NCIS - The Wall - Review: “Hero”

NCIS - The Wall - Review: “Hero”

14.19 - “The Wall”
Directed by Bethany Rooney
Written by Gina Lucita Monreal
Reviewed by Kelly Anne Blount

“The Wall” starts with a group of Veterans visiting a museum exhibit featuring the history of the Navy. Ooh! Bruce McGill is in this episode! I LOVED him in Rizzoli & Isles! He is less than thrilled to be at the museum and wants to leave, but a Marine in uniform stops him. As he’s convincing Henry Rogers (Bruce McGill’s character) to stay, he starts to cough and falls over in the middle of the street. Things do not look good for that young man!

Over at NCIS HQ, Bishop admits to McGee that she failed to get Gibbs to eat a tofu steak and that she owes everyone drinks. That. Is. Hilarious. Points to the writers. McGee wants to know where McGee and Torres are, as they aren’t at work yet.

McGee says he has MAJOR news! Ooh! NO WAY! McGee has gossip that Torres and Quinn hooked up while Quinn was an instructor and Torres was a student. NO WAY! Bishop is joking around about Torres in right jeans right when Gibbs walks by her desk. He tells her to fantasize on her own time. Ha ha!

Gibbs breaks up the gossip and tells them that they have a dead Marine. He tells them to call Quinn and “Tight Jeans.” And, I’m done! Ha ha! The Gibbs deadpan is the best!

Quinn and Torres interview people standing outside of the museum while McGee and Bishop do the same. Bishop and McGee are looking for any little sign of hook up evidence between Quinn and Torres.

One of the organizers of a charity that transports Veterans to and from their respective memorials shares that the group here today all fought in Vietnam. She says that Henry Rogers wasn’t interested in hanging out with the rest of the group and that the Marine who passed away was his escort to the event.

Ducky tells Gibbs that the young Marine appears to have had a heart attack. Per eye witnesses, Corporal Beck, the deceased Marine, was foaming at the mouth when he died. Ducky thinks there’s more to his death.

Gibbs and Torres join McGee to interview Henry Rogers. Rogers is not interested, but Gibbs tells him a fellow serviceman needs his help and he reluctantly agrees.

Ducky was right! He found a microscopic dart wound. Abby joins them and shares what she has found. Beck was poisoned with botulinum toxin, the most poisonous natural toxin in the world. She said that people are selling this toxin and the weapons used to carry and shoot the toxin on the dark web. According to Abby, “There’s no way to trace who’s buying them.”

Bishop pulls in McGee. She has more gossip about Torres and Quinn. She says there definitely was a fling and it started after a night of karaoke.

The team discusses Andrew Beck’s past. He is squeaky clean. Beck’s girlfriend reported that someone called the morning of Beck’s death. Beck’s girlfriend gave him Beck’s whereabouts, which allowed the killer to hunt him down and fire the poisonous toxin dart at him.

They can’t pinpoint the exact time of death and Beck was in and out of crowds at the museum all morning. Their best bet is to talk to Henry Rogers, as he was by Beck’s side all day long. This sound be interesting! Even Gibbs calls him, “a handful.”

Ha ha! Henry calls Torres “Sparky” and says he has nothing in common with Mr. Rogers, “that sweater wearing pacifist.”

He finally agrees to help, when Bishop reminds him that Beck flew all the way to Nebraska to escort him to and from the museum and the Vietnam Memorial. He instantly softens. They ask Henry if he saw anything suspicious or anyone that could have shot a dart at Beck. He says that there was a “fancy coffee nut.” She bumped into Beck and spilled her coffee on him. She was definitely close enough to inject him with the poison.

MI-6 wants Clayton Reeves back. Vance says it’s not happening and Reeves is to continue his international investigations. Reeves wants another “high risk” project. Until then, he wants “temporary solo” work. Uh oh! Gibbs gives Reeves a task… It’s escorting Henry Rogers to the Vietnam Memorial for the day. Reeves agrees to take him there and “wherever else he wants to go.” Rogers has been deemed a “flight risk,” and he’s too important of a witness to let him leave.

Reeves has Rogers in his car and they are heading to the Vietnam Memorial. Rogers doesn’t want to go. He’s giving Reeves a hard time. Without warning, Rogers bails out of Reeves car, to which Reeves responds, “Bloody hell!”

Quinn and Torres are at the coffee shop where the woman spilled her coffee on Beck. Quinn asks Torres if he’s noticed anything strange about Bishop and McGee lately. He thinks they’re just being weird. They question the barista, who isn’t overly helpful.

