‘NCIS’ Shocker As Veteran Cast Member Exits In Series’ 500th Episode

SPOILER ALERT: This put up accommodates particulars concerning the NCIS 500th episode that aired on Tuesday, March 24.

NCIS celebrated a milestone on CBS, airing its 500th episode, and it killed off one of many beloved characters from the long-running navy police procedural.

The newest episode of the sequence noticed Rocky Carroll‘s Director Leon Vance defend the NCIS group because the company was shut down by the Department of Defense. Leon was in a position to restore NCIS, however the twist that shocked viewers was when he was shot to dying by a corrupt agent.

In an interview with TVLine, Carroll clarified that he “was not the catalyst for this happening,” including, “I also don’t think at the beginning of the season that it was planned.”

Carroll joined the present in Season 5 in a recurring position earlier than getting bumped to sequence common in Season 6. The actor famous that the episode was shot on the finish of November and starting of December, and he came upon his character was dying “two episodes before we shot it.”

The concept to kill off Director Vance got here from government producer Steven D. Binder, who ran the concept by Carroll, telling him they needed to ship “shockwaves through the TV community and the fan base” with the landmark episode.

From a viewer’s perspective, Carroll shortly mentioned it was “a great story,” however mentioned that “The only thing that surprised me more than being told what the story was and how it was going to impact my character was how quickly I was able to kind of come to terms with it.”

Carroll had been enjoying the character for 18 seasons and by no means imagined he can be on the present for so long as he was.

“I would have loved to have been one of the characters who was there for the very last episode, when they board up the windows, and when they officially do say, ‘All right, it’s time for everybody to turn off the lights and go home.’ You’d like to be one of the last men standing,” he added. “But after 18 seasons, I couldn’t have asked for more.”

Carroll mentioned that he felt his “character really kind of came full circle,” and in accordance with Binder, the 500th episode was “a tribute and a love letter” to his character, which can now dwell in TV historical past.