NCIS: Origins Can Finally Reveal When Gibbs Reall Met Fornell

NCIS’ 1000th episode revisited the show’s very first case, and while everyone in MCRT who directly worked on that case was no longer with the team, it was also how the show brought back Joe Spano’s Tobias Fornell. Like Gibbs’ inaugural team, Fornell was introduced in “Yankee White” as the FBI officer who butt heads with Harmon’s character over jurisdiction. Their encounter aboard the grounded Air Force One was supposedly the first time they crossed paths, so it was confusing when it was later revealed that they had a history, as Fornell married Gibbs’ second wife.

Since this all happened before the events of NCIS, NCIS: Origins is perfectly positioned to finally settle this confusion involving Fornell and Gibbs’ friendship history. Like young Gibbs’ recasting, the show can bring in someone to play a young version of Fornell and reveal how they really met. The flagship series never got the chance to address this matter, considering everything else that was happening on the show during the time that Harmon was still a regular on the project. Now, CBS has the chance to retroactively fix its plot inconsistency.