Hahaha!!!!!  Love your post, Patter! Yes, it was it's very own character! Dropped like a hot potato! That's one tough industry lol!

I would just have to think they'll need to bring it back. And if they don't why, us posters will have to get out the virtual pitchforks! ;-)

The Blacklist is back to imagery from Alice Through the Looking Glass with The Apothecary episode. Remember Season 3’s Solomon Part I was heavy on dialog and imagery from the Lewis Carrol classic. The Apothecary features a backwards world of time and words just like the Alice book did.

Notice the boxing poster on the wall in photo. It shows the words backwards because the scene was shot from a mirror.  There is an earlier look at the scene where the words are going forwards and Cooper and Aram are in opposite places. The poster says No train, No pain, No gains. Perhaps this is a clue in Red’s murder mystery. Let me know if you have ideas about that. This is similar to when Alice finds a book of poetry where Jabberwocky has reversed printing she can read only by holding it up to a mirror.

The whole episode with the events of Red’s poisoning told in reverse is similar to the White Queen’s situation in Through the Looking Glass. Time for her always runs backwards. The White Queen and many other characters in the book are Chess pieces come to life. Red, too, has been playing a game of chess in the Blacklist.

Recent episodes of The Blacklist, including the Apothecary, have drawn on the imagery of chess, just as Through the Looking Glass did. Thanks to Tessa of Criminal Minds and the Keen Minds podcast for catching so much of the chess symbolism! I would never have thought of the name Hightower (our Blacklister) as being symbolic of the rook piece in chess without Tessa pointing it out. In Medieval times, armies used a high tower on wheels to scale the walls of their opponent’s castle. The rook in Chess can represent the castle or this high tower.

Red’s castle, the flat where he has all his treasures, has been breached and the king is left unprotected. He lost one of his knights when he shot Kaplan, and now his other knight, Dembe is missing. In chess, if the king is left unprotected, the game is over. I look forward to seeing Red’s next gambit.

I’m still doing research for a post on Red’s chess game. Maybe I’ll be ready to post it later this weekend.
 
 
 
 

Last edited by Tuxie400 (3/10/2017 9:13 pm)

lara1 - While I was researching Alice Through the Looking Glass today, I found something very interesting. A book titled "The Cuckoo Clock" by Mrs. Molesworth was a popular British children's book in the Victorian era, along with the Alice books .It's a fantasy story in which orphan Griselda is sent to live with two ancient great aunts. She shrinks in size and has several adventures with the cuckoo from the clock, including one where she goes to Butterflyland. That part made me think of the butterflies in Lady Ambrosia. What if the Alice books and The Cuckoo Clock were read to Liz/Masha as a child, and Red thinks reminders of them will help her shake some memories loose?

hi Tuxie400 - our posts just crossed!  that's really interesting about the cuckoo clock. book  it definitely has some meaning showing up twice in the same season.  I think overall, Red is running out of time and there is another reason why he has come back at this point in time.

With these three books, there is also an English theme going on though how that fits in, I don't know.

Interesting thought about whether those books were read to Liz as a child.  A comparable would be Liz reading the Wizard of Oz to the child in Season Three.  And that is another fantasy book where a child wakes up in a fantasy world and somehow gets back home.  Same with the Alice books, Alice stumbles into an alternate reality but does make her way back home.  And we know about "home" and Red's quest for it.  Not that I know what that means.....!

lara1 - You are so right about all those books involving a child in an alternate reality. Masha had an alternate life as Liz. I think you're on to something there.

And yes, several poker games and poker game references this season too!

Here's what Wikipedia says about the Cheshire cat:
Alice first encounters the Cheshire Cat at the Duchess' house in her kitchen, and later on the branches of a tree, where it appears and disappears at will, and engages Alice in amusing but sometimes perplexing conversation. The cat sometimes raises philosophical points that annoy or baffle Alice; but appears to cheer her when it appears suddenly at the Queen of Hearts' croquet field; and when sentenced to death, baffles everyone by having made its head appear without its body, sparking a debate between the executioner and the King and Queen of Hearts about whether a disembodied head can indeed be beheaded. At one point, the cat disappears gradually until nothing is left but its grin, prompting Alice to remark that 'she has often seen a cat without a grin but never a grin without a cat'.

The Cheshire Cat sounds a lot like Red. I've bolded the parts that could relate to him.
 

Last edited by Tuxie400 (3/10/2017 10:31 pm)

I had a long post but just lost it!

Suffice it to say, I enjoyed immensely your posts, Tuxie and Lara. Keen observations!! I had been mulling about Hightower and the Queen of Diamonds and now we have some explanation :-) Thanks!

 

<3 Thanks Tuxie :-)  I really loved your ideas! Hopefully I'll get caught up again and can contribute more soon! I do LOVE how we can be an active part of this story though!

RABBITS: Rabbits - The Courier, the writer who's house Red habitates. Liz comes to the house, Red is reading letters to the editor from the writer who occupied the house, daily letters to The Washington Post, Red chuckles and reads, "Dear Mr. Bradley, what is up with all the rabbits..."


 

Last edited by Tatiana (3/11/2017 11:26 am)

Hi Decca!  I'm glad the UK is close to us in scheduling!  

You'll find loads of discussion on this thread!  Also there's a thread about who poisoned Red under the discussion section.  That one may have some bits in its about Redemption too though.  I don't recall if there was that much, though.