List of The Blacklist characters
The Blacklist is an American crime drama television series that premiered on NBC on September 23, 2013. Raymond "Red" Reddington, a former government agent turned high-profile criminal, who had eluded capture for decades, voluntarily surrenders to the FBI, offering to cooperate on capturing a list of criminals who are virtually impossible to catch. He insists on working with a rookie profiler by the name of Elizabeth Keen. The show also stars Diego Klattenhoff, Ryan Eggold and Harry Lennix. The pilot episode was written by Jon Bokenkamp and directed by Joe Carnahan. Executive producers for the series include Bokenkamp, John Eisendrath, and John Davis for Sony Pictures Television, Universal Television, and Davis Entertainment. In February 2015, The Blacklist was renewed for a third season, with Hisham Tawfiq promoted to main cast.
Cast overview
Main characters featured in ''The Blacklist''
Raymond Reddington
Portrayed by James SpaderRaymond "Red" Reddington is a former government agent, presumed to be a member of the United States Navy, and number 4 on the FBI's Most Wanted List. A U.S. Naval Academy graduate, he once worked in US counterintelligence and was being groomed for Admiral when something happened on his way home for the Christmas holidays. It is later revealed that Reddington was accused of committing treason by leaking information to the Soviet Union which led to the death of several American naval officers. Nicknamed "the concierge of crime", Reddington is known for brokering deals between criminals. He willingly surrenders to the FBI and provides information on a roster of criminals that he refers to as The Blacklist: dangerous criminals who are so careful to avoid leaving any traces behind that the FBI has not even detected their existence. His ethics are somewhat murky, and he espouses the use of some crimes in the service of "the greater good". He uses his arrangement with the FBI to pursue his own secret agenda; it was revealed that he needed their help to find [|Berlin], a mysterious nemesis who had been attacking his organization.
He has an unexplained interest in Elizabeth Keen and knows personal secrets about her that she has never made public. He will stop at nothing to protect her and even went as far as to block her memories of the fire she was trapped in. But she finally regains them and learns that when her father attacked her mother, she killed him while still a child. Red explains that he never wanted Liz to end up like him and was trying to prevent that. He had a romantic affair with Liz's mother, Katarina Rostova, and it is implied several times that he may be Liz's biological father. No proof of this is ever shown, and Red himself initially denies it when directly confronted by Liz, although he does claim that he knew her father well. Red is confirmed as Liz's father in "Dr. Adrian Shaw: Conclusion", and in "Mr. Kaplan: Conclusion", he finally acknowledges this to Liz after she presents him with a DNA test confirming his paternity. In "Monarch Douglas Bank", it was revealed that Red used to be married to Naomi Hyland and has a daughter named Jennifer. In "Dr. Linus Creel", when he confronted Naomi about her, he discovers that Jennifer left her after her marriage to Frank and hasn't tried to make contact since then.
After the death of [|Alan Fitch], Reddington comes into conflict with the Director, the new head of the Cabal. The Director did not believe that Reddington had the Fulcrum, a blackmail file which Reddington had used as leverage to force a stalemate with the Cabal, and wanted to end the détente and kill Reddington. In response, Reddington urgently began seeking the Fulcrum, and managed to collect various items needed to decrypt it. Finally, after he confessed to Liz that he had initially hired [|Tom Keen] to enter her life and watch over her, she gave him the Fulcrum, after which he was shot by the Director's agents. However, he survived. He continued to throw obstacles into Liz's path as she sought to find out more about her mother. When Liz was framed by the Cabal for the assassination of Senator Hawkins, Reddington countered by gathering 11 of the world's top investigative journalists and giving them the information contained in the Fulcrum. He later helped Liz go on the run after she assassinated Attorney General Tom Connolly, a member of the Cabal.
Accompanied by Liz, Reddington goes on the run to gather various resources needed for his plan to bring down the Director and exonerate Liz. He eventually succeeds in forcing the Cabal to abandon the Director, and then kills him. However, Red is unable to clear Liz completely of the killing of Tom Connolly and she only returns to the taskforce as an asset like Red himself. He meets with Laurel Hitchin, who suggests he weakened the Cabal so that they would invite him to join it.
After watching Liz die in his arms Dembe convinces Red to leave the van containing her body and Ressler places his FBI windbreaker around Red's shoulders and leads him over to the car with Dembe. As Ressler lets go of Red's arm and Red goes to get into the car he collapses and Dembe catches him saying: "I got you." And proceeded to help Red into the car. After being told to stay away from Agnes by Tom in "Cape May", Red goes on a self-imposed exile to get away from everything and find better means to cope with Liz's death. He rescues a woman who attempted suicide one time and takes her back to the abandoned hotel. Only when a man talks to Red at the beach, that he realized the woman he rescued was a ghost and it was she who tells him that he did save her, through channeling his grief in losing Liz. In "The Artax Network", Red finally visits Dom, the father of Katarina, and while he still blames him for what he done, Dom reluctantly allows Red to stay. When Aram tracks him down to try and convince Red to help them again, he refuses to leave and sends Aram on his way. Dom later convinces Red to leave and honor his word to the FBI, saying that Red's got good people who count on him. As a token of gratitude, Red fixes a C♯ key on Dom's piano and leaves. Red later visits Aram and tells him they have work to do.
In "Dr. Adrian Shaw: Conclusion", while Red is being held captive and threatened by Alexander Kirk, Red admits that he is in fact Elizabeth Keen's father. As Kirk goes to kill him, Red whispers something to Kirk that changes his mind and the two men disappear by the time the FBI arrive. Red later tells Liz that Kirk is "gone" but doesn't elaborate further and doesn't tell her that he's her father.
In "Lipet's Seafood Company" Red is berated by Cooper for letting Alexander Kirk go, but Red tells him that Kirk is gone and won't be coming back and moves on. Red works to meet with the President-Elect to whose campaign he contributed in exchange for his help with the Alexander Kirk situation and is eventually able to secure a Presidential pardon for Liz killing Tom Connolly. As a result, Liz is able to be reinstated as an FBI agent.
In "The Apothecary", Red is poisoned and needs the FBI to find Asa Hightower, the man who poisoned him. When confronting Marvin Gerard for not being at the dinner, he learns that Dembe has left him.
In "Dembe Zuma" Red finds out that Dembe left his side to find the traitor in his syndicate. Aram helps him out by procuring one name, Kathryn Nemec, whom Red recognizes as Mr. Kaplan. When confronting the man who housed her and shot Dembe, Red and Baz discovered he wired a bomb and escaped as he died in his house.
In "Requiem", Kaplan calls Red and he confronts her for hiding Liz from him. She tells him she needed to do what she should've done years ago in keeping Liz away from him and mentions that she has just begun her revenge. When Red tries to claim that she helped build his syndicate tight, Kaplan reminds him that she is the one who knows where the bodies of the people he had killed are buried and that she hid them from the FBI over the years, including that of [|Diane Fowler]. This makes Red worried when Kaplan reveals that they can be used to not only attack his syndicate, but also destroy him from within.
In "Mr. Kaplan", many of Red's associates have broken rank and joined Kaplan in her plans for revenge. He also learns that Julian Gale, a rogue FBI agent, is working with her to procure the immunity deal between Red and the FBI. Red tries to appeal to Kaplan to end the war, but she refused, telling him that Liz needs to know the truth.
In "Mr. Kaplan, Conclusion", Red takes Ressler to Hitchin's cleaner, Henry Prescott, to help him find a barrel marked back two years ago. When they open it, Red tells Ressler that he had just found Reven Wright. With the evidence, he and Ressler appeal to Hitchin for help. When she tried to refuse, Red tells her that unless she wants to be held accountable for both the Task Force's downfall and the murder of Wright, she better uphold her end of the bargain and end the indictment on the Task Force. Red tries to appeal to Kaplan again at the bridge, promising he won't shoot her. He is shocked when she decided to jump to her own death. Later on, Red is confronted by Liz who tells him that she now knows he's her father. At Tansi Farms, Red and Dembe discover the suitcase buried there is gone and that they must get it back before Liz discovers the truth about how her mother, Katarina Rostova, died.
In "Ian Garvey: Conclusion", despite taking Garvey hostage and en route to collecting the skeletal remains of Katarina, Ian rams his sedan into another car, leaving Red and Dembe there as he escapes. Red later confronts Garvey after learning that the latter now knows that Liz is his daughter. Only then, Jennifer confronts Red for what he's done and the fact that Ian saved her and Naomi's life from their disappointment when they learned of his criminal career. Red then recognizes her from all the years. Despite Garvey shooting first, Red fires back and shoots him.
In "Sutton Ross", Red recovers the bag of bones and burns it in the presence of Dembe and Katarina's father Dom. However, unknown to Red, Liz was conspiring with Ross and Red's daughter Jennifer to learn the truth. Visited by a hallucination of Tom, Liz reveals what she has learned. The bones in the duffle bag may belong to the real Reddington and the man known as Reddington is possibly an imposter who murdered everyone who tried to reveal the truth to Liz.
In "Rassvet", it is revealed that the real Raymond Reddington was killed by Liz as a child, an event she had remembered in "Tom Connoly" and thought was Alexander Kirk. The imposter's real name is revealed to be Ilya Koslov by Dominic Wilkinson. He is a childhood friend of Katarina Rostova, the love of his life and her occasional lover. Knowing that the Cabal would work to discredit Reddington and his evidence against them, Ilya took on his identity and became Raymond Reddington to prevent this and protect himself and Katarina. Dom tells Liz that Ilya underwent multiple plastic surgeries over the course of a year to change his appearance to match Reddington's and information from Katarina to fill in the blanks. After learning the truth, Liz visits him in Hong Kong where Reddington points out that her search cost him his relationship with Dembe and refuses to answer why he continued his masquerade after gaining access to Reddington's money. He later confronts Dom and demands to know exactly what Dom had told Liz, word for word.
In "Orion Relocation Services," he is revealed to not in fact be Ilya Koslov while Reddington's friend Frank Bloom is in fact the real Ilya. In "Katarina Rostova," Katarina tells Liz that even she doesn't know who the imposter actually is and Dom lied to Liz about Reddington's true identity.
Elizabeth Keen
Portrayed by Megan BooneElizabeth Scott Keen is an FBI profiler. According to Reddington and the FBI, her birth name is Masha Rostova, and she was born in Moscow to Katarina Rostova, a Russian intelligence agent whom everyone regards as a "myth". Elizabeth has a mysterious and traumatic past: her wrist bears a large scar from a fire she was trapped in as a child, and her only memory of her biological father is of him rescuing her from the fire. Reddington admitted to blocking her memories of the fire. She eventually regains her memory of the event when she killed her father to protect her mother. Reddington had been trying to protect her from the knowledge when he blocked her memories.
She is the only person with whom Reddington is willing to work. She has yet to learn why, but he has told her that it has something to do with her missing father. While her adoptive father lay dying in the hospital, he insists to Red that Liz "deserves to know", but his death is hastened by Red to prevent Liz from "knowing". She develops a bond with Reddington as they continue to work together. The Director indicates there is a close personal connection between Liz and Red, but refuses to tell her what it is. Her once-idyllic marriage to Tom Keen unraveled as she discovered evidence that he was not the man he appeared to be. After she found out he was an agent hired by Berlin to keep her under surveillance, she had the marriage annulled. She kept Tom imprisoned on an abandoned ship for several months, interrogating him. Eventually, she was forced to let him go in exchange for Berlin's location after he murdered a harbormaster, Eugene Ames.
