“Witch Hunt” is the NCIS Halloween show aired conveniently enough on Halloween. The festivities open with Dr. Leslie Burke (Susan Diol) carving a pumpkin in the kitchen of Marine Sgt. Erik Niles (David Earnest). Sgt. Niles enters the kitchen in costume (Gen. George Custer) with a fake arrow protruding from his shoulder beneath the left collarbone, a fake hatchet buried in his right shoulder, and a real bullet wound. He collapses and the plot, clear as blood, is on its way to a simmer.Meanwhile, at headquarters, the NCIS team is variously preparing for the All Hallows celebration. Special Agent Tony DiNozzo (Michael Weatherly) is dapper in coat and tie ignoring the holiday due to its magnetism for strange criminal happenings. Mossad Agent on loan Ziva David (Cote de Pablo) flirts with DiNozzo as he educates her Middle Eastern sensibilities on the finer points of the Western pagan Tradition.
Special Agent Tim McGee (Sean Murray) is threatening to attend a roll-playing soiree as a magic elf with a Redskins cheerleader he met at an Armani store and discovered she played roll playing games on the same server as he. DiNozzo and David’s discovery of McGee’s costume and the ensuing heckling were just getting started when Jethro Gibbs (Mark Harmon) rounds up the crew for an investigation at the Niles’ residence where “Gen. Custer has been shot and has a dead skeleton in his living room.” Previously discussing Halloween with David, DiNozzo finds himself vindicated in the fear that “strange things always happen on Halloween.”
The team arrives at the residence and find Gen. Custer dispatched to the hospital and the dead skeleton on the living room floor. Back at the morgue, Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard (David McCallum) declares that the dead skeleton’s cause of death was blunt force trauma to the neck but needs Forensics Specialist Abby Sciuto (Pauley Perrette) to aid with identification, though the gothic princess is nowhere to be found. Agent Jimmy Palmer (Brian Dietzen) enters the room to announce that Abby is indeed in-house and in-costume.
DiNozzo and McGee gallop to the lab to find a brilliantly tattooed and platinum Marilyn Monroe a la The Seven-Year Itch. DiNozzo, for once, is speechless; McGee is in frozen apoplexy. Once recovered, McGee provides the fetching Abby with photos of the dead skeleton and Gibbs calls DiNozzo to let him know that the authorities have a party participant who may have seen the kidnapped and kidnapper. Gibbs wants the photos to show the wife, Laurie Niles (Katie A. Keane), accompanied by her sister Rebecca Biddle (Cheryl White), for identification. It is during this period that the team discovers that Laurie and Erik Niles are estranged. The blood begins to pop.
Back at the crime scene, questioning the party goer, DiNozzo and McGee discover car tags from where the car allegedly containing the kidnapper and Sarah Niles ran over pumpkins whose pictures were bewitchingly transformed into a partial license plate number by the delectable Abby. The car was identified and then determined stolen. Gibbs and Ziva continue to search Laurie Nile’s house when the kidnapper calls and demands his ransom. Gibbs questions Laurie Niles who denies knowing the dead man, but does so doth protesting too much.
Gibbs is suspicious that Laurie is hiding something and questions her more deeply with her sister outside the room. He questions why her husband has moved out of their house and she reveals that she had a fling with an old boyfriend shortly before their marriage and the paternity of her daughter Sarah was in doubt. He husband Erik found out when the old boyfriend, Robert Miller (Scott Michael Campbell) showed up wanting a paternity test. The team locates Robert Miller and crashes his party in a major way. The car used in the kidnapping is parked outside of Miller’s house and things look very suspicious. Gibbs is notified and leaves Laurie Niles and her sister in the care of Ziva. Laurie and her sister retire to a bedroom and escape through a bedroom window. Boy is Gibbs pissed.
Back at the station, Gibbs is questioning Robert Miller and discovers he had nothing to do with Sarah Niles’ disappearance. Ducky reasons with Ziva that Laurie may be trying to protect Sarah for some reason. During Miller’s interrogation, Gibbs receives a phone call from Abby who has identified the dead skeleton and also found Robert Miller’s address on a burn piece of paper found in the trunk of the stolen car used to transport Sarah. The dead skeleton was found to have worked as a security guard for Kapp and Associates law firm who also happened to employ Laurie Niles as CFO. The team makes their way to the law firm and discovers Laurie and her sister under gunpoint from an unbeknownst man. He is forcing her to enter the law firm’s computer system and transfer money out. At the point of funds transfer, Gibbs shoots the kidnapper and sends Ziva and DiNozzo to find Sarah, which they ultimately do and notify Gibbs. Gibbs tells Laurie that NCIS has her daughter and Laurie proceeds to giver her “sister” actually a woman in cahoots with the kidnapper, as ass stomping rivaled only by Ziva extraction of flesh from the Iranian intelligence agent in the episode, Shalom.
Cast
Special Agent Tim McGee (Sean Murray)
Forensics Specialist Abby Sciuto (Pauley Perrette)
Special Agent Tony DiNozzo (Michael Weatherly)
Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs (Mark Harmon)
NCIS Director Jennifer "Jenny" Shepard (Lauren Holly)
Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard (David McCallum)
Mossad Agent Ziva David (Cote de Pablo)
Agent Jimmy Palmer (Brian Dietzen) Ducky’s assistant
Drew Paragon (Robert Reinis)
Marine Sgt. Erik Niles (David Earnest)
Kelly Gibbs (Mary Matilyn Mouser)
Sarah Niles (Kali Majors)
Laurie Niles (Katie A. Keane)
Martin Jansen (Graham Shiels)
Dr. Leslie Burke (Susan Diol)
Augie Breen (Garikayi Mutambirwa)
Robert Miller (Scott Michael Campbell)
Rebecca Biddle (Cheryl White)
This review was first published in Blogcritics.org
© Copyright, C. Michael Bailey, 2006
