‘NCIS’ Season 24 Officially Sends Torres Deeper Into Dangerous Territory

Published Nov 13, 2026, 11:00 AM EST

Ryan O'Rourke is a Senior News Writer at Collider with a specific interest in all things adult animation, video game adaptations, and the work of Mike Flanagan. He is also an experienced baseball writer with over six years of articles between multiple outlets, most notably FanSided's CubbiesCrib. Whether it's taking in a baseball game, a new season of Futurama or Castlevania: Nocturne, or playing the latest From Software title, he is always finding ways to show his fandom. When it comes to gaming and anything that takes inspiration from it, he is deeply opinionated on what's going on. Outside of entertainment, he's a graduate of Eureka College with a Bachelor's in Communication where he honed his craft as a writer. Between The IV Leader at Illinois Valley Community College and The Pegasus at Eureka, he spent the majority of his college career publishing articles on everything from politics to campus happenings and, of course, entertainment for the student body. Those principles he learned covering the 2020 election, Palestine, and so much more are brought here to Collider, where he has gleefully written on everything from the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes to Nathan Lane baby-birding sewer boys.

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Much of the buzz around the NCIS franchise this season has centered on the many returning faces. NCIS: New York finally gave LL COOL J's Sam Hanna a regular place in the procedural world again, while Origins not only brought back Mark Harmon as Gibbs, but also Emily Wickersham's Ellie Bishop to join his off-the-books mission. The flagship, meanwhile, has seen a boost in ratings with the arrival of the prodigal son himself, Michael Weatherly's Tony DiNozzo, as the new NCIS director for Season 24. For as exciting as those moments have been, the rest of the agents have experienced their own share of major developments.

Next week's episode, "Ride or Die," puts the spotlight on Nick Torres (Wilmer Valderrama), who has been on a bit of a personal journey so far in Season 24. Episode 3 challenged him by confronting him with a killer using his old undercover identity to commit heinous crimes. In taking on the case, he had to reckon with his past work that took him to some dark places and forced him to sacrifice morality to not just stop the bad guys, but also survive. The question he's left to wrestle with is whether Nick Torres, and the life he's built in the ten years since joining NCIS, is who he really is, or if parts of Dante Navarro are more real than he'd care to admit. That may be put to the test in Episode 6, in which he has to go undercover once more to protect a target after being forced to play getaway driver after a kidnapping.

Ahead of the premiere, Collider can share an exclusive sneak peek that picks up in the middle of Torres' dangerous mission. He's busy trying to fix the getaway vehicle he's been tasked with driving, while the victim gets a bit of fresh air under the watchful eye of the man behind the crime, the mysterious John Smith, played by True Blood star James Frain. After the kidnappee notes the broken lottery sign, time's up, and he's forced back into the car, though repairs on the engine are taking longer than expected.

Smith isn't about to give any answers on when his boss needs him, but he does show the NCIS agent a sign of trust when he asks if he has a passport. After this is done, he's interested in hiring Torres for an even bigger, riskier job that would involve crossing the border and could entail far greater consequences if they're caught. Torres doesn't even hesitate to accept, keeping up the facade that he's a hungry criminal willing to go to any lengths with Smith.

Collider Exclusive · Villain Personality Quiz Which Criminal Mastermind Would Be Your Nemesis? Lecter · Joker · Moriarty · Chigurh

Four of the finest criminal minds ever put on screen. One of them would look at you and see something worth their time. Eight questions decide which one comes for you, why they picked you, and what they would want when they arrived.

🍷Lecter

🃏Joker

♟️Moriarty

🪙Chigurh

MEET YOUR NEMESIS →

01

What would a criminal mastermind notice about you first? Great villains choose their opponents carefully. Something about you got their attention.

AMy manners, and everything I am careful not to say. BThat I still believe people are basically decent. CThat I am clever, and quietly enjoy proving it. DThat I handle things myself, and always have.

NEXT QUESTION →

02

How do they make first contact? The introduction tells you everything about what is coming next.

AA polite letter. Beautiful handwriting. Quietly wrong. BSomething on fire, with a message left beside it. CA puzzle, left where only I would look. DNo contact. Just the aftermath, and a coin.

NEXT QUESTION →

03

What do you actually believe about right and wrong? Every nemesis is really an argument about the thing you believe most.

AThere are lines. Mine are private and absolute. BRules are the only thing keeping us from being animals. CMorality is a system, and systems can be solved. DThings happen. Most of it was never up to me.

