‘The Blacklist’ season 1, episode 16 review: Diego Klattenhoff shines as Ressler suffers

After a one-week hiatus in order to try to make the premiere of “Believe” into a success, “The Blacklist” came back on the air Monday night with a story that took a very different focus than the usual episode. “Mako Tanida” was a story that really went back into Agent Ressler’s own personal history, and introduced us in the process to a little more of Tom Keen’s true intentions.

When it comes to Tom, he really was still given the B-story treatment as we saw him embark on a quick mission to put Jolene in her place after she came to his home at the start of the episode, and tried to get herself all involved in his marriage. Suffice it to say, Tom did not take kindly to this. Apparently when Tom goes into evil mode, he loses the hipster glasses.

Instead of Tom getting center stage, this episode was really about Ressler’s revenge mission after losing Audrey, just a matter of three short months after getting her back in his life. Do we feel like the show is still setting things up so that we end up seeing him together with Liz? Sure, but this wasn’t really about that. It was more of a way to get to know the character better, and see the interesting parallels that were drawn between him and Reddington. He had a chance to go down that road with a few simple gunshots, but he opted not to.

Also, massive kudos here to Diego Klattenhoff for killing it in this hour, and reminding us of how happy we are that he has a new gig so soon following his team on “Homeland.” The scene of him and that pregnancy test? Let’s just say that this made matters even worse than they already were. The head in the box shipped from Reddington at the end was just the icing on the cake.

As for what was with James Spader’s character and “Swan Lake” at the end, we imagine it as such: This was a final memory that he had with his daughter (or at least an important one), which may or may not be Liz. We just have to question whether or not we should take him at his word when it comes to what he said earlier in the season. Grade: B+.

What did you think about tonight’s “The Blacklist” episode, and are you glad that Ressler had such a focus this week? Share below.

Photo: NBC