Warning: SPOILERS for the NCIS episode “Humbug” are forward!
This 12 months’s Christmas episode of NCIS simply completed airing on the 2024 TV schedule, with “Humbug” following together with the staff not as they have been investigating an ordinary homicide case, however moderately making an attempt to uncover the reality behind an ambush that hit a squad of U.S. troopers in Afghanistan in December 2010. However as Alden Parker, Timothy McGee, Nick Torres, Jessica Knight, Jimmy Palmer and Kasie Hines have been wanting into this thriller, they have been being overseen by Seamus Dever’s Gabriel LaRoche, the brand new NCIS Deputy Director. It was an intrusive return, to make certain, and NCIS showrunner Steven D. Binder advised CinemaBlend what’s arising subsequent for the potentially-shady character.
When LaRoche was launched in Season 22’s second episode, I’d initially assumed he was being arrange as the brand new NCIS large dangerous, particularly since Katrina Legislation advised me how the character “kicked McGee’s Spidey senses off actually exhausting.” However “Humbug” appeared to color LaRoche in additional shades of gray, so once I had the chance to talk with Binder forward of the episode’s premiere, I requested Binder if it was honest to name LaRoche an antagonist, or if it was extra sophisticated than that. He answered:
It is extra sophisticated than that. He actually is presenting as an antagonist, and as McGee digs in, he’ll even appear shadier than we thought. However though we is usually a easy present at instances, there is a complexity in that simpleness. I’d say it is a good guess that not the whole lot is because it appears with this man.
The explanation Gabriel LaRoche hadn’t been seen because the NCIS Season 22 premiere was as a result of he’d been visiting each NCIS workplace all over the world, however McGee’s suspicions in regards to the man by no means diminished throughout his time away. Upon LaRoche’s return to Washington D.C. in “Humbug”, Director Leon Vance assigned him to oversee the staff wanting into Lieutenant Merritt Hastings, who was being accused in a soon-to-be-published tell-all ebook of negligence in the course of the 2010 assault. Lengthy story brief, Hastings was cleared of any wrongdoing, so the veterans medical invoice he was advocating for that’s up for a vote subsequent 12 months wouldn’t be adversely affected.
So far as LaRoche goes, although, it was clear his strategies didn’t jive with the way in which our fundamental characters often do issues, and so they didn’t like him hovering round them. And but, in direction of the tip of the episode, LaRoche took the blame for them after they continued to research the case even after it was handed off to JAG. It was a stunning, but welcome gesture, however then, throughout a televised press convention, he stated that, “Daring, decisive management will outline the subsequent chapter of NCIS.” In order that was greater than sufficient for me to marvel what’s subsequent for this enigmatic character, and right here’s what Steve D. Binder stated in regards to the occasions about this episode and what’s arising:
So he is gonna be getting up in everyone’s enterprise, for certain. And the query is, what are the motives? And that is what McGee is suspicious about. The subsequent largest chapter is… within the Christmas episode that is gonna be arising, Laroche is gonna be working straight with the staff and we’re gonna get a way of his MO. After which popping out of that, McGee is gonna be much more suspicious of LaRoche. And when he reappears once more, it is going to be in a state of affairs the place there’s some jeopardy. The only model is McGee needs nothing greater than to take this man out and circumstances may require him to do it.
With solely two appearances logged in, it’s exhausting to get a learn on Gabriel LaRoche, however going off what Binder advised me, we evidently shouldn’t view him as a simple dangerous man. That’s to not say LaRoche is solely man both, as McGee believes he’s making strikes for himself, and his self-interest could find yourself posing issues for the staff. Maybe that’s what leads McGee to start out planning to “take this man out,” although what precisely that may entail is a thriller.
We’ll begin getting extra solutions as soon as NCIS resumes its twenty second season January 27 on the 2025 TV schedule. Within the meantime, revisit previous NCIS episodes, or any of the opposite exhibits within the procedural franchise, by streaming them with a Paramount+ subscription.