It’s one of the biggest (and longest) mysteries in the NCIS universe: What happened to Hetty? Linda Hunt‘s character was at the center of the NCIS: Los Angeles series finale ending (though she didn’t appear), and three years later, we still don’t know what happened next. If you’re eager for some closure, you’re not the only one.
Eric Christian Olsen, who starred as Marty Deeks on NCIS: LA, was the latest guest of the NCIS: Partners & Probies podcast, hosted by Brian Dietzen and Diona Reasonover, and he addressed just that.
Olsen first recalled “watching her struggle through dialogue that was overwritten” in one of the episodes he penned (Season 11’s “Mother”).
“She had a lot of dialogue in that episode, and it was a really tough episode where she’s like holding what was supposed to be a mirror to Callen’s [Chris O’Donnell] journey. She had created this person who — we talked about the consequences of violence especially when violence isn’t a choice that you’re making but it’s brought to you and then you’re given that skill set and this person imploded after she took away love from the equation. So, love is gone and now it’s just violence and this person comes back to hunt her down and then she kills him and he’s lying in her arms and she’s giving him the same poem that she gave him when he was a kid that she pulled him out of these caves in Italy,” he said.
After that, Olsen revealed, she told him, “I want you to write an episode for me,” he continued. “She pitched Russia. She’s like, ‘Maybe I’m in an apartment in Russia.’ And I was like, ‘OK, let me let me think on that.’ And ultimately didn’t get a chance to tell that story.”
In the series finale, a letter from Hetty brought Callen and Sam (LL COOL J) to Morocco, where they joined Nell (Renée Felice Smith), Nate (Peter Cambor), and Sabatino (Erik Palladino) on a mission to rescue Hetty. It was not seen, nor was it ever addressed fully, even when LL COOL J reprised his role on NCIS and the Hawai’i spinoff. (Maybe it’ll come up on his new show, NCIS: New York?)
“She’s still out there, and as an audience member, but also as a person who deeply loves her, there should be an end to that story,” Olsen said on NCIS: Partners & Probies. “I think we need resolution. I think the idea that it’s floating for eternity needs something to be — We need closure. I have a whole pitch for what I would do with that and what she did and why she chose to do what she did. Of course, I cry all the time, but when she asked me that question, I definitely got tears in my eyes and I was like, ‘Whatever you want.’”
Dietzen then offered up NCIS as a “platform to come tell that story” and that he’d write it with Olsen.
“That’s a good idea,” Olsen said, reiterating, “Yeah, Hetty needs closure.”
What do you think happened to Hetty? Do you want to see it addressed on one of the NCIS shows? Let us know in the comments section below.