Uh-oh — might Parker’s (Gary Cole) attempt to get revenge for his long-time nemesis, mob boss Carla (Rebecca De Mornay), killing his father lead to his own death in NCIS Season 23?! TV Insider can exclusively reveal the trailer and key art for the new episodes, and the lead agent is in some serious trouble.
What better way to celebrate NCIS Day — the series launched on September 23, 2003 — than with this new look at what’s coming up on the CBS drama? There do appear to be glimpses at some of the regular cases-of-the-week — the show’s “bread and butter,” which will never go away, executive producer Steven D. Binder told us as part of our Fall Preview — but the focus is on Parker after his father’s murder when the series returns on Tuesday, October 14.
We relive Parker finding his father dead and realizing who was responsible in flashbacks as, in the present Vance (Rocky Carroll) visits him — in a jail cell! “You’re not angry at me. I gave you space, gave you time,” the director says. “I gave you cover.” Parker insists, “I’m trying to make things right.”
As Parker goes rogue to find Carla, “we’re going to see him revert to the Parker that we alluded to in his teen years,” Binder told us. “We will see him as a teen in flashbacks. He was a rough kid — in juvie homes, in trouble, arrested all the time, breaking the rules, not caring about who was between him when he wanted to go from A to B — and he’s going to revert back to that because he is pissed.”
He and Vance will be in direct conflict, and while in the past, the director has helped out the team in situations like this, that won’t be the case here. “We’ve often played where it’s Director Vance telling his team they need to get back in the box and sit down and then he goes, wink, wink, nudge, nudge. Then he leaves the file on his desk while he leaves the office so they can look through something they need to look through,” previewed the EP. “That’s not the case this time. There will be some serious conflict between these two that will live beyond these episodes.”
The trailer, which you can watch above, also offers a look at the team working the crime scene of his father’s murder and ends on an ominous note: One of the team is in a room full of explosives! Watch it to see who it is.
The theme of the season is “NCIS on fire,” Binder said, with each character getting an arc that falls in line with that. “At various points throughout the season, they’re all going to have their explosive moments.”
What do you think of the trailer? What are your theories after it? Let us know in the comments section below.
NCIS, Season 23 Premiere, Tuesday, October 14, 8/7c, CBS
