NCIS season 20 episode 19 recap: Jessica goes viral

NCIS season 20 episode 19 premiered after nearly a month long hiatus with a storyline primarily focused on Jessica Knight. After Agent Knight helps a mother and a child after an accident, she investigates what happened while also dealing with viral fame.

Right outside of the naval yard, Jessica is on her way in to work with breakfast when she witnesses a car accident. She manages to pull the mother, Reyna, and son, Adam, to safety, but the car explodes before she can pull out the male victim.

While Reyna and Adam are at the hospital, Jessica and Nick go to speak with them. Because Reyna is undocumented but her son was born in the U.S., she is nervous about talking to police in case he is taken from her.

They learn the man in the car is her brother, Daniel, or at least that’s what she claims. It turns out he was a DEA agent named Daniel Tanner, but before they can find out her connection to him, Reyna disappears. Despite Adam’s mistrust of Jessica, she keeps an eye on him, even as he bonds with Jimmy and Kasie more than herself.

Jessica Knight goes viral after a rescue on NCIS season 20 episode 19

Eventually, she gets advice that Adam doesn’t need to like her, but that he needs to be able to depend on her being there for him. As she bonds with him and learns about his interests, the team learns information from Tanner’s partner, Raymond Frank, at the DEA.

Reyna was convinced to work at the Serrano family restaurant to plant a recording device to get information on the two individuals involved in a drug cartel. Her work with the DEA was in exchange for getting her documentation papers pushed through. Where they first thought she left on her own, they know the individuals likely took her from the hospital, due to surveillance footage. The team finds out where they could be and Nick goes undercover.

Things go sideways as they try to determine where their suspect is, but with Frank and the team going in, one of the men is killed and Reyna is rescued. Reyna is eventually reunited with her son, but they are still worried about the other suspect.

Remembering that Tanner had sent clips to Adam previously, who liked to turn them into song mixes, the team finds a recording that was supposedly destroyed in the accident. It turns out, Frank had taken money from one of the Serrano brothers as a bribe and killed Tanner. Eventually, he did flip on the family so Reyna was able to finally get the ball rolling on becoming documented.

This was a really good episode and also gave us a little nod to actress Katrina Law’s time as a superhero on The CW show Arrow. It’s always great to see little easter eggs like that in television.

Let us know your thoughts on NCIS season 20, episode 19 in the comments below. You can catch up on the series on Paramount+.