‘The Blacklist’ season 4 wishlist: Alexander Kirk answers, more James Spader goodness, and simplicity
On Thursday night, “The Blacklist” ended its third season on the air with what can be best described as a series of crazy reveals. First and foremost, we learned that Liz Keen was alive! Also, we seemingly learned that Alexander Kirk is her father!
For the time being, we’re being slightly reluctant to accept the latter as canon and true, if for no other reason than that this character has shown himself to be evil and therefore is far from a reliable narrator. Still, we have to establish this as a jumping-off point to the rest of our wishlist today, which details some of the story specifics we’d like to see the series establish moving forward.
1. No steps backward with Red – The past few weeks have been a James Spader tour de force, and while you have more characters to attend to now with Liz back, you cannot walk back what you’ve done with him. Don’t be afraid to still set an episode or two entirely around him, or tell stories from him unique, challenging point of view.
2. Keep it simple … or simpler – The biggest criticism we’ve had of the end of the season is that the story was a little all over the place when it comes to names, organizations, and allegiances. This is a show that could benefit a little bit from scaling things back, and keeping things a little more focused on some of the key players in a more familiar structure. Eventually, we do want to see Red and Liz working together to chase Blacklisters once more.
3. Don’t wait on Kirk – If this guy really is Liz’s father, don’t wait to give us a little bit more insight into precisely why he has kept this secret, and also what he really wants with Liz a.k.a. Masha at this particular point in time. There are some mysteries that you can hold on, but based on the way you ended season 3, it’s going to look really silly to drag this out.
4. Establish the spin-off further – Don’t leave Tom Keen MIA just because “The Blacklist: Redemption” is coming at midseason. We still need to figure out where Tom is in this world, and also to separate him from Liz and their child in a way that actually makes some sense. We’re not there yet.
(Photo: NBC.)