The Blacklist - Recap: The UPS Man From Hell

Credit: NBC

So the story this week centers on a dangerous Blacklister called The Courier (Robert Knepper), and he's pretty much the ultimate middleman for the criminal underworld. Enlisting him to make a delivery virtually guarantees the delivery's success, and with great efficiency. He can't be threatened or bribed, and he's invulnerable to torture, for one very simple reason: he suffers from a medical condition that prevents him from feeling pain. In essence, he's the underworld's greatest, most bluntly efficient tool, completely neutral and forthrightly committed to his task. Yet there is one big catch to employing him: not only will he kill both parties if either tries to double-cross him, but he'll also kill both parties if either tries to double-cross the other. This essentially forces the crime bosses to work together, as a betrayal by either one of them could mean death at the hands of the ice-blooded Courier.

When Red (James Spader) gets word that The Courier is active again, he alerts Elizabeth (Megan Boone) and the rest of the FBI to the likelihood of the criminal delivering a potentially dangerous weapon into the hands of dangerous people. At the very least, that's the working assumption Red goes with when proposing the mission to capture The Courier to the FBI. But as we quickly learn, The Courier isn't delivering a weaponized product, he's delivering a "proof of life," images and videos to prove that a hostage is still alive, for ransom purposes. The Courier has abducted an NSA hacker and is holding him ransom for $20 million at the behest of a French crime boss, and the "proof of life" comes in the form of a microchip embedded in the criminal's skin. In the attempt to capture The Courier, Elizabeth and Malik (Parminder Nagra) engage in a high-speed chase with the suspect that ranks among the best action setpieces the show has done yet. The agents eventually T-bone The Courier's vehicle, prompting him to escape on foot, despite his arm essentially being crippled by the crash. They corner him and confiscate his weapons, taking him into custody. Yet the matter is far from over...

Credit: NBC

Once the FBI discovers that the NSA hacker has been taken hostage and buried alive, they soon realize he only has a few hours of oxygen left. This prompts a race against time that proves to be one of the more interesting investigations of the series so far. For example, Elizabeth hatches a pretty savvy scheme in which Ressler (Diego Klattenhoff) infiltrates the Frenchwoman's night club, meeting with her under the guise of being The Courier himself. Once in, Ressler attempts to convince her that the FBI is onto their plan, and that it's best for them to simply cut bait and get out. The idea is that the Frenchwoman would then retrieve the NSA hacker from wherever he'd been buried, leading the FBI directly to the hostage's location. But things quickly go sideways when the Frenchwoman correctly intuits that Ressler isn't The Courier at all (although not before forcing him to prove his credibility by cutting himself with broken glass, in a particularly tense scene that reveals more about Ressler than we've ever had occasion to know thus far, as he states that his job is all he has in his life). The FBI is basically faced with deducing the NSA hacker's location, as not only does Ressler's mission fail, but a shootout at The Courier's cabin results in the criminal's death. Luckily, Red and Elizabeth are able to get to the hacker just in the nick of time, and though it's not all that original in terms of dramatic storytelling, I still find "race against time" storylines eminently compelling, and this one was no different.

Credit: NBC

With that said, the episode suffered a bit from the continued ambiguity surrounding Elizabeth's relationship with her husband, Tom (Ryan Eggold). Tom discovers that Elizabeth has found him out, noticing that things are missing/out of place in his cubby hole beneath the floorboards. He attempts to get Elizabeth to come home immediately so they can discuss matters, but Elizabeth is tied up with the NSA investigation, and so she doesn't get a chance until the very end of the episode...after she's already read the declassified files surrounding the shooting to which Tom's gun was linked in Boston. She only gains access to these files because Red calls in a one-time favor from the NSA hacker, who had earlier promised to repay Red for saving his life. It's a pretty damn selfless act, given what he could have used the favor for had he been more selfish. Of course, even though he's gained Elizabeth access to the fails about Angel Station, it doesn't exactly present her with closure. Upon reviewing security cam images from that weekend, Elizabeth is able to finally come to the conclusion that Tom was behind the murder at the Angel Station hotel the year before. She comes home to find Tom waiting for her, anticipating The Serious Talk to begin. And that's our episode!

Credit: NBC

To end on such a cliffhanger isn't entirely unexpected, given the serialized nature of the story the show is telling. But even without that hook for next week, I think "The Courier" is strong enough on its own to hold up. Sure, it's great that we get more advancement in the Elizabeth/Tom storyline, but I'm still not convinced that the reveal of Tom's activities won't be extended even further into the season, especially now that the series has receive a full season order. But then again, the series initially had to prepare for a thirteen-episode season, on the off-chance that the show didn't receive a full season pickup. So it's actually fairly possible we'll get the full story on Tom next week, or in subsequent weeks before winter break. But it's unlikely we'll get closure. And it's doubly unlikely Elizabeth will either.

Thanks for reading my recap and review of The Blacklist - Episode 5, "The Courier"! What did you think of the episode? Sound off in the comments!