Warning: Spoiler Alert
The good news is that the latest episode of the NBC series “The Blacklist,” ranked with some of the better episode’s of the show’s first season, and easily qualified as the most entertaining installment of this season. Unfortunately, the bad news is the series goes on hiatus after next week’s “Fall Finale,” until its replacement “Katherine Heigl Saves The Planet,” finishes its run. However lets celebrate what took place in episode seven, rather than worry about the series absence for the next few weeks and there was plenty to celebrate in this episode, both in the short-term and long-term story-arcs. Information got revealed that will affect the dynamic of the show for at least the next few episodes.
Once again the show starts in a high-profile, foreign locale, this week in Dubai as Kian Nouri, one of the top scientists in the Iranian nuclear program’s drinking in a bar while on a mission to acquire assets to speed the growth curve for the Iranian’s to build a nuclear weapon. He sees a beautiful woman staring at him from the bar and approaches her, then buys her a drink. The next scene’s in the hallway outside Nouri’s hotel room, as the couple are groping each other before they enter the room. Nouri instructs her to grab the door key out of his pocket and they tumble into the room. The Iranian’s unaware that the woman’s Mossad and FBI Agent Samar Navabi and seconds later he would fall to his death, pushed out his window to the street below by Navabi.
A week later in Washington FBI Agent Liz Keen and Navabi get summoned to Red’s by Dembe and Samar tells Keen she hopes her coworkers not offended. Liz laughs it off and tells Samar her feelings aren’t bruised. Red’s dipping into his vinyl collection and thanks the women for rescuing him from his addiction. He then tells the story about Kian Nouri, who got assassinated last week in Dubai and Navabi says she heard he committed suicide. Reddington then tells her that he’s aware she killed him on a mission for Mossad and she replies she’s unable to discuss Mossad operations. Raymond then tells the women that Iran contracted “The Scimitar,” to kidnap an American nuclear scientist and force them to work for Iran. Reddington says that the mercenary’s already landed in the States.
Liz makes a detour before heading to the Task-Force’s headquarters, as she pays a visit to her former make-believe husband Tom Keen, whom she’s got shackled to the floor of the room he’s in. The agent for Red’s adversary Berlin, says he’s given Liz all the information he has, but she presses for a name of a contact to set up a meeting with Berlin. He tries to talk his way out of his prison, by saying he can only get the information she wants if she lets him free. Keen’s wearing a short-sleeved tee-shirt and Liz’s leaving with the blanket she intended to give him to stay warm in the unheated room. Tom says he’ll die of the cold and Liz displays no mercy, so he spits out the name Volkov. Volkov’s an arms dealer whose supplied Berlin frequently and has ways to contact him, Liz throws him the blanket and locks the door as she leaves.
Agent Keen tracks down Volkov, tells him she knows he’s an associate of Berlin and wants him to set up a meet, but the arms dealer tells her she’s nuts. She then tells him he’s got a choice, he can set up the meeting or he’ll be put on the FBI’s ten most wanted list and allowed to remain free. Berlin won’t let him live for long knowing that Volkov could turn on him. The arms dealer agrees to set up the meeting.
Task-Force Director Harold Cooper meets with the Government Official that secures the safety of the nation’s top nuclear scientists and he tells Cooper that there are three top scientists working for the Government and they belong to sort of a witness protection type program, all three got false names, social-security numbers and fake backgrounds and occupations. He says it will be easy to put two of the scientists under lockdown, but the third scientist’s scheduled to speak the next night at a banquet in a an area hotel and may arouse suspicion if cancelled.
Liz and Red talk in his car and she reveals the information concerning Volkov and Berlin, but won’t tell Red the source of the information. He looks her in the eye and says if he didn’t know Lizzie killed Tom in last season’s finale, he’d think Tom was the source. Keen replies that she did kill Keen, but we can see Red doesn’t fully believe her.