Local police investigated Ames' murder and had enough evidence to arrest Liz for her involvement; but she was saved by the intervention of Reddington, Cooper, then-assistant AG Connolly, and Tom himself. She also learned that she was the key to unlocking the mysteries of the Fulcrum, and that she had unknowingly had the Fulcrum itself in her possession since childhood. With the help of Leonard Caul, she deciphered the Fulcrum's contents and confronted the Director with them. She was then unknowingly infected with a customized biological weapon by the Cabal and tricked into infecting their target, Senator Hawkins. The Cabal then framed her for Hawkins's assassination and for being a Russian spy. After shooting Tom Connolly upon learning of his involvement with the faking of Cooper's cancer and the Cabal's sinister intentions for the other agents on the task force, Elizabeth is now a fugitive on the FBI's Most Wanted List. To evade capture by the FBI, she sought asylum at the Russian embassy, identifying herself as "Masha Rostova" and pretending to be a Russian spy.
In "Marvin Gerard", as Liz is being escorted to the airport, the convoy is attacked by Ressler and forcing Liz to run on foot. At a diner, she confronts Red for preventing her asylum until she learns he did this to save her life from being killed by the Cabal. While holding everyone in the diner hostage, Liz attacks an abusive boyfriend of one of the hostages' and nearly kills him until Red stops her. In "Eli Matchett", Liz comes to the realization that even if her name is cleared, it's impossible for her to go back to the life she once knew and must rely on Red to help her survive as a criminal. In "Arioch Cain", Liz and Red fake her death, after a bounty is put on Liz's head.
In "Kings of the Highway", Liz tracks down Reddington after he is kidnapped and ransoms him using a valuable object that Dembe claims is needed to clear her name. While Liz and Dembe are making the exchange for Reddington, the FBI arrives, and Ressler arrests Liz.
In "The Director", Liz is locked in the task force's cell as Ressler tries to protect her until she can testify. The Director and Laurel Hitchin attempt to prevent this by transferring Liz to an undisclosed location due to her supposedly having terrorist connections and then suffocating her when Aram changes the box's door code. Liz is nearly transferred, but the White House Counsel is able to prevent it and Ressler returns to transfer her to the courthouse. In "The Director: Conclusion", Liz spends the night in a cell protected by Ressler which keeps the Cabal from reaching her, but Laurel plots to have her assassinated as she's moved. Liz is later taken before a judge where she faces multiple charges that each come with a death sentence, including sixteen counts of murder. Laurel tries to have Liz assassinated, but is forced to call off her attempt by Red who captures the Director and threatens to turn him over to the World Court. With the help of Marvin Gerard, Red makes a deal with Laurel for her to publicly exonerate Liz on all but Tom Connolly's murder. In that case, Liz had to plead guilty to involuntary manslaughter and would get three years' probation. Though she would be free, Liz could never return to the FBI. Liz reluctantly took the deal in the end as Red ensured she'd remain part of the task force as an asset like him. Liz was publicly exonerated by Laurel while [|Karakurt] was taken into custody and exposed as the man who had committed the terrorist acts Liz had been framed for. That night, Liz emerges from the courthouse a free woman and hugs Red who is waiting for her.
Liz has difficulty adjusting to no longer being an FBI agent. After being beaten up by a man who thought she was a traitor, she is hospitalized and discovers she is pregnant. She accepts Tom's marriage proposal, hoping to start a family with him.
Liz and Tom's wedding ceremony is interrupted by Mr. Solomon, who pursues them relentlessly. Liz is injured during the chase, forcing Reddington's doctor to perform an emergency C-section to save her baby. Liz dies due to complications with the C-section and the inability to reach a hospital on time: [|Matias Solomon] blocks the vehicle containing Liz from continuing on to the hospital and Liz dies with Reddington holding her hand. Red is shown to be completely devastated by her death, as is the rest of the task force, and Tom is left to raise their daughter, Agnes, alone. In "Cape May" Red tells of a time he had to make a Hobson's choice: to save a child and lose her mother or lose both, saying it was the hardest choice he made by far in his life. While it initially seems he is referring to Liz' recent death, a later conversation reveals that the allusion was toward saving Liz as a child and losing her mother, Katarina.
In "Alexander Kirk: Conclusion", Liz is revealed to be alive, her death having been faked by Kaplan to protect her and Agnes. Liz is reunited with Tom and Agnes in Cuba, but is captured by Alexander Kirk's men. Tied to a chair, Liz meets with Kirk who reveals he is in fact her father.
In "Esteban" Liz doesn't believe Kirk and demands to know what he's planning to do with her, Tom and Agnes. Kirk claims that her daughter will be fine and that he just needs to get rid of the rat. Kirk plans to take her back to the house she grew up in so she can see the truth for herself. In "Mato" Liz gets a clue from her past when she saw her mother, Katarina, putting a few toys and a ribbon bracelet in a coffee can used as a time machine. Liz digs the can up and discovers some truth in Kirk's words. When she is rescued by the FBI, Liz is reunited with Tom. In "Miles McGrath", Liz reads through her mother's journal and comes up to an important clue involving a rare cancer plaguing the males of the Rostov family. It was only then Red reveals the truth in Kirk's plans to use Liz for a blood transfusion as her blood contains vital blood cells needed to help him replenish his own and without her, he will keep Agnes hostage.
In "The Lindquist Concerns", Liz discovers a DNA test done by Kirk which claimed her to be his daughter and briefly mistrusted Red for it. In "The Thrushes", Liz helps Red talk Kirk out of committing suicide by begging him to give Agnes back to her. He does give her back to Liz that leads to his arrest.
In "Dr. Adrian Shaw", Kirk is taken to the hospital and believing she may be his only chance of rescuing him, goes through a DNA Test. If she is found to be a match, they will prepare her for surgery and do a blood transfusion. When Tom found out, he confronted Liz for the decision and admitted that he had met his mother, Susan, months earlier. Despite his warning not to get close to Kirk, Liz mentioned that she needs to help him as he may provide the answers to who she is. While being prepped for surgery, a doctor tells her that the DNA test results between her and Kirk came back and they're not a match. Believing Red had sent false transcripts of the DNA test, she calls him to confront him only to discover that Kirk had lied to her the whole time and the DNA transcript that Tom gave her was falsified. Angered by this, Liz confronts Kirk for lying to her and abandons him. In "Dr. Adrian Shaw: Conclusion", while Red is being held captive and threatened by Kirk, Red tells Kirk that he is Elizabeth Keen's father.
In "Lipet's Seafood Company", Red is able to secure a Presidential pardon for Liz's killing of Connolly, allowing Cooper to reinstate her as an FBI agent.
In "Dr. Bogdan Krilov", Liz and Samar are sent to confront Dr. Krilov and discover Kaplan's plan to use Ressler to kill Hitchin as she is Red's only link to the Cabal under false pretenses. Liz discovers the truth about Kaplan being her former nanny whom she used to call as Katya and she begs Liz to end her relationship with Red before it's too late. Despite stopping Ressler from making a big mistake, Liz confronts Hitchin and tells her they will investigate in Reven Wright's disappearance. Inside the ice rink, Liz finally meets with Julian Gale who demands the FBI transcripts of their involvement with Red. She refuses to cooperate and suspects he has an ulterior motive in wanting the transcripts so he can capture Red.
In "The Debt Collector" Liz is kidnapped by Edgar Grant who was presumably hired by a man she had arrested previously that forced Red to cooperate with Kaplan. When he takes her to the cabin to meet with his client, Liz and Grant are taken by surprise when Red shows up. Despite Liz's attempts to help Red reconcile with Kaplan, a gun shot is fired by an unknown assailant. Liz later calls Red and informs him of her suspicion on Gale being his assailant.
In "Mr. Kaplan Conclusion", Liz is informed by Harold that he had done a DNA test between her and Red and she'll know within 24 hours if he is her father. She later tries to appeal to Kaplan to end the war with Red and she wants to show her a secret. On their way there, Red's men block the attempt and despite Kaplan's warning not to leave the car, Liz does. After opening an envelope containing the DNA test and believing it to be Kaplan's secret, Liz confronts Red for not telling her the truth about him being her father and having to find out from Cooper. She tells him that she was upset that she had already lost her mother, her nanny and Sam the people who knew her the best. Despite this, Liz mentions that she can't let Red deny the fact that she's just like him and anger, despair and love is part of a normal family. Liz also comes to the realization that Red wanted her to grow more as a FBI profiler and embraces him.
In "Zarak Mosadek", while staking out at a pub in Baltimore with Aram, Liz discovers a woman named Lillian who works as a bartender meeting with Garvey. Later on after taking her to the apartment where she lives, Liz is surprised when she learns Lillian was put in Witness Protection Program by Garvey because of Red's past abuse with her and her mother, Naomi. She mentions that she is also Red's daughter and they're half-sisters.
In "Sutton Ross", Liz visits Tom's gravesite and she tells Tom's ghost that she now knows that her father, Raymond Reddington, is dead and that the man is an imposter. Tom warns Liz to be careful due to how resourceful the imposter is.
In "Rassvet," Liz tracks down her grandfather Dominic Wilkinson with the help of Ressler and finally learns much of the truth about Reddington and her mother from him. Liz learns that the man she shot as a child, as remembered in "Tom Connolly," was in fact the real Reddington and she killed him. Dom tells Liz about her mother and her history with Ilya Koslov, the man who became Reddington to protect Katarina. Dom states that twenty-eight years before, her mother had promised to send him a letter to a post office box when she was safe, but he has never gotten one despite checking every week. Liz later flies to Hong Kong and reveals to Reddington that she knows the truth about who he really is, but he refuses to answer her questions about why he continued being Reddington after gaining access to all of his money.
Donald Ressler
Portrayed by Diego KlattenhoffDonald Ressler is a senior FBI agent who is a stickler for procedure. His father was an honest policeman who was betrayed and killed by his corrupt partner after refusing to take bribes. He spent five years on an FBI task force obsessively pursuing Reddington, which resulted in his fiancée's breaking off their engagement. He despises having to work with a criminal like Reddington, but he acknowledges that Reddington does get results. Initially he distrusts Liz Keen and her connection to Reddington, but eventually comes to respect and work well with her. After he was shot by Anslo Garrick, he reignited his relationship with his former fiancée, Audrey Bidwell. However, in "Mako Tanida" she was believed to be killed by Mako Tanida and forcing Ressler to side with Red to find him. After capturing him, Ressler and his friend, Bobby Jonica takes him to his father's secret cabin. On the drive there, Ressler is betrayed when Tanida informs him that he wasn't responsible for the deaths of both the FBI agents and Audrey's. He also learns that Jonica assumed Akio's identity to continue his business, leading the latter to shoot Tanida for exposing him and Ressler slamming the brakes to stop him. After capturing Jonica, Ressler blamed him for his betrayal that led to the deaths of their closest friends and Audrey. He also admits that while he doesn't like working with Red, he was the reason why Ressler had Audrey back in his life and because of Jonica, she's dead. Ressler gave him a choice to kill himself with a knife or Jonica will be shot. Liz convinces Ressler to stand down as Jonica kills himself with the knife. Back at his apartment, Ressler is heartbroken when he discovers a pregnancy test and learns that Audrey was pregnant with his child. He later developed an addiction to pain medication from what he went through with Audrey's death and later Meera's own. He managed to overcome it when Liz convinces Ressler to seek help.
In "Tom Connolly", with Cooper removed from being the FBI Director of Counterterrorism and finally being aware of the Cabal, Wright names Ressler as acting director. When Liz goes on the run after killing Tom Connolly, Ressler urges her to come in, saying that otherwise he will have to lead the FBI manhunt against her.
In "The Troll Farmer", Ressler interrogates Cooper for his involvement in letting Liz escape and learns a little bit of the Cabal's plans for the FBI itself. He eventually decides to release Cooper, but warns that they will keep an eye on him. In "Marvin Gerard", Red informs Ressler that the Cabal had set a trap up for Liz at the airport and he rushes in to prevent the departure. Though he succeeds, Liz is shaken up by his reckless actions, believing he wanted to capture her, and flees the scene before Ressler could explain himself. He is later visited by Tom Keen, wishing to assist him knowing trouble is on the horizon for both Red and Liz. In "Eli Matchett", Ressler refuses his help and warns Tom to stay out of his way.
