Photo Courtesy Of NBC
Warning: Spoiler Alert
One of the great debates that divides our nation, centers around the argument whether or not “Global Warming’s” taking place on our planet. If it’s occurring because of toxins that we let into our air, than humanity’s destroying our home. The most radical, but most effective way of solving that problem’s eradicating every vestige of humanity, but nobody insane enough to dream up that concept, could possess the intelligence to actually accomplish that, could they? In the circles that Raymond Reddington travels in, people with mindset do exist as we witnessed in the latest episode of the NBC series “The Blacklist,” as an eco-terrorist group plans to wipe out humans across the planet, by releasing the plague that wiped out millions on this planet 700-years-ago.
The episode begins without the usual previous episodes catch-up clips for the audience, going straight into this story. We see a woman in her late thirties, walking down a city street in Washington, DC, frantically talking to someone on her cellphone. The woman says to the person on the other end, that she needs to stop him and she’s going to the police. We see the caller on the other end’s a woman about ten-years younger, who tells her friend that she’ll come and meet her and go with her to the police, right then we notice the woman walking, has blood dripping down he side of her face. She asks the other woman to please come alone and hangs up.
Moments later the woman, now cleaned up waits for her friend who pulls her car to the curb. She gets out of her car, but we quickly see a man jump out of the passenger side and quickly we figure out this is the man she talked about on the phone. She’s got something he wants and he struggles to get it, she tries running and gets hit by a cab, throwing her up in the air, then slamming her to the asphalt. The man searches her handbag, finds what he needed and tells the crowd to call an ambulance, then he and the other woman run off.
Red and FBI Agent Liz Keen, talk on the phone and Keen’s rather upset that Red still has his sniper keeping her under surveillance, she tells him to get rid of him or she will. Reddington changes the subject to the reason of his phone call, an incident that took place in the city that morning, as a woman died after being struck by a taxi. What intrigues Raymond’s the woman’s identity, Carrie-Ann Beck, wife of Maddox Beck, part of a radical environment cult, who allegedly died in a blast a few years before. Red believe that Beck’s responsible for his wife’s murder and most likely planning something to shake people up. Raymond doesn’t realize how much he’s understating the situation.
Back at the FBI Task Headquarters, Keen informs all the agents about what she learned from Red, Task Force Chief Harold Cooper tells his agents, he wants them down at the morgue investigating cause of death. The group’s IT expert Aram Mojtabai, informs Cooper that Beck’s not in the morgue, she’s being kept on life support as she’s carrying a 30-week old baby, the hospital’s hoping to save. Beck’s brain-dead, she’s just kept alive for the sake of her child.
Aram also reveals that the hospital found ancient clay under her fingernails and he believes he knows the cause. A museum held an exposition featuring 13-ancient paintings and one got stolen, ironically it was the least valued painting in the collection, a painting on loan from a church in Italy. But Aram’s got some clues as the museum scanned the painting with lasers and found a map hidden within the work. Cooper tells Aram to ask the woman whose the Bureau’s cartography expert to come take a look.
The woman arrives and tells Cooper, Agent Donald Ressler and Aram the lore of the painting. According to legend, the map contains how the plague got contained 700-years earlier, as Priests traveled to the ends of the earth to bury it. When Cooper starts pressing for information about where it could be buried, she informs Harold the whole thing’s a fake and the work’s worthless.
Lizzie heads to Red’s office and the same cartography expert’s there and he introduces her to Keen. The woman tells Raymond that the paintings worth a fortune and that it does show where the plague’s buried, turns out the ends of the world seven centuries ago, now’s known as the United States. Beck arrives at the spot before Keen and Ressler, but walked away empty-handed as the infected priest’s grave moved. There’s a stone plaque giving the new location in ancient Aramaic, which Aram translates. The body’s interred in an ancient church about 30-miles away.
The agents arrive and a priest takes them to the chamber containing the remains but they see that the lock and chain securing the door’s cut, Ressler has the priest take him to the other entrance while Liz goes through the door into the chamber. She encounters Beck in a haz-mat suit, with a bag carrying the infected remains, Keen has her weapon drawn and tells Maddox he’s not leaving the room alive. He counters that she has a choice, let him leave or he’ll expose them both and they’ll both soon be dead. Liz contemplates her choices, when Beck’s accomplice sneaks up behind her and hits her on the top of her head knocking her to the ground and the two escape.
Red’s still working on his own private projects, having little to do with the cases he gives to the Task Force. Through the previous episode, Raymond became consumed with insuring the safety of his former wife, now with that resolved he’s moved on to search for a mysterious girl that he gives little information about. He deals with a man we’ll refer to as “The Tracker,” a tiny misshapen bald little man with coke-bottle glasses. (For fans of “Fringe,” he played the guy who owned the store that Peter Bishop got rare books from.) The waiting room for “The Tracker’s” clients resemble a huge DMV, with a woman calling out numbers as if she worked in a bakery.
“The Tracker,” tells Red he’s got no new information on MS. Mysterious, mainly because Raymond’s provided him with little information. Reddington starts blasting the little man, but then notices something seems wrong with his old associate and asks what it is. The man responds its his mother, she’s got cancer and they’re running out of options. He mentions a few different procedures they’ve tried, then says the Flack seed diet and Red stops believing him. “The Tracker’s, ” invented fake illnesses for relatives for years and Red knows he’s pulling the same routine and he leaves the office.
