The Blacklist – Miss Rebecca Thrall (No. 76)

By starrymag | October 18, 2017

By: Robert Warren

 

 

Officers McGinnis (Brian Wiles) and Parker (Jay Ward) of the Baltimore Police Department barge into the home of Scott ‘Scottie’ Stansbury (Ryan Jonze) with a warrant and McGinnis takes two shots to Scottie. Scottie falls to his death as Parker comes running over. McGinnis quickly places the gun in Scottie’s hand and Parker asks McGinnis what happened. McGinnis tells him, “He drew. He fired,” as if he is saying Scottie killed himself. Parker checks his pulse and sees he is dead. Parker acknowledges the fact that McGinnis had to fire and McGinnis admits he did. McGinnis sees the chief and assures the chief he was following protocol but the chief lets him know that he is going to need a lawyer.

The legs of a woman in polished red heels cluck the street as she enters McGuiness`s car. She assures McGuiness that he has done his job and the funds are now available for him. She now wants the password to the account because she is ready to do her job. What is that job? The show leaves us hanging.

In “Miss Rebecca Thrall (No. 76)” Raymond ‘Red’ Reddington (James Spader) fights the ice machine in the hotel hall for a little ice. Shaking the ice machine, he walks down the hall with nearly an empty bucket of ice as he sees a cracked door. He looks away and then proceeds to knock on the door of Gary and Piper (Jennifer Knox) to use their phone because he locked himself out of his room. As he is on the phone with Dariush he sees three men walking in a suspicious way by the pool.

Redddington decides to enter that cracked apartment room and sees the words “Rivera wants you” on the mirror. Reddington’s cell phone beeps as he dials Dembe Zuma (Hisham Tawfiq) asking for a plate number.

Tom Keen (Ryan Eggold) sits outside with medical expert Nik Korpal (Piter Marek) seeing about identifying the bones in the suitcase. Korpal tells him about Pete (Karl Miller) who may be of help because he has the medical equipment Tom needs to identify the bones. Pete walks over to Tom and Korpal. They begin talking about the bones and pulling DNA from them. Pete points out when bones are exposed to air it can make it difficult to pull DNA from them and Tom suggests that if that is the case then he start heading to work on it.

Elizabeth ‘Liz’ Keen (Megan Boone) walks into a coffee house that Reddington is at because she heard from Dembe that Reddington moved out of the Terrace Vista Hotel that he was staying at. Reddington has a newspaper full of apartment listings that he is looking at apartment hunting while Liz can start looking into McGinnis because Reddington believes it was premeditated murder.

McGuiness is claiming that the victim shot first as according to the newspaper, but Reddington believes otherwise. Just because McGinnis has a clean record does not make him innocent. This is a case of “killer cops for hire,” as Liz puts it. Reddington wants find McGinnis and put a stop to this because if they don’t Reddington believes that this won’t be the last case like this.

At the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) headquarters Liz is speaking as they are looking into the records of McGinnis. Liz`s boss at the FBI, Harold Cooper (Harry Lennix), tells her to talk to McGinnis and see if anything seems off. Liz heads out.

Liz began to sit and investigate McGinnis as Donald Ressler (Diego Klattenhoff) sits and investigates Parker to try to figure this out. Liz met with Ressler to discuss how it went. Liz believes McGinnis is guilty because he said that the first shot missed, but the second shot hit. It seems off that the second shot would hit when usually the second shot goes higher up so Liz thinks he is guilty.

The three men who Reddington looked suspiciously earlier by the pool are now entering an abandoned warehouse as Reddington is sitting at a table with a gun pointed to them. Dembe walks around the corner to face the three suspicious men and cocks a shotgun that loads the bullets. One of the men says that Reddington never delivered the guns to Rivera and Reddington assures them the guns will be there in 36 hours. Dembe leaves with Reddington surprised he said the guns will be there within 36 hours because Reddington has no guns.

Liz and Ressler enter the home of McGinnis`s family, with the McGinnis family lawyer there, trying to find out more information and telling the family about where McGinnis stands as of now. Ressler steps to the side as he receives a call from Henry Prescott (James Carpinello) about fetching a car for Prescott. Since Prescott helped Ressler with hiding a problem involving the National Security Advisor`s skull a while back Ressler is in debt to Prescott at this point. Ressler just asks for the license and registration of the car to obey Ressler`s orders and then returns to Liz who he needs to interview the family by herself so he can go. Liz lets him take off as she works on interviewing the family by herself.

Reddington is at the Department of Motor Vehicles to speak to Glen Carter (Clark Middleton). Reddington gets called and he goes to Glen`s office and Reddington proceeds to ask Glen to borrow one million dollars for two days.

Liz mentioned Waterday is a place that lets people borrow loans like the victim of the shooting, Scott Stansbury, and that there may be a possible connection to McGinnis if the cop borrowed a loan there as well. Ressler said in fact that McGinnis did borrow a loan from there and Cooper says, “Are you telling me the same company that bought the victims settlement loaned money to the cop who shot him?”

Liz and Samar Navabi (Mozhan Marnò) go to Waterday Financial to talk to Mr. Johnson (Aaron Serotsky) about why Waterday would loan money to both the victim Scott Stansbury and the shooter McGinnis.  Mr. Johnson explains that with so many loans going out it isn`t fully possible to know what the intent for the loan may be. Liz is not impressed with the answer and wants to see all the recent documents about loans made out to the victim and the Baltimore Police Department. Without a warrant; however, she is going to be forced to come back to look at the documents once she has a warrant.

Reddington is sitting with Joe ‘Smokey’ Putnum (Michael Aronov) and Heddie Hawkins (Aida Turturro) trying to find a place to build a covert runway. Reddington does not care how it gets done as long as it gets done. After leaving the table he meets with Tom to talk about a business venture.

