NCIS has been one of the most popular series on television for almost two decades.
The show couldn’t have maintained such a long and successful run if it was just another case of the week procedural series. It worked for Law & Order, but when it comes to the rest of the shows in the genre, they need much more to keep fans interested.
What NCIS offers are characters that viewers fall in love with. Along the way, many characters have come and gone that fans have hated.
There are also the personal relationships between the characters, both those that moved on to romantic pairings and those that only hinted at something stronger.
These have been part of the NCIS story since Season 1, and while fans loved many of the relationships, some big ones never had a chance to survive.
Luckily, there were also those that stood the test of time.
10. Never had a chance: Bishop and Jake
When Ziva and Tony left NCIS, it seemed like no one could replace them in the cast. That turned out to be far from the truth.
Not only did fans accept Nick and Bishop, but they embraced them and began shipping the two from the moment they joined the team.
The problem is that Bishop was married. That ended up being an even bigger reason to ship Nick and Bishop because no one liked her husband, Jake. The marriage wouldn’t last anyway.
Not only were there too many secrets between them, with both government agents, but Jake cheated on Bishop and that ended things for good.
9. Meant to Be: Jimmy and Breena
While Bishop and Jake’s relationship ended due to their careers forcing them to keep secrets, which eventually led to Jake cheating, Jimmy and Breena don’t have those problems.
Jimmy has grown into one of the most likable characters on NCIS and seems to be the one with the purest heart. He deserves love and he seems to have it with Breena.
The two have been married for seven years and are very cute together.
Of course, as NCIS has shown more than once, the career of an NCIS agent is not always the best for a married couple, so here is hoping that their relationship can maintain his always-busy schedule.
8. Never had a chance: Tony and Jeanne
For a while, it seemed that Jeanne was the best thing that ever happened to Tony. While fans wanted desperately for Tony and Ziva to hook up, it looked like he found his perfect partner in Jeanne.
There was only one problem.
Tony was dating Jeanne as an undercover operation to get closer to her estranged father, the arms dealer known as La Grenouille. While these two seemed perfect together, and it seemed like Tony was finally falling in love for real, everything fell apart when the undercover operation exploded.
When Tony told her that he only dated her as part of the job and didn’t love her, he was likely lying, but this was an NCIS relationship that was never meant to be.
7. Meant to Be: Fornell and Diane
None of Gibbs’ relationships, outside of the marriage that ended with his wife and daughter’s deaths, were ever meant to be. That included his marriage to Diane.
However, when Diane married FBI agent Fornell, it seemed she had finally met her perfect partner.
The two ended up divorcing, giving Fornell and Gibbs an awkward thing in common, but there was one other thing that the two didn’t have in common.
Fornell and Diane never really stopped loving each other. When she died, it sent Fornell over the edge, and he has still never really recovered from losing the woman he loved.
6. Never had a chance: Tony and Caitlin
Tony and Caitlin was the pairing that fans wished for instantly in the first season.
The banter between the two was cute, and it always seemed something was bubbling beneath the surface. However, it was never meant to be.
Tony and Caitlin were more like a brother and sister, with their incessant bickering and one-upmanship, and that was even more prevalent when Timothy joined the team, and they ganged up to torment him.
That didn’t stop the shipping from fans, and the only thing that finally ended the speculation was when Caitlin died at the end of the second season of NCIS.
5. Meant to Be: Vance and Jackie
One of the most depressing moments in NCIS history came when Director Vance and his wife Jackie shared dinner with Ziva and her father.
A gunman drove by the house and opened fire, killing Ziva’s dad and Vance’s wife. It was a hit on Eli David, but the tragedy was Jackie getting caught in the crossfire.
There have been many deaths on NCIS over the years, but this one seemed the most senseless. Vance and Jackie had a great relationship and a family with kids. This was just something the show did to torture and torment the characters, and it ended one of the best relationships any character had on the show.
4. Never had a chance: Timothy and Abby
If Tony and Caitlin were more like a brother and sister than a romantic possibility, that is even more true for Timothy and Abby. These two were the closest of friends.
That is why their romantic pairing in Season 1 could never work.
Yes, at the time, no one knew much about McGee, and he ended up in a hot relationship with Abby for a short time. However, in Season 2, things cooled off. Their dating was not mentioned, and while there was still flirting between them, they eventually stopped anything other than being best friends.
3. Meant to Be: Timothy and Delilah
While Timothy and Abby were never meant to be and Abby never did find anyone to share her life with, McGee ended up in the best place.
Timothy met and began dating Delilah.
Just like all other relationships on NCIS, this one looked like it was headed for a tragic end when a terrorist attack left Delilah in the hospital, on the verge of death. She ended up in a wheelchair.
However, their love was too strong to end with that injury. The two married and have since had twins, and have the best marriage on the show.
2. Never had a chance: Gibbs and Jenny
The biggest mistake in the early seasons of NCIS was to have Gibbs and his NCIS Director Shepard as a former couple.
It was fun to see their awkwardness while working together, but it hurt Jenny’s character as the show wore on. She needed to be a strong leader and ended up as two things — a woman with a grudge against the man she blamed for her father’s death and Gibbs’s ex.
By the time she finished her storyline concerning her father’s death, all that was left was her past relationship with Gibbs. No female character should be defined by that. Jenny’s death on NCIS was tragic, but it helped send her out in a blaze of glory, proving she was more than just someone from Gibbs’s past.
1. Meant To Be: Tony and Ziva
The one relationship on NCIS that was always meant to be, even with so many detours along the way, was Tony and Ziva.
They met and there was an instant connection. However, it was flirty and had more for shippers than anyone in the early years. Both dated other people and those relationships never worked onscreen or with the fans.
Everyone wanted Tony and Ziva together.
They finally got that moment, but it was fleeting when Ziva left, and then died.
By the time Ziva returned, proving to have survived and gone into hiding, Tony was gone from the show. However, while she was gone, fans learned she and Tony had a daughter, and the last anyone saw of Ziva, she was leaving to rejoin Tony and their daughter and hopefully live happily ever after.