Aram and Agent Samar Navabi are alone at the Task Force building when Reddington and Dembe enter the building and Aram tells Red that Liz isn’t there. Raymond tells Aram he came to speak to him, and the two of them and Dembe find a secluded place to talk. Red wants to see if Aram can track the girl and Mojtabai freaks, asking what Raymond did to the guys who couldn’t find her. Reddington gives Aram a sad smile and tells him finding this girl’s an important piece of his war with Berlin.
Keen and Ressler arrive back to headquarters and tell Cooper, Aram and Samar what happened. Navabi light’s into Liz for letting Beck get away with the remains and Lizzie defensively says, he was going to expose both of them. Samar shakes her head and talks about all the deaths that will occur because Keen allowed him to escape. As she stalks off, Aram pulls Keen aside and tells her he’s sure she made the correct decision, as he’s seen her under pressure and she always comes out on top. He then says Red asked him to do one thing and he froze, he soon realizes he should have kept his mouth shut as Liz badgers him for what Red wanted.
Beck and his associate ground up all the remains, turning it into a mist that will spread the plague through the air, he heads to his flock and tells them it’s time for their sacrifice, then picks one girl as patient zero. They infect her with the plague, then set her loose in the middle of the city, coming in contact with 2300 people before she passed. Those people get quarantined but only have hours remaining without an antidote.
Keen shows up at Red’s very upset, as she tells Red the FBI’s not looking for his daughter, who Liz believes is the mysterious girl. Red tells her that jealousy usually leaves him cold, but he finds it endearing in Keen’s case. She laughs at the accusation but Red says she’s just not ready to admit it to herself. Lizzie walks out in a huff.
Beck’s ready to introduce the next phase of his plan, having his entire group infect themselves, then take planes to every corner of the earth, insuring humanity’s destruction. Each of them get a mister with a mask attached and take the deadly disease deep into their lungs. Then go their separate ways to complete their mission.
The teams back together at headquarters, when Aram announces he’s figured out the plan and then describes how Beck’s group plan to take flights to 24 cities around the globe. All of the infected have boarded their planes except for one guy at Dulles. Keen and Navabi run off in tandem to stop the man from boarding his plane. The two agents arrive but can’t locate the suspect, but Amar spots him on the airports security cameras and direct the agents to where he’s standing. Samar locks eyes with the suspect and he breaks into a full run trying to elude her, he trips over some equipment and she tackles him, then the two roll on the ground into a small glass room. They struggle then the guy pulls out a mister and sprays it into Navabi’s mouth, realizing she’s infected she shuts the door, she’s also wounded as the guy shot her in the side. Liz sees her in the room but Samar tells her not to come in, she’s infected. Keen weighs her choices for a moment then enters the room, attempting to staunch Navabi’s bleeding with her jacket.
“The Tracker,” calls Raymond and tells him to get to his office. When Red gets into see him he tells the little man that his vending machine’s still broken. “The Tracker,” tells Reddington he found the girl, he used an application to make the picture resemble what she’d look like today and he found a 97% match. Red looks at the dossier and smiles saying her name, Zoe D’Antonio, then smiles at “The Tracker.” The little man looks through the window in his door and asks Red what’s going on, Raymond tells him he got him a new vending machine.
As Red and Dembe climb back into the car, Reddington receives a call from Aram and Raymond tells him the girls been located. Mojtabai congratulates Reddington, but tells him that’s not the reason he called, Liz and Samar got infected and Aram’s coming up short trying to locate where his compound is. He tells Red that Beck’s fallen off the grid and Red tells him that’s where Aram should start and hangs up the phone.
Later Mojtabai, comes into Cooper’s office and tells the chief he’s located Beck’s compound after receiving a tip from Red. He says the group would want a solar-energy powered location, not on the grid and only one property in the area meets those requirements. He gives Cooper the address but tells him not to get surprised if Reddington gets there first.
There are just two people at the compound, Beck and the woman who lied to Carrie-Ann, when Red strolls onto the property saying hello. Beck pulls out a knife and asks Reddington who he is and Raymond pulls out a pistol and tells him he’s the snake in the grass. He then tells Beck how he used to admire him for taking on polluters, but his message got distorted. Just then Dembe shows up with a tray containing vials of the vaccine. Red tells Beck that only two kinds of people would pull the stunt Beck did, saints or megalomaniacs and tells Maddox he’s far from a saint. He knew Beck wouldn’t sacrifice his life so he made a vaccine for himself and the woman. Red and Dembe take all the vaccine and leaves as sirens approach. By the time the authorities arrive the pair died from the plague.
The Blacklist’s a show that uses music quite effectively in all their episodes and the closing montage featured a very touching tune, serenading the scenes we watch as the episode draws to a close, Lizzie and Samar are both in hospital rooms passed out while receiving the antidote. Red sits with Liz, while Aram’s in Samar’s room when she wakes up and grabs his hand. The final shot’s Red on the street outside of a food-truck, selling food to customers on the corner. The young woman known as Zoe D’Antonio walks out of the truck, dumps some garbage and then heads back inside. Red approaches the “Roach-Coach,” as the episode concludes.
The Story Continues Next Monday at 10:00 pm o NBC.
