NCIS: Hawai’i makes a show of looking different, even if the content remains about the same

Variety

"While the original NCIS introduced (Mark) Harmon’s character by showing him building a boat from scratch in his garage, NCIS: Hawai’i opens on Vanessa Lachey’s Special Agent Jane Tennant coaching her daughter’s soccer match before a camo helicopter whisks her away to a crime scene," says Caroline Framke. "Jane isn’t quite a full-on maverick, no doubt because that would require her to stick her neck out in a way that women of color rarely can without reprisal, no matter how high up the food chain she might be. Instead, she’s a firm and sympathetic team leader who figuratively and literally throws herself into the fray when necessary. At least in the first episode, Lachey proves a perfectly solid center of gravity in her first leading series role; it will be interesting to see how much the show pushes her outside her comfort zone, if at all." Framke adds: "As a simultaneous offshoot of and counterpoint to the original NCIS, NCIS: Hawai’i does make an effort to bring something else to the franchise. Lachey is the first person to lead an NCIS property” who’s not a white man; Tarrant’s Kai is a Hawai’i native who uses his more intimate knowledge of their island to his advantage; Lucy and Kate’s prickly flirtation doesn’t exactly look like Harmon and Alexander’s by default. But the show still feels of a piece with NCIS proper, military jargon, efficient dialogue, flashy mysteries and all." ALSO: NCIS: Hawai’i seems it came out of a focus group: "Hey! What if we combined NCIS and Hawaii Five-0!"