Caroline Framke Chief TV CriticThe first episode of “NCIS” premiered in 2004 with news footage of George W. Bush boarding Air Force One transforming into a scripted scene of a fictional George W.
Bush joshing about barbecue before one of his new bodyguard mysteriously drops dead. Forty-some odd minutes of Mark Harmon being right, Sasha Alexander frowning, and countless 9/11 references later, the bad guy is caught and the gang is free to solve another 18 seasons (and counting) of weekly mysteries.
The show was an extreme product of its time, but in the grand tradition of procedurals about cops and military personnel, proved extremely malleable to fit whatever era it finds itself reflecting.
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