1 of 3 | Michael Weatherly and Cote De Pablo star in “NCIS: Tony & Ziva,” which is now available on DVD. Photo courtesy of Paramount+
NEW YORK, July 14 (UPI) — The NCIS spin-off, Tony & Ziva, updates fans on two iconic characters more than a decade after they vanished from the small screen.
Released on DVD Tuesday, the one-season adventure follows the titular former agents — played by Michael Weatherly and Cote de Pablo — as their quiet retirement and co-parenting of teen daughter Tali (Isla Gie) are interrupted by an international crisis.
The pair was last seen together on Season 11 of NCIS when de Pablo left the show in 2011.
Weatherly exited in Season 13 three years later.
“The fan expectation is really where it all came from and where it originated,” Weatherly recently told reporters at New York Comic Con about how the update came about.
“I was really curious. How do you come back and explore that guy and bring in and integrate all these things that happened off camera?” the 58-year-old actor said.
“Where do we meet him? What’s he like? So, I’m hoping that fans of the old show recognize the character that they knew and loved. But, also, can see that he’s evolved. And if you’ve never seen the show before, you’re like, ‘Why does he cry so much?'”
Because the show focuses on Tony and Ziva as parents, viewers will see softer sides of the characters.
“All of those feelings were there,” Weatherly said.
“He just had so many defense mechanisms covering them, the jokes and the movie references and the ‘making someone else uncomfortable, if you’re uncomfortable.’ I’ll win by making you uncomfortable, because then I blow it up and you can’t attack me now because I blew us all up.”
The actor insisted Tony didn’t create these social dynamics on purpose.
“He didn’t even know he was doing it and I think that he learned a lot from Tali and the patience it took to become a father and put himself second and realize that, as good as an investigator as he was, and as much as he had learned from Gibbs (Mark Harmon), Gibbs is a very damaged father figure, and wasn’t really great at teaching him love,” Weatherly recalled.
“He’s great at teaching you how to solve a crime and be lonely and eat steak with a knife, but he wasn’t great at integrating all these other aspects.”
Weatherly said he has always been deeply committed to his performances and he didn’t do much differently on this project, even though he is credited as a producer, as well as the star.
“It doesn’t really change how much I care,” he noted.
“Going back into the Tony DiNozzo world is like…. Have you ever been in a really deep cave? Have you ever been spelunking in a mine? In a mine where you go so far underground that it’s like, ‘Oh [expletive], something bad can happen and I would not be able to [get out].’ So, I feel that way about DiNozzo,”
Weatherly will return to NCIS for Season 24 next fall.