After arresting Liz, Ressler joins Red's efforts to protect her from the Cabal, aiding in protecting Karakurt in "the Director". He later tells Liz that he believes she was framed and he would not have arrested her if he believed he couldn't protect her. Ressler is able to protect Liz until Red forces the Cabal to exonerate her. He then returns control of the task force to the reinstated Cooper.
In the season 4 episode "Philomena", Ressler's old friend Julian Gale invites Ressler to join his investigation into the eighty-six bodies exhumed by Mr. Kaplan. Cooper suggests Ressler do so to help the task force stay ahead of Gale's investigation.
In "Dr. Bogdan Krilov", Ressler follows an anonymous tip on Reven Wright's disappearance that leads to a woman living with her sister who has claimed she saw Hitchin order some men carrying a rolled carpet. When he delved further, the woman admitted she saw a foot come out of the carpet, leading Reesler to suspect that Hitchin murdered Wright. Before he could take the woman into protective custody, Ressler and her are attacked by men presumably working for Hitchin. However, Liz and Samar suspect he was being manipulated by Kaplan after Krilov confesses. They stop Ressler just in time from killing Hitchin and Liz revealing he was under the influence of propofol and manipulated to kill Hitchin by Kaplan and Krilov. Despite standing down, Ressler is later taken into custody with his FBI badge revoked.
In "The Debt Collector", when he is accused by Gale for wanting to help Red, Ressler reprimands him for being selfish. He points out to Gale that he was on another assignment by looking into Wright's murder and had no time to deal with Red's shenanigans. Ressler lost his badge upon being under the influence of propofol and nearly killed Hitchin had Liz and Samar not stopped him. The last thing he needed is Gale causing him more problems with his life. He later apologizes to Ressler upon learning what happened to him.
In "Mr. Kaplan", Ressler informs Cooper, Liz, and Samar that Gale has gotten enough intel to demand an indictment on the Task Force involving Red, from the grand jury.
In "Mr. Kaplan, Conclusion", Red helps Ressler locate Hitchin's cleaner Henry Prescott who leads him to the murdered Reven Wright. However, Reddington uses the body to force Hitchin into dropping the investigation even though it means that Wright will not get justice as Ressler wanted. Hitchin subsequently returns Ressler's badge, but they get into an altercation, causing Ressler to accidentally kill her. He later calls Prescott to help hide Hitchin's body in a similar manner to Wright's, under the pseudonym Red gave Ressler, Frank Sturgeon.
In "Smokey Putnum", Ressler is informed by Cooper that Hitchin died by hitting her head and there will be no further investigation. He seems relieved by this until Prescott visit him in his van. He informs Ressler that he knows the truth and blackmails him for favors if he wants Prescott to keep his secret involving his accidental murdering of Hitchin.
In "Miss Rebecca Thrall", Ressler is contacted by Prescott for a favor involving a package inside of a car to be delivered to him. He is reminded of their deal in what could happen if he refuses. After delivering the car to Prescott, Ressler warns him to never call him again.
In "The Informant", while pursuing a criminal, Ressler is contacted by Prescott to stop pursuing his clients. While searching Judge Sonia Fisher's apartment, Ressler asks Samar to search the bedroom. After she leaves, he comes across a tablet and uses the password on it. It's there, Ressler discovers the names of Prescott's clients, including his own name on the list. He gets a call from Red, telling him it is time they had a chat. With Red's help, Ressler discovered Prescott's real name and meets him in the park where he's playing football with his family and arrests him. Afterwards, he gives Cooper a letter of resignation and includes his confession for all the things he's done. Cooper rejects the letter, stating that his name wasn't found on Prescott's client list. Prescott is later killed by Reddington who removed Ressler from the list.
In "Brothers", its revealed that as a teenager Ressler shot and apparently killed his father's former partner Tommy Markin after overhearing a phone call in which Markin revealed the truth during Ressler's father's funeral. The murder of his father and Ressler's revenge killing inspired him to follow in his father's footsteps and join law enforcement, having previously been going down a troubled teen going down a bad path while his brother Robby was heading to the police academy. Robby covered up his actions and hid the body while in the present day, Robby seeks Ressler's help after the field he buried Markin in is being dug up for development purposes. Ressler and Robby try to move the body, only for it to be stolen by the Albanian mob to whom Robby owes money. The mob use Markin's body to blackmail Ressler into stealing a file for them. Robby eventually reveals that Markin was still alive after Ressler shot him before Robby finished Markin off. The brothers decide to come clean to Liz even though it means they will go to prison. With Liz's help, Ressler takes down the mobsters after his brother and they reconcile but are not arrested as Liz manages to make the body disappear. Liz later explains to Ressler that he is the one thing she can count on in her chaotic life and can't afford to lose him.
Tom Keen
Portrayed by Ryan EggoldThomas Vincent Keen, born Christopher Hargrave, originally from Couva, is Elizabeth's husband, an elementary school teacher who turns out to be a covert operative working for Berlin. When first confronted by Elizabeth, Tom asserts to her that he was assigned to protect her, and that Reddington "is not who think he is". Elizabeth shoots him and stages his death, but keeps him prisoner on a boat for several months to extract as much information as possible. When she is nearly discovered by the harbor master, Tom saves her by strangling him to death; as a token of gratitude, she lets Tom escape. Tom later meets with Reddington and their conversation reveals a previous working relationship. Apparently, Tom was recruited at the age of 14 by a blacklister known as The Major due to the combination of sociopathy and extreme talent, to be groomed for covert operations. Reddington acquired him from The Major to insert him into Elizabeth's life, but when Berlin found out, he doubled Reddington's price. After his escape, Tom utilizes The Major for a new covert operation as a neo-Nazi drug and arms dealer in Dresden named Christof Mannheim, but not before calling Elizabeth; he appears to have developed genuine feelings for her during their "marriage", which seems to complicate matters for both The Major and Reddington, as it was the reason behind his killing the harbor master on Elizabeth's boat. When Elizabeth nearly gets subpoenaed for the harbor master's murder, Reddington and Ressler attempt to extradite Tom from Germany so he can clear her name; Tom initially refuses, but then appears in court and willfully surrenders. With the help of Assistant Attorney General, "Smiling Tommy" Connolly, Reddington helps Tom and Elizabeth sweep the whole event under the rug; Elizabeth is cleared while Tom "never existed". The Major, seeing Tom as a liability after this affair, tries to shoot Tom but the Germans intercept them; Tom bargains for their lives and they both manage to escape, but The Major is still set to have Tom killed. Desperate, Tom hides at Elizabeth's place and pleads her to give him his passports; in exchange, she convinces him to tell her the truth about his relationship with Reddington, then reveals that she had always known that on some level, Tom's love for her and their life together was genuine. He later tells Liz of his dream to become a fisherman and urges her to come with him to Japan to start a new life with each other, but she declines, telling him that she needs to finish what she's started. After Liz kills Tom Connolly and becomes one of the FBI's most wanted, Tom departs on his boat to Japan to begin his new life.
In "Marvin Gerard", Tom appears before Ressler, wishing to help assist him in saving Liz, suspecting the tides are against Red's favor. In "Eli Matchett", he and Ressler get into a brief scuffle with each other. While waiting for Liz to call him, Tom meets with Cooper and is recruited to help investigate Karakurt. Posing as a hustler, he befriends a wealthy socialite and infiltrates an underground street-fighting ring, where he eventually locates Karakurt. He brings the assassin to Cooper, but the Cabal finds them, forcing all three men to go on the run. Eventually, with Ressler and Cooper's help, he evades the Cabal and delivers Karakurt into federal custody. After Liz is released, Tom proposes marriage to her, but she turns him down, saying that she is too uncertain about the future to accept. Tom is later confronted by Red who warns him to stay away from Liz, after the actions he pulled when he ignored his first warning that led to this. After Liz's death, he tells Red to stay away from Agnes and blames him for his failure to protect her.
In "The Artax Network", Samar visits Tom in the hospital who has been having a hard time raising Agnes alone and offers to help him. Tom is later recruited again by Cooper to keep an eye on Cynthia Panabaker and he discovers more that confirms Cooper's suspicion. Visiting Cooper in the post office, he is able to confirm the woman that Panabaker had a meeting looks like Liz's mother, Katarina.
In "Alexander Kirk", Tom is forced to work with Mattais Solomon and Susan Hargrave, the people responsible for Liz's death to get at Alexander Kirk, the man who ordered the attack. During the mission, Tom shoots Solomon in revenge, but Solomon seemingly gets away after Tom leaves. Tom later goes after Susan before Red calls him to stop Tom. Red reveals that Tom is in fact Christopher Hargrave, Susan's long-missing son. Moments later, Susan enters and tells him about her son, how he disappeared twenty-eight years earlier when he was three years old and she always hopes to see him again. On Red's advice, Tom doesn't let Susan know he's her son but doesn't kill her for Agnes' sake.
In "The Lindquist Concern" Tom suspects Kirk is manipulating Liz and seeks out Ressler's help for previous files from the FBI. Though still unable to trust him, Ressler agreed to help Tom out by giving him previous FBI files. Tom's spying on one of Kirk's men and confrontation leads him to where Kirk's true whereabouts are: Russia. He calls Liz to warn Red about Kirk's plans to kill him.
In "The Architect", Tom searches for the truth about his true parentage and why he disappeared years ago, after reading the death of his father, Howard Hargrave. His search leads to a mother whose son made Tom disappear and procures a confession from him.
In "Whitehall/Whitehall Conclusion ", Tom discovers his father, Howard, is alive and being held in a mental hospital. He also learns that Susan had faked Howard's death and had an ulterior motive for Halycon. This led to Tom convincing Nez to side with him as they try to uncover the truth of the secret Susan had been hiding the whole time concerning Whitehall. Solomon tries to stop Tom and Nez, claiming that Susan was set up by Howard and had no knowledge on it.
In "Mr. Kaplan, Conclusion", it's revealed that Tom found the suitcase Kaplan left in the storage locker and looks inside it. He discovers the skeletal remains of an undisclosed person and closes the suitcase. Tom then takes it with him under Kaplan's orders to deliver the suitcase.
In "Ian Garvey", Tom finally found out who the skeletal remains belong to and the connection she has with Elizabeth. Now realizing the truth, he calls Liz to come home and plans to tell her the truth about her mother along with the fact Red killed Kopal. However, Ian Garvey interferes with his group and attacks the two. Having taken back the bag containing the skeletal remains, he leaves and has a few of his men get rid of Tom and Liz to send a message to Red. Despite Tom's best efforts to fight them off, he is stabbed as Liz loses consciousness. Tom's final words are that Liz will be the one to make it and he dies in the hospital.
Meera Malik
Portrayed by Parminder NagraMeera Malik is a CIA field agent assigned to Reddington's security detail at the personal request of Diane Fowler. Not much has been revealed about her character other than that she is a CIA agent tasked with Reddington's file, and that she is the mother of two children. She was revealed to have unknowingly leaked information to the terrorist Anslo Garrick upon the orders of an unknown individual. Reddington discovers this and forces her to help him unmask the person responsible. She ends up betraying the task force. In season 1's finale, "Berlin: Conclusion", she is killed in a nightclub by an escaped convict who slits her throat.
Harold Cooper
Portrayed by Harry LennixHarold Cooper is the Assistant Director of the FBI Counterterrorism Division and head of the covert FBI task force assigned to pursue the criminals on the Blacklist. He is on an upwardly mobile career path in the Bureau, something that his work with Reddington occasionally threatens to derail. He had a particular interest in Reddington's past, and is willing to oblige Reddington's unusual requests due to this understanding of him. He was attacked and put into a coma by Berlin's agents at the end of season 1.
