The Blacklist Refugees » Episode 4.18 - Philomena-

Tuxie400 · 4/29/2017 2:59 pm

Tatiana - The word Nothing on the top of a building is curious. I don't have any theories about that one - unless nothing we're seeing is really happening.

Honey West - It will be interesting to see if there is A Third Man tie-in with Vienna. The theme is someone thought to be dead who is not. Could Katarina be in Vienna? And I really hope one of the musical selections is Billy Joel's Vienna. The lyrics mention a fire and looking for the truth.

Did any of you notice a woman in Liz's apartment who might be the babysitter? Someone on Blacklist Exposed Facebook site posted a screencap showing a woman, and another person there posted a screencap showing a man with Red's hairstyle walking away from Kaplan as she puts Agnes in the crib. Who is the man? Is he really there, or does it just represent Kaplan wanting Agnes to be able to walk away from Raymond? Spooky!

After thinking about it for a few days, I noticed at least three things that seem to being showing us an alternate reality. We've already talked about Kate saying the last time she laid eyes on Agnes was when she helped Liz escape to Cuba. We know she saw and held Agnes in Cuba. Kaplan, in talking to Marvin, said Raymond had messed up his parole and his relationship with his fiance. While Red did make Marvin a fugitive, Marvin and Becky seemed to be together recently and going to a yoga retreat. The other thing that may be contradictory is Julian Gale being a member of the Reddington task force. In Mako Tanika, it seemed the only members were Ressler, Sam Raimo, Pete MacGuire and Bobby Jonnica. There was no mention of other members at Raimo's funeral or of why Julian Gale couldn't be there. Gale, however, could have been a member of that task force either before or after those four arrested Mako Tanida. However, there was in the Mako Tanida episode a reference to Vienna. Ressler originally suspects Red of killing Raimo, and asks him, "Is this payback for Vienna?"

Tatiana · 4/29/2017 4:57 pm

Tuxie - I hadn't thought of Billy Joel's Vienna... interesting :-)

The screencaps I saw looked like the woman was "Kaplan's muscle" from IMBd and the man was her body guard.

I really do think Kaplan only knows a portion of the 'truth' but she certainly could still cause catastrophic damage.

lara1 · 4/29/2017 10:33 pm

I wonder about the "Nothing" on top of the building and what it might mean. I haven't re-watched it yet, so don't recall where they were traveling when that hit the screen.

I tried to remember if there were words on top of any other buildings in the series. there well could have been, that didn't mean anything at the time (might have just thought them the name of a company for example) but its impossible to remember where and when if there were.

Other than that I have no ideas on "Nothing"

HW - re Kate and the fulcrum. I'm thinking that perhaps there's a lot more to Kate than what we have seen.
I do wonder from time to time whether she has been working for someone else all along.
If red gave her the fulcrum, and she sewed it in the bunny, why didn't he know where it was? I'm thinking she may have sewn it in the bunny to keep it from him, rather than for him. some real mysteries have me scratching my head! LOL

lara1 · 4/29/2017 11:48 pm

Tuxie400 #101 - I just re-watched the episode and Kaplan also says to Marvin that he's now alone. That's not the case, Marvin is very much still with his fiancee - they were on their way to Tahiti for a vacationn.

I also thought the man in Liz's apt was weird. I know that its been described as a bodyguard but it was weird the way he was dressed like Reddington and looked like him, with his back toward Kaplan (not sure that is how a bodyguard stands), and when Kaplan left, it looked like 2 people left with her, but there seemed to be another man, not the one that looked like Red. Anyway I think it was odd.

And why does Gale seem to know exactly how Red killed Fowler, that seemed eerie to me.
And I wonder if he planted that record cleaner brush. Surely the team that was originally in charge of the case found that? They wouldn't know it was a murder but wouldn't they have examined everything top to bottom? hmmm

Last edited by lara1 (4/29/2017 11:48 pm)

Tatiana · 4/30/2017 8:40 am

lara1 wrote:
I wonder about the "Nothing" on top of the building and what it might mean. I haven't re-watched it yet, so don't recall where they were traveling when that hit the screen.

Personally, I think NOTHING is a joke to the audience. There's so many symbols and clues in this series! It would have been funny to post NOTHING and see how folks reacted. In fact, it was Zee Hatley who is the post production producer at TBL who tweeted about it as a clue and then viewers discovered it. So in a series seeped in symbols and messages, this was, well, nothing :-)

lara1 · 4/30/2017 9:18 am

Tatiana - lol you may be right. Im so glad that Zee is back. Missed his interaction with the fans!

Tatiana · 4/30/2017 9:46 am

Zee is a fun tweeter LOL.

I don't know if you saw it Lara, but one of the tumblr posters (Aly?) called him out on the aerial DC shot being from autumn. He responded mea culpa but in his defense said there just aren't very many aerial shots of DC to chose from!

lara1 · 4/30/2017 11:52 am

Hi Tatiana. Yes I saw that! Lol. And I didn't even notice that! I think I just "check out' with scenes like that. 🙃

Colleen · 5/01/2017 12:01 pm

Hi Everyone - what a hoot about NOTHING lol
I googled "nothing" to see if there were any famous movies or books, and found a few. I imagine they are just coincidences, but still interesting to read...

