#Hawai’i’ Turns Vanessa Lachey Into an Action Star as Jane Tennant

“I feel like I’m in a movie: Platoon meets Jurassic Park,” says Vanessa Lachey of filming the latest NCIS entry on lush Oahu. She stars as Special Agent in Charge Jane Tennant, a divorced mom who is the first female to head the office of NCIS Pearl Harbor (and also to head a show in this TV franchise).

“She is a strong woman doing it all: running this team, raising two children, giving herself credit and respecting everything she’s done to get here,” Lachey says. The actress has loved putting in hours of tactical, weapons and physical training. In the premiere, “There’s a massive fight scene, and I had the best time!”

Facing danger together—the first case involves the suspicious crash of an experimental aircraft—has made Tennant’s agents tight. “They’re like a family. Sometimes there’s going to be arguing and bickering,” says NCIS: Hawai’i executive producer Christopher Silber. “[But] Jane sets a high bar and everyone falls in line.”

NCIS: Hawai’i, Series Premiere, Monday, September 20, 10/9c, CBS

This is an excerpt from TV Guide Magazine’s 2021 Fall Preview issue. For more inside scoop on the new fall TV season, pick up the issue, on newsstands now.