Back at the FBI headquarters, Cooper is looking with Liz at a few of the loans that were done through Waterday and noticing how some of the loans were taken by cops involved with murders. There is also a pattern of none of these loans being paid back. Liz notices how it is weird so many of the loans were being used for assassinations. Keen walks into Waterday and announces for all of the employees to step away from the desks. She now has a search warrant. Mr. Johnson gets a call while being tied up to a wall by Rebecca Thrall  (Sarah Wynter) saying that the Feds have invaded the office and know now. Mr. Johnson says that they are in trouble. Thrall walks in a few circles stressed. “We`re in trouble.” Thrall questioned, “We? They`re pulling files from your office.” Thrall walk stressed then proceeds to suffocate Mr. Johnson.

Reddington walks to meet with Adika Buhari (James Moses Black) to pick up some guns. Buhari knows that money is not really Reddington`s thing, but Reddington assures Buhari he will have the money. Glen Carter (Clark Middleton) walks in to give Buhari the money. Reddington wants the guns delivered by the end of the day.

Reddington is walking through a forest talking to Smoky on the phone about the forest, which is supposed to be turned into a runway for a plane that is supposed to land in four hours. Smoky says that he just needs time because he has to get Leroy and Quakers to that area. “Who the hell are LeRoy and Quackers,” Reddington asks.

The FBI did some investigating to see that the next victim that might be targeted is Robert Urwiller (Julian Rozzell Jr.) Urwiller is in a convenience store grabbing two lottery tickets meanwhile Smoky has arrived to the forest area to clear it for a runway except he returned with more than he left with. Smoky returned with Leroy and Quackers, two elephants meant to clear the path. Off the elephants go carrying the trees. It seems Smoky being a carnie may have paid off a bit.

Urwiler takes off the road in a car as a copper slides around the side.  Ressler, who is moving things around the trunk of his car, receives a call from Cooper about the blacklister`s next target. Cooper is making sure that Ressler is on the way and when Ressler sees a cut off human arm with the hand attached in the trunk of his car he says he is coming.

Reddington is in the forest area thanking both Smoky and Heddie for clearing the forest so the plane can land. Marc Scibila`s “My Time is Comin” plays in the background as the plane starts coming down for landing.

Ressler talks to Liz and lets her know that he has Urwiller`s car`s location and where it is headed. Navabi is driving as Liz gets the coordinates. Liz tries to get details on the car.

Urwiller hears sirens start to go off and looks in the mirror of his car to see the coppers flashing lights. Urwiller pulls to the side as the cop, Jennifer (Nikiya Mathis), gets out and walks to the side of his car. Jennifer asks for Urwiller`s license and registration. When Urwiller bends for it Jennifer pulls a gun on Urwiller as Liz pulls in. Navabi tells the FBI to notify the Annapolis Police. Urwiller turns around and sees Jennifer with the gun and is in shock. Liz jumps out of the car yelling “FBI” and tells Jennifer to drop the gun. Jennifer puts her hands up scared as `Liz, approaches. Navabi grabs the gun from Jennifer’s hand.

Buhari is walking along the cleared forest with the guns for Reddington in a case. Reddington sends Dembe to grab Buhari`s payment as cars full of the U.S. ATF Department of Justice pull up. Buhari`s squad runs off as Reddington and Tom put their hands in the air.

Liz is leaning against a cop car as Ressler pulls up. Ressler tells Navabi the Waterday CEO is dead according to Aram but he may have had an accomplice. “For all we know, is socliciting more cops,” Navabi said. “If we can get to Serry, we might be able to get to the end of this.”

Reddington and Tom are inside the back of a van talking to each other and Tom is a bit upset that he may be going to prison with Reddington because of this whole thing. Tom starts going on a rant about how kind and good of a person `Liz’ is compared to Reddington. “She sees the best in people…” Tom says. “Even when she is being lied to.”

The woman in heels, Rebecca Thrall, walks again at the end of the episode with a gun in her hand. She walks aside an empty cop car and gunshots are fired to break inside the glass, unfortunately for her the glass is as you would suspect, bulletproof.

Liz pulls up in a car and tells Thrall to put her hands in the air, she listens.

Someone shows up to the van that has Tom and Reddington and takes the cuffs off of them. “Who the hell is this guy?” Tom asks.  Tom is shocked that he just got the cuffs off and thought he was going to prison. Reddington had this all planned however to scare off Buhari`s squad so he didn`t have to pay for the guns.

Reddington shows up to Cooper`s office and tells him how he gets both Rebecca Thrall and the African gunrunner Buhari who Reddington is having taking straight to FBI custody. Tom starts talking to Liz about he could`ve been killed and how surprising it is that Liz is related to Reddington. Nevertheless, Liz appreciates Tom being willing to help her father. “Means the world to me,” Liz says. She takes off and Tom receives a call from Nik saying that McGee called able to get some DNA from a tooth. Reddington peers through a window looking at Tom on the cell as Tom looks back.

Reddington starts talking to Ressler about how he has more of an appreciation for him since he is willing to walk the thin line separating order from innocence. Reddington finds this admirable and wants Ressler to know that he can trust Reddington. Ressler takes off and is seen overlooking his trunk where the arm with the hand attached is.

Ressler gets told his next assignment is going to be coming real soon. Insects chirp as Reddington and Dembe sit outside with low lit lighting, just being at peace and having small talk. Glen shows up for his money and Reddington mentions that it has been turned in full. Glen joins the two fellows outside to just be at peace. Reddington passes Glen a drink. They all take a sip up and the episode reaches a close as Reddington gives Glen two pats on the back.