By Season 2, Cooper regained consciousness, but is revealed to have an inoperable brain tumor in the episode "T. Earl King VI". With the help of his friend, Attorney General Connolly, he entered an experimental drug trial. However, he has had to compromise his ethics and perform various morally dubious tasks for Connolly to stay in his favor and remain in the trial. He confronts Connolly, who admits that he has been manipulating him on behalf of the Cabal. He blackmails Cooper into helping them, saying that they will destroy Cooper and his wife Charlene if he fails to cooperate. Cooper tells Reddington about the situation, and the two attempt to use Cooper's connection to Connolly against the Cabal. When Liz is framed for the assassination of Senator Hawkins, Cooper flatly refuses to cooperate with the Cabal and is placed on administrative leave by Connolly. After Liz finds evidence that Cooper's doctor is working for the Cabal, Cooper confronts the man and discovers that the Cabal faked his cancer and that he is not dying. After he witnesses Liz's murder of Connolly, he tells her to run, and later turns over his badge. Ressler interrogates him to determine his complicity in Connolly's murder, but eventually decides to release him.
In "Marvin Gerard", Cooper is told by Wright that for him to have the charges dropped against him, Cooper not only has to resign, but also take a desk job. Although he reluctantly does, Cooper is determined to help Liz clear her name and investigates Karakurt. In "Eli Matchett", Cooper meets with Tom in a Chinese Restaurant and although he can't be trusted, Cooper thinks he's perfect for the job. He recruits Tom to help investigate Karakurt. Later, Tom brings Karakurt to Cooper's house and they are forced to flee with Charlene when the Cabal sends a team to kill Karakurt. Charlene suggests they hide at their neighbor's cabin, admitting that she had cheated on Cooper with him.
In "The Director Conclusion", after Red forces the Cabal to exonerate Liz, a mission Copper aids in, Cooper is reinstated as head of the task force and congratulates Ressler for his work in Cooper's absence. Later, he separates from Charlene.
In "Mr. Kaplan: Conclusion", after facing the prospect of the task force being shut down due to Kaplan's war on Reddington, Cooper resolves to settle once and for all the question of Liz and Reddington's relationship. He takes a sample of Reddington's blood from an evidence locker for an old case, and has it tested against Liz's DNA.
In "Kuwait", it is revealed that as a young soldier during the Gulf War, Cooper covered up an illicit smuggling operation run by his superiors. His friend, Daniel Hutton, discovered Cooper's involvement and the two argued when Hutton threatened to blow the whistle on the operation. Iraqi soldiers attacked the pair and kidnapped Hutton. Cooper's commander later recommended him for the Navy Cross in exchange for his silence regarding the smuggling. In the present day, Hutton turns up alive and Cooper travels to Iran to rescue him. While attempting to return to the US, Cooper is captured by Hutton's men. Hutton reveals he escaped captivity years ago and became "the Simoom", an infamous terrorist who sold classified information to criminals. He tortures Cooper, but Reddington arrives to rescue him and kill Hutton.
Aram Mojtabai
Portrayed by Amir ArisonAram Mojtabai is a quirky and skilled technician who regularly assists the FBI. He formerly worked for the NSA. He is friends with Elizabeth Keen. It is shown that Aram likes Samar Navabi until they suffered a falling out in "Gaia".
In "The Djinn", Red appeals to Aram for help in locating Nasim Bakhash as part of his plans to exonerate Keen. In "Kings of the Highway", Aram reveals his knowledge of what he has learned from the laptop in exchange for Ressler telling him of the protocols. It's also there he begins to feel guilty for having to tell Ressler about Samar's plans to help Liz and Red. As she leaves, Aram realizes the extent of what could happen to Keen if the Cabal get their hands on her and has to decide where his loyalties lie.
When Liz is arrested and the Director comes to take her into custody, Aram changes the password to her cell to lock him out. The Director cuts off Liz's air to force Aram to give up the password. Aram then confronts the Director at gunpoint in a desperate attempt to stop him from taking Liz. She persuades Aram to stand down, but in the process he buys enough time for Cynthia Panabaker, the White House counsel, to arrive and transfer Liz to a federal courthouse under Ressler's direct supervision. Aram later joins Red's team to kidnap the Director and exonerate Liz by using his computer skills to hack an elevator's controls to make it go to the wrong floor. The mission is a success and Liz is exonerated of all but the murder of Tom Connolly, for which she agrees to a plea of involuntary manslaughter and is set free.
In "Miles McGrath", it's revealed that Aram has been seeing someone else, a woman named Janet Sutherland, and his relationship with Samar suffers a falling out when he finds out about her plans for a transfer. At the end of "Gaia", Aram coldly tells Samar that he's glad she's leaving the team when he found out that she blamed him for an action Cooper did on his behalf as it was against his morals to kill again. He also mentions he only congratulated her out of respect for both Ressler and Cooper. Aram tells Samar that he's very angry at her because he wished she had told him about her plans to transfer and slams the door in her face.
However, in "The Thrushes", it's revealed that Aram's girlfriend, Janet, is an undercover operative hired by Alexander Kirk to gain access to the FBI's computer networks through Aram. She was suspected by Samar and Ressler the whole time and they present their evidence to him, finding that he has already figured out she is a mole. When Aram discovers this, he regrets how he treated Samar after learning she did love him. Using himself as bait, he is able to keep Janet occupied long enough for Ressler to arrest her. At the end of the episode, Aram is comforted by Samar and realizes his feelings for her. He is happy when she admits she rescinded her transfer papers and decided to stay.
In "The Architect", Aram is sent undercover to bring down a blacklister known as The Architect. Aram is forced to aid in the prison break of a man about to be executed and witnesses the Architect's brutality in securing the man's freedom. Aram is rescued by Samir and Ressler, but the Architect makes an escape. Recognizing that more people will die if the Architect escapes and shaken by what he has witnessed, Aram kills the Architect with his own portable coilgun without hesitation. When he is shaken again by his actions, Samar comforted Aram and convinces him that he did the right thing in killing the Architect.
In "Dembe Zuma", Dembe kidnaps Aram to get him to help find the traitor in Red's syndicate. After helping Dembe find a name as a clue, he returns to the Post Office to catch Janet and Samar in a confrontation. Though he is able to defuse the situation by escorting Janet away from Samar, Aram becomes worried for her when she leaves work without talking to him.
In "Mr. Kaplan", Aram is about to go speed walking with Janet until he is ordered by a man to appear before an inquiry involving the Task Force. Despite defending the Task Force and Red, he is imprisoned in the same cell that Liz was held in.
In "Mr. Kaplan, Conclusion", Aram learns about Janet testifying against him to protect her deal and why Samar never told him about it out of a need to protect him. He realizes that she wasn't right for him and ends their relationship for good. Coming back to the Task Force, Aram realizes Samar's feelings for him and shares a kiss with her.
Samar Navabi
Portrayed by Mozhan MarnòSamar Navabi is a Mossad agent from Iran. She is a highly skilled interrogator. She first appears in the season 2 premiere, "Lord Baltimore", in which she briefly captures and interrogates Reddington. Later she joins the Blacklist task force on an indefinite basis. She appears to be colluding with Reddington for an unknown purpose.
In "Zal Bin Hassan", Samar's past is revealed and how she witnessed the death of her parents. Red then scolds her knowing that she almost had her family's killer back in Cairo, but missed one key element that led to both her partner being killed and Samar being hospitalized. She has an emotional reunion with her brother, Shahin, who was believed to have died years earlier in a bombing. However, Samar soon discovers that her brother is not who she believes him to be, and is in fact the very terrorist she had spent years hunting. She helps her former partner Levi destroy important documents, but she is captured by her brother and taken to the harbor, where Reddington intercepts them, freeing Samar and capturing Shahin. Reddington asks Samar to let him take Shahin for his own purposes, and she sadly agrees, saying her brother died long ago. Afterwards, Samar and Ressler become intimate.
Samar secretly helps Liz locate Reddington after he is kidnapped. When Ressler finds out and confronts her, she admits to it and to previously tipping Liz and Tom off to help them evade the FBI, arguing that if Liz is arrested, she will inevitably be killed by the Cabal. In response, Ressler promptly fires Samar from the task force. She then joins Reddington and helps him carry out his plan to exonerate Liz. After Liz is released, Samar rejoins the task force.
In "Gaia", she and Aram fought over her plans to transfer, with the latter admitting that he only congratulated her out of respect for both Ressler and Cooper. When he tells her off how he truly felt and leaves, only then Samar begins to feel guilty for hurting Aram.
In "The Lindquist Concerns", Samar is comforted by Ressler and she trusts him enough to tell him of her suspicions on Aram's girlfriend, Janet, being up to no good. In "The Thrushes", she and Ressler confirm their suspicions to Cooper about Janet before confronting him about it. When Samar revealed the knowledge that she and Ressler investigated her being an operative working for Kirk to gain FBI files, Aram regretted how he treated her. After the operative is arrested, Samar comforts Aram and pleases him by admitting she rescinded on her transfer papers. In Dr. Adrian Shaw, Samar and Ressler attempt to find Sonia Bloom, only to learn that Red beaten them for it. She confronts him on the phone with the belief he has plans to kill Bloom. Red evades Samar's question, but only mentions he will expose the truth soon.
In "Lipet's Seafood Company", Samar engages in an unsanctioned Mossad operation to steal a microchip without the FBI's knowledge. She deliberately misleads Aram when he begins investigating the incident. After the task force finds out the truth, Cooper upbraids her for deceiving him and tells her to figure out whether her loyalties lie with Mossad or the FBI. She asks Aram out for a drink, but he turns her down, telling her he has had too many bad experiences with women he cannot trust. Later she meets with her ex-partner and sometime lover Levi, but declines to resume their relationship, confessing to him that she is "in love with someone else".
In "Dembe Zuma" while trying to work together, Samar and Janet had a serious confrontation with the latter admitting that when she met Aram, he was just like Samar before she taught him how to have fun. She tells Samar that she knows about her feelings for Aram and would never admit it out of fear. Janet even points out that she is doing a poor job hiding it behind a disinterest and tough façade. Samar doesn't talk to Aram and leaves, apparently shaken by the fact Janet knew that she had feelings for him. In "Philomena", Samar interviews for a prestigious FBI fellowship. She is accepted, but declines upon learning that Aram recommended her for the fellowship, believing he only did so out of guilt for not telling her about resuming his relationship with Janet.
In "Mr. Kaplan: Conclusion", Samar investigates Janet after Aram is imprisoned for failing to cooperate with a grand jury investigating the task force. She discovers Janet's criminal record was expunged in exchange for her persuading Aram to testify against the task force. She visits Aram in jail, but chooses not to tell him about Janet's involvement after he says that Janet's support is keeping him sane. Later, Aram learns this and breaks up with Janet. He asks Samar why she kept silent. When she replies it was because Janet made him happy, he kisses her.
In "Lawrence Dane Devlin", Samar drowns after her kidnapping by a Blacklister. Samar calls Aram to say goodbye, telling Aram that if he had proposed, she would have accepted. Aram manages to find Samar in time to save her life; however, she is left on life support. According to Ressler, Samar went a long time without oxygen and all the doctors know for sure is that she cannot currently breathe on her own and may never be able to again. Despite this, Aram refuses to give up on her, playing the comatose Samar music and officially proposing to her before placing his grandmother's ring on her finger.
In "Sutton Ross", Samar awakens from her coma and accepts Aram's proposal.
Samar realizes the near-drowning has left her with permanent brain damage. After attempting to hide it from Aram and the Task Force, she realizes she can no longer continue her duties after she becomes incapacitated while pursuing Bastien Moreau. Rather than tell Cooper the truth, she resigns from the task force. It is revealed that she has vascular dementia and her condition will only deteriorate along with her memory.
