Many actors have come and gone from NCIS over the years, but one of the people who stuck around the longest was Mark Harmon’s Leroy Jethro Gibbs. Introduced to audiences in 2003 in the JAG two-parter “Ice Queen” and “Meltdown,” which served as the backdoor pilot for NCIS, Harmon stayed on this procedural franchise’s flagship show for nearly 20 years, exiting in Season 19’s fourth episode, “Road to Nowhere,” to build a new life for himself in Alaska after having already resigned from the title agency the season prior. While it remains to be seen if Harmon will ever reprise Gibbs on NCIS (it wasn't looking good as of July 2023), fans of the character can take comfort knowing they’re not done spending time with him.
CBS announced in late 2023 that it’d given a straight-to-series order for a prequel show called NCIS: Origins. This series will follow a younger Gibbs long before the events of NCIS unfolded. Fortunately, there are various other details that have been unveiled, so let’s go over what we know so far about Origins.
What Is The NCIS: Origins Premiere Date?
Although NCIS: Origins doesn’t have a specific release date yet, when the prequel was announced, CBS said it was in development for the 2024-2025 TV season. That leaves one of two options on when it might premiere. One, it’ll be among the channel’s programming dropping in September, October or November of 2024, or two, it will be saved as a midseason show for sometime in 2025. If it’s the former, then assuming it’s initially scored a standard 13-episode order and ends up being well received among the public, there’s a good chance Origins’ inaugural season could be extended to around 20-24 episodes.
The Story Will Follow Gibbs In 1991
NCIS flashed back to Gibbs’ teen and Marine years a handful of times over the years (more on that later), and let’s not forget about Season 8’s “Baltimore,” where Mark Harmon played a younger Gibbs meeting Michael Weatherly’s Tony DiNozzo for the first time in flashbacks. NCIS: Origins, however, will take place at the start of Gibbs’ law enforcement career in 1991.
This is the same year that Gibbs’ first wife, Shannon, and their daughter Kelly were killed by the drug dealer Pedro Hernandez, because Shannon witnessed Hernandez murdering a Marine at Camp Pendleton. They were murdered in February, and after Gibbs sought Hernandez out and assassinated him, he joined the Naval Investigative Service (as NCIS was known back then) the following August. So that leaves a 12-year gap between when this show starts and when it will catch up with the beginning of NCIS.
Mark Harmon Is Narrating And Executive Producing
Although we won’t see Mark Harmon’s face in NCIS: Origins (or at least, that isn’t the plan for now), his presence will definitely be felt in the new show. Most notably, Harmon is narrating the prequel, so envision the present-day Gibbs recounting his early law enforcement days either to himself or an unseen audience.
Austin Stowell Is Playing Young Leroy Jethro Gibbs
When NCIS: Origins was announced, Sean Harmon, Mark Harmon's son, ruled out playing a young Leroy Jethro Gibbs on the show after previous stints as the character on NCIS. We'll discuss later why he made this decision, but taking his place will be Austin Stowell, whose credits include A Friend of the Family and The Hating Game. Now we wait to see how the actor will be made up to look closer to how Mark Harmon looked in the early '90s.
Mike Franks And Vera Strickland Will Also Be Main Characters
Muse Watson recurred in NCIS across Seasons 3 through 8 as Mike Franks, Gibbs’ mentor and former partner who recruited him into NIS/NCIS. Even after being killed by the Port-to-Port Killer, he continued to appear as a figment of Gibbs’ imagination every now and then through to Season 15. Now we’ll get to see how Gibbs and Franks’ early days together went down, as Six’s Kyle Schmid has been cast as the younger Franks. The character is described by TV Line at this stage of his life as a “a proud Texan who all but showers in his cowboy boots and sports a perfectly coiffed mustache that’s as thick as his skin.”
Longtime NCIS fans will also recall that back in the Season 11 episode “Under the Radar,” we met Vera Strickland, Franks’ former partner who was played by Roma Maffia. In NCIS: Origins, the character will be played by Diany Rodriguez from The Blacklist. She’s described as “a no-nonsense, sharp-witted Brooklynite who’s tough as nails and never minces words” by Deadline, and who finds herself continually having to deal with “misogynistic morons.” It sounds like she’ll be part of the ragtag team being led by Franks that Gibbs joins.
Two New Characters Round Out NCIS: Origins’ Main Cast
In addition to the above established characters getting additional screen time, NCIS: Origins will also spotlight two new characters in its main cast. The first is The Watchful Eye’s Mariel Molino as Special Agent Lala Dominguez, whom Deadline says is “a former Marine who navigates her 1990s male-dominated field with a steely resolve and a dark sense of humor.” Evidently she and Stowell’s Gibbs will form a special kind of relationship, because the story that unfolds between them “is filled with sparks and turns that will keep the audience guessing.” Given his wife and daughter’s recent deaths, though, it seems likely romance will bloom between the two immediately.
Then there’s The Chi’s Tyla Abercrumbie, who’s been cast as Field Operation Support Officer Mary Jo. She won’t be part of Origins’ field team, but she is said by Deadline to be the “lifeblood of the Camp Pendleton office” and has dubbed herself the “HSIC,” the Head Secretary in Charge. So when Gibbs, Franks and the others are back at the office, count on seeing her a lot, and maybe there will be some opportunities for her to join the other agents directly on missions.
Sean Harmon Is Executive Producing Alongside His Father
We won’t be seeing Sean Harmon onscreen in NCIS: Origins, but like Mark Harmon, he’ll be an executive producer on the prequel. In fact, he specifically said in the official announcement that he’s not playing Gibbs because he wants to focus on his behind-the-scenes duties. The Harmon men will executive produce alongside Gina Lucita Monreal and David J. North, who will be the co-showrunners.
There’s still a lot left to be revealed about what we can expect from NCIS: Origins, so keep your eyes peeled here for more updates. You’re also welcome to stream NCIS and its other spinoffs (Los Angeles, New Orleans, Hawai’i and Sydney) with a Paramount+ subscription, or see what shows, both new and returning, already have premiere dates set this year with our 2024 TV schedule.
