NCIS: LA - Beacon

Not going to lie, I definitely read the title as 'bacon' when I first saw it. Probably as a result of the bacon I just had for dinner. Nom.

Oh look, Arkady is back! Oh look, he's wrestling with someone. Oh look, an explosion! Oh look.. I'm pretty sure he's dead.

Thank you for the re-enactment, Jon.

Callen is dropping off his lady friend and she's all skeptical about whether he'll actually be around that evening like he says. Makes me wonder what exactly these people do on their days off. Work out? Target practice? Sit around practicing their quipping? She says "I'm still getting used to this". You've had four months lady! Why is this complaining only happening now? Also where the heck have you been for the last four months?!

MISSING: Have you seen this woman? Oh, nevermind. There she is.

Granger doesn't want Kensi and Deeks in the field together. Because they have fun when they're together, and Granger is against that. (Just kidding. It's actually because of that LAPD investigation about him. That hasn't been mentioned for weeks, I'd almost forgotten about that). Hetty says Callen is sad not because Arkady was his friend, but because he was possibly the last link to his father and his family. *Cue the sympathetic tears for the misunderstood orphan hero*

Callen finds a pocketwatch from the KGB on the body, which apparently Arkady always carried with him. He also looks at the burned body and says "There's no way of knowing who this is." THAT'S BULLCRAP. BONES WOULD HAVE IT DONE IN FIVE MINUTES. Actually, Angela would probably scan the head and be like "well various parts of the face burn at different rates so I reverse-burnt them and here's his face."

Not that Angela isn't a genius, but COME ON WHERE IS THE REALITY?!

Apparently Eric has taught Callen that origin stories tend to disappoint. He's not wrong. But Callen likening himself to a superhero is so cheesy... Ugh. Also, apparently Callen has been to Arkady's house a few times. Because "he has a nice pool". Suuuuuuure Callen.

Deeks found some fingerprints and ran through a crime scene scenario. Which Kensi finds pretty hot. I concur, Kensi. Also pretty observant of him. He and Kensi found a deed to a yacht hidden in a frame.

Eric is a little resentful of Deeks and I don't know why... Apparently he's jealous of his hair. But Eric has nice hair too!

Be proud of your hair, Eric. Actually, be proud of your face, too.

He and Nell figure out something smart and then Eric says "I love you!" OH MY GOD. Which obviously was because of how excited he was about her idea, but then he covers it by saying "By that, I mean your mind. Your beautiful, gorgeous mind." AWWWWEEE!!!! And then he makes it creepy/weird again by saying he wants to take some of it home with him and she says that's like a lobotomy and he realizes she's right and I am still squealing internally because THIS IS THE ERIC AND NELL BANTER I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR ALL SEASON!!

I'M SO HAPPY RIGHT NOW!!!

Callen is eating tofu. Voluntarily. That's weird. Apparently it was Joelle's idea. And he actually listened? We finally address the stuff Callen does on his day off, and I was right, it is all work-related stuff. He has no hobbies. And he also sleeps on the floor. What a weirdo.

After Eric has freaked out about the person they discovered in the video footage - we cut to Callen and Sam and Arkady walks up to them all casual and says hi. Which I totally called. Clearly he's alive. It's right in the episode description that a 'murder victim shows up alive and asks for their help.' SHOCKING!

Arkady is funny. He wants bagpipes for his funeral. And the guy in the car is the guy we saw him struggling with at the beginning of the episode, he ended up shooting that guy with his own gun. AND his car was already rigged to explode. What the shit?! Who does that?!! What if he accidentally hit that button on the remote? What if someone rear-ended him?? That is insane.

Arkady is not being helpful, he doesn't want to be in the interview room, he wants coffee, he calls kayaks 'canoes'. But seriously, the boatshed is nice. The Coast Guard finds that the yacht might actually be a cargo ship, because it has a transponder.

Arkady is worried about a random girl who's on his phone, and admits that he set up a deal between American people with ships, and Russians with cargo. Also the guy whose fingerprints were in Arkady's ransacked house was a suspended LAPD officer who now works for the sketchy shipping company. He was the one who Arkady shot and then blew up, but he was working with another guy, also an ex-cop, who they can't find.

Deeks is all sad and sighing and gloomy and Kensi asks him if there's anything bad that IA might find, and he doesn't know how to answer that. Sad Deeks face.

Arkady tells Hetty that's it's 'nice to see her again', and she responds "I wish I could say the same, but my mother raised me not to tell lies."

Haha so witty Hetty. Although that in itself was a lie, because she lies all the time. PARADOX ALERT!

The ship was full of oil. 100 million dollars' worth of oil, to be exact. HOLY SHIT. Damn oil. Apparently that's enough to start a war. No kidding.

I'm sorry, did someone say 'oil'?

The sketchy siblings who own the sketchy shipping company are stereotypically sketchy to the max. And the bad cop who Kensi and Deeks were tailing is on his way to meet them. For some more sketchy dealings, no doubt. Turns out the bad guy is not the one who they were looking for, he's dead and in the trunk of his own car. But they go into the stairway so naturally that concrete interrupts their radio and Callen and Sam can't hear them. Somehow yelling 'gun' and causing mass panic lets all the civilians know who the BAD guy with the gun is... No one ducks and runs from Sam. He didn't even try to shoot Arkady, he just shoots the shipping company owners. And then Sam shoots him. He was a Russian contract killer.

Callen returns the pocketwatch to Arkady and they exchange Russian phrases. Yaaaay symbolic gestures! And Arkady calls Callen 'my friend' as he leaves, so THEY TOTALLY ARE FRIENDS.

Hetty has a feeling that 'the day is not yet over'. And Nell says that the tanker is not where it's supposed to be. So now Hetty wants to talk to Arkady again, but that's gonna be easier said than done.

I really wish there'd been more resolution to the Nell/Eric awkward cuteness, but hey, those few scenes we had with them were a lot more than we've had in recent weeks. I'll take it!
Also, someone give Deeks a hug.