Review of NCIS: Los Angeles 1X11 Breach by Sandy and Carina
Dear NCIS:
So, after the hustle and bustle of the Christmas holidays were over and the ringing in of a New Year complete, I couldn’t wait for the new episode of NCIS: Los Angeles. I set the timer on my TV, grabbed a cup of hot cocoa, and settled down to tune in.
Sandy says:
This one was a little tough for me coming hot on the heels of NCIS’s Ignition. But by the end of the teaser, it had my full attention.
The opening scene is, as expected, a set up for this week’s case. It opens in a Gentleman’s Club with a group of men enjoying the show. Immediately our attention is drawn to one of the men who seems to be more into the performance than others. We get a glimpse of the gyrations and such of the dance (which I actually could’ve done without) and then the show ends. The young man heads to the bar for beer refills for his friends, and as he’s waiting, he spots the dancer from before.
Sandy says:
I actually wondered if pole dancing was listed on her resume and on the audition sheet. I’m sure it was.
Seeing this as a golden opportunity to meet the woman he’d been staring at just moments ago, the young man goes over and asks for a dance. She declines, stating that she’s done for the night. As she’s walking off, another man walks up and accosts her. The young man steps in to defend her, and heated words are exchanged. Before they can come to blows, the club owner walks up and tells them to take it outside.
The other man glances from them to a friend who has just approached. The young black man nods at his friend, and both leave the club. The dancer thanks the young man for his help and turns to leave. Seeing his chance escaping, he runs after and catches up to her. He asks her out for coffee, she says no. He’s about to try again when a car bursts through the wall of the club. The young man sees this and pushes the woman out of the way, but is killed instantly by the impact of the car. The camera pans over to the driver, who’s dead as well and we see that it is the young black male friend from earlier.
At this point I’m intrigued about the motivations for this seemingly random attack. Sure, it seems that the dancer and the unidentified man from before have some sort of history, but it still doesn’t explain why his friend drove into the club. Yes, he could have been doing so to kill the young woman, but how could he possibly know that she would just happen to be standing there when he went through the wall? A question that, at this point, I’m hoping will be cleared up.
So, the opening credits roll. And is it just me or is this not the best theme music. Nothing you can hum or anything of the like, but catchy all the same.
The next scene opens with Hetty and Callen walking over to the bullpen area of the OSP office. No one else is there, which Callen notices. Apparently everyone else has gone upstairs to the briefing room, but Hetty wanted to speak with Callen about an expense report. Seems he spent $1400 on sushi and Hetty wants an explanation. Callen explains that his undercover alias, Tony Z, was a high roller and thus $1400 for sushi was understandable. Hetty informs him to try the soup next time. “Try ordering soup, playa!”
This scene was classic! Linda Hunt is perfection as Hetty, and I just adore her. And I was tickled pink at her “Try ordering soup, playa!” line. Golden.
Sandy says:
I agree. Linda Hunt is making the role her own and slipping into the vernacular here and later are perfect touches.
Callen joins the rest of his team upstairs and is briefed on the case. The young man from before is finally identified as Petty Officer Mostel Renny, a crypto-language technician for the Navy.
Callen wants to know why they are investigating an accident, but Hetty informs them that it’s a crime scene. She also lets them know that the female witness, the dancer from the nightclub, is awake and recovering at the hospital.
The team splits with Sam and Kensi going to the crime scene and Callen going to the hospital.
At the crime scene Sam and Kensi almost immediately confirm Hetty’s suspicions that this is indeed a crime scene. They note the lack of skid marks and the fact that in order to reach the speed need to cause so much damage, the driver had to be accelerating long before he reached the parking lot.
Again, begs the question as to how he knew that he’d kill the right person. I’m gonna assume that he didn’t care, but hopefully we’ll get more concrete facts later on in the episode.
Sandy says:
My brain was so busy working on how the guy left the parking lot and came back to drive into the building that I didn’t even wonder about who he was aiming at. The description here was confusing for me.
Callen arrives at the hospital to find the witness is awake. He goes to question her, but she avoids his questions and gives him roundabout answers. Callen discerns that she’s worried about possibly being deported, so he assures her that he isn’t from immigration.
That seems to settle her somewhat, and she recounts what happened at the club.
Sandy says:
I thought she opened up kind of quickly to someone with a fishy story about a pothole problem in a neighboring town.
Eric calls and informs him that while the black male driver is still unidentified, they did get a hit on a print they pulled from the car window. Cesar “Chi Chi” Vargas, s drug smuggler and human trafficker. He sends a photo to Callen, who shows it to Katya, but she doesn’t recognize him.
