The fourth episode of Season 4 of the American crime drama TV series “The Blacklist” was aired on NBC on October 13 and it was one of those captivating episodes that had viewers glued to their seat from beginning to start.
The episode, titled “Gaia,” initially showed the attempts of Elizabeth ‘Liz’ Keen, played by Megan Boone, and her husband Tom Keen, played by Ryan Eggold, to get to Alexander Kirk, played by Ulrich Thomsen, who has been keeping their daughter Agnes from them as sort of leverage.
Liz already made it clear during the episode that the reason why Kirk tracked her down because he needs her or the blood of her daughter Agnes to be able to cure his rare genetic disorder.
But Kirk still insists that the reason why he came back is to be together with his daughter and granddaughter, reports the International Business Times.
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Using the video feed of Agnes, Liz and Tom tried to find a way to rescue their daughter from Kirk but when Kirk found out that they were onto him, he pulled the plug on the video feed arrangement, leaving them with no other choice but to settle for the plan of Raymond ‘Red’ Reddington, played by James Spader, to get to Kirk.
Tracking down an eco-terrorist
During the episode, Red was seen tracking down an eco-terrorist named Owen Ayers who goes by the alias of Gaia. He is a stealth eco-terrorist who has a self-proclaimed mission of protecting the earth from the greatest threat to its existence.
His mission also involves killing innocent people and committing acts of terrorism to draw attention to certain toxic economical practices.
The Post Office eventually learned that Ayers was a Navy officer and a helicopter pilot but was discharged in 2011 after his unit flew through an unscheduled radioactive gas venting at Fukushima and he suffered radiation poisoning.
But he was not the only victim. His young son, Skyler, has a major deformity covering half of his face, which was apparently caused by the radiation that contaminated Ayers’ blood.
They were able to apprehend Gaia eventually and the reason why Red was hunting him down is because he wants to know when Ayers’ son Skyler would have his next appointment with his doctor.
Moving on from the Post Office
One of the sidelights of episode 4 of Season 4 of “The Blacklist” is the decision of Agent Samar Navabi, played by Mozhan Mamo, to ask to be transferred.
Agent Donald Ressler, played by Diego Klattenhoff, tried to convince her to stay but Aram, played by Amir Arison, only offered her his congratulation and well wishes, believing that nothing would be able to change her mind, details the Entertainment Weekly.
Navabi tells Ressler that it is not just because she now knows Liz is a whiny traitor who took advantage of them by faking her own death after they helped her family over and over again.
She said that it’s bigger than that, referring to the Post Office itself because people never know where they stand with anyone, citing whether people would be there for her when she needs them.
As expected, the fourth season of “The Blacklist” on NBC went off to a rousing start on September 22, picking up from the Season 3 finale.
The very much alive Liz finds herself in a predicament where her child, Agnes is missing, and she is also at the mercy of her kidnapper, Alexander Kirk, who also claims to be her biological father.
Because of the manner how she was taken, Liz is already determined that she is not to trust Kirk since no father in his right mind would hire killers to destroy his daughter’s wedding and force her out.
Liz believes that Kirk also holds her daughter hostage but she wanted to make the most out of Kirk for information that Red failed to share to her in the past.
Typical with “The Blacklist,” the momentum of the premiere episode carried through the second episode that aired on September 29.
Entitled “Mato,” it featured Red seeking the help of Tom and the FBI task force to track down a bounty hunter whom he believed knows the whereabouts of Alexander Kirk. He also thinks that once they get to Kirk, they would also find Liz and her daughter, Agnes.
Red was confident that the mysterious assassin was privy to Alexander Kirk’s next move.
While at the outset Liz would not trust Kirk, once he starts revealing key information that was not shared with her by Red in the past, she would begin to trust her supposed biological father.
It was showrunner Jon Bokenkamp who made the disclosure by saying that such plotline is one of the biggest reveals of “The Blacklist” Season 4.
The biggest question among fans would still be the real relationship of Red and Liz and whether Kirk would have the answer to it.
It could be recalled that the ‘death’ of Liz in Season 3 helped viewers have a deeper insight on Red’s back story and the extent of his feelings for the former FBI profiler. Bonkenkamp also confirmed that Season 4 will also be exploring the perspective of who Red really is to Liz.