Turns out she didn’t have anything to do with Beck’s murder, per Abby. She says that the dart had to have been injected after they got their coffee and walked outside in the rain. The dart has traces of rain water with the same pollutants that were in the rainstorm.

McGee has something! Corporal Beck volunteers in multiple places. Turns out someone called a hotline that he volunteered at and those calls and the data were hacked and erased. Did Corporal Beck take a call from the killer? Was he killed for knowing too much?

Ooh! McGee found something! He found Torres singing karaoke, which allegedly led to Quinn falling for him. McGee agrees to confront Torres. That should go well, said no one ever!

Gibbs wants an update. Beck volunteered at Metro Ties Crisis Center. They received 17 calls the last night Beck volunteered there, but the calls were wirelessly erased from a cable company’s tech support in Florida. There are over thirty people working at tech support that night, so there are a lot of potential suspects.

Gibbs sends Bishop to the call center to figure out what happened. She asks if she can bring Quinn. Interesting! I have a feeling the hookup never happened. I want it to be true, but I feel like they’re getting us excited for a big let down or some type of misunderstanding, what do you think?

Uh oh! Reeves calls Gibbs and says that there has been a problem. Gibbs walks into one of the conference rooms or the “table room” as Rogers refers to it as, only to find Rogers handcuffed to his chair. Gibbs tells both of them to “quit their whining” and to “work it out.” Aw, Gibbs! You are my favorite!

Bishop is staring at the back of Quinn’s head. She’s trying to ID Quinn from the karaoke bar. Bishop finally confronts Quinn about the alleged hook up. Quinn denies it. I don’t know what to believe at this point?

The manager of the call center gives Bishop and Quinn the phone numbers of the three callers Beck took the last night he volunteered there. One of the calls is suspicious. It lasted 48 minutes and came in from an unknown number.

Reeves pulls out a cot in front of Roger’s hotel door. Reeves isn’t letting Rogers slip past him tonight. Turns out Rogers is a war hero. He is really torn up about Beck’s death, even though he doesn’t want to admit it. Rogers points out that neither he nor Reeves have anyone special in their lives. That is sad. Wonder if tonight will prompt them to reach out to friends and/or loved ones? Maybe Reeves will lean on Bishop for support?

Aw, Abby! She is making something in her lab. She says that Rogers, “filled her heart with so much joy.” She calls him a, “handful of joy.” She is upset that he had to face so much negative feedback when he came home from Vietnam. In order to make him feel better, she’s making him a welcome mat because she wants him to “feel welcome, every time he steps through his door.” She also wants to volunteer to be an escort for the honor flights, like Beck. Abby, like Gibbs, is also the best!

Abby found out that the private call to Beck at the crisis center, “came from a landline belonging to Maya Davis.”

Gibbs and Torres find Maya Davis deceased in her car. It appears that she wrote the word, “form,” on an envelope before passing away.

Ducky confirms that the same kind of dart that was used on Beck, was also used on Maya Davis. Gibbs tells Ducky that they need to find out what Maya called Beck about that night at the crisis hotline center. I agree!

Quinn and Bishop update Gibbs on Maya Davis’ life. They don’t have much info to share. She had an intense ex-boyfriend, which caused her to change her number to an unlisted number. The ex is living in New Zealand. Gibbs points out that he could have paid someone to “do his dirty work.” Interesting! Bishop thinks that Maya Davis may have been injected in her home.

Vance has new orders for Reeves, who left Rogers to get a heating pack from Abby. When he returns with the heating pack and Abby’s welcome mat, Rogers is gone! Ha ha! He left him a note that says, “My back is fine, SUCKER!”

Back at Maya’s apartment, McGee and Quinn haven’t found anything suspicious, other than a prescription bottle with something that looks like pencil shavings in it. Torres comments that he likes the name, “Maya.” McGee turns it around and says, “Speaking of women and names, you and Quinn ever have anything?” He’s so awkward! Ha ha! Torres denies it, but says that he’s okay with that rumor making its way around.

Dale Gruber, the building manager, knocks on Maya’s door. He asks Torres and McGee if they already hauled away Maya’s car and he points out that he was away all weekend at a snake owner’s convention. Is this a massive clue? Is he the killer? Google botulinum toxins and snake.

Gruber says that Maya used to take a long walk every morning. He asks the guys to keep an eye out for his boa constrictor, which has been missing since Friday. Yikes!

Reeves shows up at Gibbs’ place. I wonder if Rogers is there. He isn’t, but Gibbs’ tells Reeves that he’s got good instincts and that he needs to use them.

Aw, Henry Reeves is at the Vietnam Memorial. He is crying as he’s making pencil rubbings of his friend’s names who were lost in the war. This scene is incredibly emotional.

