10 Hidden Details and Secrets in NCIS Most Fans Missed

Two federal agents walk up to airport security with their guns and badges. The young screener is new on the job. He reads the letters on their ID and admits he's never heard of NCIS.

"NCIS? That anything like CSI?"

Tony DiNozzo doesn't miss a beat. "Only if you're dyslexic."

That was the very first episode, "Yankee White," in September 2003. Twenty-three years later, NCIS is in Season 24, Michael Weatherly is back as Tony, and the franchise fills CBS Tuesday nights with NCIS: New York and NCIS: Origins. Somewhere along the way, the show tucked a lot of little secrets into the background.

Quick answer: Some of the best hidden details in NCIS are a JAG shot in the old opening credits, a Harrison Ford joke in the pilot, Caf-Pow that was really fruit juice, real NCIS directors making cameos, and creator Donald P. Bellisario's own family in the cast.

1. The Show Wasn't Even Called NCIS at First

Tony's dyslexic joke wasn't just a throwaway line. For all of Season 1, the show aired as Navy NCIS. It was a CBS decision, made partly so viewers who didn't know the abbreviation (or kept mixing it up with CSI) would get it. In Season 2 the title became Naval Criminal Investigative Service, and by Season 3 it was simply NCIS.

The CSI line was the show poking fun at its own name on day one. It still gets a laugh on a rewatch.

2. That Harrison Ford Line Is About a Movie, Not a Casting Story

In the same pilot, Gibbs needs the floor plans of Air Force One. Kate Todd, still with the Secret Service, says they're top secret. Gibbs shrugs: "Come on. I saw this in a Harrison Ford movie."

He means Air Force One, the 1997 film where Ford plays a president fighting hijackers on his own plane. The whole episode keeps winking at it, right down to the team noting that in the movie, the terrorists got on board as reporters.

You'll often read that Ford turned down the role of Gibbs. That's a stretch. For the show's 20th anniversary, executive producer Charles Floyd Johnson told The Hollywood Reporter that Ford "was a name that everybody thought about for Gibbs because he was so perfect. But I don't think it ever got further than, it was a name thrown out." Here are the other names on that Gibbs wish list.

3. Gibbs's Rules Started in the Very First Episode

The famous rules didn't come later. They show up right in "Yankee White." Gibbs rattles off Rule One (never let suspects stay together), Rule Two (always wear gloves at a crime scene) and Rule Three (don't believe what you're told, double check).

Kate's reply is pure Season 1 Kate: should she write them on her Palm Pilot "or crochet them on pillows?" Twenty-plus years later, fans are still quoting those rules.

4. The Old Opening Shot Came From JAG

For years, the opening credits ended on a car driving at night toward the U.S. Capitol. That footage wasn't shot for NCIS. It came from "Ice Queen," the 2003 JAG episode that introduced Gibbs, Tony, Abby and Ducky as a backdoor pilot.

It was a fitting little nod to where the show came from, especially since the D.C. you see on screen is mostly Southern California. NCIS has been filmed at Valencia Studios in Santa Clarita, on the other side of the country from the Navy Yard.

5. The "Foof" Was Inspired by an Old Camera Flash

You know the sound. An act ends, the picture snaps to black and white, and there's that soft foof.

It wasn't there in Season 1. It first showed up in Season 2's "Lt. Jane Doe." Producer Charles Floyd Johnson credited Bellisario, who wanted something distinctive, and said the idea grew out of the sound of an old flashbulb going off. The actors loved it, Johnson said, because everyone wanted to be the face frozen at the end of an act.

6. Abby's Caf-Pow Was Really Juice

Abby Sciuto went through Caf-Pow like water, but Pauley Perrette wasn't drinking a giant cup of caffeine. "For the first six years it was Hawaiian Punch," she told CBS in 2009, "but then I quit eating and drinking refined sugar, so now I have unsweetened cranberry juice."

Sean Murray tried a sip once and regretted it. And the cup was never full: the props team glued a regular-size can inside so she could sip through that long straw all day.

7. The Most Wanted Wall Has Some Familiar Faces

The "Most Wanted" photos in the squad room are a real Easter egg hunt. When Osama bin Laden was killed in May 2011, his photo on the wall got a red stripe through it.

Not every face up there is a criminal, though. Many are members of the show's own crew, and for a long time one of the "fugitives" was Bellisario himself.

8. Real NCIS Directors Walked Through the Set

The real NCIS has worked with the show over the years, and two of its directors got to step in front of the camera.

Dave Brant, who ran the real NCIS from 1997 to 2005, guest-starred in Season 3's "Frame-Up" in November 2005, right before he retired. Gibbs teases him about quitting, and Brant calls it "a lateral move into the recreational sector, Jethro."

His successor, Thomas Betro, turns up in Season 5's "Identity Crisis," walking down the hall and trading finger guns with Gibbs. Blink and you'll miss him.

9. It's a Family Show, Literally

Sean Murray's mother, Vivienne, married Donald Bellisario in 1998, so the man who created McGee is Murray's stepfather in real life. When McGee's little sister Sarah showed up, she was played by Bellisario's daughter Troian, Murray's real stepsister.

Bellisario's son Michael played Chip Sterling, the lab assistant who turned out to be framing Tony in Season 3. And when the show needed a young Gibbs for the 2008 flashback episode "Heartland," it cast Mark Harmon's son Sean.

10. Tony Played His TV Dad Before He Met Him

When NCIS was casting Tony, Michael Weatherly was in Australia playing a young Robert Wagner in the TV movie The Mystery of Natalie Wood. Bellisario, who also had a place there, met him for dinner.

Then, in Season 7's "Flesh and Blood" in 2010, Wagner himself arrived as Tony's father, Anthony DiNozzo Sr. Casting director Susan Bluestein called it "really ironic." Senior was a charming, unreliable smooth talker, and you could see exactly where Tony got it.

The Best Payoff Took 23 Years

Some of the best NCIS details aren't hidden at all. They're just waiting.

From McGee's earliest days on the team, Tony called him "Probie," and he never really stopped. In October 2026, Tony came back as the new director of NCIS. On his first day, McGee finally got to hand the nickname back.

That's the thing about this show. Watch closely enough, and it always gives something back.