Line #8 Recap/NCISS06E12


1	!!Caged
2	Directed by Creator/LeslieLibman
3
4	Written by Creator/AlfonsoHMoreno
5
6	A group of film students working on a horror movie discover the skeleton of a dead Navy officer in the woods. Gibbs realizes that the way he was killed is identical to the MO of Celia Roberts, a SerialKiller he convicted eleven years prior, so he sends [=McGee=] to Maryland Women's Prison to retrieve a written confession. However, while [=McGee=] is there, a guard suddenly ends up dead, and the prisoners riot out of fear that everybody in the visitor's center will be blamed for the murder. [=McGee=] manages to convince them to appoint him as their negotiator by offering the services of NCIS to investigate the crime, with the promise that only the murderer will be punished. In exchange, the prisoners will release the visitors and an injured guard, leaving himself and two other guards as hostages. The warden agrees to the terms, but issues a deadline for the inmates to surrender by sundown. This gives Team Gibbs seven hours to uncover the true identity of the murderer and save [=McGee=]'s life.
7	!!
8	* AfraidOfNeedles: [=McGee=] visits the prison to ask Celia to confess to the killing of Navy Lieutenant Neil Poletto. Since she is already serving 175 years for multiple other murders, he can't threaten her with an extended sentence or offer her an early release, but he ''can'' agree to keep her case under federal jurisdiction and not hand it over to a state court which could issue the death penalty. She smiles coyly and says, ''"I don't like needles..."''
9	* AllGirlsWantBadBoys: PlayedWith. After [=McGee=] lays down the law to an auto mechanic who's been jerking him around, Abby remarks:
10	-->'''Abby''': Wow, [=McGee=], your time in the big house really changed you... I ''like'' it!
11	* AssholeVictim: The guard, Trimble, turns out to be a drug-dealing child molester who was raping Sharon's oldest daughter, so it's no surprise that he ended up dead.
12	* TheBadGuysAreCops: Warden Halsey guesses that Trimble was killed because he was in charge of investigating and shutting down the pipeline smuggling heroin into the prison. Turns out he was running the pipeline.
13	* BaitAndSwitch:
14	** The ColdOpen has a young woman in a cheerleading outfit running through the woods, then she runs into a guy wielding an axe; it turns out that they're just some film students working on a scene for a low-budget slasher movie.
15	** After the team figures out that Sharon was the one who killed Trimble, Celia takes her aside to talk in one of the private rooms. When they're done, she tells [=McGee=] to let the warden know they found the killer, making it look like Celia convinced Sharon to give herself up. It turns out that Celia actually convinced Sharon [[TakingTheHeat to let her take the blame instead]] so Sharon could get the second chance she desperately wanted.
16	* BavarianFireDrill: In the interests of time, because [=McGee=] is being held hostage, Abby calls the prison directly to get some necessary information. While delivering the evidence to Gibbs:
17	-->'''Abby''': ''[sheepishly]'' Oh, by the way, if they ask you at the prison... I'm your boss.\
18	'''Gibbs''': ''[big smile]''
19	* CoolBigSis: Ziva swears that if any of the inmates hurt [=McGee=], she will ''"kick their ass."'' [=McGee=] smiles and tells her he's fine.
20	* DeathSeeker: PlayedWith. Judy Williams is not rushing towards death, but she is looking forward to it more than anything that might happen to her in life, because what she wants most is to find the soul of the woman she killed and say how sorry she is.
21	* EnhancedInterrogationTechniques: While Gordon Lambro is being interrogated, Tony takes away the pencil he is using to scratch under the cast around his broken arm, and snaps it in half.
22	* EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: After the inmates riot, a major concern for several of the inmates is to get their visiting family members out of the visitor's center so they don't get caught in the potential crossfire from the raiding guards.
23	* EvilGloating: Trimble not only blackmailed Zoe Bellows into sleeping with him, he emailed pictures of her to the other guards. Sharon knew about the rape, but breaks down completely when she hears about the latter.
24	* EyeScream: While [=McGee=] is questioning Angela Lopez, he notices tell-tale signs of heroin withdrawal and asks for the name of the guard supplying the inmates. She answers by spraying him with a can of Mace "borrowed" from one of the guards being held hostage.
25	* TheFettered: Tony and Ziva agree that ''"sometimes this job sucks."'' They are the enforcers of a law that sent Sharon Bellows to prison for killing her abusive boyfriend in self-defense, and now is going to send her to prison for the rest of her life, permanently separating her from her daughters, for killing a corrupt, drug-dealing guard who was raping one of those daughters.
26	-->'''Tony''': Trimble was scum.\
27	'''Ziva''': It makes no difference in the eyes of the law.\
28	'''Tony''': Hence the word "sucks".
29	* FingerInTheMail: Two violent inmates discuss sending out a cut-off ear or finger to show the warden that they're serious about the HostageSituation. They decide not to use a guard [[PragmaticVillainy because that'll only piss them off more...]] so they decide to do it to [=McGee=] (who's not one of the guards or one of their family members). He barely manages to talk them out of it.
30	* GirlsBehindBars: The episode is set inside the visitor's center of a woman's prison. It’s portrayed realistically, as the female inmates prove very difficult to handle and one even threatens to kill [=McGee=] repeatedly.
31	* HeelRealization: Discussed by [=McGee=] and one of the inmates:
32	-->'''[=McGee=]''': Well, you seem to have taken responsibility for your crimes.\
33	'''Judy Williams''': It's a mixed blessing. First few years here, I was angry at everybody. Blamed the world for my crappy childhood. Then I got in a prison program training seeing-eye dogs. One day I'm training this puppy, and it hits me: I killed an innocent person who didn't do me any harm. Now I can't wait until the day I die, so I can find that soul and apologize for the terrible thing I did.
