As longtime fans of the original NCIS know, Mike Franks, played in that show by Muse Watson, was killed by Jonas Cobb, a.k.a. the Port-to-Port Killer, in Season 8’s “Swan Song.” So we know how his story ends, but NCIS: Origins, which is currently airing on the 2025 TV schedule, is providing the opportunity to flesh out the character as it tells the story of Leroy Jethro Gibbs’ first years working for NIS. In an interview with CinemaBlend, Kyle Schmid, who plays the younger Franks, shared with us the big part of his mustachioed lawman’s life that he hopes the prequel will cover. I’m hoping this provides a little more incentive for Origins Season 2 to be greenlit.
After chatting with Schmid about the NCIS: Origins episode “Monsoon,” where we saw flashbacks of Franks in 1982 and a massive blow being dealt to the character’s relationship with Tish, I asked him if there was a big event about Franks’ life that was mentioned in NCIS that he’s looking forward to exploring later down the line in Origins (which you can stream with a Paramount+ subscription). He started off by telling me:
So Mike has a kid… I’m so excited to see where Mike goes from tomorrow to where we see him in that world. I feel like Mike would be a great father. He’s a very hard man, but… we see how much Mike loves his team and his family, we see how much Mike loves Tish. I’m so curious to know about the origin story of the family and where he goes and who he falls in love with next, who that might be. I’m curious to see how someone like Mike gets back into that world of being open to finding perhaps love again.
Mike Franks’ son, Liam O’Neill, was introduced in the NCIS Season 4’s “Iceman,” although he didn’t stay alive for long. Viewers learned that Franks and Liam’s mother, Mary O’Neill were together in 1982 for six months, but then Franks walked out on her, unaware she was pregnant. Like his father, Liam joined the Marines, and while he was serving in Afghanistan, he met a woman named Leyla Shakarji and got her pregnant. Liam sought out his long-lost father for his help in getting Leyla and their daughter, Amira, out of Afghanistan, and the two got to know each over during their brief time together before Liam died.
Given the aforementioned “Monsoon” flashbacks, the first of which showed Mike Franks leaving the woman he was with behind when he agreed to transport drugs to California, I think we can safely assume this is Liam’s mother. I would certainly be intrigued to see how NCIS: Origins would handle Franks discovering he’s a father, perhaps with Mary O’Neill coming back into his life to let him know about Liam, who would be turning 10 in 1992. The trick is furing out whether it would retcon anything from NCIS (which has already been done with how Franks met Jackson Gibbs), meaning Franks couldn’t be that present in Liam’s life for long. Still, I’d be game to see how Season 2 handles this
As Kyle Schmid mentioned, he’s also interested to see what’s next for Mike Franks on the romantic front, because as of “Monsoon,” he and Tish are no longer together (although I’m skeptical that they won’t get back together). Schmid also told me he’s eager to see his character’s relationship with Gibbs, played in this series by Austin Stowell, become more fully developed, saying:
There’s a lot of story to be told between Franks and Gibbs. I’m really excited to see them on the road together. I’m excited to see them have some good one-on-one bonding experience, you know, that relationship is so strong in the mothership, You know, I just, I just can’t wait to see all the spokes on that wheel that bring it together.
There are five episodes left to go in NCIS: Origins Season 1, so hopefully we’ll learn in the coming weeks whether Season 2 is on the way or not. Meanwhile, I’ll be looking forward to seeing more of Mike Franks bonding with Gibbs the “probie,” and seeing their relationship move closer to what we saw between the two of them in NCIS, as the prequel airs episodes at 10 pm ET on CBS.
