NCIS returns for Season 18 with a storyline that seems to have ties to past episodes of the show.
In particular, it appears that the Season 18 premiere is going to link back to what happened to Fornell’s daughter on NCIS.
Having a new episode of the show that references past events is familiar territory, but it also necessitates a few reminders about what has taken place with the NCIS cast.
For this particular storyline, we may need to travel back to the Season 16 finale to get to the bottom of it.
What happened to Fornell’s daughter on NCIS Season 16 finale?
Tobias Fornell (played by actor Joe Spano) used to be married to the ex-wife of Leroy Jethro Gibbs (Mark Harmon). That led to an odd relationship between the two men at first, but they have become great friends over the years.
The ex-wife, in this case, was Diane Sterling (Melinda McGraw), who had a daughter with Fornell. That daughter is Emily Fornell, who was first played by actress Payton Spencer and later Juliette Angelo.
During the Season 16 finale, Emily suffered an overdose and it looked like she might not survive. Fornell needed Gibbs’ help to get to the bottom of the case, and Emily did end up surviving. An even more memorable moment of the show came when Gibbs saw a vision of his ex-wife (she died on the show) right before Ziva David (Cote de Pablo) re-joined the show to save his life.
Season 17 served to build upon the foundation of Emily’s overdose and turned into a very personal season for Gibbs. He formed an emotional tie with the boy living next door, but it turned out that the boy’s mother was a killer on the hunt for Ziva and himself.
Season 18, Episode 1 of NCIS
Sturgeon Season is the name of the fall 2020 premiere for NCIS. In the synopsis for the new episode, everything is directly tied back to Emily Fornell’s overdose and how Gibbs and Tobias are not done with the investigation.
“Gibbs and Fornell (Joe Spano) attempt to track down the leader of a drug ring who supplied drugs to Fornell’s daughter. Also, the team deals with the case of a missing cadaver from the NCIS autopsy room, on the 18th season premiere of NCIS.”
It appears that the early writing for Season 18 is again going to have emotional ties to some of the main characters and that Gibbs is going to be doing some more off-the-books type of work to help out his friend.
We see you @SeanHMurray! Wishing you a very happy birthday. #NCIS pic.twitter.com/IvDsLQYYGw
— NCIS (@NCIS_CBS) November 15, 2020
The Season 18 premiere of NCIS airs on Tuesday, November 17, and serves as a lead-in to the new seasons of FBI and FBI: Most Wanted on CBS.
NCIS airs Tuesday nights at 8/7c on CBS.