NEXT QUESTION →

04

What finally gets under your skin? Everybody has a pressure point. Finding yours is the whole plan.

ABeing seen clearly by somebody I cannot read. BWatching good people do something ugly. CLosing to someone who was simply better prepared. DHaving no move left that changes anything.

NEXT QUESTION →

05

They have made their move. How do you fight back? This is the part of the film where the audience finds out who you are.

ACarefully, and never where they expect to be touched. BLoudly. I would rather lose than play their game. CWith a better plan. I can out-think this. DDirectly, once, with whatever is closest to hand.

NEXT QUESTION →

06

What would they use against you? A good villain never brings a weapon you have not already handed them.

AMy privacy. I have kept far too much to myself. BMy conscience. I will not cross the line they want. CMy ego. I cannot resist a worthy opponent. DMy certainty that I can handle it alone.

NEXT QUESTION →

07

What do they actually want from you? The money is never the point. Something else always is.

ATo understand me better than anyone ever has. BTo prove I am no better than they are. CTo finally be beaten by someone worth the trouble. DNothing at all. I stepped into the wrong path.

NEXT QUESTION →

08

How does it end between the two of you? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides who comes for you.

AA conversation I will be replaying for years. BA choice forced on me that has no clean answer. COne final move, and the better mind wins. DA coin in the air, and nothing I can say.

REVEAL MY NEMESIS →

The Case File Is Complete Your Nemesis Is…

Four criminal masterminds. One of them was always going to be yours. Here is who comes for you, why they picked you out of everyone available, and what they want from the encounter.

Hannibal Lecter

Your nemesis does not want to beat you. He wants to know you completely, and he is patient enough to wait for it. The frightening part is how good the conversation is.

• Lecter is the most dangerous kind of opponent: the one who finds you interesting. He never raises his voice, because he has never needed to.
• You keep a great deal to yourself and you are careful about what you show. That reserve is exactly the door he would knock on.
• The films understood something other thrillers missed. The horror is not the violence. It is being perfectly understood by the wrong person.
• He would be unfailingly polite about all of it. That is the worst part.

The Joker

Your nemesis is not after money, territory or revenge. He is after a demonstration, and you are the person he has chosen to prove his point on.

• The Joker only picks opponents who believe in something. Your decency is not a defence against him. It is the entire reason he showed up.
• He has no plan you can predict and nothing you can take away, which removes every tool you would normally reach for.
• His whole argument is that you are one bad day away from being him, and you would spend the rest of your life proving him wrong.
• He would call it a magic trick. You would call it the worst night of your life.

Moriarty

Your nemesis respects you, which sounds flattering until you work out what it means. He chose you because nobody else was worth his time.

• Moriarty is the original criminal mastermind, the template every later one borrows from: a mind the equal of the hero's, pointed the wrong way.
• You enjoy being the cleverest person in the room. He is counting on exactly that, and he has already built the room.
• This is the rare nemesis who would be genuinely disappointed if you lost badly. He needs the game to be worth playing.
• It ends the way these things always end. Two people, one problem, and only one way down.

Anton Chigurh

Your nemesis has no personal interest in you whatsoever, and that is precisely what makes him unsurvivable. You are not a rival. You are a stop on the way.

• Chigurh does not negotiate, gloat or explain. He arrives, he asks one question, and the answer was decided long before you opened your mouth.
• You trust yourself to handle things. He is the one problem in the world that has no interest in how capable you are.
• No Country for Old Men rewrote the screen villain by removing the thing audiences quietly rely on: the sense that talking might work.
• Call it. He will wait.

↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ

'NCIS' Season 24 Is About to Reconnect Torres With His Darker Side

Frain is no stranger to being menacing, having played Franklin Mott, who, coincidentally, specialized in kidnapping on the HBO vampire show. As Smith, though, he's especially dangerous, and Torres will have to stay vigilant and avoid making a single wrong move around him that could jeopardize the lives of everyone in the car. NCIS Season 24 will be a return to CBS for the veteran actor, who previously enjoyed a brief run on Elementary as Odin Reichenbach. It'll also be a chance for Torres to get back in touch with that other side of him as he eyes some potential CIA side jobs. He's never been one to shy away from danger, though Smith looks to make this a more complicated mission by driving the tension up a notch.

NCIS Season 24, Episode 6 premieres on CBS on Tuesday, November 17. Check out our exclusive sneak peek in the player above.

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  Sean Murray

  Timothy McGee

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  Tony DiNozzo