Lara1- I remembered those comments as well and wondered about them. I went back and rewatched Requiem from the point where Sam goes to Kate to ask her to meet with Red.  Kate flips out, says that he turned his back on his family and country and took everything she loved from her.  But then when she is meeting with Red in the warehouse, she says "I don't know you" when he asks her to work for him.  The writers say it wasn't retconned.  My thoughts were (from the non-impostor point of view) that the comment about Red putting Liz in her arms as a baby wasn't mean to be literal, but metaphorical...that he and Katarina entrusted their daughter with this woman as an infant and she has been devoted to her safety since then.  As for the comment about Red not seeing her when Annie was shot, I assumed that Red had Kate under surveillance for a long time to see what she was doing and whether or not he could trust her.  He had probably done some of it himself, as he was still building his empire at the time, but that he wasn't there the night of the shooting. 

Shifting topics, but something I've struggled with ever since the Requiem episode was Katarina's possessiveness of Masha.  Her demands that Kate bathe, feed, hold, dress her exactly like Katarina does, that she will only fill in when Katarina is away, and that she will never love her.  I'm a mother (not rich enough for a nanny, sadly), but even if I had one, I would never put such demands in place.  To me, it spoke to an unhealthy level of control over her child.  Red talks about how Masha lived with Constantin off/on for 4 years.  That made me wonder if Katarina and Constantin were separated frequently (either by his travels or their choice).  It sounds like Katarina never tried to stop Red from believing Masha was his child. She manipulated two men into believing she was their child while simultaneously keeping her from them both in various ways (ending the relationship with Red, possibly leaving Constantin or taking Masha to Nova Scotia while he was in Russia).  I've even come to wonder if Katarina started the fire at the house in order to force Red to reveal where Masha was and retrieve the Fulcrum.  Finally, when it comes to Katarina saying she needed to leave Masha, she tells Kate that she can't stay with her either because she was the family nanny.  It seems to me like Kate disappeared well enough after that.  There was never any mention of her being harassed to find Masha/Liz.  If someone had wanted to know badly enough where the girl was, wouldn't they have tried to get the information out of Kate?   To me it sounded like one last effort for Katarina to both keep her child safe, but also ensure that if she couldn't be with her, no one else who had been close to her could either.  I don't have an especially positive view of Katarina, if you can't tell.  If she is alive, I imagine her being completely bonkers and highly dangerous. But I've noticed that Red never tries to disparage Katarina in front of Liz.  I don't know if it is because he wants to protect her from truth about her mother (that she was unhinged even then and that she knowingly put Liz in danger) and/or because he loves her still and struggles with his own acceptance of what she did.  I feel like he does (or did) release his anger towards Katarina and her manipulation on Tom because Tom was to Liz what Katarina was to Red and he didn't want the same pain for Liz that he had experienced.  I think that was why he was trying so hard to get her to not adopt a child with him.  Because he knew first hand that a child made it so much harder. 

And as someone mentioned elsewhere,  there was the possibility that Red and Katarina discussed her leaving Masha with Sam after the fire.  Whoever that was, thank you!  I have always labored under the impression that Katarina believed Red to be dead after the fire, but in hindsight, the only person who has ever said that was Red (and the Katarina he hallucinated in Cape May).  I have wondered how Red ended up finding Liz without Sam discovering Red was alive and calling him up to say he has his daughter.  That thinking makes more sense. 



 

I have the Blu ray and watched it with director commentary.  The Jons said that the shadow in that scene was to save money and they didn’t like it upon seeing it because it looked like they were trying to hide something. So I don’t think it was intended to be interpreted that way but to save money of effects.

But I definitely understand what you mean about everyone backing out.  I just wondered if that was any motivation for Katarina other than safety .  Because Dom says Red told him he had to back out. 

lara1 wrote:

Interesting thoughts Brittany.  I also think that KR was almost obsessive in terms of control over Masha and the instructions she gave Kate.  A bit odd.  But I have no explanation for it !  (yet )

Back to when Kate met "Red" after Sam came to get her and she says to Red that she doesn't know him - in my theory, she didn't because she did not at that time realize that it was the "Raymond" she knew standing in front of her.  After the fire everyone backed out of Masha's life and it seems like they didn't want anyone around who could connect the dots back to Masha.  Kate changed her name, Red disappeared by and large, Dom backed out too.  Therefore I think there's more than one reason why they shot that scene in shadows.  (After all, they shot the scene with "young "Sam" not in shadows and it was the same actor who played Sam, made to look younger.). I think Red was hiding in the shadows to hide his identity.  But that's just me!  I've probably just made up a completely different story!  LOL

It's also my birthday! Thanks for the great present, TBL! Kickoff of season 5!

What an amazing birthday!  

Thanks, everyone! TBL return was a terrific birthday present!