May 8, 2023
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NBC The Blacklist - The showrunners confirm they've always known the endgame - Jon Bokenkamp.
Daniel Knauf: On the Blacklist, we are making up a lot of things as we go along but not the main thing. The core - the heart and soul of tha
“When you know ultimately why he chose her, and why he decided to give us these cases, I think the story is ultimately over. But we will answer that, and we will get there, and we do have an answer that we’re working towards.” - Bokenkamp, Tv Insider
“The truth is that, once we know who Reddington is, and we know why he entered Liz’s life, then the story is over. Only then, is the story told.” - Bokencamp, Collider
Daniel Knauf: On the Blacklist, we are making up a lot of things as we go along but not the main thing. The core - the heart and soul of that show is the relationship between Red and Liz. Their trajectory has not changed one iota. It’s solid as a slot-car track.
Zee Hatley: Re: S5 Finale:
"My favorite line from the pilot paid off last night. Follow the breadcrumbs… " #TheBlacklistReveal
Daniel Cerone: The pieces will fit, but it’s a series journey with twists and turns. We know the end game.
BOKENKAMP: We did not pitch what the entire plan was to the network, but we have always had an endgame in mind. I come from writing features, and it’s hard to sit down and write a movie and just start on page one and go, “Well, we’ll see where we end.” It’s like a math problem. You have to know what you’re working toward. We have always had that bible in our heads, which makes it very difficult, at times, to write the show.
Jon Bokenkamp: “Obviously, we side-step and we improvise at times, but the deep core of the mythology of the show and who Reddington is, and all those big questions, are rooted in the inception of the show.”
Jon Bokenkamp: - along the way there are benchmark truths that we like to land on that are canon that might sound like they’re adrift or can be open to interpretation - and oftentimes they can be, and they should be. But that’s part of what’s fun about the show is trying to keep up with the mythology and unlock it. Ultimately I’m really proud, if you look back at the last six seasons that we’ve done, it adds up in a very clear way. We work very hard to do that.
Did you know from the beginning that James Spader’s character wasn’t really Reddington?
Jon Bokenkamp: Since day one. It’s almost impossible to not know the ending before you begin or at least a really strong sense of it. “it is something that we’ve been playing from the beginning, and James has been playing from the beginning that we’ve been working towards.”
This turn goes all the way back. It is something that we've talked about since the show was picked up [in 2013]," Bokenkamp tells ET of the game-changing revelation.
ET: What hints from the early seasons can you call out as clues that the Raymond Reddington we've gotten to know the past several years was an impostor?
Jon Bokenkamp: There are a number of them. In season one, Liz flat out asked Reddington over the payphone, "Are you my father?" and after a long pause, he said, "No." That is true and true since the beginning of the show. Now, Raymond Reddington is her father but this man is not the original Raymond Reddington. That's an example of how we have feathered storylines to point us toward this reveal. There are moments like that in each of the five seasons.
Jon Bokenkamp: The Imposter Theory can be traced all the way back to the first time Reddington met Elizabeth Keen and told her: 'I'm a criminal, criminals are notorious liars. Everything about me is a lie.'"
This trail of breadcrumbs has been five years in the making.
Jon Bokenkamp: It’s something we’ve talked about daily on the show. If we didn’t have a very clear answer to what we were doing, it would be very difficult. I hope now that people can look back at the five years of clues that have pointed us toward this and realize that this isn’t something we’re just pulling out of our pocket
How surprising is the reveal of Reddington’s true identity?
On a scale of one to 10, it would have to be an 11.
Eisendrath: We started the show seven years ago with one story that we knew we wanted to tell and we’re very happy about the fact that we’ve been given the chance to tell it over all these years,
Eisendrath: The audience, while wanting to know ultimately the truth, won’t get impatient—but will be given enough to enjoy the riddle of what the ultimate truth is.
Eisendrath: Just because we give the answer to one of the early questions that we deposit in the pilot, does not mean that there won’t be others that come from it. So, yes, we will answer some of the questions from the pilot, but those will just spin off other questions.
Eisendrath: We had an idea of what the story was from the beginning, and we haven’t really veered from it at all. That’s part of why, every year, we’ve been able to give genuine, legitimate answers that the audience has been able to enjoy.
The show has many mysteries and unanswered questions - for instance, what Red whispered to Kirk. Should fans expect all of them to be answered?
James Spader: There’s an intention from the writers, creators and mine to bring the audience with us during this journey and keep them until the end. And at the end the audience will be able to go back to the first episode and watch it all again and notice it all makes sense since the beginning.
James Spader: It may come as a surprise, but the truth is, that the directions that we’ve taken and the decisions that we’ve made in terms of the show are not arbitrary. They’re not. “- there has been a plan.”
James Spader: If it’s done the way we intend, once we reach the inevitable end of the series, you’ll look back and you’ll realize that there were things you found out along the way that you weren’t sure how to process and all of a sudden those things will connect.
Anthony Pepe: No doubt. It’s not even a question. We have given you the answers from practically the first episode. How much more do we have to force feed it? It’s Katarina Rostova. I mean it’s not even a question… - for lack of a better term I got that straight from the horses mouth. James told me himself, if you watch the show from the beginning, everything is right there. Now that you know what you know.
Lukas Reiter: One of the things that’s really special about this series is, unlike shows where you’re finding it as you go, we’ve always had that sequence and we’ve always known the central truth at the center of the series. And so it is pretty cool as a writer to be working on the same story for this amount of time cause I don’t think you see that that often.
Zee wouldn’t confirm. I wonder why? 🤔
I happened upon this. Adding to my collection.