Truly, madly, deeply - this ep could easily have been called "DEARIE"
That 1 word made everything, every crumb the show-runners have fed us come together in a the flick of a seldom used word.
DEARIE, I say!

Aram was on fire tonite!

Red doing double duty as his own criminal empire self-instruction tape and tracking down culprits!

Ressler, Harold & The Rage all pretty much benched.

Must admit - I just popped big-time when the word 'Dearie' was uttered by Shmullengasser near the end of tonite's episode!

When I get on an obsessive roll, I get on an obsessive roll - so here's another Blossom Dearie ditty, filmed during her final years. What a unique performer. This one could be directed at many of TBL characters - particularly - Mr. Kaplan, Red, Harold and particularly Aram - most certainly Glen.Carter as played by the late Clark Middleton -
Blossom Dearie - 'I'm Hip' - YouTube

After thinking about it, I'm going with Mr. Kaplan faked her own death, rather than it is someone pretending to be her. Just from a writer's standpoint, the show needs a major antagonist.


 

Honey West wrote:

Interesting episode. They did make it pretty clear that Mr. Kaplan ordered that second safe a long time ago. Maybe she even had the other one replaced early on and Red thought that he was using the one he ordered, never realizing that his (and Liz's) weren't the only biometrics that could open it. Kate could have done that with an eye to using it to protect Liz somehow. Anyway, it is likely that all that transpired well before Red re-entered Liz's life. Then again, maybe that was what made Kate do it. She probably knew that Red was looking at Liz as being his eventual successor and she decided that she needed to have access to the safe as well. As much as I would like to see Kate return, I suspect that dearie stuff was maybe just a nice shout-out to a past character. But, you never know. We never did see Kate's body recovered, or a funeral, or anything after she jumped off the bridge.

So, Red recorded all those instructions for Liz and put them in what he thought was the real safe. Anybody was able to open the safe after that and take the box. When was the safe switched? I am thinking way back after it was originally installed and Kate probably had it done so she could have access without Red knowing. She probably didn't know what she might need it for, just that she might need it someday. But somebody else obviously knew about it. Kate wouldn't have switched the safes all by herself, so somebody else knew about it. And I'm sure it was never Kate's intention to get Liz killed, but that is what happened.

Aram was one busy guy! Kidnapped by the avocado cartel king, his code being used for nefarious purposes and then he had to bust it up, confrontation with his greedy ex-partner, calling his Mom, etc. Good thing Cooper is still around to be able to help him out with the task force part of his job!

Red is not as quick to kill people these days, but he is not beyond using Brimley! And his little tidbits of advice to Liz were fun. Best wine pairings. LOL!

Brimley might be the most polite and curmudgeonly torturer in the history of torture. The beauty of having a rather elderly man with various mammals and gas station spare parts is that we rarely (or ever) see Brimley plying his actual trade. The myth of invisibility extends great power to the meekest of men - so long as their jaw-dropping acts are not witnessed by the camera!