In "The Osterman Umbrella Company", Samar overpowers the first assassin sent by the Mossad to exterminate her. She escapes with Aram only to be tracked down by a second group of Israelis, and Aram is able to call in support and stop the attack. Aram decides to stick with Samar and secures new passports from the task force, but she flees the country with the help of Red, leaving a devastated Aram behind to protect Reddington.
Dembe Zuma
Portrayed by Hisham TawfiqReddington's trusted and loyal bodyguard, driver, factotum, and confidante, Dembe Zuma is introduced as a Muslim former freedom fighter from South Sudan. It was assumed that he was Raymond Reddington's bodyguard. The episode "The Mombasa Cartel" revealed that he was born the youngest son of a farmer named Samwel Zuma. When he reported a number of low-ranking operatives of a poaching organization, the Mombasa Cartel, to the authorities, the cartel killed Dembe's father, mother and siblings and sold him to human traffickers. At some point, he was being held by the Eberhardt Cartel. He spent eight years in the world of human trafficking and was enslaved until the age of 14, when Reddington found him half-dead and chained to a pipe in the basement of a brothel in Nairobi. Reddington took care of him, nursed him back to health and made sure he got an education. Dembe eventually got a bachelor's degree in English Literature, learned to speak four languages fluently and learned six others well enough to get by. Dembe rarely speaks, and does not converse without being close to Reddington.
In "The Troll Farmer", it is revealed that Dembe has a daughter and a granddaughter whom Matias Solomon uses as leverage to force him to surrender to him. In "Eli Matchett" Dembe is further tortured by Solomon's associates for refusing to disclose Red's whereabouts. He later finds Mr. Vargas in the same situation, and the two team up to escape. However, Vargas betrays Dembe and shoots him. Dembe rescues Red and Liz from Solomon before collapsing from his injuries.
After Reddington shoots Mr. Kaplan and leaves her for dead in "Mato", Dembe's relationship with Reddington becomes increasingly strained. Eventually, he says to Liz that he no longer recognizes Reddington, and tells her he killed Mr. Kaplan. In "The Apothecary", Dembe disappears after apparently poisoning Reddington. It is later revealed that he was innocent, but fled to find the true culprit. With Aram's help, he discovers that Mr. Kaplan was alive and was responsible.
Alina Park
Portrayed by Laura SohnA Special Agent with the FBI whom Liz interviews for a place on the Task Force. Reddington finds Alina bureaucratic and by-the-book, preferring Frankie instead. Alina has a secret from her time at the FBI office in Anchorage, which she refuses to reveal to Liz. Reddington deliberately sets out to disgust Alina, causing her to turn down the job. When Frankie takes Reddington hostage, Alina pursues her and nearly stabs her to death. Seeing Alina's brutality, Reddington changes his mind and agrees to give her the position. Alina accepts, on the condition that she tell Liz what happened in Anchorage. It is later revealed Alina fell into disgrace in the Anchorage FBI after flouting the law to catch her mother's ex-boyfriend, whom she blamed for her mother's fatal overdose. Upon encountering this ex-boyfriend on her return to Anchorage, Alina chooses not to kill him and allows the police to arrest him instead.
Main characters featured in ''The Blacklist: Redemption''
Susan Hargrave
Portrayed by Famke JanssenSusan "Scottie" Hargrave is the co-head of Halcyon Aegis, a secretive military intelligence firm. She has an estranged husband, Howard, who is an old friend of Reddington. She is also Tom Keen's mother though to her he's been missing for twenty-eight years and she doesn't know what happened to him.
Tom Keen photographed her meeting with Cynthia Panabaker. After learning she was involved with Elizabeth Keen's death, Reddington attacks Hargrave's operations to force her to meet with him. She agrees, setting a trap for him. Reddington is alerted to the trap by Tom, and turns the tables, capturing Hargrave instead. She denies any responsibility in Liz's death, but reveals that she was contracted to capture Liz by a man named Alexander Kirk. Reddington then proposes a temporary alliance with her.
Hargrave, Solomon, and Nez Rowan team up with Reddington, Tom, and the task force to steal $300 million from Senator Diaz, a presidential candidate who is being bankrolled by Kirk, in an attempt to draw Kirk out. Impressed by Tom's skills, she offers to hire him as an employee of Halcyon.
In "Ruin," Hargrave returns to visit a newly widowed Liz, having been exonerated for the crimes her husband framed her for through Tom's testimony. She takes temporary custody of Agnes while Liz deals with her anger and grief.
Nez Rowan
Portrayed by Tawny CypressA mercenary who works for Susan Hargrave. Nez has struggled with addiction before and during the series she relapses.
Matias Solomon
Portrayed by Edi GathegiMatias Solomon is a high-ranking Cabal operative. He was formerly a CIA asset in Ethiopia, working with Laurel Hitchin, but the agency ended its relationship with him when he proved to be too brutal even for them. He is soft-spoken and courteous but highly sadistic, with a predilection for torturing his victims. He also has a tendency to leave his men to die while he escapes.
In "The Troll Farmer", he takes Dembe's granddaughter hostage and uses her to capture Dembe. He visits Peter Kotsiopulos' office as a representative of the Cabal, reprimanding the Director for his inability to prevent Reddington from releasing the Fulcrum and threatening that continued failure would mean his life. He viciously tortures Dembe for information on Reddington's location, but fails to break him. Through a deception involving Mr. Vargas, Solomon finally tricks Dembe into revealing the information and captures Reddington and Liz. However, Dembe rescues them and drives Solomon off. In "Sir Crispin Crandall", while trying to fire at Red and Liz, he finds himself trapped with all of the most intelligent people in cryogenics. Solomon visits Peter again and warns him of his position in the Cabal. Peter then reprimands him for trying to revolt and forces Solomon's cooperation. In "Zal Bin Hassan" Solomon traces Tom down to Wing Yee in the hopes of ambushing Liz and Tom, but instead is caught by the FBI. During interrogation, the Director tortures Solomon by forcing him to swallow fishhooks, a ruse intended to convince the FBI that the Director is not in league with him. Solomon is then released.
Later, Solomon leads an assault team to kill Karakurt, who is being held by Tom Keen, Cooper, and Ressler. He captures Tom at gunpoint and demands that Ressler hand Karakurt over. However, Cooper knocks him out from behind, and Ressler arrests him.
While being transported by federal agents, Solomon is rescued by an unknown person driving a Rolls Royce. Then, working for Susan Hargrave, he plots to steal a nuclear weapon. This plot turns out to be a decoy to divert the FBI's attention from his real mission: capturing Liz Keen. He and his men surround the church where Liz and Tom are about to be married and demand that Liz come with them or they will kill everyone else and take her by force. However, Reddington, Tom, and the task force members are able to fend off Solomon's men long enough for Ressler to come to the rescue, allowing Liz and Tom to escape. He chases Liz again after her escape and hunts her ambulance as Red tries to take her to the hospital to save her life. Solomon is able to disable Red's vehicle and pins him and his men down. Eventually FBI backup arrives and Solomon flees as his men are killed. However, the delay in getting to the hospital caused by Solomon's attack causes Liz to apparently die due to complications during childbirth.
In "Alexander Kirk", Solomon and Tom are forced to work together in an operation to take down Blacklister Alexander Kirk who had orchestrated the attack on Liz. During the mission, Tom and Solomon rob a pharmacy together and Tom shoots Solomon in the gut in revenge for the attempt on Liz's life. Minutes later the police enter to find a pool of blood but no sign of Solomon himself.
The Blacklist
The Blacklist is a list of criminals that Raymond Reddington has compiled in his illegal business dealings. Names on the list are criminals that the FBI does not have overwhelming evidence against, hence why they have never been caught. Some criminals are unknown to the FBI, or have avoided leaving behind the needed evidence for conviction, or live a high-profile public life whilst concealing their criminal behaviour.The list is truly international with at least several members from Serbia, China, Russia, Germany, United Kingdom, Japan, Iran, Uzbekistan, etc., in addition to those from the United States.
It is unknown how many members the list contains, but the highest number revealed on the list so far is 192 in the comic book series and 184 in the TV series.
It is unknown what criteria Red is using to determine each member's position on the Blacklist, but most of the lowest numbers revealed so far have been the subject of multi-episode story arcs, suggesting that lower numbers are more significant figures in the show's mythology. The identities of many of the lowest numbers on the Blacklist remain unrevealed to date.
Various Blacklisters are also members of the Cabal.
Pavlovich brothers
Portrayed by Goran Ivanovski, Renne Gjoni, James Biberi and Stivi PaskoskiThe Pavlovich brothers were four Serbian relatives who specialized in snatch and grab operations. They first got a taste for blood working for Milošević's protective detail during the ethnic cleansing campaigns of the Yugoslav Wars, but went on to operate independently with no political affiliation. Working together as a team, they used high firepower and ruthless tactics to achieve their goals.
In the series' pilot, they kidnapped Beth Ryker, the daughter of General Daniel Ryker, by killing six FBI Agents during the ambush.
They then kidnapped a Chinese scientist who had been rescued by the CIA. Later, Raymond Reddington hired them to kidnap Tom Keen. They delivered Tom to Elizabeth Keen. While attempting to smuggle Xiaoping Li back to China, they were killed at McKendrick Pier.
Stanley Kornish, "The Stewmaker"
Portrayed by Tom NoonanStanley R. Kornish, a dentist by trade, had a separate career as a professional body disposal expert. Working for whoever could afford his services, he used his expert knowledge of chemicals to dissolve corpses until there was almost nothing left. He kept a photo of and a tooth from each victim as a souvenir. His dog accompanied him on his disposals.
In "The Decembrist", Raymond Reddington tells Milos Kirchoff how he interrogated Kornish about a photograph of Zoe D'Antonio found on the body of one of his associates. He explains that Zoe was brought to Kornish, for him to make her disappear.
Gina Zanetakos
Portrayed by Margarita LevievaGina Zanetakos was a corporate terrorist who committed terrorist acts that resulted in corporations losing or gaining an advantage over the competition. Raymond Reddington said she once contacted him for help in assassinating a Supreme Court judge. He also claimed that she was a former lover of Tom Keen. She worked for the Major.
Using the alias Shubie Hartwell, she entered the United States. She was hired by the Hanar Group to detonate a dirty bomb in the Port of Houston. The explosion would have allowed the Hanar investors to profit from the re-routing of sea shipping to New Orleans. After being captured, she was allowed a plea bargain since the bomb had not devastated the port. A search of her apartment produced a photograph of Tom Keen who she claims not to know. When questioned about the murder of Victor Fokin, she claims to have committed the crime on the orders of Raymond Reddington.
Gina is eventually released from prison. Tom contacts her, looking for work to provide for Liz and his unborn baby. Gina reluctantly brings him in to work on a jewelry heist. After they pull off the heist, she asks him to run away with her, and he refuses. She then double-crosses him and has him shot, but he survives. He then confronts her at gunpoint and demands that she persuade the Major to let him walk away from their organization, and she agrees. Later she is seen on the phone with an unknown person, talking about Tom.
Gina and the Major ambush Tom in Liz's apartment. The Major is about to kill Tom when Gina decides to kill the Major instead and leaves Tom to bury the body.
Anslo Garrick
Portrayed by Ritchie CosterAnslo Garrick was a mercenary who specialized in raiding secret and well defended prison facilities and extracting high-level prisoners, always using extreme levels of violence. He worked almost exclusively with a unit of highly armed, countryless mercenaries known as "the Wild Bunch". At some point, he raided a CIA blacksite in the Bering Sea to exfiltrate a man named Mahmoud al-Azok. His employer paid him to plant evidence that blamed the raid on Peruvian insurgent organization Shining Path. At some point he and Raymond Reddington worked together, though the alliance ended in 2008 when Garrick gave the FBI his train number and itenerary for a stop at Waterloo station in Brussels. Once Red arrived, a hit squad led by Donald Ressler made an attempt on his life, but failed. Red realized that Garrick had betrayed him and shot him in the face, damaging the right side of his face and apparently blinding his right eye. However, Garrick survived and spent 5 years in a prison described as a "black hole". To remind himself of the incident, Garrick never had the facial scarring repaired by surgery.
