‘The Blacklist’ season 4, episode 14 review: Who paid Isabella Stone? Aram goes undercover
What we learned through part of tonight’s new episode of “The Blacklist” was rather simple: Aram and his ex-pretend-girlfriend actually were able to benefit from all of that time in which they spent together.
Tonight’s new episode of the show was entitled “The Architect,” and one of the top priorities in the story was fairly simple: Seeing the Task Force try to take down the title character, someone whose main job is finding a way to construct and orchestrate “perfect crimes.” Not exactly the easiest guy to take down, no? Aram, given his computer and hacking skills, was the right person to go undercover as the “Blacklist” version of Elliot Alderson from “Mr. Robot.”
Eventually, Aram was able to make it out of there alive, but the Architect was still hard at work ensuring that his crime went off without a hitch. We’ve heard of breaking out of prison, but breaking into prison is an entirely different story. Aram unfortunately was the Architect’s hostage, and with that he was used in order to orchestrate his prison release plan. What he didn’t quite anticipate was him still finding a way to send out an SOS signal to give Ressler and Samar a clue as to where he was. We had a shootout in the woods (one of the things that the show does best), one that led to Amar actually being the one to take the Architect out in an explosive finish.
Obviously, this is not a guy we’re used to seeing going out there and causing these said explosions. Yet, that is precisely what we ended up seeing here. It’s a move that he made in the moment, thinking that it was a way to help others. It was only later that we started to see him show a little regret since having the Architect alive could’ve meant an opportunity to get more answers … but Samar still encouraged him not to feel too bad about this.
Red’s interrogation – Meanwhile, Red was busy doing some interrogation in the early going of one Isabelle Stone; while Melora Hardin was filming this scene, don’t you think she probably wished that she had one of Jan’s candles? It was his interrogations that led to the reveal that whoever hired him shared the same uber-mystery bank that he used with great frequency.
This put Red down an epic rabbit hole, one where he had to figure out precisely who deposited at the bank and effectively set up his demise. Red went on to do everything that he can in order to ensure that he got the name … and it included using a gun against an old friend. Isn’t that just what the guy does, though?
Here’s the big shocker at the end of the story: Red paid Isabella Stone … or someone did from his account. Good luck trying to unspool that one!
Tom’s journey – If you remember back on this past episode of the show, Ryan Eggold’s character put himself on a pretty epic path in order to properly figure out precisely what happened to him. His origin story sent him on a mission like no other. What he eventually was able to recover was a “script” from an earlier part of his life, one that led to a dilemma: Why was it so significant that he disappeared, and someone confessed to his murder? He realized that spending time with his mother was one of the only ways to get the answers he so sought.
Overall – There were times tonight when we started to wonder if the show did a little too much, but what they pulled off was pretty fantastic in terms of the twist at the end. Grade: B+.
What was your take on “The Architect,’ and do you want to see Aram go undercover more often? Let us know some of your thoughts on the subject below. (Photo: NBC.)