Origins’ Bosses Break Down Shocking Finale and Share Early Season 3 Details (Exclusive)

NCIS Origins does something that we never expected to see from a show in this franchise in the final moments of its Season 2 finale. And, at the same time, it puts one of the team in serious danger as a result of something he’d been doing all season. Warning: Spoilers for the NCIS: Origins Season 2 finale ahead!

When word comes that the Camp Pendleton office is being shut down, everyone reacts differently. Gibbs (Austin Stowell) is upset, especially once Lala (Mariel Molino) reveals she’s thinking about moving to the small town where Manny (Miguel Gomez) is in witness protection and becoming its sheriff. Randy (Caleb Foote) thinks he might have some sway with all the digitizing of the files he’s been doing to score a spot in Naples (and bring Lala with him). Franks (Kyle Schmid) sort of ignores it but also has bigger problems on his hands, like Abe Pruitt (Christopher Backus) holding hostages — including his brother — in his compound. Gibbs gets between Mason and a bullet and everyone lives, and Abe’s once again in custody.

Meanwhile, Vera (Diany Rodriguez) convenes a brain trust consisting of Mary Jo (Tyla Abercrumbie), Kowalski (Michael Harney), Herm (Daniel Bellomy), Dalton (Jeffrey Boehm), Woody (Bobby Moynihan), and Lenora (Lori Petty), and they come up with a solution for Wheeler (Patrick Fischler) to sell the new director — Tom Morrow (Alan Dale on NCIS)!: NCIS to sell the idea they’re hard on crime. It works!

But there’s not much time to celebrate with two major moments to end the finale. First, Randy is kidnapped, connected to his computer work all season. Then, Gibbs rushes to Lala’s apartment as “I Will Always Love You” plays. She did leave… but then comes back and tells him she wanted him to ask her to stay. He does, and they kiss! “We got our happy ending,” Mark Harmon says in voiceover. “I only wish it could’ve lasted forever.”

Below, showrunners David J. North and Gina Lucita Monreal (who will not be returning for Season 3) break down the Season 2 finale and share early Season 3 details. (Plus, watch Mariel Molino break down the finale here.)

You basically drop Gibbs and Lala into a romcom at the end there: chase after the love interest, ask to stay, and kiss all while one of the most romantic songs is playing. So why that way? And when did you know you’d have the kiss finally come in this episode?

David J. North: Gina was originally going to title this episode, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days.

CBS

Gina Lucita Monreal: I really was. He talked me out of it. No. [Laughs] We knew from the beginning of this season that we were building to that kiss. And so we really tried to lay the groundwork for that and make it make emotional sense, which I feel that we did get there with the characters. And I love the last moment. I just want to say when Austin tosses the hat back into the car, that was not scripted. He actually every time took the cap off in the car and that time he forgot and he did that. I didn’t know it was coming when I watched it the first time and I just fell in love with that moment. It just tipped it over the edge to even move.

North: I didn’t even know that.

Monreal: Yes. Oh my God, I love that moment. But yeah, we wanted this moment to be as beautiful and romantic as possible because we know we’ve been teasing it since day one, but we also wanted it to be unexpected and it doesn’t really go along with what we normally do in the NCIS franchise world. Usually we will tease that out until we can’t possibly do it anymore. So we really wanted to surprise people and also just remain true to the characters. And we felt like in this moment this was the truth for them.

Also in the NCIS world, it seems like so many first kisses come as one character is leaving, so it was nice for it to come as one that’s like, “No, I’ll actually stay.”

Monreal: Yeah, exactly.

So what had you wanted to do with Gibbs and Lala this season to lead up to that? Because they couldn’t even kiss in a dream up to this point, which was so funny.

Monreal: Yeah, I mean, we really wanted to tease it out as much as possible, but we were also trying to remain true to the Diane story and canon with Diane. So we did play that out and they are still technically married and they are in canon technically married, even though the papers have not been signed. At the same time, we wanted to tell this Manny and Lala story. We felt like it deserved to be told. We love those two characters together. So we wanted to accomplish all of that while still building to bringing Gibbs and Lala together. And then so really we had all these obstacles in Diane and Manny to bringing Lala and Gibbs together and wanted it to come full circle where they ended up together at the end of this episode.

I have to say, Gibbs and Lala’s conversation while watching the compound remind me of Kensi and Deeks in the NCIS: LA Season 4 finale just a little bit. That moment was when I was like, “OK, they’re going to kiss in this episode.”

Monreal: [Laughs]

As we hear in the voiceover, they do get that happy ending, but I only wish it could have lasted forever. We know it doesn’t because we know canon, we know Gibbs’ romantic history. But what can you say about what we’ll see there? Because it is kind of wide open for you to explore this.

