NCIS Season 21 Is Making One Huge Change, According To Wilmer Valderrama

The dual WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes over the 2023 summer upended the entertainment industry. One far-reaching effect is that many network shows that usually debut in the fall will come out in the first few months of 2024 with a truncated episode order. When it comes to "NCIS," a different release date isn't the only thing that'll be new. 

Wilmer Valderrama, who plays Nick Torres on the procedural, spoke with Entertainment Tonight about "NCIS" Season 21 coming to people's screens in the near future. He confirmed it'll consist of 10 episodes, but there will be something different about them compared to previous seasons: "Because we're doing 10 and not your conventional 22, we've decided to have a little bit more fun with the new generation of streaming content and really have our show feel like something you have to watch all 10 together."

"NCIS" has always had a bit of serialization, with certain story elements carrying over across a given season. Still, it sounds like that will be in greater force going into Season 21. There may not be as much of an emphasis on a crime-of-the-week format. Valderrama continued, "We're gonna try to make sure that every time an episode ends, something in that episode is gonna carry over, and we're gonna try because I think it's time for producers to evolve [with] the future of content and how it's being consumed."

"NCIS" fans will want to tune in to CBS on February 12 to see what happens next. Fans have bided their time for a while, which may have been particularly unbearable considering where Season 20 left off. The "NCIS" Season 21 premiere will center heavily on Nick Torres, who pulled a gun on a mysterious man who has wronged him in some manner. Given what we now know, it's entirely possible this storyline with Torres' past will play into several episodes across the new season, so there may not necessarily be a clean resolution by the end of that single episode. That remains to be seen, though. 

Torres may get the lion's share of attention on February 12, but a week later, on February 19, it'll be all about the dearly departed David McCallum, who played Ducky on the series before his death in September 2023. The "NCIS" showrunners have said how the Ducky tribute episode will have the central characters coming to terms with their colleague's passing, and it's bound to be emotional for viewers at home who have watched McCallum on the show since Season 1.

"NCIS" Season 21 may have only half as many episodes as it usually does, but it sounds like the team behind the scenes is going to make sure they all count. It's going to be a season to remember no matter what, and if greater serialization plays well with audiences, it could become more commonplace with "NCIS" and its spin-offs.