This is it, premiere week. Where weeknights are spent watching brand new episodes of new and returning shows. When it’s time to push your DVR to its limits and cancel your plans. To sit down on your couch or in front of your computer screen and watch the eagerly anticipated season premieres.
This is what September and October is all about, the end of hiatuses and the beginnings of new storylines to be extensively discussed with friends and random people in online forums.
On September 24th the fifth season of Castle premiered. The opening scene of the episode began just a few hours after the fourth season finale left off and to the appreciation of many fans, showed the immediate aftermath of the Kate and Castle hookup. That included a hilarious moment of Kate sneaking out of Castle’s apartment, which would later be mirrored in another lighthearted scene.
While this episode did a good job of tying up the loose ends from last season, it also did a good job of showing where the season would be heading. Crime will still be the focus of this New York based cop drama, but it will take on a different dynamic. No longer will there be a cat and mouse relationship between the two leads, but an established one, leading to an entirely different character dynamic on the show. This gives viewers a reason to keep watching. If any of their past chemistry and moments together in the opening episode are a clue, watching Castle and Kate try and work together while in a relationship and hide it from their coworkers at the same time will be hilarious.
Tuesday night continues to be a blockbuster CBS with the premiere of the 10th season of NCIS. The episode was watched by 20.2 million viewers, eager to learn the fate of the NCIS team after an explosion tore through their headquarters in the ninth season finale. While some of the suspense regarding the fate of the characters was taken away due to contract renewals made public over the summer, the suspense element was still there. And while the episode was formatted different than normal, as the story took place over five months, it still focused on one case only so the storyline still had some flow.
This episode and this season promises to develop the couple that has, for a long time been in the making, Tony and Ziva. Executive Producer Gary Glasberg has said in multiple interviews that he is, to some degree, going to pull the trigger on the Tony and Ziva relationship, rewarding fans who have been waiting for years, myself included. He also says that the effects of the attack on NCIS headquarters will not stop after the first episode, they will continue to be felt throughout the rest of the season.
The premiere of NCIS’s tenth season got off to a great start, but I wouldn’t expect much less from television’s most watched drama.
