Warning: The following contains spoilers from NCIS Season 19, Episode 10, “Pledge of Allegiance,” which aired Jan. 3rd on CBS.
Late last year, Mark Harmon played Special Agent Gibbs for what looked like the last time. His final appearance during the early part of Season 19 capped off a successful run that lasted over 18 seasons and 400 episodes. The hit show had been building to Gibbs’ exit for some time, but seeing him actually leave still wasn’t easy for the NCIS faithful. However, a recent episode dropped a Gibbs reference that honored the team leader’s legacy while also opening the door for a future cameo.
The build-up to Gibbs’ exit started back in Season 18 when Agents Sloane and Bishop left the show. Along the way, some of Gibbs’ questionable actions came back to haunt him, and Director Vance had no choice but to suspend his lead agent. That’s when things began to get real, and it wasn’t long before Gibbs expressed that he had no intention of trying to apologize for his actions or attempting to reclaim his job.
Everything came to a head in the Season 19 episode, “The Great Wide Open.” Gibbs and McGee traveled to Alaska to wrap up a multi-episode storyline about a serial killer. After they put a bow on the case, Gibbs dropped a bombshell on McGee — he wasn’t going back to NCIS or DC. The storied agent was going to stay in Alaska because he had finally found the peace that he had been looking for since his wife and daughter were killed years before.
And as they gave Gibbs’ job to someone else and adjusted to a new era of the show, NCIS’ writers didn’t pull and punches. They went to the trouble of putting Gibbs all of the way in Alaska, ensuring that he was written off to the fullest extent without killing him off. That made the possibility of repetitive cameo appearances impossible, but a recent episode reopened the door that Gibbs will appear again at some point.
“Pledge of Allegiance” didn’t feature a primary plot related to Gibbs, but a subtle subplot paid homage to the character’s legacy. As the episode opened, McGee was on the phone with his bank, trying to figure out where a mysterious $10,000 had come from. He didn’t find any answers, and later in the episode, the same thing happened to Jimmy Palmer. It all came together at the end of the episode when Vance called the two of them in and explained that their children had become the latest recipients of the Leroy Jethro Gibbs Scholarship Fund. It turned out that Gibbs had started a college fund for Kelly (his daughter) years before. After she was killed, he didn’t stop the fund, and ever since, he’s been quietly helping agents put their kids through school.
It was the perfect way to pay homage to Gibbs and honor his selfless legacy as someone who always did the right thing without expecting any thanks or commendations. But wasn’t the end of it. Obviously thankful for Gibbs’ generosity, Palmer hoped that he would get to thank Gibbs in person one day. Of course, that’s far from a confirmation, but it hints that a future visit from Gibbs could be in the works. After all, NCIS has had former characters make reappearances, and as a producer on the show, Mark Harmon could easily return at some point.
To see how McGee, Torres and the rest of the team continue to adjust to life without Gibbs, watch CBS’ NCIS on Monday nights, at 9 pm. ET.
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