NCIS - The Tie That Binds - Review: “Flashbacks and Deception”
14.10 - “The Tie That Binds”
Directed by Arvin Brown
Written by Don McGill
Reviewed by Kelly Anne Blount
This week’s episode opens with a father (Captain), his daughter, and his daughter’s fiancé leaving a performance of The Nutcracker. The father, who just checked his phone, is promptly picked up after the show by a service that appears to be like Uber. The driver offers him a bottle of water, which he gladly accepts. As he’s telling the driver about his daughter’s face lighting up every year at The Nutcracker, he starts to cough. A few moments later, he’s grabbing his throat and is clearly struggling to breath. The man driving the car pulls over as the man is dies in his back seat. The driver pulls the Captain’s body out and dumps him in the street. Yikes!
Ha ha ha! Fornell’s daughter wakes him up with an air horn. She wants to know why he’s still living on Gibb’s couch. I’m weak! He’s doing hip thrusts (physical therapy exercise) and blaming Gibbs for not pushing down on his pelvis. I’m weak!
Dead body, Gibbs heads out. The team is already on scene. There’s still money in his wallet, so robbery is unlikely.
The dead Captain has Ducky’s address on him. Uh oh!
Back at HQ, McGee reports that Captain Greene had served in Iraq and has one grown daughter. They can’t find his cell phone and therefore can’t find which ride sharing app he used the night of his murder.
Interesting, Captain Greene is under investigation by internal affairs. They think he was selling intelligence. Not good. The only clue they have now is Ducky’s address scrawled on a piece of paper in the victim’s pocket.
Ducky and Jimmy have found poison in the victim’s system. Ducky doesn’t have any record of Captain Greene in his files.
When Gibbs mentions that the victim has been to Iraq and Minorca, it jogs Ducky’s memory. We cut over to a flashback of a young Dr. Mallard bringing a girl to his mother’s house to raid the liquor cabinet. His mother is supposed to be in Minorca, but has come back early. She’s laying naked on the couch with only a blanket on. Eek! Looks like Ducky’s mother was having her own special night at home. There’s a man, Balthazar, hiding in her wardrobe. Ducky’s mother says that she and Balthazar are in love.
Ducky doesn’t share the story with Gibbs or the team. He keeps it to himself.
The victim’s daughter and her fiancé are in the conference room. The fiancé admits to Captain Greene asking weird questions the week before about his overseas connections.
Interesting! Captain Greene went to Ducky’s house three days ago, looking for his mother.
MI-6 and Torres are arm wrestling. Sigh… Who’s more manly? How about who is more childish? Perhaps the writers are trying to show their blossoming bromance is also healthy with competition. Either that, or perhaps they are going to kill off MI-6? Sometimes shows build up relationships before killing off characters. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
Any who, Captain Greene had super sensitive intelligence at his fingertips and if he was indeed compromised, the higher ups need to know ASAP! The team found out that he has a secret bank account in Crimea. Very concerning.
McGee and Quinn head to Ducky’s old house and talk to a man who works on the property. Per the gardner, the Captain asked about Mrs. Mallard. He was there with a friend and left when Mrs. Mallard wasn’t available.
Thank goodness for technology! The Mallard’s old house has a special doorbell which records video of anyone who stands on the porch. Time for a BOLO on the car the Captain drove over. That’s not all the video has to share… The man who works on the property high tailed it right after Quinn and McGee left. Looks like they need two BOLOs!
Fornell’s daughter is at HQ and asks Gibbs why he hasn’t kicked her dad out yet. She wants to take matters into her own hands. Gibbs tells her not to burn down the house. She responds with something like, “On to plan B.” She’s a real character! We need her in more episodes!
Ducky has a flashback. His mother and Balthazar are due to get married. Ducky is worried that Balthazar is taking advantage of his mother. He asked a friend to investigate the new man in his mother’s life. The flashback ends.
Abby found the ride sharing app that Captain Greene used. Unfortunately, the company has no record of the ride, someone used a computer worm to intercept the request. They do have another important shred of evidence. Turns out that the Captain called a man named Balthazar directly after leaving Ducky’s house. Talk about dropping a bomb! Ducky is completely shattered by this information. He tells Gibbs and Abby that Balthazar that was his mother’s fiancé.
Ducky tells Gibbs and Vance about his mother’s fiancé Balthazar, who would now be over 100 years old, so the chances of Captain Greene speaking to him after stopping by the Mallard’s house, would be unlikely.
We have another flashback, where Ducky confronts Balthazar about being a con man. He admits that he used to be a conman, but that he fell in love with Victoria, Ducky’s mother, and that he could never hurt her. Ducky tells Balthazar to leave and he threatens to turn in the dirt he found on him if he chooses to stay.
Gibbs and Fornell are discussing the case in Gibbs’ basement. They are trying to figure out how Balthazar fits into the case.
Fornell wants Gibbs to run the fingerprints from his daughter’s boyfriend, who he met earlier in the day. Gibbs tells Fornell no. Before Fornell can argue, Gibbs finds a termite, allegedly. Fornell gets on the phone immediately with his cousin, who’s an exterminator. He tells Gibbs he doesn’t want to lose his comfy microfiber couch/bed. I think this is a plan put into place by his daughter and Gibbs to get Fornell out of Gibbs’ house. What do you think?
The found the man in Captain Greene’s car the day he went to the Mallard’s house. Quinn and Bishop interrogate the man. Turns out that he’s a private investigator and Captain Greene hired him to investigate Balthazar. Mrs. Mallard took out an add looking for him before she passed away. That’s really sad! Turns out Captain Greene gave the PI a hard drive in case anything happened to him. Per Abby, the Captain did not steal any intelligence. Phew!
Gibbs’ house needs to be exterminated. At first, he’s upset, then he quickly realizes what this means, and he is thrilled.
Ducky is super upset. He thinks he might have done something wrong by making Balthazar leave. Poor, Ducky!
Ducky has another flashback. His mother is devastated about Balthazar. He invites his mother to come live with him in America, after his upcoming tour.
The man who worked on the Mallard’s property as a gardener has been found and is in the interrogation room. Oh my! Now that’s a confession! Ducky’s mother and the man were lovers. They became involved in the 90s. McGee wants to know why she was looking for Balthazar, if she was in a relationship for years with the man who worked at her house. She told him that she thought she saw Balthazar, before she passed, and asked her lover to take out the add. Guess where Ducky’s mother thought she saw Balthazar? At the performance hall where The Nutcracker was playing in the beginning of the episode.
WHOA! Captain Greene’s daughter’s fiancé is the nephew of Balthazar. He stole classified data from his father-in-law and he was selling it. The man he was selling it to was the man who pretended to be a driver for the car service and the man who killed Captain Greene.
Gibbs arrests him in front of The Nutcracker performance hall. I feel sorry for Captain Greene's daughter!
Ducky has read his mother’s diary entries all morning. He found out that she really loved the man who worked at her house. He feels much better about his choice to kick Balthazar out of his mother’s life.
Aw! Takumi, the man Ducky’s mother loved, visits Dr. Mallard. Everyone is super happy for Ducky and they all get together to celebrate the holidays.
Fornell and his daughter are finally back in his home for the holidays. They are preparing for her entomologist boyfriend to come over. Fornell thinks her boyfriend helped her plant the termite, he does study bugs after all.
The episode ends with Gibbs stopping by Fornell’s house. His house is being tented due to termites and he tells Fornell that he needs to sleep on his couch. Karma?
*******
My Thoughts:
This was a nice episode. Ducky is so sweet and I love learning more about him and his life.
I still miss Tony.
What did you think about the episode? Leave a comment below!
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