He was hired by Alan Fitch to kidnap Reddington. He succeeded in extracting Reddington from the FBI's custody, and tortured him. Reddington ultimately killed him by stabbing him in the neck in "Anslo Garrick Conclusion".
Madeline Pratt
Portrayed by Jennifer EhleMadeline Pratt, outwardly, is a well-known and politically active socialite. Behind the facade, she forms relationships and affiliations with powerful, influential people and then uses those connections to commit million dollar heists. Reddington credits her with the theft of 6 million dollars' worth of diamonds from a De Beers outpost in Congo and a heist on a mint in Prague in which the security fibers used to print the Czech koruna were stolen and then used to print counterfeit banknotes. She had a previous romantic connection with Reddington, which he broke off.
In the first season, she poses as Red's widow to steal documents belonging to him worth 10 million dollars from a bank in Istanbul to gain his attention regarding the proposed theft of the Effigy of Atargatis. She met with Elizabeth Keen, whom Red had said was a career thief. After using Red and Liz as a diversion to allow her to steal the Effigy of Atargatis, she sold it to the Russian mafia after removing the Kungar 6 list. Red tricked her into revealing the location of the nuclear warheads and allowed her to escape. Later she stole a painting from Red as revenge.
In the second-season episode "T. Earl King VI", Pratt was "kidnapped" by the Kings to bait Red into infiltrating "The Palace" so he could be sold at their auction.
Milos Kirchoff, "Berlin"
Portrayed by Peter StormareMilos Kirchoff is one of Reddington's nemeses between the first and second seasons.
Prior to the series, Kirchoff started out in the Red Army, rose to the rank of Colonel and later became a member of the KGB. Notorious for sending his enemies to the gulags in Siberia, he was a loyal servant of the Soviet Union. In 1991, near the end of the Cold War, Kirchoff took part in a meeting in Kursk with other Soviet officials on how to combat their more progressive countrymen who wanted the Soviet Union dissolved. The meeting was interrupted when a bomb went off, killing 15 attendants and the last of the old Soviet resistance. The act was done by a man named Kiryl Morozov on the orders of Alan Fitch, known as "The Decembrist", but Reddington was blamed. Shortly after that, Kirchoff's daughter was suspected of falling in love with a dissident and imprisoned. He used his connections to help her escape, but the Kremlin found out and decided to use him as an example to the Motherland.
He was put in a Siberian gulag where a lot of people he had put away were imprisoned. One day, he was sent a pocket watch he had given his daughter. Over several months, he was sent several body parts and was led to believe that they were hers and that Reddington was behind it. In reality, Fitch sent body parts belonging to someone else and helped Kirchoff's daughter escape to the United States, but not before convincing her that her father was responsible for the bombing. Eventually, Kirchoff sharpened one of the bones he had been sent into a weapon, killed the people holding him captive and escaped and formed his criminal syndicate under the alias "Berlin".
During the first eight episodes of the second season, Red meets with Milos Kirchoff again, who once more blames him for his daughter's death and intends to hurt Red by going after Zoe, whom he assumes is Red's daughter. Red reveals that Milos Kirchoff's daughter Zoe is actually alive and someone else in Milos Kirchoff's faction had lied to him about her being killed. He is soon reunited with his daughter, who had been living under an assumed name as Zoe D'Antonio.
In the episode "The Decembrist", after being reunited with Zoe, Milos learned the truth of Red's innocence. He kills Kiryl Morozov after learning of Fitch's orders to frame Red and use Milos as a pawn. He was furious with Alan Fitch for lying to him about her death and takes action. Milos orders his agents to abduct Fitch and strap a pipe bomb on him, intending to kill him. Using Zoe to gain the access numbers to free Fitch, Red holds Milos at gunpoint. Red returns to the warehouse where he is holding Milos prisoner with a bottle of vodka and places 2 shot glasses in front of Milos. After they reminisce about the Cold War and finish the bottle, Red kills Milos.
Luther Braxton
Portrayed by Ron PerlmanLuther Todd Braxton is a professional thief known for stealing money and information from China, Iran, and the United States. He typically organizes his operations to take place during wars, natural disasters or other upheavals and take advantage of the surrounding chaos to cover them up. He is credited with stealing 282 million dollars from Baghdad during Operation Shock and Awe and the abduction of a CIA asset from Tehran during the 2009–10 Iranian election protests. Braxton has a past with Reddington, including an incident in Belgrade where Braxton bested him, killing Red's local point man, Henkel, and hanging him by the neck with one of Reddington's own neckties. While serving in the Gulf War, Braxton was involved in a traumatic friendly fire incident in Khafji. He was successfully given therapy to have the memories of it removed.
He was hired by the Director to get the Fulcrum, and captured and interrogated Liz to find it, subjecting her to therapy to help recover blocked memories from her past that related to the Fulcrum. He was killed by Reddington in episode 10 of season 2.
"The Major"
Portrayed by Lance Henriksen"The Major" recruits social exiles who have a specific psychopathy personality profile. The persons are trained to act as spies for various clients. Once an agent has been assigned, they are to only contact the Major if the situation is "mission critical". One of his star operatives was Jacob Phelps, who posed as "Tom Keen", Elizabeth Keen's husband, for several years. The terrorist Gina Zanetakos also works for him.
The Major tried to kill Tom, but was killed by Gina instead.
Die Entrechteten
Die Entrechteten are a neo-nazi movement that smuggle drugs and weapons around Europe. Tom had a contract to infiltrate inside, until Reddington lied to them about Tom being an informant working for the FBI in an effort to bring him back to USA and confess the murder of harbormaster Eugene Ames to free Liz from being imprisoned.in the episode "The Longevity Initiative", the Germans track down both Tom and the Major and torture them for their leader's death. After they threatened him to kill Elizabeth if he didn't talk his motives for his infiltration, Tom and makes a deal: in exchange for Liz would not be their target, he reveals his assignment: he's going to help them solve the murder of a woman named Sarah Hastings, who was affiliated to the Germans, which is the main reason they want revenge for her death. After accepting the truce, they let Tom and the Major go.
These are some of the members of the movement:
- Elias
- Elias's right-hand man
- "Skinhead"
- Ali
- Franz
Marvin Gerard
Marvin Gerard was a Harvard alum and magna cum laude graduate, Gerard became the college's third-youngest professor at the age of 31. He went on to serve as prosecutor for the state of New York for 3 years, after which he made partner at his father-in-law's criminal defense firm. While Gerard was being considered for a seat on the federal bench, his teenage son, Timothy, fell in with a bad crowd and, suffering emotional abuse from his mother, abused prescription drugs he got from her supply. Gerard separated from his wife and filed for custody, but since his wife came from an influential family, he wasn't able to. He eventually went so far as to kidnap Timothy to keep him away from his mother, for which he was disbarred and sentenced to 7–10 years at Federal Correctional Institution, Cumberland. Timothy hung himself a year later. Gerard continued doing legal work behind bars, serving as shadow counsel to politicians, CEOs, and high-profile criminals, including Reddington, who apparently consulted with Gerard before he turned himself in to the FBI against Gerard's strong objections.
In "Sir Crispin Crandall", Gerard locates the vault where Peter Kotsiopulos is keeping his embezzled money.
In "The Director, Conclusion", when Red puts together a team to exonerate Liz, he calls in Gerard as part of that team. Gerard helps them plan on how to kidnap Peter Kotsiopulos. Once they have the Director, Red demands Laurel Hitchin exonerate Liz in exchange for Red not taking the Director to the Hague and sends in Gerard to discuss the terms of the deal with Laurel. Eventually Gerard manages to negotiate a deal where Liz is exonerated publicly for all but the Tom Connolly murder as Liz killed him in front of witnesses and it wasn't in self-defense. Instead, Laurel offers a plea of involuntary manslaughter with 3 years' probation. Gerard privately talks to Red and convinces him to take the deal as it will keep Liz safe and out of prison and is better than Gerard expected them to get. Gerard later presents the deal to Liz who reluctantly signs it as she will no longer able to be an FBI agent though she can remain on the task force in a similar capacity to Red. Thanks to Gerard's deal, Liz is later able to walk free. In "The Apothecary", Red believes Gerard poisoned him and is destroying his organization until it's revealed to be Dembe. In "Philomena", Gerard is kidnapped by a bounty hunter, Philomena, who works for Mr. Kaplan. When he refuses to turn against Reddington, Kaplan leaves him bound to a lamppost, and he is arrested by the police.
He coerces Ressler into arranging his release by threatening to reveal the latter's collaboration with Reddington to Julian Gale.
Zal Bin Hasaan
Portrayed by Sammy SheikZal Bin Hasaan, born Shahin Navabi, is the younger brother of Mossad agent Samar Navabi. He witnessed his parents' murder at a very young age. He faked his own death after carrying out his very first bomb attack, adopted the pseudonym "Zal Bin Hasaan", and began a career as a feared and vicious terrorist. He evaded capture for many years, despite the best efforts of an elite Mossad task force dedicated to hunting him down. He resurfaced in America, where he abducted six technicians working on Israel's Iron Dome defense system. Posing as a hostage, he was reunited with his sister, claiming he had gone into hiding to avoid persecution. He and his men infiltrated a Mossad compound, seeking a list that contained the names of the members of the task force. However, Samar and her ex-partner destroyed it when she found out his actions as a terrorist. He was captured by Red and Samar disowns Shahin, believing that he died with their parents. Red turned him over to unnamed associates in exchange for a favor.
Artax Network
The Artax Network is a defunct network of communications satellites that was intended to provide data coverage throughout the globe. Matias Solomon and his employers used it to track all of Liz Keen's movements and actions. Aram discovered this and the FBI forced Solomon's group to abandon the network.Katarina Rostova
Portrayed by Lotte Verbeek and Laila RobinsKatarina Rostova was a Russian spy who was assigned to turn Raymond Reddington but instead formed a romantic relationship with him that resulted in the birth of Masha Rostova/Elizabeth Keen. Her father was named Dom.
In "Cape May", it is revealed that Reddington believed that she had committed suicide by drowning to protect Liz from unknown individuals who were pursuing her. He continued to tell Liz that her mother was dead, despite receiving a painting commissioned by someone who claimed to be Rostova. However, Liz and Tom suspected she was alive. Katarina had left a journal in the house that Kirk claimed Liz grew up in and while reading it, she learns more about Katarina's affair with Red along with the Rostov family's long history with a rare cancer.
In the season 4 episode "Requiem", it is revealed that Katarina hired Mr. Kaplan to be Liz's nanny. During this time, Katarina was forced to kill a Soviet agent in self-defense; Kaplan disposed of the body. Later, Katarina tells Kaplan that Reddington kidnapped Liz, believing her to be his daughter. She was unaware that he took Liz to America to live with his family out of a need to protect both her and Katarina from not only Kirk/Rostov but also Berlin/Kirchoff who was attacking him. Katarina rescued Liz, but was forced to flee when both the US and Russian governments began hunting her. She asked Kaplan to leave Liz in the care of the man who would become her foster father, Sam.
In "Mr. Kaplan Conclusion", before her suicide Kaplan prayed for Katarina to forgive her as she dug up the suitcase and left it in a storage locker. The suitcase was later retrieved by Tom Keen and opened it to discover skeletal remains that apparently belong to the real Raymond Reddington.
