Written by Ryan DeMarco
The Blacklist Midseason Premiere Plot Summary
In the conclusion to the two part arc, Agent Kean (Megan Boone) is taken hostage by Luther Braxton (Ron Perlman) who plans to retrieve her memories in order to get the fulcrum. Red (James Spader), and the FBI Task Force race the clock in order to stop Braxton.
Agent Kean found herself fighting something that she believed was long gone: her memories. As she slips deeper into a comatose state, he slowly uncovers more and more fragments about her childhood, and the fire that happened 26 years prior, an event that she believed killed her parents.
We picked up last nights episode right after the factory was hit with a missile attack, As the facility begins to crumble and smoldering with flames Red awakens to find Braxton is gone along with Agent Kean. He’s taken her to Alaska of all places to try to retrieve the fulcrum from Kean’s memory. He recruits Dr. Selma Orchard, a neurologist who once helped Braxton eliminate painful memories. Throughout the episode we’re only offered a number of memories from Kean, as a young child trapped in her closet, she listens to her parents argue, she begins to hear a mention of the fulcrum, finally ending with a gunshot and smoke oozing in through her closet door. Her last glimpse is with Red standing in her house just watching. She finally begins to get some answers.
When Kean wakes up she is obviously furious with Red. She tells him that she knows why he’s always been around and pretended to care. She feels that he was only around because of her knowledge of the fulcrum. But now she knows that Red was present during the fire and holds more information to her than he ever led on to knowing. Lizzie and Red’s relationship has always had their ups and downs with lies and deceit but considering this one hits too close to home, how will it affect the show?
Luther Braxton proved to be a disappointment in my view, especially when played by Ron Perlman. His character was given much more material in the first episode but this episode he is mostly standing in the background and quickly dealt with towards the end. I understand this episode was meant to shed more light on Agent Kean’s past but I felt the story was still a little lazy and just tied up way too neat for it to be believable this week.
I commend the writers for finally building a flow with uncovering Lizzie’s past but, I believe they need to focus on building stronger villains (Aslo Garrick, anyone?) for Red and the task force to deal with, after all they are meant to be on Red’s blacklist.
Do better Blacklist, I know you can.
Rating 6.5/10
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_t2VAkahevo&spfreload=10
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