S01.E08: Blonde Ambition

[AnimeMania]

(Season Finale)

When JD’s (Todd Lasance) son is kidnapped by an international assassin in exchange for a wanted criminal in NCIS custody, the team frantically tries to get his son back safely without trading in a criminal.

Premiere Date: Tuesday, January 23, 2024         CBS     8pm   

Henry McWilliam as Jack
Kate Jenkinson as Rebecca
Georgie Payne as Liv
Cassie Howarth as Alison
Deepka Ratra as Paramedic [Michaela]
Paul Jenkins as Dead Clown
Arky Michael as Russian Orthodox Priest
Marina Zivkovic as Yelena
Matthew Holmes as FBI Special Agent Cummins

[Raja]

Well that's over. From the set up of having a team reading to kidnap a cop's son and in this case a random sergeant would actually have power to fulfill your ransom demand was goofy. Then we have a terrorist/free lance spy issuing last rites for another terrorist, or free agent who is being run by an American spy to kill her co worker. And now we wait to see if CBS will commission more episodes with hopefully no more lockout holes in the production schedules to fill.

Just some random thoughts. The CGI explosion without and shrapnel coming off of the van has bugged me since the industry switched from practical effects. The clean FBI team with a full Special Agent in Charge to pick up their high value target brought me back to the old British Airlines commercial "he'll be hungry and tired"  after that 11 to 24 hour flight. They had to have one of those Criminal Minds private jets for their Con Air flight. It seems as Sydney cashiers are no different than Manhattan ones when a detective comes around.

[jabRI]

I want to like this show, but I think it would be better if they stayed with the more recent NCIS formula of domestic COW rather than far flung conspiracy arcs.  Just my opinion, but it seems to be on so sporadically it's hard to follow these long trails of breadcrumbs.  I forgot who the 'blond' was weeks ago.

[Trey]

 I liked this 8 episode series well enough, at least partly because it was new programming, but I don't know if I like it well enough to watch if it gets picked up for a full season - probably depends on what is on at the same time.

Edited January 24 by Trey

[Raja]

5 minutes ago, jabRI said:

I want to like this show, but I think it would be better if they stayed with the more recent NCIS formula of domestic COW rather than far flung conspiracy arcs.  Just my opinion, but it seems to be on so sporadically it's hard to follow these long trails of breadcrumbs.  I forgot who the 'blond' was weeks ago.

I haven't been back to the mothership, except for the crossovers lately. But didn't they have one of these case of the week versus arc mix problems to write Gibbs out?  I dropped New Orleans, except for the occasional episode when its grand conspiracies got in the way. And I am watching Hawai'i make a rapid changed into the NCIS, and genre conspiracy thing by the end of its second season.

The case of the week with the grand arc to keep you coming back has always been a hard mix. Just dropping it in for the finale in a short 8 episode run with an out of nowhere Mission Impossible mask wearing asset being run  by a bent US spy master just didn't do it. And with a FBI team handily around for a high value target to take home not so empty handed we are left really nowhere to go for a small team in a friendly foreign city to run with.

 

[blackwing]

I thought this was an exciting episode.  I know that this show has done well for CBS but some of it is because there was nothing else original on.  I hope it has done well enough to get a full pickup for next fall.  They can't leave things on a cliffhanger and I think crossover episodes (at least with Hawaii) would be great.

It does seem like Dempsey will face discipline for absconding with the suspect and then she got away.  But Mackey's boss Rankin, the guy stationed in Sydney, is corrupt and working with this international criminal gang.

Todd Lasance was great in this episode, we finally got some character development for JD.