Aram receives information that “The Scimitar,” tracked a man identified as John Reese, whom the mercenary’s records stated was a member of Naval Security. They had pictures, his Government file and logs tracking his movements for the last several days. Keen and Donald Ressler drive to a shuttle stop, that Reese’s car’s parked at and keep him from “The Scimitar.” Reese gets off the shuttle and Liz and Ressler pull into the parking lot seconds later, identify themselves and tell him he’s been targeted and they’ve arrived to protect them, they haven’t gotten in their car yet when the bad guys arrive with weapons blasting. They pull away from the other SUV, but a motorcycle pulls up besides them and throws some gas that knocks them out and their vehicle flips, before Liz blacks out she hears a man speaking in Farsi.
Reddington’s sharing some of his delicacies with his new-found friend Zoe, the young woman that “The Tracker,” located for him, then he pours her some wine. She asks Kenneth (the alias he’s used with her) if he has children and he says he’s got a daughter and things “are complicated.” Zoe tells him that her father did terrible things and she hasn’t seen him in years, then the sedative that Red put in the wine kicked in. Raymond tells her he’ll do her no harm as she passes out.
Lizzie wakes up in a hospital bed, first sees other patients, then sees Ressler unconscious in the bed across from her bed, she attempts to get up and yelps in pain, noticing for the first time her left arm’s in a cast. A doctor introduces himself as Dr. Rivera and tells her she’s at Bethesda, that she fractured her arm in three places and that Ressler suffered cerebral injuries, they’re going to put him through an MRI to determine the damage. She asks for a phone, to call her director and Rivera soon returns with a phone for her. She calls Cooper and tells him that she and Ressler are in Bethesda and Cooper tells her he’s sending Navabi over to check on them. Liz says goodbye, but becomes suspicious because of some sticky residue on the phone, she suddenly realizes she’s not in a hospital and the guy she talked with lacks a medical license.
Aram and Samar realize that Keen and Ressler are being held by “The Scimitar,” and Navabi contacts Red and the two pay a visit to a man that Samar and Mossad have tracked for months, because he’s done business with the Mercenary in the past. They go to his estate and surprise him while he’s getting a massage, as Red starts whacking golf balls against the house. The man, Ali, comes out to his backyard wrapped in a towel and Samar comes out with her pistol pointed at him and tells him she’s violated Mossad rules by being there, so she’s got nothing left to lose and asks where “The Scimitar’s,” hiding. Red then threatens him with unthinkable torture and he reveals where the phony hospital’s located.
Keen’s realized her arm’s not broken and removes her cast, then overpowers the nurse who attempts to inject her with a sedative. She wakes Don up and helps him walk as he’s groggy from the sedatives they gave him. Liz sees “The Scimitar’s,” two henchmen and is able to knock one out and take his gun, but the other one arrives and luckily so does Samar, who shoots the other gunman dead. The trio then head to the hotel that the scientist Dr. Collins is speaking at. Cooper arrives first and gets told the scientist’s in a safe room with guards posted at the door, but “The Scimitar,” knocked out the guards and kidnapped Collins. The three agents arrive and Cooper instructs them to get everybody inside the hotel, nobody leave until Collins’ gets found.
Liz and the others tell everyone to get back into the hotel, but a guy who looks like a bellman with a luggage cart keeps walking towards the parking lot. He turns around and of course it’s “The Scimitar,” who escapes in an SUV that comes at the perfect moment. But Keen’s saved Dr. Collins, who got stuffed inside the suitcase on the luggage cart.
Red takes Samar to where “The Scimitar’s” holed up at and then tells her that he’s the man that ordered the bombing that killed her brother and that nobody but them knows he’s there. They capture “The Scimitar,” and then Dembe tells Raymond that they need to leave, the meet with Berlin’s about to take place. Navabi tells her captive that he killed her brother and he tries to tell her that her brother was a suicide bomber. “The Scimitar’s,” body shows up a few hours later with a bullet between the eyes, execution style.
Reddington surprises Berlin when he arrives instead of Volkov, he tells him Liz gave him the info in hopes Red would kill Berlin, but he’s not going to do that. Instead his visit’s to prove that someone lied to Berlin that Red killed his daughter, he then introduces Berlin to the Russian’s long-lost daughter, Zoe.
The Story Continues Next Monday Night at 10:00 pm on NBC.