In "Rassvet," it is revealed that Katarina was a double agent working both for the Cabal and the KGB. The real Reddington was the man shot by Liz on the night of the fire from which he was pulled by Katarina and her lover Ilya Koslov in an attempt to save Reddington's life. However, Reddington died of his injuries and the two covered up his death, leading to Reddington being declared missing. Katarina's apparent suicide was to fake her death, but her survival was exposed to Anton Velov when Katarina intervened to stop a rape at a shelter she was living at. After a brief period in hiding, she and Ilya traveled to Moscow to warn her father, who was also her KGB handler, to leave Russia to escape the Soviet government's reprisals for her treason. Later she tried to kill herself, but was stopped by Ilya. She then agreed to his proposal to assume Raymond Reddington's identity and gain access to his accounts, to protect her and her daughter Masha from the Cabal and to stop Reddington from being discredited as she knew he would be. In the present, Liz locates Katarina's father who reveals that twenty-eight years before, Katarina visited him and promised to send Dom a letter to a post office box once it was safe for her again. Though Dom checks every week, Katarina has not sent one letter despite it having been nearly thirty years. Dom is unsure if she is still alive, convinced that Katarina would've made contact if she was still around.
In "Robert Diaz" Katarina is revealed to be alive and living in Paris. When Red/Ilya appeared to warn her about the former KGB's newest assassination attempt on her life, Katarina briefly kisses him before stabbing him in the stomach. A group of men takes Red away in a car and she leaves carrying only his hat.
Katarina brutally interrogates Reddington for information on an unnamed group that is pursuing her. After Reddington escapes to Dom's house, Katarina makes an unsuccessful attempt to recapture him. She then moves into an apartment across the hall from Liz, posing as Madeleine Tolliver, a friendly retiree with an estranged daughter. She begins insinuating herself into Liz's life, installing surveillance devices in Liz's apartment and babysitting Agnes. While taking Agnes to the park, she inadvertently allows Agnes to see the dead body of an assailant she killed.
Using knowledge gleaned from her surveillance, she finds and kidnaps "Frank Bloom", addressing him as Ilya Koslov and torturing him for information on an attempt on her life he helped engineer years ago in Belgrade. After Liz discovers "Madeleine" is an imposter and confronts her at gunpoint, Katarina admits she is Liz's mother. Katarina abducts Liz and tells her that Frank Bloom, not Reddington, is the real Ilya Koslov, and that both Reddington and Dom are lying. Liz helps her escape when the FBI closes in on her location. Reddington is tailing Katarina when a car runs into her vehicle and two assassins shoot her and drag away the body. It is later revealed that Katarina faked her own death to convince Reddington to stop hunting her. She contacts Liz, promising to return when she has found out who is pursuing her.
Alexander Kirk
Portrayed by Ulrich ThomsenAlexander Kirk, born Constantin Rostov, is a powerful billionaire businessman who made his fortune buying up Russian companies after the fall of the Soviet Union. He claims to be Elizabeth Keen's father, and is suffering from an unrevealed medical condition.
Kirk was revealed to be the mysterious client who had hired Susan Hargrave to capture Liz. After Liz faked her death, he hires an assassin to kill Tom Keen and take Agnes. Reddington and Hargrave steal $300 million from Senator Diaz, a presidential candidate Kirk was backing, in an attempt to lure Kirk to the United States, but Kirk does not take the bait. After Reddington frames him for selling oil to rebels, Kirk is forced to appear before a congressional committee to testify. He changes his mind at the last minute when his men discover Liz is alive. He has Liz kidnapped and brought to him, and tells her that he is her father.
Liz is in disbelief at Kirk's claims and doesn't trust him. So Kirk takes her to the house he claimed she grew up in, near Nova Scotia. When the FBI rescued her, Kirk decides to continue his revenge on Red by keeping Agnes from him. Red reveals why Kirk had kidnapped both Liz and Agnes in the first place: he is dying of a rare genetic blood disease which female relatives do not share. Kirk intends to use Liz for a bone marrow transplant to save his own life. In "Dr. Adrian Shaw", Liz attempts to save Kirk through the transplant; but the DNA test performed by the hospital reveals that Kirk is not her father. Angered by the fact that he lied to her and sent her falsified DNA transcripts, Liz abandons Kirk. In "Dr. Adrian Shaw: Conclusion", Kirk escapes the hospital with Liz and is upset to learn he really isn't her father. Kirk trades Liz for Red though the person he sends to release Liz safely tries to kill her, saying that Kirk used to be a good man until he saw her on TV on the run from the Cabal and became obsessed with her. Liz is rescued by Ressler and Samar and with Aram's help, tracks down Kirk's location. Kirk tortures Red who confesses to being Liz's father and brings Kirk a cure. Kirk decides to kill Red rather than release him in exchange for the cure and the two men reminisce over Katarina Rostova. As Kirk goes to kill Red, Red whispers something in his ear that causes Kirk to stop. Both men disappear from Kirk's lab afterwards and later that night, Red tells Liz that Kirk is "gone". When Liz asks if Kirk is dead, all Red will say is that Kirk is gone with no further explanation. In "Lipet's Seafood Company", it's confirmed that Red allowed Kirk to escape. Cooper berates Red for this, but Red simply tells him that Kirk is gone and won't be coming back and insists they move on.
Mr. Kaplan
Portrayed by Susan Blommaert and Joanna P. AdlerMr. "Kate" Kaplan, born Kathryn "Kathya" Nemec, is Reddington's personal "cleaner" who comes in to scrub crime scenes. She cleans up after Liz kills one of the men watching her from across the street, and then helps Liz find Reddington. Later, she helps Reddington clean up after he kills Diane Fowler at the end of episode 13 of season 1. She also disposes of the bodies of Lucy Brooks and the Cowboy once they are found by Reddington's people. In season 3, she helps Liz fake her death so she can escape from Reddington. For this, she is shot in the head by Reddington in the second episode of season 4, but survives and is held hostage by an unknown man in "Gaia". She later recovers and leaves.
In the season 4 episode "Requiem", it is revealed that she was hired by Katarina Rostova to be young Liz's nanny. She became friends with Katarina after discovering she was a Soviet spy and learned that she was having an affair with Reddington. When Katarina was forced to flee and abandon her daughter, Kaplan left Liz with her foster father, Sam. Later, she fell in love with a woman named Annie Kaplan, and assumed her surname after Annie was murdered in front of her. She then joined Reddington's employ to protect Liz, on the understanding that she would always place Liz's interests ahead of his. In the present day, she exhumes all the bodies she buried for Reddington over the years, intending to use them to destroy him. In "Philomena", Kaplan hires Philomena, a bounty hunter, to kidnap two of Reddington's subordinates, including Marvin Gerard. She tells Liz that she was her nanny, and warns Liz not to get involved in the fight between her and Reddington.
In "The Debt Collector", Kaplan calls a temporary truce with the FBI to find Liz after the latter is kidnapped. She tracks down Liz, only to learn that Reddington engineered the kidnapping to draw her out. When she confronts him, she declares that it is impossible for the two of them to coexist.
In "Mr. Kaplan"/"Mr. Kaplan: Conclusion", Kaplan attacks the task force, first attempting to steal a copy of Reddington's immunity agreement with the DOJ and give it to Julian Gale. When Reddington foils this plan, Kaplan agrees to testify about Reddington's crimes to a grand jury. Before doing so, she exhumes a suitcase containing the skeleton of an unknown individual. After the grand jury is dissolved through Reddington's machinations, Kaplan is cornered by the FBI and Reddington. The latter refuses to kill her and admits his remorse for trying in the first place, but she tells him that she has arranged for an accomplice to give Liz "the truth" after her death, then she commits suicide. Afterwards, her accomplice, revealed to be Tom Keen, picks up the suitcase, presumably to deliver to Liz.
Henry Prescott
Portrayed By James CarpinelloHenry Prescott is a cleaner hired to dispose of bodies accidentally or intentionally killed by the victims. His services was used by Red to help the Task Force get them Reven Wright's body as evidence to strengthen Donald Ressler's case against Hitchin and forced her to help whitewash the Grand Jury to throw off Kaplan and Julian Gale. Prescott's services were later used by Ressler under the pseudonym of Frank Sturgeon to dispose of Hitchin's body after he accidentally kills her.
In "Smokey Putnum" upon discovering Ressler's true identity, Prescott blackmails him for favors if he wants his secret to remain under wraps. In "Miss Rebecca Thrall", he calls Ressler for a favor in relocating a package inside a car. Prescott mentions that should he refuse, he will expose Ressler's secret and he will go to jail for the murder of Laurel Hitchin.
In "The Informant", while pursuing a criminal associated Prescott calls Ressler again, warning him if he pursue his clients, he will call off the deal and Ressler will go to jail. With Red's help, Ressler discovers Prescott's real name is Mitchell Hatley and gives chase. Despite Ressler wanting to see him go to trial and be imprisoned, Red and his men attack and stop the FBI transport convoy and Red burns the imprisoned Prescott alive inside the vehicle.
Ian Garvey
Portrayed by Jonny CoyneIan Garvey is a corrupt U.S. Marshal who is running a drug distribution ring. He and his men follow Tom to his home to take both him and Liz hostage. Taking the skeletal remains in a black bag, Garvey orders his men to kill the two. Elizabeth survives while Tom dies from his wounds. While holding on to the skeletal remains, Garvey later discovers a DNA test was done on the remains and learns who the remains belong to.
In "Pattie Sue Edwards", Garvey discovers that Singleton had learned the truth and forewarned that if he pursued criminal charges against him, Singleton's family will die. He kills Singleton to ensure his secret remains safe, but one person witnessed the murder unfold.
In "The Capricorn Killer", Garvey meets up with Red in a motel room with knowledge of the skeletal remains. He mentions that Red should tell him why the remains are important to him. Red refuses, but mentions he will get rid of the witness and his family, if he doesn't go public with the information. Despite Garvey agreeing to it, he also warns that if Red kills him, the truth in how Katarina died will be exposed.
In "Anna Gracia-Duerte", Garvey attempts to take Liz and Aram hostage, both are looking for the witness' whereabouts. However, Red foils this plan and rescues them. He later calls Garvey up, telling him that he knew he tried to take his daughter from him and also that he knows of his illegal dealings.
In "Zarak Mosadek", Garvey meets at a bar with a woman who is revealed to be Jennifer Reddington and works as a bartender. It's later revealed that he put her into the Witness Protection Program to protect her from Red and from an abusive past she and her mother both endured from him.
In "Ian Garvey: Conclusion", Garvey meets Jennifer at a park in Baltimore and tells her what he plans to do to Red. However, Red strikes first with the help of Sinclair using a double to pose as him, while the real Garvey is taken hostage. While being held hostage, Red explains there's a manhunt going on for his arrest in the murder of Zarak Mosadek. While en route to collect the duffel bag containing the mysterious remains, Garvey rams his car into a parked car and escapes while leaving Red and Dembe there. He goes over to Paul's Pub to seek Jennifer's help in getting money while instructing her to claim it's a robbery in progress. However, Liz gets to him first via a back door and orders Garvey to tell her the whereabouts of the duffel bag. Ian soon learns about her connection to Red from Jennifer.
At the end of "Ian Garvey: Conclusion", Garvey is shot several times by Liz and Dembe when he attempts to kill Red, leaving him severely wounded. Wanting to know what Garvey knows about the bones, Liz attempts to save his life and he is rushed to the hospital where the doctors announce they are losing his pulse. At the beginning of "Nicholas T. Moore", it's confirmed in a conversation between Red and Liz that Garvey died of his wounds. However, Liz is not happy as the answers he possessed died along with him.
In the beginning of "Lawrence Devlin", Red learns from Joe that the duffel bag containing the unidentified bones that Reddington is seeking are in Costa Rica with a man who was claimed to be deceased, but is alive due to Garvey keeping him in Witness Protection.
