“Callen, G.” Season 1. “Lange, H.” Season 3. “Blye, K.” Season 3. “Granger, O.” Season 7. It’s about time that a “Deeks, M.” episode joins that list, and NCIS: Los Angeles Season 14 so far is shaping up to be perfect for it. (We haven’t forgotten that we haven’t gotten a “Hanna, S.” episode either yet, to our surprise.)
The CBS procedural drama has always done a good job of having character-centric episodes, but it’s those name-specific ones, delving into one team member’s past, that we so enjoy. And given everything that has been happening with Investigator Marty Deeks (Eric Christian Olsen) in Season 14, it would be fitting for this to (finally) be the year for his.
After all, it’s a big season family-wise for him. Deeks and Special Agent Kensi Blye (Daniela Ruah) are now parenting Rosa (Natalia Del Riego), whom they were approved to foster in the Season 13 finale, and learning to balance their work and home lives. Deeks’ mother Roberta (Pamela Reed, always a delight) lives nearby, giving us plenty of great scenes featuring her and Deeks, her and Kensi, and now her and Rosa. You know she has to be involved in the “Deeks, M.” episode whenever it comes, and now they don’t even need to come up with a reason for her to be visiting.
And Deeks’ past regarding his father came up in relation to a case in “Flesh & Blood,” when he recognized a suspect had been abused by her husband, the victim. Deeks’ father abused him and his mother, and as a kid, Deeks had to shoot him in self-defense; the then-LAPD liaison learned in Season 2 that he died in a car accident years later.
“It’s June 30, 1990, and my mom decides she wants to take me to watch the Dodgers play the Cardinals, and I will never forget that day,” Deeks told the woman. “The only reason I remember it is because it was so hot, like LA had been coming off this massive heatwave and I can still see the ice cream cone melting as it’s being passed down the row. … The other thing I can still see from that day is my mom and she’s sitting next to me in this 90 degree heat except for the fact that she is wearing jeans and a long-sleeve turtleneck. And she was covered up like that the whole entire summer, not that it matters, because she couldn’t cover the bruises on her face.”
“Did he spare you at least?” she asked. “No. I mean, but I was a kid, right? Kids are supposed to have bruises. I’d just tell the teachers that I got into another fight on the playground,” he shared. And then she opened up about her husband’s abuse.
After the case was wrapped, Deeks asked his mom how she made it through. “Oh, how the hell do I know, honey? That son of a bitch sure didn’t make it easy on us. He took everything from us, kid, including the person I was,” Roberta said. “But because of you, I got her back. And I told myself I would never ever lose her again. Is the life I’ve made for myself since then perfect? No, but it’s mine.”
Our only request, for whenever the “Deeks, M.” episode happens? Bring back or at least mention Ray (Channon Roe), Deeks’ childhood friend who served as a confidential informant, then went into witness protection. After all, wouldn’t he like to know that Kensi and Deeks finally moved past just having a “thing”?
Plus, since executive producer R. Scott Gemmill told TV Insider last spring “we always keep it [in the back of our minds]” that a season could be the last and “it’ll be sad, but everything has to come to an end at some point,” we’d like to get that “Deeks, M.” episode (as well as the “Hanna, S.” one) when we know we definitely can.
NCIS: Los Angeles, Winter Premiere, Sunday, January 8, 2023, 10/9c, CBS
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