NCIS star finally explains his sudden return to the show

By the end of season 15, two beloved characters of NCIS had left the series, and the fans were uncertain if a certain divisive character was going to return for the next season. Luckily, he is going to stick around for a while.

38-year-old actor Wilmer Valderrama joined the cast of the CBS crime procedural in 2016 for the show’s season 14 to play the – role of detective Nicholas “Nick” Torres, signing a contract to stay in the series until the end of season 15.

But the job Valderrama did in the past two years in the show has pleased the TV network enough that he was offered a new deal that ensures his presence in the series for at least two more seasons, as Cinema Blend reported.

The star signed this new contract on behalf of his own production company WV Entertainment and it goes beyond Valderrama’s part in NCIS, including plans of develop projects with a strong emphasis on diversity, according to Deadline.

The actor and producer, who is of Venezuelan and Colombian descent, expects to have a positive impact in the network’s programming. Read more on our Twitter account @amomama_usa

“As someone who immigrated to the United States at 14 years old, I am immensely passionate about this opportunity to create engaging and culturally relevant projects with CBS Television Studios.”

-Wilmer Valderrama, Deadline, June 22, 2018.

Now that the actor has strengthened his links with the network, Valderrama has opened up about what NCIS has meant for him, and how it was the only crime drama he considered interesting enough for him to become involved with.

As TV Week reported, Valderrama had spent some time trying to figure out his next career move as an actor, and a criminal procedural was the last thing on his mind, as he told the entertainment site in a recent interview.

"A lot of those shows just cover the case of the week and it can become quite predictable, so I turned a lot of them [offers] down,” he said.

"But NCIS isn't like that; it's a success for a reason. I was given an opportunity to take the show to a place the audience hasn't seen – that's what drew me in," added the actor who became known for playing “Fez” in “That 70’s Show.”

Valderrama’s presence in the current season of NCIS, which premiered on September 25, is certainly a relief for the viewers, who have had to cope with the departure of most of the original cast members.

49-year-old Pauley Perrette, for instance, was one of the last remaining original cast members to leave the show, after been committed to it for 15 seasons, and the fans had a hard time accepting she was not going to be around anymore.

But a day prior to season 16’s premiere, her former co-star Michael Weatherly, who left the show a year before Perrette, said he believed the actress was going to return to reprise her role as lab technician Abby Sciuto.