved. Except, of course this time he didn't call the wife, as they thought the body was Jensen. But it was nice how happy he was to be 'right'.

Irks.

- Borin from start to finish. That's a tad unfair, actually. Had they stopped at one or two Gibbs-isms, it would have been fun and good. But as they seem so fond of doing, they totally over-did it, so it got to the stage where I really wanted to strangle her. So by the time I got to the end I'd forgotten how the first couple of times had been 'fun'. But even so I don't see why they had to repeat a sub-plot they'd used before.
- The over-labouring of 'Jensen was a master diver'. The writers seem to be 'writing down' so much and by doing so are making the characters seem dense. For Gibbs to only just 'get' it couldn't be Jensen, after he was the one to keep on reminding us Jensen was a master diver, really didn't show Gibbs in an intelligent light.
- Abby was a wee bit irritating; the Caw-Pow! sub-plot didn't really add anything. But it just confirms my comment a week or so ago that the writers don't know what to do with Abby these days. In fact at times it seems they don't know what to do with any of the characters, especially when we get an episode that focuses on a case. Because these are sadly few and far between now, it seems they've forgotten the case aspects that in this case Abby used to do.

Best scenes:

- Opening squad room scene.
- Jimmy and DiNozzo's exchange on the beach.
- The first Autopsy scene with Gibbs, Ducky and Jimmy.
- Gibbs and Ducky in Autopsy in the evening when Ducky is back in his bowtie.
- The final Gibbs and Ducky Autopsy scene when they are discussing Jensen not being Jensen.
- The final scene with DiNozzo and Ziva.

Pairing of the week:

Gibbs/Ducky

Character of the week:

Ducky, because he was 'Ducky'.

Actor/Actress of the week:

David McCallum.

Storyline:  9.25

Enjoyment: 9.25

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