Between shocking reveals and emotional goodbyes, the final season of has been an intense ride. And in Season 10, Episode 20 ("Arthur Hudson"), it also proved to be a guest star-filled one.
As the leader of one of the vastest criminal networks in the world, Raymond Reddington () knows that it takes a village to keep operations afloat. Throughout , we've seen Red dismantle his criminal empire to protect the Task Force, which has led to several tear-jerking goodbyes.
In "Arthur Hudson," Red visited several of his cherished colleagues who have assisted in his criminal operations, and it was a delightful tour-de-force of
fan favorites. Not only that, we met Red's longtime pilot, who has been famously off-screen for the entire series. , but not without Red making a few pitstops along the way.
By the end of "Arthur Hudson," Red has effectively disbanded the Reddington Task Force in an effort to protect Cooper () and the agents from the fallout created by the entire operation going belly-up (Toby Leonard Moore). It is a bittersweet maneuver, but Red knows that the only way he's going to keep his loved ones safe is by uprooting his criminal network and starting anew.
Before this happened, Red visited his longtime money launderer, Heddie Hawkins (Aida Turturro), to tell her about a recent visit to a Costa Rican bird sanctuary that she once recommended to him. In a , he tells Heddie that he adored the beloved tourist attraction much that he bought it. Red claims he rarely gets down to South America, so the deed has been transferred to Heddie's name as a gift. It doesn't happen every day that someone gifts you an entire aviary sanctuary out of the blue, but Red wants to make sure Heddie has something to remember him by.
It becomes clear that Red is preparing to leave the country. Red's intended whereabouts are a mystery. On his farewell tour, Red visits his cherished interrogator, Teddy Brimley (Teddy Coluca), to chat about his ongoing (Diany Rodriquez) and to tell him he's leaving the country for a while. When Teddy comments about being out of work with Red gone, Red assures him that he will find employment elsewhere and not be afraid of starting over. Projecting much, Red?
Later, Red successfully wiretaps the meeting designed to expose the Task Force's actions, stepping over Congressman Hudson's toes to control the narrative and protect the agents from legal fallout.
It's a jaw-dropping moment when Red saves Cooper just in time, but he needed some help to pull it off. Red recruited his go-to tech genius, Tadashi Ito (Alex Shimizu), to pull the digital strings to cut Hudson's exposé short, managing to avert the government's gaze solely.
Cooper and the agents are recruited to help track down and arrest Red, much to the chagrin of his longtime colleagues. However, just as the FBI arrives at Red's private airstrip and sees his jet take off, they are horrified to see it suddenly crash in a fiery explosion.
Of course, . Not a stranger to faking his own death, Red got the FBI off his tail with the help of his trustee pilot, Edward, who escaped the crash unscathed. Better yet, fans finally got to see the face of the famously off-screen Edward, played by none other than Spader's co-star Andrew McCarthy. The reveal was literally explosive.
Raymond Reddington (James Spader) and Elizabeth Keen (Megan Boone) from Season 3 Episode 1 (2015) of The Blacklist.
Photo: David Giesbrecht/NBC
Simply put, the lineup of latest episode was peak entertainment. Red has worked with some seriously delightful criminal accomplices throughout the years, and as the curtain closes on , it was nice to see those folks shine one last time.
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