North: Yeah. And I think it was just it’s time. It’s early as like you guys said as far as what’s typical in NCIS or these shows, but it felt like it was time for them to get together. And it was very powerful hearing Gibbs say, “I wish it could have lasted forever.” It’s very vulnerable from the Mark Harmon Gibbs that we’ve known. And yeah, everybody should stay tuned. I’m excited to see what happens with these two.

The series began with the ominous “the story of her,” and that comes up again here with the, “I was going to walk out the door like the story of her never happened.” Can you say if the story of her refers to this relationship we never knew about for Gibbs or if there’s still something coming?

North: No.

Monreal: That line is funny though, because that line, like the story of her never happened, it wasn’t in the script and it wasn’t in the show until our last day of editing it. And I was like, “There’s something missing there.” And I was talking with the editors and I almost cut that whole part. And then one of the assistant editors said, “Well, I like it because it reminds you of the story of her.” And I was like, “Oh, we need to put that in there.” So yeah, that was a late edition.

So alongside this whole romantic moment happening, you also have Randy being kidnapped.

Monreal: Poor Randy!

And it’s payoff for all the times he mentioned the files he was putting into the computer all season. So when did you know you were going to have that be the other ending of the finale?

Monreal: Well, really we talk about the finale in the very first weeks that we get into the room when we’re talking about the season. And I think that’s one of the things that separates us from other procedurals is that we really are tracking the emotional arcs of our characters and we know we want to set them at the end of the season so we can build to it. And so for Randy, yeah, we knew he was doing this computer thing. We knew at the end of the season, we wanted him to get kidnapped, so we were able to build toward that.

Is that connected to a case we’ve seen on screen already or when we haven’t?

North: We don’t want to reveal that because it’d be such an important part of Season 3.

Can you say anything about what we’re going to see in Season 3 from there and just in general, how Randy is going to handle it maybe compared to how he would’ve if this was the end of Season 1?

North: Well, I think Randy’s grown a lot since Season 1, to start, but we’re looking forward to having a lot of fun like we did this year in Season 2 and a lot of the workplace comedy stuff. So we’ll see what happens with Randy though, because we’d like to tell these stories in a way that we feel is honest. And he was grabbed really in a dangerous situation. And he’s a character that we don’t know what happens with him in canon. So we’ll see what happens.

Monreal: Caleb is also a very versatile actor, so he does the comedy so well, but he also does serious stuff. In drama, he really digs in. So I’m excited to see where his character goes.

I was going to bring up the comedy because he is a source of levity, I feel like a lot of the time. So did you always know you wanted to throw something at him like this?

North: We always knew he was capable of it, like Gina said, as an actor, and this felt a good direction to go.

NIS becoming NCIS, we knew that was coming, but love how you did that with the brain trust. Talk about bringing together that group to do so and how you settled on addressing the name change in this way with the office almost shutting down.

Monreal: I think it started with, wouldn’t it be fun to have Woody at NIS at Pendleton? That’s where the idea started. And then we knew we wanted to highlight the name change and that this was actually happening in real life at this time. But I think the fun of having all those characters just evolve from the story itself and the C of it just felt like a very Woody thing to deliver to us and then wrapping Wheeler into that as well and giving him that big win, that all sort of just gelled together when we realized how fun it would be to have this particular group of people in one room together.

Erik Voake/CBS

Yeah. And I love Wheeler getting a little emotional when he was telling them that the office was shutting down because we’ve seen how much this place means to him and how much these people mean to him.

Monreal: Exactly. Patrick just played that so vulnerably and beautifully. And just then to see the other side of it when he’s pitching on the phone, pitching his heart out and popping the champagne, he really did have a big arc in this episode, even though he wasn’t in it a lot, it was fun to track Wheeler’s progress throughout this episode.

North: And for Wheeler, the loss of his marriage, the loss of his secret relationship, the troubles he has with Jason, even though they’re on a little bit better of a track, this job is what he has. I think his direction is escape all of that. And you felt that really in the finale.

And thank you for everything you gave us with Wheeler and Mary Jo this season, because I love that dynamic.

Monreal: We love it as well. The two of them together is just sort of magical. So we love to write to that whenever we can. And those storylines in particular are really special to us this season.

And then you have those very familiar notes from NCIS playing as Gibbs puts on the jacket and hat. I loved that.

Monreal: Yeah, we knew that from — David was just saying this today. We knew that from the moment we were writing the pilot, when we started breaking it, we wanted that moment of him putting on the jacket with the NCIS theme playing. And that was another moment in editing where we had voiceover all during that and I was like, it just isn’t playing right. And then we realized that we needed to pull the voiceover from that part so that the music could really be at the forefront. And you feel the emotion of that. That song is just … If you’re a fan of the show, it means something. So we wanted that to be front and center.

We get Franks head-slapping Gibbs at just the right time in this episode. Did you always know you wanted to have that happen at this point with the NIS to NCIS transition? Because it’s fitting.

