So a lot happened in “Hostages,” and I mean A LOT.
I thought that they might leave the big reveal of Scottie finding out that Tom was Howard’s accomplice as a big cliffhanger for the penultimate episode before the finale in two weeks, but they just went for it. Tom tried to break Howard out of the hospital where Scottie was holding him, and he got caught on one of the security cameras. Dumont was able to clear up the grainy footage and told Scottie that Tom was Howard’s mole inside the Halycion team. She immediately ordered Solomon to take him out. To me, this seems like a little bit of an overreaction. She had developed a pretty personal relationship with Tom, and her immediate reaction was to have Solomon kill him with a sniper rifle instead of talking to him? You would think that you would talk to someone you cared about before having them killed, but maybe that’s just me.
Whatever her incredibly flawed reasoning, it made for an extremely intense moment. I did think for a second that Scottie might not call Solomon off in time, and “Hostages” might be the end of Tom with the final two episodes dealing with his death, but that’s a little extreme even for Redemption. Needless to say, I was on the edge of my seat.
And I have to say, I’m extremely disappointed in Solomon. I know he’s a bad person, and I shouldn’t expect anything from him, but I thought he cared about Tom at least a little bit. Yes, Tom almost killed him in the past, but he had very good reason for doing so, and Solomon knows it. Scottie had to call him off three times to stop him from killing Tom, he wasn’t just following her orders, he wanted to kill him. I wouldn’t really say that he and Tom are friends, but they had kind of a love/hate relationship that I thought would be enough for Solomon to have some hesitation if he ever had to go after Tom. They’ve just had so many funny moments together and so much banter that it least seemed like they genuinely sort of liked each other. Apparently not.
Seems like the relationship between Tom and Solomon that I liked so much might be dead.
One part of “Hostages” that I really enjoyed was the budding friendship between Nez and Tom. Nez tells him that Howard was the one who helped her get clean after she became addicted to drugs and he always did whatever he could to help her. Tom told her that Howard was alive and Scottie was after him and she decided to join Tom in helping Howard. She also decided to enlist Tom’s help in breaking her continuing drug addiction so she could be at the top of her game to help rescue Howard, which was a touching moment, Tom even gave her a hug.
Even though Solomon doesn’t have his back, at least Nez does, and she knows that loyalty should be balanced with a desire for the truth and fairness as well. Solomon is just blindly following Scottie with no desire to find out why Howard faked his death or why Tom is doing what he’s doing. Now I know that Solomon owes Howard nothing, but I thought he was at least smart enough to want to know every angle of a situation, and he knows nothing about what’s going on between Tom, Howard, and Scottie. Maybe as things continue to heat up he’ll actually start caring about why everything is happening, and use that brilliant calculating mind we all know he has.
In closing, I would like to offer a little advice for Scottie. If you’re trying to call off the hit on the man you now know is your son, don’t start by asking “Is it done”. Start by telling your sniper (I.E. Solomon) to stand down. Asking him if it’s done just makes it sound like you want him to finish the job.
So Scottie knows Tom is her son, which is the biggest reveal from “Hostages” leading into next week’s episode.
This is actual footage of Scottie when Howard told her that Tom was her son and she should call off the hit on him:
Followed by a lot of tears after she realized how close she came to killing him.
But next week is the moment we’ve all been waiting for……that’s right, you guessed it! Finally some crossover with The Blacklist! It looks like Cooper and Liz are going to join Tom in his fight to protect Howard and find out about his past once and for all. I’ve missed them so much! It looks like we’re in for a really intense and emotional episode before the finale as Tom is extremely beat up and daring Scottie to kill him with her gun to his head.
Check out the trailer for part one of “Whitehall” next week to see for yourself! See you all next Thursday night!
The Blacklist: Redemption airs Thursdays at 10/9c on NBC.