Shea Buckner Cast as Young Dwayne Pride in NCIS Origins

Shea Buckner, known for his recent role in Hulu's Only Murders in the Building, has been cast as a young Dwayne Pride in an upcoming episode of CBS's NCIS Origins. The prequel series, set in the early 1990s, explores the early career of special agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs, and Buckner's appearance will mark the introduction of Pride, a character originally portrayed by Scott Bakula in the NCIS franchise's New Orleans spinoff from 2014 to 2021. The episode is slated to air later this season as part of the show's second year, which premiered earlier in 2025.

In the episode, Pride is depicted as a former Sheriff's Deputy and newly minted Probationary Special Agent assigned to the NIS Panama office. He shares a complicated history with Gibbs, played by Austin Stowell, and the two must address their past tensions while undertaking an undercover operation. This storyline draws from established NCIS lore, specifically the Fed Five task force, a group of elite NIS agents that included Gibbs, his mentor Michael Franks, Dan McLane, Felix Betts, and Pride. The task force gained prominence for unmasking the Privileged Killer, Spencer Hanlon, in a case detailed in the original NCIS series'...