Can't help but thinking about Red's wheels turning while he's in the grip of Katarina Rostova (or whoever that is) and liking The Illusionist and how he sets stuff up. Red could use that kind of ingenuity on his team. Same with The Nurse - although of all the women on the Blacklist thus far, The Nurse has little to no super-powers, other than incredible empathy and human understanding. Red has something on her - I'm sure!

BBB - I agree Red was entertaining as always, and I liked the nurse too!

Tatiana - It did remind me of the Scimitar with Liz and Ressler in that fake hospital.

Big Badd Bazzer wrote:

Can't help but thinking about Red's wheels turning while he's in the grip of Katarina Rostova (or whoever that is) and liking The Illusionist and how he sets stuff up. Red could use that kind of ingenuity on his team. Same with The Nurse - although of all the women on the Blacklist thus far, The Nurse has little to no super-powers, other than incredible empathy and human understanding. Red has something on her - I'm sure!

Red is quite partial to empathy and human understanding 

Now, this Katarina Rostova, not so much. I don't remember the line, but when she had her man shot she said something about you can't be nice in this world. Nothing like our Reddington.
That's why I like to call her "Fakarina" 

Who she is, we don't know, but it will be interesting to find out.

Tatiana wrote:

Tuxie400 wrote:

One of the lines I found most intriguing was Red calling Katerina an illusion from the "collective imagination."
 

Tuxie, I wish I had your keen mind. I don't remember that line at all and yet it's very telling, especially if this whole thing is a stage and these characters mere players.

Everything is an illusion.

And we haven't seen anyone playing chess for awhile. However, Aram did mention playing chess with Death when he was talking about watching Ingmar Bergman films. The Seventh Seal, if I remember correctly from my college film studies classes. Although I have to admit my favorite is the Bergman parody "De Düva".

Tatiana - Oban tells Red he is like an illusion. But Red says Katarina is the illusion. I think Red's exact line was "Katarina is a figment of the collective imagination."  That kind of matches up with the idea from Season 2 that she was an amalgamation of several women.

Honey West wrote:

Tuxie400 wrote:

Tatiana - Oban tells Red he is like an illusion. But Red says Katarina is the illusion. I think Red's exact line was "Katarina is a figment of the collective imagination."  That kind of matches up with the idea from Season 2 that she was an amalgamation of several women.

 
And don’t you have to just wonder - is Raymond Reddington an amalgamation of several men? We know of two at least! Dead Red and Faux Red. Maybe there were others?

 
Oh yes I do!!

I thought I'd add some dialogue for discussion.

This part, where they refer to her as "keen", and not Masha, to me says she's not Masha's mother.  I don't know the name of the associate who was talking to "Katarina" (in quotes because I think she's a fake), so I just put ??? in that place.

???: I have intel on Keen. Should I act on it?
Katarina: Not yet. I'm hoping we won't have to.

???" What about the Elizabeth Keen intel?
Katarina: Is it solid?
???: 100%.
Katarina: Give it to the Movers, just in case.

This is the dialogue talking about Katarina being an illusion. The sentence I bolded in red is the one that's the most confusing to me and I think the big hint of the episode. 

Oban: We know about the Townsend Directive.We know that it is a standing order to kill Rostova and that it is very much in play. I want you to tell me who is coming for her and where she is so I can get to her before they do. She has some intel that I want, and obviously I cannot get it from her if she's dead.
Red: You said you prefer illusion to reality.
Oban: Mm. More than you can possibly imagine.
Red: I may have seemed like an illusion, but she is one someone you can never find.

Red: I may not have told you what you want, but I told you all you need. You'll never find Rostova.
Oban: Ah, yes, yes, yes, because she's an illusion. What does that mean?
Red: She's a figment of the collective imagination.
Oban: I don't believe you. In fact I am thinking that she did this to you.
Red: Did she?
Oban: Why are you protecting her?
Red: Some people in this world are soul mates. Katarina Rostova and I shared one. Betraying her would be like betraying myself.

