The Blacklist - "Wuijing" S1E3
WARNING: This review contains spoilers.
OK, James Spader is bringing a world class 'A' game to The Blacklist. Trouble is, the script cannot keep pace with Spader's acting chops.
At least in this third episode of the show, the FBI is no longer pretending to have Reddington in custody. So watching the first half of the episode was more enjoyable, considering I didn't have to keep wondering how he comes and goes from custody. You know, since he is a High Value Detainee and all.
This episode starts with a great opening scene. An agent is ambushed, killed, and his hand cut off by the bad guys. The bad guys then use his hand to try to break a biometrically-protected laptop computer, presumably to get access to some seriously classified national secrets. But the hand/fingerprint thing doesn't work, so the Big Bad of the Week, an unknown spy-killing mercenary called Wuijing decides to call in Reddington's help with cracking the encoded information.
A meet is made with Reddington, and Red works it out where he gets to take Elizabeth Keen (Megan Boone) along with him. And, quite handily, Lizzy is not only a budding top-notch FBI profiler, but a closet computer geek who can hold her own in a room of real computer geeks. Which is a nice ability to possess when you are trying to take down an unknown bad guy who is so good at his tradecraft that he can kill random spies without notifying any of the proper authorities of his existence, but can't seem to see through the charade of Reddington and Keen. I would guess that the trick is Spader's acting, and not the writing of the show.
Meanwhile, Keen is digging out the box of passports, guns, and money that belongs to her rehabilitating husband, the mild-mannered mate of a smoking hot rookie FBI profiler-turned-hacker. Keen continues along with her decision NOT to ask her husband, "Hey, what's up with the passports, the gun, and the bundles of 10 grand that I found in that wooden box in the floor?" Which makes perfect sense. I'm sure my wife would not question me if she found similar items in our house. But my wife does not work for the FEDERAL BUREAU of INVESTIGATION!
Later, when Wuijing gets suspicious of Reddington and Keen, Reddington pretends that he is being set up by Wuijing. And Red shoots Wuijing's computer geek, who was just about to reveal that Keen used a memory stick to transmit all of the bad guy data to the FBI/CIA. Then Keen uses a tracking device to lead the FBI to Wuijing, and Agent Ressler gets to save the intended target of Wuijing from assassination, but not before a good fight scene where a clearly-trained martial artist is bested by the fisticuffs of Ressler.
Usually, you see this kind of wheel-spinning and standing-in-place type of episode in the middle of a 22 episode network show. But we, the audience, are treated to this kind of episode in the third show of the season. Lucky us.
I'm strangely enjoying this show, but I must admit to suspending logic whenever I tune in. As the show progresses and builds its world, I'm hoping for some deeper character development and at least a nagging question or two to get answered. Or at least a few hints thrown our way.
I'll continue to watch for the foreseeable future, primarily because of Spader. But, please, writers, don't make him utter anymore lines like that horrible throwaway, "That's what they said about Deep Throat and the G-spot."
Random Thoughts:
- Is Agent Ressler the dumbest law enforcement officer on TV? I mean, I'm afraid of how this character would react at a four-way stop sign.
- Nice touch with the ballistics, Lizzy. Too bad the writers left us hanging with the Classified, redacted report.
- If you were a super secret agent with the Department of Homeland Security, could you keep it from your spouse?
- I'm going to try the "steal all your data with a memory stick" trick and see how that works. Or maybe it just works on network dramas.
What did you think?
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