It was a slightly more subtle political message this time out.
White supremacy ended up being at the heart of NCIS: Los Angeles Season 13 Episode 10.
What started out seeming like the standard military technology stolen by a bad-actor country ended up getting a twist.
As the Jan. 6 insurrection proved, white supremacists are embedded in government, law enforcement, and the military, which was the point being made here.
It took a while to get there in a roundabout way, but the OSP made it … eventually.
A murdered civilian scientist developed a radar system that essentially let Marines see through walls to increase their combat efficiency.
What wasn’t addressed was that the radar didn’t have all the bugs worked out yet.
But the buyer didn’t seem too concerned about that. When you’re buying stolen tech from two skinheads in a pickup, you don’t ask too many questions.
Where’s the logic in selling to a race you consider inferior to pay for attacks on other races you consider inferior?
The team took some entertaining directions to unravel this mystery.
When the scientist’s lieutenant went MIA just before the killing and theft, that’s one actual red flag.
Once Sam determined that Tyler was a member of a racist gang, and Fatima discovered that merchandise goes missing around him, it was pretty simple to figure out who was behind the radar theft.
A bigger puzzle was why no one had asked any questions about Tyler’s previous activities. That’s likely because the military regularly loses inventory, and there had been no bodies attached to his early thefts.
Having found the seller, Fatima then uncovered the buyer simply by checking for those soon departing for hostile nations.
Like Tyler, no one had previously noticed the pattern of Jun Chen gaining jobs at universities near military locations, being just in the right spot to accept handoffs of stolen technologies.
Most unlikely was how Kensi’s jeans obsession came into play.
After finding threads near where she postulated that the killer had hidden, Kensi learned that those came from new high-end jeans.
This allowed for disgusted looks from Kilbride and shocked faces from Deeks as she explained the value of these special jeans.
It also meant she could drag Deeks on a field trip to the one local store which sold such jeans for $425 a pair (not a three-pack, as Deeks guessed).
Kensi quickly determined that those able to afford such jeans had little cause to traffic in stolen military technology.
That led to further questioning of store owner Ruby, who admitted that she donated her seconds to a community center that had tried to help his late addict sister.
The community center initially appeared to be a dead-end but would be important later on.
Jun proved to be a sympathetic villain. She smuggled back weapons to her Communist government in exchange for it taking care of victims from a toxic agricultural area, including her parents.
While she was willing to go to prison rather than give up the location of the radar prototype, June was OK with fingering the white supremacist sellers, ultimately stopping a near-disaster.
The sellers wanted money and an unstable explosive the Chinese had been developing.
Fatima was able to identify the second seller, older racist Seth Wilcox, who Kensi and Deeks recognized as a workman coming out of the center earlier.
Callen and Sam took down the two white supremacists while Kensi and Deeks evacuated the special scholarship event just in case.
Now onto the weird ongoing storylines. First up would be the sale of the Squid and Dagger.
Since the bar was seemingly another victim of the pandemic, Deeks was smart to unload it. The two of them had been carrying it for too long, and that beats just going under.
Now why Deeks kept babbling on about converting his garage into a man cave was a whole other matter. They live in L.A., they need cars, and they need a place to park them. Maybe he could convert the nursery since that doesn’t seem to be working out for them.
No bar meant Deeks had to inform his tenant, Callen, that he needed to move out. Being Deeks, he hemmed and hawed then hemmed some more, especially after Sam refused to bail him out. Because you know Callen is headed for Sam’s houseboat.
And when Deeks finally told Callen, Callen was relieved. He’d just been helping out those crazy kids because he thought they could use the rent.
Callen’s got his problem forming, although what exactly that is wasn’t clear.
People connected to Callen are getting calls from him that he knows nothing about.
All that’s evident is that these calls originate in Russia. Is it time for the Katya storyline to raise its ugly head again?
Kilbride seemed incredibly cranky and was dispersing most of his ire at Fatima, who had been his special project. What’s up with that?
Fatima was rightfully overwhelmed by the lack of help in Ops. I wonder when Roundtree will resurface?
To revisit the Katya storyline, watch NCIS: Los Angeles online.
What did you think of the white supremacists as villains?
Why was the radar technology left unrecovered?
Who’s after Callen this time?
Comment below.
Dale McGarrigle is a staff writer for TV Fanatic. Follow him on Twitter.