NFL
By: Greg Rector
After ten glorious seasons “The Blacklist” will end this Thursday night when the series ends with a two-hour episode. James Spader has been magnificent in portraying Reddington as complex a man as has ever been portrayed on television. When Spader chose to portray Reddington he clearly stated he wanted to portray a character on a television show who could sustain his interest and the viewers’ interest for more than 20 episodes a season, or in Spader’s own words create a “limitless landscape.” James Spader thank you for that doing that for me and millions of others for the last ten years.
From that iconic moment ten years ago when Raymond Reddington surrendered himself to the FBI he instantly won my heart over. He surrendered himself only to set himself up as the leading criminal on the planet who would go on to continue his criminality yet he was responsible for FBI task force 836 to apprehend many people they knew nothing about until Reddington showed them the FBI task force.
The First Eight Seasons
The Trials and tribulations of FBI profiler Elizabeth Keen and her relationship with Raymond Reddington kept us spellbound for those first eight seasons of “The Blacklist.” How did Reddington know so much about Elizabeth? How did Reddington know just when to step in and save Elizabeth Keen time and again all the while running his criminal empire and maintaining enough cases for the FBI? When Elizabeth was killed to end the eighth season how would this show go on?
Harold Cooper the head of the FBI task force was frazzled and dazzled by Redington time and again. Agent Donald Ressler went from being the guy who had chased Reddington for years to being one of the other task force members and he was just so interesting to watch go from a good guy cop to a man who crossed the line all because of the work of the task force.
The Last Two Seasons
Well, the show did go on despite Elizabeth Keen’s passing away. Quite nicely as a matter of fact. Last season we saw Raymond Reddington destroy his former lawyer Marvin Gerrard who had helped to kill Elizabeth Keen as season eight ended.
This season we saw Raymond take down his criminal empire stroke by stroke all while keeping the task force busy as well. How the show ends on Thursday will be very interesting indeed as instead of New York where the show was based sees Raymond Reddington goes to Spain for what the finale episode will bring us is all going to be revealed. Will we finally learn who Raymond Reddington really was? I highly doubt we find out the answer that was teased so masterfully over the great ten seasons of the show. The Blacklist will go down as a landmark television program.
Farewell
I am going to miss seeing Raymond Reddington befuddle criminals and the FBI task force weekly for the last ten television seasons has been a joy to watch James Spader give us all that “limitless landscape,” A man who was so serious about so many things who as in one episode came into the FBI black site and along with his cohort Dembe used helium balloons to speak with Director Harold Cooper. I will never forget Raymond Reddington. Farewell to one of the greatest characters ever on television.