Gibbs brings Reeves to the Vietnam Memorial. They are keeping an eye on Rogers as Gibbs gives Reeves some advice. Reeves doesn’t want to hear it right now. Gibbs presses on. Gibbs points out that Reeves, Rogers, and himself, are all really the same person, just a few decades apart. Reeves wants to go on all of these super dangerous missions because he doesn’t have anyone to worry about or anyone to worry about him. He also tells Reeves that he has memories of those he lost and he has memories from those he let in afterward. He has made a family of friends and loved ones. He encourages Reeves to do the same. That hit Reeves hard.

Abby is bummed that Gibbs didn’t bring Henry with him to her lab. Abby is pulling footage of cameras that caught Maya while she was on her walk the morning of her death. Maya had a lot of friends in the neighborhood and she was a “hugger,” so there were a lot of people who could have potentially injected her with the dart.

Reeves and Rogers walk through the door, to which Abby proclaims, “HENRY!” Reeves looks hurt and surprised. Abby loves Rogers and their friendship is beautiful, even though it’s brand new.

Abby found out that the pencil shavings were actually from a laminate floor with dangerously high levels of formaldehyde. If her company was selling flooring with formaldehyde levels that high, they could be putting a lot of people at risk! Ooh! Maya wrote, “form,” before her death, was she trying to write, “formaldehyde?”

Rogers spots someone in Abby’s surveillance footage of Maya’s walk! The same woman who stole a cab right in front of him at the museum is seen in the pictures from Maya’s walk.

The woman, Bridget O’Leary, is a purchasing manager at the flooring company where Maya worked. She just signed off on a purchase of 15 million dollars worth of laminate flooring from Asia. Per Quinn, “The flooring is scheduled to ship out to customers in two days.”

Maya set up a separate email address to work with a reporter on the dangerous flooring. Her spilling the company’s secrets could definitely be a motive for murder.

Quinn, Torres, and Gibbs head over to the flooring company. Bridget O’Leary runs into the warehouse and hides. This could be super dangerous if she has another dart. O’Leary screams, “HELP,” which causes a male employee to tackle Torres. Luckily, Gibbs knows right where she’s going to run and has his gun drawn on her, stopping her in her tracks.

McGee and Quinn show O’Leary their evidence. She’s in big trouble, as they can pin everything on her. She wants a lawyer.

Meanwhile, Vance has Reeves’ new assignment. If he signs on, he’ll be heading off to Syria soon. I bet Reeves changes his mind about going after his talk with Gibbs. What do you think? Well, there you go! Reeves asks Vance “for a moment to think about it.”

Bishop is showing Quinn the video of Torres singing karaoke. She denies that she was there, the back of the head of hair that looks like her must have belonged to someone else. Hmmm… Now I think Quinn and Torres are lying and that something really did happen! What about you?

Turns out that O’Leary had a cousin that worked at the tech support company in Florida. Her cousin erased the tapes from the crisis center and called Beck’s house to find out where he was the day he was murdered.

Bishop and the crew decide to go out for drinks, after all she owes them a round from losing the tofu steak bet. Bishop and McGee head out with Torres and Quinn a few steps behind. Once they’re alone, Torres and Quinn joke about the “crazy rumor.” Hmm… Now they’re totally acting like they did indeed hooked up! WHAT DO I BELIEVE?

Gibbs and Reeves escort Henry Rogers back home. AW! Reeves has planned something incredibly special! He has gathered a huge crowd to welcome Henry back with a proper hero’s homecoming welcome! I LOVE IT and I’m totally crying, so is Henry!

Reeves tells Gibbs that he turned down the mission in Syria. He thanks Gibbs and watches as Henry is celebrated at the airport.

*******
My Thoughts:

Well, I totally sobbed during this episode. Two times in fact!

Bruce McGill did a great job as a guest star! I want him back on a show full time, please!

I do have a few MAJOR questions though…

1) Where/How did O’Leary get the poison? Did I miss something there?
2) I thought for sure they would have tied it back to the snake guy! Even if she “found” and/or stole his snake and got the poison that way, it would have been a nice tie back to the case.
3) When Gibbs, Torres, and Quinn go to O’Leary’s work, they don’t seem worried at all that she might have another poisonous dart. That element would have added a lot of suspense to the end of the episode, her shooting a dart and barely missing one of them, right?
4) I would have loved to see Abby give Rogers the welcome mat that she made for him. It could have been a really nice scene. I’m bummed it didn’t happen.
5) Do you think Quinn and Torres hooked up?

Overall, I liked the episode a lot, but there were a few loop holes left open. All thoughts/answers/theories on my questions above are greatly appreciated!

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