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one of the things i love about sam’s legendary status is that they (frank military to be specific) constantly make sure we the audience know that sam is considered a legend but never once actually thought to actually tell us what he did to warrant that status.
people are really out here acting like sam never had any actual character development over the course of 14 years like, SHUT UP! just admit you didn’t like or care about his character enough to bother paying attention to him and go away!
if frank military had taken the reigns of ncisla instead of gemmill, sam hanna would have ended up the sole lead (as opposed to callen AND sam being co-leads) of the show but no one is ready for that conversation yet.
each to their own and everything but i really don’t agree with the consensus that the first part of the ncisla series finale was boring, that they’re wasting time or rushing through everything because they didn’t have enough time to plan the end of the series.
this part set up so much for all the characters (and for those it didn’t, past episodes already did that eg. sam & kilbride possibly managing ops together depending on what sam decides) and where their story is going and did so in a very simple, straightforward and frankly, basic way. you had callen & anna planning their wedding, sam’s relationship with his father and his struggles with being his father’s carer, rountree and his sister and whatever’s happened with his civil suit against the lapd and deeks & kensi and the subtle references to the possibility she’s pregnant. all stories that can be easily managed and concluded in the finale.
i’m definitely getting the impression from this part alone that they aren’t going to do anything big for the series finale but will instead be more lowkey and focused on family (team & individual) and certain characters careers. especially given how much of this episode was family focused already and showing the different types of families. if anything, i think this is going to be similar to the 300th episode.
this part also didn’t focus as much on the case as i assumed they would. it was evenly balanced between the characters, relationships and case of the week and that’s why i think it worked so well. not to mention, the last case being that of an undercover operation and assisting an operative who may or may not have turned due to being deep cover for so long, it works given the initial premise of the show being “undercover” and is a nice call back.
hot take: in regards to hetty, the only difference between the drona project story and every other story that has ever involved her is that this time, the show isn’t actively looking for a way to make any character who is angry at her for her actions feel like they are entirely in the wrong for feeling that way nor are there further lies and manipulation from hetty to make herself look like she didn’t do anything wrong and guilt anyone upset at her. this story is entirely in character for the show and for hetty as a character. if anything, the drona story just furthers what season 4 already established which is that hetty was responsible for and created child soldiers and operatives out of orphans who trusted her and the fact that hetty fans are acting like this one particular story has been disrespectful to her character and is the one ruining her just demonstrates how little attention has been paid to exactly the kind of character the show established hetty as being for the entire time the show has been on.
i think some people have taken kilbride’s comment about callen too seriously. it couldn’t have been more obvious that kilbride wanted sam to have the job of supervisor/operations manager (hell, he spent the entire episode looking for that package (i can’t even remember what that was now) so he could give it to him and you don’t spend that much time on something if it’s only because you don’t want another person to be annoyed at a random individual or have too much time on their plate that they can’t handle it) but he didn’t know how to go about it so he went into this deep diver over the top exploration about everything callen has to worry about and used it as a stepping stone to ask sam to take over at osp.
when you look at it, like, really look at what he actually said, it was basically: “i have no idea how to tell you i think you are the best person for the job so i’m going to tell you that your husband is very temperamental and you are the only one who would be in charge that he would listen to.”
the thing i loved the most about the sallen “will you be my best man?” scene is that both of them treated it like it was a given. callen assumed sam would be his best man so didn’t feel the need to even ask him* and sam assumed he would be callen’s best man and didn’t need to be asked but because of the whole callen/castor situation (great call back in 1x06), sam made him ask and enjoyed every second of it (including batting his eyes at callen) and as a result, it literally felt like an “old married couple” scene which really is peak sallen. i’ve seen some criticism about it and how it should have been heartfelt and emotional because of what this meant for callen but honestly, in my opinion, this felt so much more in character for both of them and their relationship.
*there’s also something about callen looking at his wedding and going: “if i’m getting married, sam needs to be standing at the altar with him.” (and if anna doesn’t turn up, he can just turn around and marry his husband of 16 years).
the fact that there are certain ncisla viewers who truly believe that the show is only focusing on rountree and/or fatima because they want to appeal to a certain demographic as opposed to you know, the actual reason which is that they are MAIN characters, have been main characters for the past 3-4 years and should get the same amount of attention and focus on the show as the older characters do. while i’m at it, the same goes for kilbride. he’s been on the show for the past 5 years and is finally getting more focus, stories and character development. just because the show is ending this season doesn’t mean that they should neglect THREE main characters and only care about the ones that have been there since the beginning.
