NCIS has quietly written Tobias Fornell (Joe Spano), the FBI agent who appeared alongside Leroy Jethro Gibbs since the show's very first episode, out of Season 22. With Mark Harmon's Gibbs long gone from the main cast and Gary Cole's Alden Parker now leading the team, the show has replaced the Gibbs-Fornell rivalry-turned-friendship with a new NCIS-FBI dynamic built around Parker and FBI Deputy Director Wayne Sweeney, effectively retiring the format that defined the franchise for two decades.

Fornell featured in the series' 200th and the franchise's 1,000th episodes, missing only Seasons 17 and 22, but his screen time shrank once Gibbs departed. Season 22, Episode 4 mirrors the original series premiere, with Parker and Sweeney clashing over jurisdiction on a case threatening the US President before reaching a mutual understanding that hints at a budding friendship, much as Gibbs and Fornell once did.