I got into NCIS only during the past summer but I was so engrossed with the show that I watched it start to finish. It had a rocky start, sure, with the show trying to find its footing and its niche, but it figured out what it wanted to be fast and I find it to be FAR superior to its parent show, JAG. The plots, the characters, the cases, the everything, in this show, makes it great.<br /><br />NCIS is the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, an actual organization, which investigates the homicides and crimes committed by or against members of the US Navy - i.e. naval civilian officers, navy officers and enlisted, and marine officers and enlisted. They're also very obscure, and hence are seen as the underdog of law enforcement(in the show, anyway) but, of course, as our heroes, they are brilliant. The main character, Leroy Jethro Gibbs, is a former gunnery sergeant Marine sniper with a murky and depressing past (like Bellisario likes to make his characters) and appears to have a consistent team of four characters: Abby Sciuto, the forensics expert, Anthony DiNozzo, the senior field agent, and Timothy McGee, the computer forensics expert and field agent who joined the show as a permanent member in season 2.<br /><br />Earlier in the show, Kate Todd, played by Sasha Alexander, was also a member of the team and a former member of the Secret Service tasked with protecting the life of the president. Her character ended up being killed in one of the most brilliant story arcs I've seen on TV, and being replaced by Ziva David, a very unique character in terms of law enforcement drama, as she is a Mossad officer - i.e. her training is not investigation, but rather assassination and intelligence gathering.<br /><br />The show has two very strong aspects to it which really make it stand out from the other generic shows of its kind like CSI. Firstly, the characters are, while somewhat stereotypical in their mold, fully developed and incredibly dynamic. Tony is perhaps the best example of this - when the show started he was a goofy, slightly moronic field agent, and he developed into the professional, trained officer who keeps his sense of humor in check or uses it to his advantage. Relationships between the characters changed dramatically, with Ziva and Tony starting out as small friends and quickly graduating to huge amounts of romantic tension - which of course ends up playing a massive role in the 6th season and ultimately brings the events to their culmination. The second aspect of the show that really makes it unique to me is both the creativity of the individual cases and the amazing nature of the story arcs. The La Grenouille story arc was absolutely brilliant and I could not have foreseen it, and the introduction of Ari and Michael were equally fascinating. In addition to that, the show is not afraid to make some bold choices (for those who have seen the season 2 finale, they know what I'm talking about). Characters can go and come and even with the main ones, there's no certainty. It's the mark of a good television show.<br /><br />The dark horse of the show, Dr. Mallard, played by famous Scottish actor David McCallum, is probably the most intriguing of these characters. As a body forensics expert he has a strange past that he loves to share but personally, as a medical student, I found the accuracy of his character's work to be fascinating. The autopsy scenes, while grisly, fascinate me because they're quite accurate in their depiction and their protocol.<br /><br />This show is worth seeing and is a family show; I think it can be watched by more than one generation at a time and is thoroughly enjoyable. 9/10