Because NCIS: Origins takes place in 1991, the prequel that’s currently airing on the 2024 TV schedule chiefly serves as a platform for Austin Stowell to play the younger Leroy Jethro Gibbs. However, Mark Harmon, who played Gibbs on NCIS for nearly two decades, is closely involved in Origins as both executive producer and the show’s narrator, and he even appeared on camera during the first episode. While there’s a world where Stowell could have simply narrated in addition to performing on camera, he recently shared why he’s glad Harmon is handling that duty instead.
Stowell sat down with TVLine to talk about an assortment of NCIS: Origins topics, including why he’s looking forward to when his Gibbs and Lucas Dixon’s Tobias Fornell will meet. When the actor was asked about if Harmon comes on location to record his Gibbs narrations or if he handles those from home, Stowell answered that he believes his predecessor is “going to the lot” and doing them in a professional recording booth. Then, after saying he doesn’t hear Harmon’s vocals until viewing the completed episodes, The actor continued:
I do the voiceovers when we do the table read, and I’m really happy that I never have to do them, because it’s like, if you could talk to your younger self, how emotional might that be? And especially in terms of this particular chapter of Gibbs’ life, it is incredibly powerful to me how that voice is the man who has learned the lessons talking to the boy who has not. When I hear Mark’s voice, it gives me information about how I should be playing the character moving forward. That I think Mark and I… he says that he’s learning from me at the same time, but obviously those scales are very much tipped the other way that I’m trying to soak up everything that he gives me so that I have all the more ammunition, so to speak, to play this character.
While I have no doubt Austin Stowell would do an effective job narrating NCIS: Origins, I wholeheartedly agree with him that Mark Harmon was the better choice to do this. Maybe it’d be a different story if the narration was coming from Leroy Jethro Gibbs shortly after he was done with each of his cases in 1991, but that’s not what’s happening here. Instead, we’re hearing from the present-day Gibbs who’s looking back on his life and has collected the life experience his younger self is a ways off from getting. Perhaps more importantly, hearing Harmon vocally reprise the character helps Stowell improve his own performance.
Mark Harmon exited NCIS early into Season 19, and when we saw him again in NCIS: Origins’ first episode, a.k.a. “Enter Sandman Part 1,” he was still living in the Alaskan wilderness. The older Gibbs is now chronicling when he started out at NIS, but in a twist, the story itself isn’t so much about him. Instead, “Enter Sandman Part 1” is telling a story he doesn’t usually like to tell, one about Mariel Molino’s Lala Dominguez. What’s going to happen between these two? It’s hard to say, although there’s already speculation that Gibbs’ relationship with her will lead to the creation of Rule 12.
New episodes of NCIS: Origins, which is getting an expanded first season, air Mondays at 10 pm ET on CBS. After that, all you’ll need is a Paramount+ subscription to stream them to your heart’s content.
