Last week’s episode of NCIS, “Shabbat Shalom,” felt like a huge cliffhanger you might see a season opener or finale – exactly what Executive Producer Gary Glasberg wanted, he told TV Fanatic today.

With Ziva’s father Eli, dying along with Vance’s wife, what can we expect in “Shiva,” tomorrow’s conclusion? Glasberg hopped on the phone with us to tell us that the thrills, twists and turns are not over yet.

TV Fanatic: In general, talk to me about the conversations you and the writers have about killing off characters, even recurring ones.

Gary Glasberg: This is something actually that we’ve been talking about for some time. I came with this thought – really, that’s all it was – as far back as last spring. I approached Rocky Carroll (who plays Vance) about it and he was open to the idea. Really, this will take the Vance character and sort of open up his world and change his world significantly. Suddenly he’s a single parent, he’s a widower … there’s a tremendous amount in his personal life that we have to be aware of and deal with.

It adds a whole other layer to his character [and] rather than do something a little more traditional which would be to do a move like this at the beginning of the year or the end of the year … to do it right in the middle of the season would not only surprise people but energize the back half of the season, as well.

TVF: And talk about Ziva. Her father tried to reconnect, she pushes him away and now she has to deal with his death.

GG: Cote [de Pablo], I thought, her performance last week was terrific and the episode that comes up tomorrow, she just does really great and beautiful stuff. It not only affects what she’s thinking internally but it affects her relationship with Gibbs, who takes on even more of a father figure role, it affects the Tony/Ziva relationship and it sets up this need to find out who killed Eli.

TVF: With Ziva and Tony, they could bond over their daddy issues but will we see their relationship go to a new level? Or does it change things between them?

GG: I think the relationship continues to evolve and this adds something new and different to their relationship, as well. You’ll see tomorrow that Tony is really there for her as a friend and a co-worker and they share some very intimate, personal moments and that gets established in tomorrow’s episode and actually will carry through the rest of the season, as well. Yeah, when people encounter big difficult moments like this hopefully their friends and family are going to be there to support them.

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