How can I not comment on the final episode of the Blacklist after watching every episode of the series from the very first episode in Season 1 to the final episode 10 years later? I am still numb.
Yes, it’s fiction, but the storyline and characters grow on a viewer and fan after many years. The brilliance of James Spader in acting out the idiosyncrasies, foibles, eccentricities, compassion, cold-heartedness, brutality, brilliance and calm demeanor of Raymond (Red) Reddington was masterful throughout the series. It is doubtful that the character or the series could have been the same with any other actor. Spader made the character real.
But, here I am today, after watching the final 2-hour (two-part) episode of the show’s 10-year tenure feeling empty, let down, disappointed and yes; numb.
Spoiler alert !!! If you did not yet see the final moments of the last episode (somehow), then don’t read the following.
Although Raymond was a cold-blooded killer, he was not a sociopath. There were many people he loved, many people he cared about and had compassion for. He had humanity. That was incredibly portrayed by Spader and the writers alongside his criminal and killer procliviites. Yet………
Here he was in the final minutes of the last episode after 10 years; in Spain, in a pasture, face-to-face with a large snorting, slobbering bull. I had hoped that this was just a stare-down, something symbolic, before sickness would cause Raymond to sit down under a tree, as he admired the surrounding beauty, and die a natural death.
But, that wasn’t what the writers had in mind. I am not happy with the writers. I really just thought we were witnessing Raymond’s brave, unshakable nature and that the bull would turn around and walk away and Raymond would go peacefully and maybe, earlier in the episode, we would have a better idea what every member of the task force would do as they moved on with their lives.
That didn’t happen. Instead, the bull charged. In the last minute, we are witness to Donald Ressler standing over Raymond’s bent and contorted body, brutally broken up, and calling Harold Cooper to report that “I got him.” Yes, Ressler shows a reverent moment of respect when finding Raymond’s hat several feet away, dusting it off, and putting it on Raymond’s body. “I got him;” really?
Where is the funeral? Where are the assurances that all the team members are moving on with their lives? Dembe gives an incredible speech from his hospital bed to Harold and tears stream down his face as he recalls his love for Raymond and all the aspects of Raymond that were good. Yet, Dembe had gone to such great lengths to turn his life around and found an honorable occupation and now we know that he has been fired. What will he do?
After 10 years; I feel somehow let down. Maybe there could be no ending to the only show I watch on network television that would have made me happy. Maybe Red could have gone out in a blaze of glory, but I would have rather he joined his girlfriend in Columbia and lived happily ever after. Is that a crazy wish for someone who probably killed a hundred or more people? (sometimes unflinchingly….no, usually unflinchingly) It is the side of Red, the side with humanity and compassion and love for his friends and his grand-daughter that deserved better. Why the loyalty to a job over all else for Ressler and Cooper?
Good-bye Blacklist. You were a long-running brilliantly-written series that took me to a different place every week (except for the long break) and provided some real entertainment and affinity for some fictional characters.