34	* HiddenHeartOfGold: Celia Roberts might be a remorseless SerialKiller, but she does care about her fellow inmates on some level. This is proved when she willingly takes the blame for the guard's murder at the end of the episode and tells the warden that she acted alone so Sharon, the true murderer, and the inmates don't get punished for both it and the riot.
35	* IHaveYourWife: All Trimble had to do to get Zoe Bellows to submit to his sick advances was to threaten her mother, who he was responsible for guarding in prison.
36	* InPrisonWithTheRogues: Gordon Lambro, a [[DirtyCop corrupt guard]], is fingered for dealing drugs. Gibbs offers him a choice: he's going to prison either way, but if he doesn't cooperate, they'll have him inserted into the general population:
37	-->'''Tony''': A prison guard in prison? I hear that they make you prom queen on your first night, and ''every night'' is Prom Night.
38	* JerkassHasAPoint:
39	** The main reason why the inmates riot in the first place when Trimble is killed; the prison would just blame all the inmates in the visitor's center for the death. [=McGee=] convinces them to appoint him as their negotiator because it's the only way for them to get pardoned for the riot.
40	** When the warden tacks on the deadline for NCIS to solve Trimble's murder before sundown, he points out to Gibbs that as long as the situation in the visitor's center lasted, the rest of the prison population felt empowered. While he was willing to agree to the prisoner's negotiations to get the visitor's freed as hostages, he knows it'll better to get the hostage situation shut down as soon as possible.
41	* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: The warden is a strict individual who wants the hostage situation to end as quickly as possible, but he shows concern for those taken as hostages and he's visibly horrified when he discovers what Trimble did to Sharon's innocent daughter.
42	* MamaBear: Sharon killed Trimble because he raped her oldest daughter.
43	* MoralityPet: Played literally. Judy Williams's HeelRealization came while she was training seeing eye dogs for a prison program.
44	* PapaWolf: Gibbs enters this mode when interviewing a guard the inmates pinned as one of the drug dealers in the prison and one of the suspects. When he tries to deny it, Gibbs shouts that he has no time for this because he had an agent in danger.
45	* PrisonRiot: When a guard in the visitor's center suddenly ends up dead, the inmates panic, believing that they'll all take the blame, and riot.
46	* PyrrhicVictory: Teased. Gibbs looks completely dead-eyed as Zoe Bellows confesses that Trimble raped her, meaning the case is solved - and Sharon Bellows will be locked up for the rest of her life, and her daughters will never see her again, just so [=McGee=] and the other hostages can be released unharmed. Fortunately, Celia is willing to [[TakingTheHeat take the heat for Sharon]].
47	* RaceAgainstTheClock: Team Gibbs has until sundown (seven hours) to solve the murder or else the warden will void the agreement to only punish the inmate who killed Trimble and send his heavily-armed guards into the visitor's center.
48	* RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil: The unspoken consensus among Gibbs, the team, Warden Halsey, his guards, and the prison inmates, is that Trimble got what he deserved, and his end wasn't ''nearly'' painful enough.
49	* TheScream: In the ColdOpen, the student director making an amateur horror film berates his lead actress because her scream doesn't sound real enough. Then, during a break, she lets out a scream that he compliments her on - because she just tumbled into a hidden pit with a skeleton in it.
50	* TakingTheHeat: Celia convinces Sharon to let her take the blame for the murder because while Sharon had only a year left in prison and still had other children at home to take care of, Celia had no family and was serving life. When Celia also give herself up, she "confesses" to the warden that while Trimble was raping Sharon's daughter, she had nothing to do with the murder. Team Gibbs know the truth but they decide to respect the wishes of both women involved.
51	--> '''Ziva''': Do any of us ''really'' believe Celia killed Trimble?\
52	'''[=McGee=]''': I don't think anyone's going to lose any sleep over it.
53	* ThemeSerialKiller: Celia killed all her victims in the same manner: multiple stab wounds to the torso, followed by sawing off the middle finger of each hand.
54	* TookALevelInBadass: The episode's BookEnds show [=McGee=] haggling about his car with a mechanic who keeps jacking up the time and the fee needed. At the end - after spending the day in a box with a group of murderous convicts - [=McGee=] tells the mechanic that they ''will'' have his car ready for him in forty-five minutes, and they ''will'' charge him the original price less ten percent for the inconvenience he's suffered. When the mechanic asks him who he thinks he is, [=McGee=] responds that [[YouHaveNoIdeaWhoYoureDealingWith he's a federal agent who puts away killers for a living.]] The mechanic wisely agrees to comply.
55	-->'''Tony''': Wow... who'd have guessed that [=McGee=] would grow a pair in a women's prison?
56	* {{Unishment}}: Since Celia is already serving a 175-year sentence, having a few extra years (or decades) tacked on for killing Trimble (which she didn't) and Lt. Poletto (which she did) will make no difference to her - unlike Sharon, who is eligible for parole in a year and desperately wants to get back to her children.
57	* WhosLaughingNow: PlayedWith. When Gibbs enters the visitor's center, Celia - who Gibbs caught and sent to prison - is the one to pat him down.
58	-->'''Celia''': Never thought I'd get to be the one to do this to you, ''Mr. Gibbs''.\
59	'''Gibbs''': Me neither... ''Celia''.

Context Recap / NCISS06E12