Back at the bar, Sam speaks with the club owner about the accident and asks if he knew who the driver or the other mystery man was. He asks if the mystery man used a credit card, but the club owner says no. As Sam walks off to meet Kensi he remarks to her that the man is hiding something.
At this point it’s pretty obvious that the club owner is up to his neck in this. What exactly ‘this’ is has yet to be discovered, but I knew from this point on, even without Sam’s confirmation, that the club owner was hiding something.
Callen, Sam, and Kensi meet up at Cesar Vargas’ home to question him. Callen knocks but no one answers, so they all break in and check the house for Cesar. They come up empty until Callen notices some refrigerator bins sitting on the floor and thinks to check the fridge. When he opens the door, Cesar’s body falls out.
This scene was fine, but as I live in an apartment with a sliding glass door onto my patio, when Callen so easily broke into Vargas’ apartment, all I could think was ‘is it really that easy?’ I certainly hope not. Another thing, did they really have just cause to enter the house? Sometimes I’m at home and I choose to ignore my door when someone knocks. I’d hate to think that gives them the right to just burst in. Also, they never identified themselves, so had Vargas been alive inside and chose not to answer, they still wouldn’t have had grounds to enter. But, creative license I guess. I can ignore the small hiccup.
Sandy says:
Sometimes it’s best not to get too technical.
The following scene in the coroner’s lab was hilarious. She obviously expected and wanted Nate to be the one to come down to her lab with questions. It’s also obvious that where Nate finds her humor somewhat charming, Sam and Callen simply find it strange and maybe a bit creepy. I have to agree with them here. But at least she finally gets the question out that they have both (she and Nate) been longing to ask one another since the start of the season. Is Nate seeing someone? Of course, neither Callen nor Sam answers. But I bet you that they won’t forget this. Probably hold it for Nate-teasing material later on in the season.
Sandy says:
We really need somebody macabre in this show and the ME is it. She’s a combination of early Ducky and Palmer on steroids. Wowzer. I do enjoy whenever she shows up, though.
From the coroner we learn that Cesar Vargas likely died as a result of blunt force trauma followed by suffocation. She also gives the results of her autopsy on the unidentified black male driver. He wasn’t drunk, didn’t even have alcohol in his system, and he still hasn’t been identified. She takes them over to the table holding the body and lifts him partially to show them the scars on his back. She doesn’t know were they come from, but states that the last time she saw anything like that she was in Rwanda.
Eric got a hit from the driver’s prints on an international database. It turns out the dude isn’t from America at all, he’s from Sudan and his name is Dang Oyatt. Sam identifies him as one of the ‘lost boys’ orphaned after the second Sudanese civil war, who became known as the Lost Boys of the Sudan. As they are discussing this, Dom gets a call that Katya checked herself out of the hospital. Callen suggest he and Sam go pay her a house visit, but Sam tells him to take Kensi because he needs to check something out. Callen asks if he’s gonna share the information, but Sam tells him only if it pans out.
To me, this scene is crucial to the episode as well as to the relationship between Callen and Sam. It’s obvious that Sam has secrets (who doesn’t), but even more so its obvious that he knows he can trust Callen not to pry until he’s ready to share. Callen may not like it, but he respects Sam enough to let him work this angle while keeping him in the dark, knowing that if anything pertinent turns up, he’ll be the first to know. I think this scene, more so than any between them so far this season, is a perfect example of why they work as friends and partners.
Sandy says:
I agree that this mutual trust is an important part of their relationship. There have been times already when they bicker like a married couple, but they also know that each has his secrets that he may or may not be willing to share and they respect one another for it.
Nate finally shows up in the episode, and he’s in Hetty’s sights. Apparently he has a lot of vacation time saved up and works overtime pretty much all the time. Hetty places him on holiday starting next Monday. Nate and Kensi walk up just as Hetty leaves and ask him what that was all about. He states that he thinks something is up with Hetty.
Yep, me too. Hetty has always been a bit high strung, but it seems even more so this time around. But still, seven weeks of vacation? I think Nate needs to take more than one week off. But then again, I never save that much vacation time on my job.
Sandy says:
By this point, the general consensus was that something was wrong with Hetty. It’s just a matter of finding out what.
Sam arrives at a recreation center where several young men are playing basketball. It’s obvious that the kids know him, one more so than others. Sam calls him Moe. But for some reason, the young man makes a run for it when he calls his name. Sam catches up with him, as expected, and the two leave to talk.
