• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, 10 hours ago

It is an increasingly common sign of the times -- TV shows that in any other era would get prime-time showcases on network TV are going to streaming first.

The latest is the new “NCIS: Tony & Ziva,” the latest spinoff from the original “NCIS” on CBS that for years was one of the highest-rated shows in all of television.

The original premiered in 2003 and is still on. Over the years, it spawned five spinoffs (not counting “Tony & Ziva”) -- “NCIS: Los Angeles,” “NCIS: New Orleans,” “NCIS: Hawai’i,” “NCIS: Sydney” and “NCIS: Origins,” a prequel series to the original show.

Along with the original, two others are still on CBS -- “Sydney” and “Origins.”

Needless to say, but the “NCIS” franchise has been a top performer for CBS for more than two decades. Nevertheless, the new spinoff is bypassing CBS and going straight to Paramount+. 

The title characters in “NCIS: Tony & Ziva” were both first introduced on “NCIS.” “Tony” is former field agent Tony DiNozzo, played by Michael Weatherly (above photo) for the first 13 seasons of “NCIS,” which premiered in 2003 and is still on.

“Ziva” is Ziva David (Cote de Pablo, above photo), one-time operative in Israel’s Mossad who became a field agent for NCIS, which stands for Naval Criminal Investigative Service. She was also a series regular on the original “NCIS.”

Apparently, the two became romantically involved, and after a number of twists and turns in their relationship, they are now divorced and living apart in Paris while sharing custody of their young daughter.

Tony is running his own international, high-tech security company and Ziva is running a private school of some sort (I think).

In the new show, they find themselves entangled once again in a battle against a group of super thieves who are wreaking havoc on international money supplies, while at the same time posing a threat to both of them and their daughter, Tali (Isla Gie).

“Tony & Ziva” is another in a long line of action/adventure TV shows and movies in which a swashbuckling couple are by turns romantic and antagonistic as they successfully fight off groups of bad guys who far outnumber them.

The show does as good a job as any of its antecedents in bringing the action and adventure home. Like many of them, the show is in many spots completely implausible, but it succeeds anyway.

The fact is, other than the two characters and their origins in the “NCIS” universe, “NCIS: Tony & Ziva” has nothing to do with NCIS at all since neither Tony or Ziva work there anymore. 

“NCIS” is applied here more as a brand identifier that links legacy CBS with new-generation streamer Paramount+ and vice versa.

This seems to be an emerging strategy in the streaming world, particularly when the same company owns legacy properties and a giant streamer. 

The strategy, which the TV Blog first noted last March, is characterized by the cross-migration of content from the streamers to the co-owned networks and back again.

Network and basic-cable content has long been repurposed for the co-owned streamers, and increasingly, series from the major streamers have been making their way onto the legacy networks.

The examples last March were HBO Max’s “Hack” getting a showcase on co-owned TBS and “True Detective” getting repurposed on TNT; Disney-owned Hulu’s “Only Murders in the Building” getting a second showing on co-owned ABC; and the Paramount+ Sylvester Stallone drama “Tulsa King” turning up on CBS.

The strategy seems to be: Share the wealth and everybody benefits.

“NCIS: Tony & Ziva” starts streaming on Thursday, September 4, on Paramount+.