So who's taking over Kate again?

Kate in the S&M gear.

Tony's Kate flashback.

Really good season opener, can't wait for part two.

I still can't believe that Sasha Alexander left the show. She had such great chemistry w/ the rest of the cast.

Tony's flashback was the best! damn them panties

I have 2 sides of feelings about the season opener. I was sad in seeing how the immediate aftermath played out, I actually had a lump in my throat at times, but thankfully the visions of Kate to the NCIS crew on an individual basis were quite funny and allowed for some playfulness to provide some levity of her sudden passing.

When jarred me was the sudden change, literally in the middle of the evening once Jenny (Lauren Holly) shows up, and Gibbs changes in the blink of an eye from stunned NCIS leader to a horn-dog of Tony-proportions. If I didn't know any better, weeks had passed, but it was still just maybe half a day by the end of the episode since Kate was gunned down.

Now, the introduction of Ziva confuses me because if she sticks around for the season, then her allegiance to Ari feels like a double-double agent type of thing.

But, this season is off to a roaring start, and the chemistry appears to be intact for now.

This was an excellent episode I too had the lump feeling while watching this. Along with Tony's flashback McGee's matrix style was also very good I got half a stock watching this. It's not often you can say those two things while watching the same thing. I caught onto this show half way through last season and am sad that I didn't notice right away. Thank god for dual tuner dvr's. I am not entirely sure if I'm gonna like Lauren Holly though.

I do not like Director Shephard. What type of relationship does she have with the Mossad agent? What is with her and Ari?

Lots of questions and some anger, great way to start off an intruiging season.

Look out Ducky!

I can't find the article I read at the end of last season, but it seemed to me that leaving the show wasn't exactly her idea - the producers wanted someone "ethnic" because there were too many white people on the show. Cote de Pablo, who plays the new agent, is from Chile. I was kind of surprised they had her playing an Israeli.

But the other story is that Sasha Alexander asked Donald Bellisario to be written out of the show because she didn't think she could keep up with the physical demands of her role on the show. Bellisario acquiesced, but he told Sasha that he'd had to kill her off if she wanted out of the show, thus the kill-shot in last season's finale.

Yeah, that's the story I keep finding when I search now. With Hollywood, you never know. It seems unlikely that she would leave a steady gig. She's hot, but she's not exactly a household name. I wondered if that was the story they mutually agreed to make public, kind of like when a crooked CEO is about to get axed they say "He's resigning to spend more time with his family" rather than "He's busted and he'd rather quit than be fired."

When they announced they were going to kill someone off, I thought it would be either Mark Harmon, who was rich enough not to need the work and was likely to get other offers, or the newbie guy, since he's technically not a "Probie" anymore and would be kind of easy to replace. I was stunned when it was Kate, so I went looking for news stories and found a quote where one of the producers actually used the phrase "we are looking to replace her with someone ethnic". I wish I could find that again.

Still, I liked the first episode and I'll continue to watch.

Well, looking to replace her with someone ethnic at some point doesn't preclude the fact that she left on her own accord. It could have been that she asked to leave, the producers said yes, then the producers said they were going to replace her (since she was leaving) with someone ethnic.

Doing a television show, especially an hour-long, can be hard work. I could see tiring of it after a couple of years and wanting to do something else. There have been cases of others doing it from time to time (including Sherry Stringfield with ER and that guy who was the first Captain on 21 Jump Street just off the top of my head).

I think finding someone who had good chemistry w/ their co-stars would be more important than finding someone whose ethnic.

I found Ziva annoying and far too condescending.

And that's why you're not a big-time Hollywood producer.

Great start, and I'm glad they didn't just jump a few months into the future after they've dealt with Kate, and just pick up the Ari story mid-season. I'm in for the whole ride.

Yeah Fredric Forrest, Captain Jenko. I liked his character a lot--but I think the other spin was that he was getting on the producers nerves or something. Fredric Forrest? Shocking I know. The show wasn't the same without him IMO.

Got to say I'm sorry to see Sasha Alexander leave, heh still holding out hope it's a dream. If not I know she'll be in something else soon.

Not crazy about Lauren Holly in this--not crazy about Lauren Holly in general...

Was it wrong to laugh at Gerald attempts at driving Ducky's Morgan? I couldn't help it.

The resolution of the Kill Ari saga opened up more questions than it answered.

This was a good episode. I bet we will see Aris sister back something about she cant stay home because she failed or something like that. This was a good episode all around. Rather unusual flashback they used for McGee though it seemed more like something Tony would remember.

I believe she was added on as a new cast member, and had a certain number of eps scheduled. They will probably see what kind of reaction they get from her. They set her up to stay, since she did I also think the new director was signed for a limited amount of eps, but dont know if she will be a regular or not.

Lauren Holly should fire her hair stylist, her hair was all over the place.

This was better then part 1 of this story from last week.
And hopefully we are done with the talking dead Kate segments.

It was painfully obvious that Zena (or whatever her name was, I forget) was hiding in Gibbs houes and was gonna shoot Ari. I don't care for her character at all.

I'm hoping we get back to regular decent stories next week.

I think it has been a great start to the season. cant wait till this show is on dvd.

Why did this episode have to end with "talking bad guy syndrome"?

Probably because it was doing an homage to Kill Bill vol. 1 and 2.

Ziva might have come off kinda strong, but she'll be fun to watch, though she seems too overt for the spy work in her past. Having her and Gibbs make the rest of the team think there is animosity between is a bit of fun and games between them, but will Gibbs' trust be betrayed later.

Ducky has the worst luck with women he's known from his past.