An odd sounding philosophical movie called "Nothing" - featuring disembodied heads:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_(film)

A more spiritual movie but probably not as comedic as "Nothing" that is called "The Nothing" - doubt there are disembodied heads in this one:
https://www.christianfilmdatabase.com/review/the-nothing/

Last but not least is "Nothing Personal" that features Lotte Verbeek! The movie website also lists Lotte's education background. She's a dancer!
http://www.nothingpersonalthemovie.com/synopsis.html

Tatiana · 5/01/2017 12:56 pm

Colleen wrote:
Hi Everyone - what a hoot about NOTHING lol

Last but not least is "Nothing Personal" that features Lotte Verbeek! The movie website also lists Lotte's education background. She's a dancer!
http://www.nothingpersonalthemovie.com/synopsis.html

Thanks for posting that, Colleen! Yes! She is a dancer, and I think ballet (?) regardless, quite the coincidence ;-)

Patter · 5/01/2017 1:01 pm

I just read EW recap and I was stuck on this, "Cooper reminds her that it wasn’t their idea “to paper a deal with the most dangerous criminal in the Western Hemisphere”....really, there is no one more dangerous than Raymond? PLEASE TELL US WHY?!?!?!

http://ew.com/recap/the-blacklist-season-4-episode-18/

Honey West · 5/01/2017 3:05 pm

Patter wrote:
I just read EW recap and I was stuck on this, "Cooper reminds her that it wasn’t their idea “to paper a deal with the most dangerous criminal in the Western Hemisphere”....really, there is no one more dangerous than Raymond? PLEASE TELL US WHY?!?!?!

http://ew.com/recap/the-blacklist-season-4-episode-18/

I was wondering that, too, Patter. Not the most notorious or whatever, but the most "dangerous". Why would that be? Is it because of what he does or who he is, or both?

lara1 · 5/01/2017 5:05 pm

You know, I picked up that most wanted thing somewhere else in the series and there's a conflict, but I just passed by it at the time.

In Season 3, after Liz "dies" Panabaker says something similar, like, "we've made a deal with the most wanted man in the world, would be nice to know if he plans to live up to it" - she says that to Cooper while wondering whether Red will still help the Task Force now that Liz was no longer around.

But earlier in the series he was not #1. I can't remember what it was, but I distinctly remember thinking at Panabaker's remark in Season 3, where did she get that from?

Anyone else remember? LOL

lara1 · 5/01/2017 5:54 pm

So I have been thinking about the alternative reality idea.

Tuxie400 - I was wondering if you had any thoughts on this. I could not find any discussion of this on other boards; and I could not get farther than a list I made of the alternative reality details thus far:

In the alternative reality:
-Young Liz was not burned in the fire nor have a scar:
-Katarina, and not Red, took Liz from the fire
-Kaplan, and not a male friend, brought Liz to Sam
-Sam was reluctant to take Liz;
- Katarina, and not Red, put Liz in Kate's arms when Liz was a baby;
- Alexander and not Constantine, was the name of Katarina's husband;
-Kaplan met Red years after the fire, when he was already a criminal; and not before the fire, nor did he know Kate, having been "away" when she was attacked; she did not even know him then;
-Kate last held Agnes before she sent Liz to Cuba (huh, even Tom would know that to be "untrue");
-Marvin is alone, and no longer with Becky

I thought if I listed these out it might shows a pattern or otherwise spark my brain into thinking, but no such luck! LOL Am I missing anything, or does anyone have any further thoughts?

edited to add: so is this the biggest mirror "image" of them all, or is Kate's memory faulty; or does she simply not know what she thinks she knows - only what Katarina told her or "wanted her to see" (Kirk's words to Red)

Last edited by lara1 (5/01/2017 6:00 pm)

IowaWatcher · 5/01/2017 7:15 pm

That's a compelling list, Lara.
I don't know what to make of all that.

Tuxie400 · 5/01/2017 7:40 pm

lara1 - That's a good list for the "alternate reality." I don't see a pattern either. I like your idea that this may be the biggest mirror image of them all. I think some of them could be chalked up to Kaplan's faulty memory, but not all of them. Marvin didn't even set her straight about his relationship status.

lara1 · 5/01/2017 9:55 pm

Then there is he cryptic comment to Liz about how she doesn't remember Kate being her nanny because of all she's "been through". Seems like Kate either doesn't know about Liz's memories being wiped, or that Liz knows about it. Which may be another thing that means Kate doesn't necessarily know everything.

Honey West · 5/01/2017 11:10 pm

lara1 wrote:
You know, I picked up that most wanted thing somewhere else in the series and there's a conflict, but I just passed by it at the time.

In Season 3, after Liz "dies" Panabaker says something similar, like, "we've made a deal with the most wanted man in the world, would be nice to know if he plans to live up to it" - she says that to Cooper while wondering whether Red will still help the Task Force now that Liz was no longer around.

But earlier in the series he was not #1. I can't remember what it was, but I distinctly remember thinking at Panabaker's remark in Season 3, where did she get that from?

Anyone else remember? LOL

I seem to remember that he was #4 in the beginning. But he got bumped up to #1 when he and Liz went on the run after she killed Connolly. Does that sound right? I'm being too lazy to research it properly.

lara1 · 5/02/2017 8:58 am

Ah yes, Honey West, that could be the reason. And good to know I'm not imagining things!

lara1 · 5/02/2017 10:37 am

Another alternate reality "possible" - no sister visible in the opening scene in Requiem with Kaplan at her mother's wake. Still think its odd unless the sister was much younger (infant for example).