Throughout NCIS’ 22-season run, some finales have been far more memorabl than others, with the Season 22 finale keeping fans in suspense when it hit the 2025 TV schedule Some haved killed off characters big and small, or put them right at death's door, and perhaps the most memorable finale death came back in Season 2 when Sasha Alexander’s Kate Todd was shot in the head. While it was surprising to viewers at the time, Michael Weatherly actually pointed out an amusing easter egg that made me immdiately go back to watch and spot it.
In the Season 2 finale, “Twilight,” the team tries to go after rogue agent Ari Haswari, who is working for Hamas and is the leader of an Al-Qaeda cell in D.C. who'd previously infiltrated the NCIS morgue. In the final seconds of the episode, he shoots and kills Kate on the roof of a building after everything seemed to be calm and fine. It was a pretty shocking death, especially so early on in the series.
However, while previously speaking to Alexander during an episode of his and Cote de Pablo’s podcast, Off Duty: An NCIS Rewatch, Weatherly admitted that eagle-eyed fans could have technically predicted the death just before it happened:
When you got that shot to the head, I was standing behind you. And if you watch the scene in slow motion, this is a little Easter egg for the people at home. If you watch just before the dot appears that they digitally put there, but there's a blood pack on the back of your head that Larry Fuentes or whoever exploded, and blood goes all over my face. But Larry was in front of me. So I flinch right before the blood.
Anyone who has been in a situation where you’re expecting something to happen and you can’t help but flinch in anticipation know what Weatherly was going through. Take the annoying puff of air that has to go right on your eye at an eye appointment, for example. You know it’s coming, but you don’t know when, and your body prepares you no matter how early.
It sounds like that’s what happened with Weatherly, and considering he was expecting some fake blood to shoot out at him, I don’t blame him for flinching early. It is funny that a very shocking scene could practically be predicted thanks to Weatherly, but luckily, it’s one of those “blind and you’ll miss it" scenarios. And the death to this day remains a shock, no matter how many times you replay it.
For those who can't immediately watch it with a Paramount+ subscription like I did, here's Weatherly's face in the instant before the gunshot sounds and the blood hits him.
This does make me wonder if any other deaths on NCIS were accidentally spoiled before they happened, but that’s what will make rewatching the show even better. Especially since NCIS won’t be returning for another few months. The wait will be worth it, though, assuming there aren’t any more major deaths for a while.
Meanwhile, Kate’s death changed the course of NCIS moving forward. The series brought in de Pablo’s Ziva David, Ari’s sister, as a Mossad liaison officer turned NCIS Special Agent. She stuck around until Season 11, and despite Ziva’s supposed death in Season 13, she came back for a small arc in Season 16 and 17. Now, she and Weatherly are coming back to the franchise for their own spinoff, NCIS : Tony & Ziva, streaming in the impending future on Paramount+. Just think: if not for Kate’s death, none of this would have happened.
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