The Blacklist (season 1) - TV Show Review

Characters:
Raymond 'Red' Reddington (James Spader)
Elizabeth Keen (Megan Boone)
Donald Ressler (Diego Klattenhoff)
Harold Cooper (Harold Lennix)
Meera Malik (Parminder Nagra)
Aram Mojtabai (Amir Arison)
Tom Keen (Ryan Eggold)

The Blacklist is a 2013-piloted NBC television drama, centered around the FBI and a wanted delinquent, Raymond Reddington, who voluntarily helps them track down a list of people that he has, known as his 'Blacklist'. 

Let me start by talking about the performances. James Spader is nothing short of spectacular, which such a diverse and complicated character. Every aspect of him is captured really well, and his voice is just magnificent. I thought I would always picture Ultron when he spoke, but I didn't. His voice belongs to him. And his voice is perfection. 

Megan Boone had a more complicated task, one might argue, of playing the most highlighted and troubled character of the show. While Raymond Reddington seemed like he was always on top of everything, Elizabeth Keen was, well... Human. She's not as mysterious as Reddington, and there's certainly more insight into her character in this show. That's not an easy task. And Boone nails it.
Keen is an FBI agent, and the only person who Reddington will communicate with (for reasons explained as the show progresses), and she has a task force of colleagues, who all really make a lovable ensemble, as strange as that may sound. Lennix, Nagra, Klattenhoff and Arison , though not having the largest of roles, do a great job, and the chemistry between the five agents is beautiful. 

Ryan Eggold's character, Elizabeth Keen's husband, is a very pivotal part of the plot, so I won't spoil anything, but the performance wasn't anything special. I feel like another person could have been cast, and it wouldn't have made much of a difference. 

What's important about a TV show that runs for 22 episodes a season is that the story doesn't become obsolete, and eventually dry itself off. In this show, there is a different major story in every episode, with the overall story of the show subtly taking place in the background. That was a good technique to use, and there wasn't a bland episode at all. The story itself is suspenseful and is always missing something, and I like that. I like being left to my imagination. 

One more thing. The relationship between Megan Boone's and Klattenhoff's characters, though very, very subtle, really worked for me. I liked that bond that they had. They weren't on each others' backs, but they had each others' backs, and there was just something about that connection that was a big selling point. The show really focuses on relationships between characters, particularly the different and contrasting relationships that Elizabeth Keen has, and the fact that this relatively small one was so good should indicate the quality of the really major ones. 

Overall, The Blacklist is a great show. Its theme is somewhere between thriller and drama, and that clicks really well. The performances are great, the story is compelling, and the characters are brilliant. 

On a scale where M is the lowest, and R is the highest possible rating, with the highlighted letter being the rating:

The Blacklist (season 1): MIHIR

I'm going to start season 2 right away!