NCIS: Los Angeles Review: Where There’s Smoke, There’s Fire (And Plenty of Firefighters)

This week’s episode of NCIS: Los Angeles took the team a little outside their comfort zone to the world of firefighting. Sam and Callen are always up for a challenge, but were they able to stop a raging infero and solve a murder investigation at the same time?

Before we get to this week’s big case, I’d like to initiate a hip-hip-hooray moment for Callen. As of this week, he is legally known as Grisha Aleksandrosovich Nikolasev-Callen. Yes it’s a mouthful, but the important thing is that Callen finally knows all about his past! There are no more major secrets, no more haunting questions. Callen can now truly, finally move forward with his life knowing who he is.

A SCIF, or a place used to process classified intelligence, is burned in a huge fire. Some valuable intelligence is stolen from the SCIF, and whoever committed the arson also killed a firefighter on the scene. Whatever was on the stolen drive was alot more powerful than the NCIS originally thought if a DOD sergeant was kidnapped for her thumbprint clearance.. Even worse, the fighter’s killer may have been one of his own. So Callen and Sam go undercover at the firehouse as new temporary replacements. This is a good thing since tensions at the firehouse are mounting. Losing one of their own has definitely taken its toll on the house. Despite this, Sam and Callen theorize that the mystery firefighter who killed their victim wore outdated gear, which means he is probably retired.

What they actually discover at the scene of another fire is firstly, the missing DOD sergeant strapped to a chair meant to be burned alive. Secondly, they find the actual killer on site. He is a rejected potential firefighter, so it would make sense that he would target LAFD, not the DOD. The real organizer of this ridiculous crusade is arson investigator Peter Heckett, who Sam and Callen met in the beginning of the episode. Hackett wants a list of names on a classified list of potential terrorist. Unfortunately that list is only a theorized list of terrorists, as in most of the people on it are innocent. Densi break their suspect in custody by pointing out that his own brother is on the list simply for donating money to a charity with questionable ties to the Middle East. He tells them where Hackett is just in time to save another victim.

Deeks spends most of the episode fretting about how good his life has been lately. So many years with NCIS have either made him paranoid, or ten times smarter since Deeks senses that a shoe is about to drop (and no, it’s not Eric’s literal one). The big revelation was not at all what I expected-Mama Deeks has found herself a man. Given her proclivity for bad taste in the past (abusive husband), Deeks is scared that his mother could get hurt. If she does though, things are different now. Mama Deeks knows how to stand on her own two feet, as does her son and future daughter-in-law.

Hetty has a huge weight on her shoulders. She is extremely concerned that things have been so quiet in the search for the mole. She senses that something horrible and unexpected is coming their way. By the looks of the preview for next week, we may only have to wait seven days to find out the full ramifications.

Do you think the mole will be revealed by the end of Season 7?