Things are beginning to pick up speed as the end of NCIS: New Orleans Season 3's end appears on the horizon.

Just for good measure, the team also had to deal with a super-virus making a unit of Seabees sick on NCIS: New Orleans Season 3 Episode 19.

It's a shame Pride and company kept getting tripped up by "need to know."

They didn't need to know why a special unit of Seabees was brought in to install supposedly high-speed, fiber-optic cable, a task that could have been handled by any competent civilian contractor.

It was pretty obvious by the way Commander Lopez was ignoring their inquiries that more was happening than she was letting on.

So the NCIS squad got left in the dark when trying to solve the mystery of who was poisoning the Seabees, which was hard to figure out when they didn't know what was being worked on.

Good thing Patton was around to feed them an occasional lead. Look, there's Lopez outside the deadly bakery, while she was supposedly missing. Look, there's a stolen car loitering around the bakery. Let's track that down.

He gave them something to work on while military intelligence dragged its boots. By the time NCIS got read in by the powers that be, it was way too late to be useful.

This was also the episode when Sebastian finally became a functional field agent instead of a punch line.

That's largely because Loretta, his mother figure who is so much less neurotic than his real mother, was imperiled. 

This brought something out previously missing in Sebastian.

Now he's raising his voice and following his hunches just like all the other agents around him. He divined that the obnoxious pair ordering him around weren't really who they claimed to be. He flushed them out prematurely by pulling a fire alarm.

Yeah, this Field Agent Sebastian was tolerable. But I fear it's the exception rather than the rule.

Sebastian is just offbeat weird. Not smart weird like Reid on Criminal Minds. No, more like Eric on NCIS: Los Angeles. Very talented in their specialty areas, but don't let them out to interact with the general public.

But, for another outing at least, the grand experiment lumbers on.

It's a good thing Sebastian was on his game this time, because once again Percy was MIA. I understand that not all actors' contracts are identical, so it's unrealistic to expect each character in every episode. 

But Percy is one of four field agents. There's no deep bench like on NCIS: Los Angeles or a burgeoning squad like on the mother ship (Gibbs' Gaggle?) Being an agent with NCIS: New Orleans shouldn't be a once-a-month duty, like with the National Guard.

But this hour is most important for the showdown between Pride and Mayor Hamilton.

At this point, any working relationship has been shattered.

Hamilton has gone from being the expected New Orleans rogue politician to someone darker. While Pride can be sneaky, he's too much of a straight arrow to allow someone such as Hamilton to flourish while succeeding on the backs of the city's residents.

The same hit-man, supposedly with a link to Hamilton, who blew up Javier Garcia also shot the last Chinese spy? What does Hamilton gain from shutting up the spy? Is he importing Chinese industry to New Orleans? Somehow, I doubt that.

But now that any semblance of civility is gone, Pride is going to have a much more difficult time investigating Hamilton. Especially with the mayor threatening to kick NCIS out of New Orleans. He seems to think he has the pull to do so, but we'll see.

So let's figure Pride's quest will remain a storyline in the background while the team solves the case of the week. With only three episodes left, I'm betting this storyline carries over to next season (now that there is for sure an NCIS: New Orleans Season 4). Hamilton's had too long to put down roots to expect a quick resolution.

To follow the Pride-Hamilton feud, watch NCIS: New Orleans online.

How did you enjoy the case of the week? Is having Sebastian in the spotlight again a good thing? How will Pride take down Hamilton? Comment below.

Quotables for Week Ending March 18, 2017

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Dale McGarrigle is a staff writer for TV Fanatic. Follow him on X.