NCIS

Season 17

Out of the Darkness

1. This is the first season premiere not to feature David McCallum as Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard, as well as the first premiere not to feature every character in the opening credits sequence.
2. At the beginning of this episode, during the recap, clips showing Ziva's story are shown. One clip showed Bishop finding Ziva's letter, asking her to keep Ziva's secret. During this montage, while the letter is onscreen, Ziva's voice is heard reading the letter.

Someone Else's Shoes

1. DASG is short for Department of Army (Civilian) Security Guard.
2. Jennifer Marshall's character of a homeless Marine is named Francesca Rinaldi; the same name as a line of spaghetti sauce.
3. Crazy Credit After the executive producer credit; In memory of our friend and colleague CODY JAMES REEDY (with his photo) We Will Miss You.

In the Wind

1. Maureen, the ticket woman at the bus station, says that she wouldn't have sold Phineas a ticket because of a "no unaccompanied minors" policy.Wilmer Valderrama (Nick Torres) starred in the movie Unaccompanied Minors (2006).
2. Special guest appearance from JAG (1995). Karri Turner portrays Phineas' aunt Mickey. NCIS is a spin-off of JAG where Turner portrayed LT. Harriet Sims from Season 2 until the end of the series (1997-2005). Turner appeared with Mark Harmon in JAG: Ice Queen (2003), which was the NCIS spinoff in 2003. This was Turner's first return to acting since 2011.

On Fire

1. An exhaust tip is an adornment placed at the end of the exhaust pipe.
2. The reason why the suspect was allowed to leave police custody was due to the fact that he claimed sovereign immunity, which usually applies to royalty. The last ruling family of the Russian empire was the Romanov dynasty, which ruled from 1613-1917. They were executed during the Russian Revolution, which heralded the emergence of Communism as a form of governance.

Ephemera

1. The $1,200 Art paid for the diamond ring in 1972 would equate to nearly $7,300 in 2020.
2. Gregory Itzin played the Director of the FBI in "NCIS: Yankee White (2003)", the "NCIS" series premiere.
3. The MSRP for a base 1968 Mustang fastback was $2,818 - which Nick notes is less than the rent on his apartment. That amount in 1968 would equate to over $21,300 in 2020.
4. Mark Harmon plays Superman in the animated film Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths (2010), while guest star K Callan played Clark's adoptive mother Martha in the live-action series Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993).
5. Rocky Carroll and David McCallum are the only regular NCIS cast not to appear in the 1972 flashback scenes. In fact, Rocky Carroll does not appear in this episode at all.
6. The most recent sale of a 1870 S Seated Liberty Dollar, one of only nine known coins of this type, was at the January, 2015 Florida United Numismatists auction where it sold for $470,000. Prior to that one of the other known coins sold at a family auction in April, 2008 for $805,000.
7. In this episode, the current NCIS cast plays the 1972 flashback versions of the "cold case" characters. Of these characters, only two are seen to survive to the present-day investigation: Bertha (Maria Bello in 1972 and K Callan present) and Spencer(Sean Murray in 1972 and Gregory Itzin present). Each of these "1972" actors meets their respective present version at some point in the investigation. Also, Wilmer Valderrama (1972 Art) is present with the dead body of present-day Art (Joe Renteria) in the garage.

Blarney

The Arizona

1. This is reminiscent of NCIS (2003)'s NCIS: Call of Silence (2004), for which Charles Durning was nominated for an Emmy. Gibbs took extraordinary measures to coax traumatic World War II memories from Durning's character in order to solve the case. And, as here, he did so as most of the team (plus the JAG officer) watched through the glass. Like Christopher Lloyd here, Durning was 81 years old.
2. Two more episodes were supposed to be filmed for this season but the show's production shut down due to the COVD-19 after this episode filmed. This episode became the season finale.
3. EMFA (Joe's rank) stands for Electrician's Mate Fireman Apprentice.
4. Gibbs digs out a 1950's Argus model 300 slide projector from a box in his basement. It has the optional automatic cartridge attachment.
5. Christopher Lloyd plays a 95-year-old man (his driver's license shows he was born in January 1925). In fact, Lloyd was only 81 as of the air date and was born in October 1938.
6. Peter Murnik appears as a USN Admiral. He first appeared in the NCIS (2003) universe as criminal Clark Palmer on JAG (1995).
7. McGee getting hounded by wrong-number calls is a flashback to the same thing happening to Gibbs about a car for sale in NCIS: Chained (2004).
8. A surveillance picture shows Joe Smith leaving a taxi. Christopher Lloyd played Rev. Jim on Taxi (1978) for four seasons.
9. McGee and Torres try to track down a cab driver. A nice tribute to Christopher Lloyd and the breakout character Reverend he played on "Taxi."