Monreal: It is fitting. I know. I don’t think we knew that the Head Slap was going to come at the same time as the — We knew we wanted to do the Head Slap. We didn’t know where it would fit in. And there it just has sort of happened. It felt very natural there, but I think it was a lucky break for us that happened at the same time as the transition to NCIS.

You kept throwing a lot of Franks in this finale. There’s the office shutting down, which he doesn’t want to deal with. Then you have Abe back. Then you have Swanson (Hannah Barefoot) back. Did you want to keep adding things on him to lead to that moment of frustration in the locker room where he breaks the locker?

Monreal: Yeah. I mean, I told Kyle after the episode was all done, I’m just in awe of how he played all those different emotions that we threw at him in this episode. Even if you look at his performance in the moments without the dialogue, in that locker room scene that you’re talking about, he’s yelling at Gibbs and he’s so vulnerable and he’s so raw. And then Swanson gets mentioned at the very end and he’s like, just the transition there. He’s doing some really nuanced work in this episode, which we so appreciated. We threw a lot at him. So yeah, it was kind of a pile on Franks, but he handled it beautifully.

Speaking of Swanson, because we saw the Franks and Tish relationship, it was so sweet, loved it. So what was your approach to then doing this Franks and Swanson stuff that you did towards the end of this season?

North: We brought her on, we wanted to see what the chemistry would be on camera, and it’s been really fantastic. She’s been wonderful, and so it’s going to be fun to see where things go between Franks and FBI Swanson.

Erik Voake/CBS

Abe Pruitt is now in custody, but we’ve seen what’s happened before when that’s been the case. Can you say if this is closing the book on his story or just a chapter?

North: This is definitely for the compound and that side of it, this is closing the book, but you never know what’s going to happen with Abe. His mind’s always working, so maybe we haven’t seen the last of him.

And Franks and Mason are in a better place than they have been, but how likely is that to last?

North: Things are complicated between brothers, but I think that they’ve turned a corner here. But Philip Winchester who plays Mason is just phenomenal and look forward to seeing how that … There’s a lot of baggage there with that relationship, so we’ll see where it goes.

I love the Franks and Gibbs stuff that you gave us in the finale because we know about that relationship. We knew about that relationship before the series ever began, but to see how it’s been playing out has been great. So talk about crafting those conversations and also having him call Gibbs out on his feelings.

Monreal: Yeah, we wanted that to echo — remember in the very beginning where he calls Lala out and it’s sort of painful to watch. He’s being an ass basically. And here he’s calling Gibbs out in a much different way, but it’s still real. And so we’re seeing how Franks is evolving as a leader, as a human being. And those are the moments that we always try to embrace because we feel like those are the moments that are most relatable. So yes, he’s calling Gibbs out, and then a couple scenes later, he’s thanking Gibbs for saving his brother. And we see these building blocks of the relationship between Gibbs and Franks that make them the two men that we know on NCIS.

Speaking of seeing the human side of Franks, the moment we got with him and Lala about Manny, that was sweet.

Monreal: Yeah. David … Yeah, can I say that you wrote that part? I can’t remember whose name was on the script, but David wrote that. It was a beautifully written scene. I love that moment, too, at the copier when he says, “Just tell me you’re OK.” Yeah. Yeah. Again, they’ve come a long way from him yelling at her.

North: Yeah. What she did was egregious, but Franks doesn’t care. He’s a rule breaker and he’s a lot of things, but he’s not a hypocrite and he’s not judging her, but he is a protector and he wanted to make sure — what she did is dangerous. She could be getting herself into trouble, the whole team into trouble. But yeah, I think that’s what we love about Franks, is the typical boss there is going to be going, “What the hell are you doing?” But instead he’s just saying, “OK, you did that. It’s OK, but are you OK now?” But he did want to know that it’s over because she’s going to get herself into a lot of trouble with that.

I have to bring up the Doc Tango (Julian Black Antelope) episode you had this season, which was so fantastic. When you knew you were going to be diving into Doc Tango’s history, did you always know you wanted to bring back young Ducky (Adam Campbell) for it?

Monreal: Yes. We thought it would be great to do a Tango and Ducky episode. That’s where the idea started. And then Margarita Matthews who wrote it, she was able to fold in the idea of Tango’s tribe and his history. And that was a really special episode to all of us.

Yeah, especially because you got this Tango and Franks stuff, which is always great to see on screen.

Monreal: Yeah, I love the two of them together.

Is there going to be a time jump when Season 3 picks up? You kind of left it where it feels like you have to pick up sooner rather than later.

North: Stay tuned.

Is there anything you can say about Season 3?

North: It’s going to be jam-packed. It’s going to be a lot of fun, a lot of staying true to what we do on Origins and stay tuned to see what happens with Gibbs and Lala. And oh man, I hope Randy.

Monreal: And Randy!

North: I hope he’s OK.

NCIS: Origins, Season 3, Fall 2026, CBS