Callen and Kensi arrive at Katya’s home just as she’s leaving. Callen asks her if the name Dang Oyatt means anything to her. She says no and makes to leave, but a SUV full of armed men drives up the street at that moment. Callen pushes her and Kensi to the ground and dives for cover himself. He gets a few shots off, but the SUV manages to escape anyway.
Back at base, Callen and Nate interrogate Katya, with Nate doing most of the talking. Katya isn’t injured from the earlier gunplay, but it’s obvious she’s shaken. She tells them that she never saw the gunmen before. Callen shows her a photo of Oyatt, and she tells him that it might be the friend of the man who’d accosted her the night before.
Nate tries to assure her that it is okay, but Callen takes off the kid gloves and lays it on the line, telling her that the guys probably intended to kill her the night before, not the Petty Officer. Katya asks why would anyone want to kill her. Callen leaves her alone with Nate and goes into the other room, where Kensi has been watching the interrogation. Kensi states that Katya is hard to read. Callen states it’s a defense mechanism people build when they are used to being on their own.
Sandy says:
I think this line of Callen’s really spoke to his character more than Katya’s. He knows what it is like to be alone and he recognizes the same behavior in Katya that he, himself uses.
I like Nate, I really do. But I didn’t really understand the need for him in this scene. Maybe it was just so they could pull the good cop/bad cop routine. I don’t know. But he seemed like an unnecessary addition to this scene.
Sandy says:
I disagree. If you’re going to have a Forensic Psychologist on staff, they should be available for all the interrogations. I just don’t know why Kensi was the one to come up with the assessment. Kind of defeats the purpose of having Nate there at all if Kensi and Callen can make the assessment. Just what has he been doing to fill in 32 hours of overtime? Would have made more sense for Callen and Nate to have the conversation and Kensi to watch the girl.
Sam and Moe are at the beach, and Sam asks him about his SAT scores. It’s obvious these two share a fondness for one another. Sam doesn’t like him being at the youth center because they have a rep for teaching radical views, but Moe states that he feels like he can be himself there and not judged by anyone else.
Sam shows him a photo of Oyatt, and according to him Moe isn’t the type of person to do something like this, even states he doesn’t have a driver’s license. He asks him about the other man, giving the description Katya gave earlier. Moe admits he knows him, and states his name is Zafar Juddalah, a religious fundamentalist.
While Dom searches for Zafar, Dom notifies Vance and homeland security.
I must say this. Adam Jamal Craig is one of my new favorite young actors, and I really wish he’d be put to more use on screen lately. It seems he’s been relegated to wallflower, just there for decoration. I hope that changes in the near future.
Sandy says:
Sometimes I wonder if the cast is too large, but don’t let the execs hear that, because I wouldn’t want to lose anyone in the cast. I agree, Dominic Vaile is not being used to his fullest potential, but when he is, he’s golden. I hope they will settle into a better balance as the series progresses.
Callen finally voices the question we’ve all been wondering when he asks Sam how he knows Moe. Sam states he bought him here from Sudan, after Moe’s father was killed during a firefight.
Nate runs up the stairs and informs Callen that Katya wants to go home to get clothes. Callen goes instead and as he’s leaving he notices two smoke detectors hanging side by side on the ceiling. Seeing that this is odd, he checks them and discovers hidden cameras aimed towards the bed as well as a dvd recording. He takes this back and shows Katya what he found. He asks her what is going on, and she tries to attack him. He gets her to settle down and tells her he will have her deported if she doesn’t talk to him.
Katya identifies her boss as Dallas, the club owner, and she confirms that they’d been blackmailing people that she’d had sex with. He shows her a photo of Zafar, and she confirms that he was one of the people Dallas was blackmailing. Using Katya as a decoy and Callen as a fake customer, the two go back to the club so that Callen can try to find the tapes so they can figure out who else was being blackmailed and exactly what it is that Dallas has on Zafar.
Sandy says:
Classic caper. I’m hoping to see more of this in the future. We’ve got an undercover operation going here. Let’s see them go undercover more. A little Mission Impossible would be really nice.
Things are going good until Dallas catches on that something is wrong. He catches both Katya and Callen, but Sam and Kensi burst in before things can get out of hand.
I love that Kensi brings down Dallas, a man who makes his living using women as sex toys. And I loved her line, “How’s that for a lap dance?” after kneeing him in the crotch.