And this part, where Cooper asks Red a question from before 1991, which means only the Real Red would know the answer, is why I'm now wondering if Fake Red is actually Real Red, or someone (not Ilya) who worked with Real Red and Cooper way back when.

Cooper: 30 years ago, Raymond Reddington heard classified testimony in connection with a U.S. intelligence officer killed in Kuwait.What was the soldier's name?
Red: Daniel Hutton.
Cooper: So it is you.
Red: Were you expecting someone else?
Cooper: I wasn't sure. Now I am.


 

They can humanize "The Illusionist" by having him work with Reddington; perhaps saddling him with Glen Jellybean as an assistant. Also wouldn't surprise me if The Nurse saves Reddington on the wire rack KR has laced him to - - - - but The Nurse doesn't really have any super-powers other than incredible empathy & human understanding so I suspect she'll be sacrificed in the back half of the 2-parter, perhaps even sacrificing herself for Red, Dembe or Liz.

NB. The reason I say this is the writers have clued us in by their very own lines. ie. Liz's lines at the end of the Illusionist where she tells Cooper about Red being an outlier that actually cared about her during the course of her life - and still cares. So perhaps the "Redemption Motive" continues to surface?

Yeti - I have long thought there were multiple Raymond Reddingtons in this tale. Multiple Katarinas are a definite possibility.

There's multiple theories out there. One is the "Redarina" theory which is that our Raymond Reddington is actually the mother of Elizabeth Keen/Masha Rostova who is hiding in "plain sight". It lends credence to the line, "Red: Some people in this world are soul mates. Katarina Rostova and I shared one. Betraying her would be like betraying myself."
This is a prime example of lexical ambiguity. What did Katarina and I share? a soul mate? a soul? 
So if Red is the real KR then the second statement "Betraying her would be like betraying myself" makes a whole lot more sense as would "Katarina Rostova and I shared one" if "one" refers to "soul". 

The Redarina theory is more consistent with the description of KR as being "the cleverest, most resourceful woman I ever knew" (Red to Liz as she's on the run in earlier season).

Another theory is whether this new character is real or not.
This Katarina I call Fakarina because 1) I do not know who she actually is, 2) to me she clearly is not the original KR (played by Lotte Verbeek).
I support this because original KR showed compassion - in Rassvet she is shown to have compassion on the victim of domestic violence, even though in doing so she puts herself at risk of exposure. In the bathroom scene when the drunken boyfriend comes in and is beating his girlfriend, she locks the door and proceeds to free the woman and kill the man. In fact, the way she closed/locked the door was strikingly similar to how our nurse in Steinhil blocked the door to keep "bad" Steinhil in so Red could inject him and flee (latr being caught). I think this keys in on Big Bad Bazzer's suggestion that the nurse is compassionate. In my re-watch yesterday, she was playful and kind to Red as he lay immobilized in his hospital bed. 

On the other hand, there is a clear theme which has been present in this series from the beginning and in my opinion is solidified with this episode and that is that "We never really know anyone, do we?"
This is what Red says to Liz at the end of the very second episode of the series. It's always been about identity and it's always been about good and evil. In that same episode, The Freelancer 01:02, Red says to Floriana, "How do you contend with the angel within you? I would have kicked her out long ago" referencing her duality, she's the devil incarnate with an angel on her shoulder.

We also were dismayed in the first season at how Hudson the dog seemed to have morphed into an entirely different breed. Jon Bokenkamp said they just couldn't get the same breed, but with the incredibly generous budget they had for the first season, I find that highly suspect. Of all the staffers for this show, surely one of them had a Golden Retriever so they wouldn't have to use a little terrier, cute as he was.

I still think this is a story told with many facets so that each viewer can see it the way they want to see it. This is a thought oft repeated, literally, throughout the show. And it keys back into the theme of "memory".