Tonight in “The Thrushes” the moment we’ve all been waiting for happened. That’s right, they finally got Agnes back!!!!!!
It feels like it’s been an eternity and a half since they first started looking for her, but Red’s work finally paid off.
When Kirk was holding Agnes and standing on the edge of the roof of the building I had about a thousand heart attacks.
But an audible sigh of relief could be heard throughout the fandom when Liz was able to talk Kirk down and Agnes was finally placed in her arms.
And then we got the adorable scene at the end with Red seeing Agnes.
I mean just look at these two. He’s so happy that she’s safe and unharmed. Even more than that, it really made me realize how good Red is with kids. He’s certainly done awful and unspeakable things, but whenever there’s a baby around he becomes a completely different person. Just for a minute we get to glimpse the tender, hopeful, and carefree side of Red.
Unfortunately, the return of Agnes doesn’t solve all of the problems that our team is dealing with. There is still a lot of unresolved tension between Red and Liz about her involvement with Kirk and the argument over who her father is. No matter what Kirk has done, Liz believes that he is the only one who can give her information about her past, and Red believes that her having any kind of involvement with Kirk and trusting what he says is foolish. In this argument I’m totally on Red’s side. There are other ways Liz could get information about her past without fully depending on the honesty of a man whom she barely knows. Not to mention he’s the man who kidnapped her and threatened to drop Agnes off the roof of a building. Granted, he did stop when Liz begged him and finally called him her father, but this is again a demonstration of manipulation. She only called him her father because it was the only way she could get him to hand over Agnes. That doesn’t seem like great trustworthy dad material to me. As Red said:
“Just because he was your mother’s husband doesn’t make him your father.”
Yes, Kirk is biologically Liz’s father, but this doesn’t mean that he was the one to take care of her and keep her safe. From the number of times that Red has hinted at it, I really think he was the one to raise her until something horrible happened. No matter how many times he says it, Liz never seems to take notice. Not for one second does she stop and think that maybe Red really is her father. All he has ever done from the first day they met is protect her and fight for her exactly like a father would. Liz called him a “snake” in this episode and she and Tom told him that they will no longer live under his protection. Despite everything he has done for them, all they ever do is say that they wouldn’t be in danger if it wasn’t for him. No matter how many times they tell Red everything is his fault, he continues to help them. Once things get really serious for Tom, Agnes and Liz again, we know that they’ll come crawling back desperately needing Red’s help. Someday I hope that Red will tell them no.
Another development in the episode was with Aram and his girlfriend, who we find out is part of a hacking group called “The Thrushes,” and she is operating as a mole for Kirk. This is almost more than poor Aram can take. It rested entirely on his shoulders to make sure that his girlfriend was not aware that he knew. When Samar was preparing him for his confrontation with her, they had an incredibly touching exchange. Aram had no problem with letting Samar know that he was terrified:
“I’m not like you. I’m really scared.”
With this confession Samar promises him that she has is back and will keep him safe.
Hopefully now that Aram’s girlfriend is out of the way, he and Samar can finally have the relationship they deserve.
This situation also led to a couple of good comedic moments. Aram was supposed to be acting normal around his girlfriend, and was doing a pretty poor job of it at first. Listening in over the radio with Samar, Ressler said:
“He sounds like a gerbil on meth.”
Fortunately, Aram did get a hold of himself and had perhaps the best line of the night when he took his girlfriend down.
“Quack, Quack Bitch.”
Pretty sure that’s gonna go down in Blacklist fandom history.
To round off the episode, we actually did get to see more of Mr. Kaplan’ story, and the guy who’s holding her captive is still creepy as hell. He’s worried about someone coming to look for her and putting him in danger, and he knows that she didn’t try to kill herself as she told him, because he has motion activated cameras set up in trees all around the forest. Like seriously who is this guy? Why is he living in the middle of nowhere with basically his own personal surveillance system? Who does he think is going to come looking for him in the woods? Anyway, from all of this, he knows that Red and Dembe could come looking for her, and that has him worried. Hopefully, Mr. Kaplan can recover quickly and get away from this psychopath before something really bad happens, because it looks like Red isn’t coming to rescue her.
Next week’s episode is the last one before the fall finale, and now that Kirk is in FBI custody, we have some intense times ahead.
Here’s a look at what to expect next Thursday.
The Blacklist airs Thursdays at 10/9c on NBC.