Sandy says:
That really was a nice touch.
In interrogation, Dallas asks them if they had a warrant to search his place. Callen informs him that since it’s a terrorist investigation they don’t need a warrant. I don’t know how true that is, but if the point was to make Dallas believe it, then it works like a charm, though he does protest that he’s not a terrorist. They ask him about Zafar, but Dallas requests a lawyer.
Eric and Dom are reviewing the tapes from the club and it turns out that several of the men being blackmailed (they are only a third of the way through the tapes) are powerful and even some are in the upper echelon of the military ranks. Hetty comes in and tells them to cease all further investigation into the matter and to turn things over to the DOD and release Dallas immediately.
Callen, Kensi, and Sam all go after Hetty explaining that they must keep working this case and the ramifications if they stop. Hetty finally gives in and tells them that she will be back in an hour or so and they will shut the investigation down.
Sandy says:
But, I love how she did that covertly. You need to stop your investigation and hand over your files—in an hour. Yeah, she is in up her knickers.
Eric comes then and takes them aside to show them the Zafar tape. Hetty catches them still investigating, but she doesn’t shut them down. They discover that Zafar was indeed being blackmailed, but seeing as he’s a terrorist they don’t see why he’d care. Sam explains that its because he has a group of impressionable young men willing to kill and die for him, and that if the tape came out he they would lose respect for him and he would lose the power he’d gained over them.
Sam goes back to the recreation center and leaves a flash drive with the guys, telling them that a friend of his has information that Zafar will want to see. He doesn’t single out any one of the guys, knowing that the message will get back to Zafar somehow.
Callen is undercover as the mysterious friend with a message and Zafar meets him on a semi crowded pier. He demands the tape and threatens to kill to get it back. Callen calls his bluff, but Zafar states he doesn’t have to kill Callen, he could kill several of the innocent people nearby.
Kensi, undercover nearby as a woman with a stroller, sees him pull a gun and beans him with a stroller, Callen grabs the gun off of him with Sam finally taking him down and arresting him.
Sandy says:
I do have to say that I really enjoyed Sam taking Zafar down. Nicely filmed, nicely edited, nice subject. And the perfection of the costuming of Kensi with the boots (were those UGGS?) Looked like a mom on a stroll.
Zafar recognizes Sam and states that Sam is the one that killed Moe’s father. He also states that he gave Moe a new life. Sam goes to find Moe who is readying to go off with a group of people. Moe asks him if he killed his father, and Sam finally admits it. He leaves Sam and gets in the van.
My heart broke for Sam right here. He tried to do the right thing for the young man, but a few words and accusation from another was all it took to undo all his hard work.
Zafar is taken by the CIA to be used as an asset, while Sam and Eric search for Moe. Based on the hits on Moe’s passport, it looks like he’s heading back to the Sudan.
Sandy says:
This might be an interesting story down the road, Sam getting Moe back out. I don’t know that we’d be up for another rescue from a jail cell in Africa but it might be worth considering.
The final few scenes show G Callen at his finest: being a friend. He speaks with Sam about the situation with Moe, and he learns that Sam had killed the young man’s father because he was set to kill someone else. He also speaks with Hetty, who has been acting out of sorts for a large part of the episode. Hetty lost a friend and is working on his eulogy, which is why she’s been on everyone to take a break and appreciate life. Sam takes her words to heart and invites her out to a museum with him. He admits that he goes to meet chicks, but that she can be his wingman. She agrees, and asks him what he’s doing tonight. He looks back at Sam and tells her he’s going for a run (apparently something Sam does when he’s stressed). I love this scene. Again, it shows how great a friend Callen is. But it also solidifies, in my mind at least, his roles as the leader of the OSP team.
Sandy says:
Considering how often Hetty and G have words, it was good to see them having a moment like this one. When he asked if Hetty’s friend was a romantic one, I was surprised that he asked the question. Hetty’s frankness revealed just how comfortable they can be with one another and that the gruffness is mostly for show. I’ve loved Hetty from the start, but this one sealed it for me.
This episode was wonderful. I like the character background we got here for Sam as well as the growth we saw from Callen. The only thing that would’ve made this episode better would’ve been to see more of an active role from Dom. Other than that, I give this episode a solid A.
Sandy says:
I would also like to see them really get a handle on Nate’s character. The role of Forensic Psychologist is an interesting addition. They just need to figure out what to do with him. This was a solid episode over all. I, too, give it an A.
With love,
Carina & Sandy
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I loved this!Great job lasies!