Bastien Moreau
Portrayed by Christopher LambertBastien Moreau also known as The Corsican, is an expert assassin shrouded in so much mystery that his mere existence has long been considered a myth—and he is willing to go to any lengths to regain his anonymity after his true identity is uncovered. Moreau is a terrorist with an anti-globalist, nationalist political ideology. He underwent plastic surgery to disguise his identity before attempting to bomb the UN. After assassinating Ana Ziegler on the orders of Anna McMahon, he discovers McMahon had manipulated him into killing Ziegler under false pretenses and turns against her. He is killed by President Diaz's aides to prevent him from giving information to the FBI.
Anna McMahon
Portrayed by Jennifer FerrinAnna McMahon, is an assistant US Attorney General who is masterminding a criminal conspiracy with President Diaz. She hires Bastien Moreau to bomb the UN and then to assassinate Ava Ziegler, a German intelligence officer in possession of a file containing compromising information on the conspiracy. She vehemently opposes staying Reddington's execution, but is overruled by the President when Cooper threatens to go public about Ziegler's assassination. She is later assigned to be the Justice Department's liaison with the Task Force. Reddington believes she is connected with a terrorist group called the Third Estate, but this turns out to be a red herring planted by McMahon to divert the Task Force's attention. Eventually McMahon becomes aware the Task Force is actively investigating her involvement in the conspiracy. After Liz and Ressler retrieve Ziegler's file, McMahon has the entire Task Force arrested, framing them for conspiring against the President. After the Task Force escapes and foils the plot, they are recaptured by McMahon and her Secret Service agents but manage to break free with Reddington's help. McMahon is about to kill Reddington when Dembe arrives and kills her.
The Cabal
The Cabal is a powerful clandestine organization, a shadow government orchestrating assassinations and international conflicts, that is responsible for many key events in the series, from the arson at Elizabeth Keen's former house to the bombing in Kurzk for which Milos Kirchoff was framed. The core members of this group are greatly concerned with retrieving the Fulcrum, a blackmail file that can bring down many of the most influential men and women in the world.| Member | Country | Career | Status | Actor | Appearance |
| Diane Fowler |  |
| Deceased | Jane Alexander | |
| The Man with the Apple | Deceased | Graeme Malcolm | |||
| Alan FitchThe Decembrist | |
| Deceased | Alan Alda | |
| [|Walter Gary Martin] | | Active | Jason Butler Harner | ||
| Thomas ConnollySmiling Tommy | |
| Deceased | Reed Birney | |
| Kiryl Morozov |  | Deceased | Alon Moni Aboutboul | ||
| Kat Goodson | | Active | Janel Moloney | ||
| Peter KotsiopulosThe Director | |
| Deceased | David Strathairn | |
| Roger Hobbs | | Deceased | Ralph Brown | ||
| Kenneth Jasper | Unknown | James A. Stephens | |||
| Leonard Caul | |
| Active | Ned Van Zandt | |
| Karakurt | | Captured | |||
| Matias Solomon |  | Active | Edi Gathegi | ||
| Susan Hanover | | Captured | Cindy Katz | ||
| Laurel Hitchin | | Deceased | Christine Lahti |
Supporting characters
Introduced in season one
- Charles Baker as Newton "Grey" Phillips, Reddington's mysterious aide and bodyguard. Feeling threatened for his family's safety by the Cabal, Grey is forced to betray Reddington to Anslo Garrick. Reddington kills Grey through suffocation, but not before promising him that his family would be protected.
- Deborah S. Craig as Luli Zheng, one of Reddington's bodyguards and his money manager. She has evaded the SEC twice. In full view of Red, she is killed by Anslo Garrick.
- Rachel Brosnahan as Lucy Brooks/Jolene Parker, a woman posing as a substitute teacher who tries to seduce Tom Keen before revealing she knows his secret. Her primary interest, like Tom's, is Raymond Reddington, and she is revealed to be another of Berlin's operatives. She is killed by Tom Keen.
- Bazzel Baz as Baz, the commander of Reddington's military detail who accompanies him during covert operations and gunfights. He moves into the apartment across from Liz to protect her per Reddington's orders. He fights alongside Reddington, Dembe and the task force during Liz and Tom's wedding when Matias Solomon's forces raid the wedding chapel. Baz is shot by Kaplan when he attempted to get her out of the car.
- Jason Butler Harner as Walter Gary Martin, an FBI agent who initially investigated the disappearance of Diane Fowler.
- William Sadler as Sam Scott, a prolific criminal who became Elizabeth's adoptive father once her biological father was killed and her mother Katarina disappeared. He truly raised her despite her believing that she raised herself. Sam was friends with both Reddington and Katarina. However, while in a hospital, when Sam insists on telling Elizabeth "the truth", he dies after Reddington smothers him with a pillow.
- Dikran Tulaine as Max Ruddiger, a professional bomb maker.
- Emily Tremaine as Audrey Bidwell, Ressler's former fiancée who broke up with him due to his obsession with capturing Reddington, but who attempts to rebuild a relationship with him after the events of Episode 10 of season 1, "Anslo Garrick Conclusion". She was shot and believed to killed by Mako Tanida, but was in fact killed by Bobby Jonica. When Ressler was clearing up her things, he discovers a pregnancy test and realizes she was pregnant with their child.
- Lance Reddick as "The Cowboy", a mysterious private bounty hunter whom Reddington hires to track down Jolene Parker. He is killed by Tom Keen.
- Joseph Siravo as Niko Demakis, a business partner in Reddington's syndicate who eventually turned on Reddington and was killed for his disloyalty.
- Geraldine Hughes as Dr. Nina, a doctor specializing in virology from which Keen and Ressler seek help when confronted by biological weapons.
- Teddy Coluca as Brimley, Red's skilled interrogator who uses unusual items to extract information from unwilling subjects
Introduced in season two
- Sahr Ngaujah as Yaabari, a Cameroonian warlord whom Reddington extorted for information about Berlin. He later bought Reddington in a human trafficking auction and was killed as Elizabeth was rescuing Reddington.
- Adriane Lenox as Reven Wright, Diane Fowler's replacement. She was murdered by Laurel Hitchin in the season 3 episode, "Kings of the Highway", to conceal her connection to Matias Solomon. In the season 4 finale, Ressler locates her body with the help of Reddington, and obtains proof that Hitchin killed her.
- Hal Ozsan as Ezra, Liz's mysterious guardian hired by Reddington.
- Mary-Louise Parker as Naomi Hyland/Carla Reddington, Reddington's ex-wife. She was kidnapped by Berlin as part of his vendetta against Reddington. She and Reddington have a daughter, Jennifer, whose whereabouts are unknown until Season 5.
- Lee Tergesen as Frank Hyland, Naomi's husband.
- Paul Reubens as Mr. Vargas, a double agent for Reddington assigned to spy on Niko Demakis. During the events of Season 3, Vargas is revealed to have been in league with the Cabal associate Matias Solomon, and is fatally shot by Reddington for his treachery.
- Dante Nero as Samuel Aleko a.k.a. "The Samoan", a former confidential informant of Meera Malik, later employed by Elizabeth to hold Tom Keen prisoner.
- Clark Middleton as Glen Carter, a skiptracer who uses his position at the Department of Motor Vehicles to access personal information needed to locate people and objects.
- Scottie Thompson as Zoe D'Antonio, Milos Kirchoff's biological daughter. Thought dead by Berlin, she is tracked down by Reddington to clear up the misunderstanding that started their war.
- Franklin Ojeda Smith as Eugene Ames, a Metro Police officer and DC harbormaster who found Tom Keen in the boat where he was imprisoned. He was killed by Tom, which triggered an investigation that nearly brought murder charges against Elizabeth.
- Valarie Pettiford as Charlene Cooper, Harold Cooper's wife.
- Michael Kostroff as Martin Wilcox, a Detective investigating Eugene Ames's disappearance.
- John Finn as Richard Denner, a Superior Court judge who hears the case against Elizabeth in the death of Eugene Ames.
- Piter Marek as Nik Korpal, Liz's former boyfriend and practicing doctor, who was coerced into working for Red. In "Leonard Caul", Nik accepts payment for helping save Red's life. In "Drexel", it is revealed that Nik has become an on-call doctor for Reddington. In "Mr. Solomon: Conclusion", Nik helps to deliver Agenes, Liz and Tom's daughter. Tom goes to Nik to ask for help identifying the remains inside the suitcase in "Greyson Blaise". In "The Endling", Nik bargains for release from Red's employment but he is killed by Ian Garvey after trying to obtain the identity of the remains inside the suitcase.
- Jack Koenig as Dr. Levin, Harold Cooper's doctor who is forced by The Cabal to give him a drug created by Leo Andropov that simulate symptoms of a deadly brain tumor.
Introduced in season three
- Peter Vack as Asher Sutton, a wealthy socialite whom Tom Keen exploits to track Karakurt. Tom kills him when both men are captured by an underground street-fighting ring and forced to fight to the death.
- Conor Leslie as Gwen Hollander, Asher Sutton's girlfriend.
- Tony Plana as Mr. Diaz, the Foreign Minister of Venezuela. He assists Reddington in bringing down the Director.
- Deirdre Lovejoy as Cynthia Panabaker, the White House Counsel, who replaces Reven Wright as the DOJ's contact with the Task Force.
- Brian Dennehy as Dominic Wilkinson, Katarina Rostova's father and Liz's birth grandfather who blamed Reddington. He tasked Dom in hiding a box containing a key for an island off the coast of Brunei. Red explained he was trying to avoid coming back to Dom after the first time because of both the war with Kaplan and his need to protect Dom. He tells Dom that if he doesn't return alive and Kaplan kills him, Red asks Dom to find Liz and tell the truth about him being her grandfather. In "The Invisible Hand", after Liz questions him about his involvement as a Soviet spy, he calls Red to inform him that she is getting closer to the truth and that he needs to tell her soon. In "The Brockton College Killer," Liz learns he is her maternal grandfather and visits him. In "Rassvet", Dominic claims that he was Katarina's KGB handler and that he fled Russia for America to escape the Soviet government's retribution for Katarina's treason after helping Katarina escape the authorities. Reddington takes refuge at his house after fleeing from Katarina's custody; when she tries to recapture him, Dom is severely injured in the crossfire.
- Benito Martinez as Robert Diaz, a U.S. Senator and the favored presidential candidate of Alexander Kirk, his campaign accounts were looted by the Task Force and Solomon to draw out Kirk. Later revealed to have won the presidency. In "Lipet's Seafood Company", Red extorts Diaz into providing a Presidential pardon for Liz's killing of Tom Conolly. In Season 6, he conspires with Anna McMahon in a convoluted plot which is apparently intended to end in his own assassination. The Task Force foils the plot, and it is revealed that Diaz was actually trying to kill his wife to prevent her from revealing his involvement in killing a man in a hit-and-run accident. He is then forced to resign.
- Oded Fehr as Levi Shur, Samar's former partner in Mossad. It is implied he and Samar were romantically involved. He reconnects with Samar when he comes to the US in pursuit of the terrorist Zal Bin Hassan, who turns out to be her brother Shahin. In "The Osterman Umbrella Company", he discovers Samar is suffering from vascular dementia and reports this to Mossad, leading to them putting out a contract on her life. In retaliation, Reddington kills him.
Introduced in season four
- Joselin Reyes as Romina, a woman working together with Mato kidnapping Agnes in Cuba, later to be arrested at the end of "The Thrushes".
- Annapurna Sriram as Odette, a lawyer whose mother once worked for Alexander Kirk as a housekeeper. She is of Russian descent and resents Liz for having Alexander Kirk's affections. In "The Thrushes", she is seen in bed together with Alexander Kirk, revealing that she is his lover. Odette confronted Liz about her parentage during their fight in "Dr. Adrian Shaw: Conclusion". However, when Ressler and Samar appears, rather than let herself be arrested, Odette commits suicide by jumping in the water.
- Annie Heise as Janet Sutherland, a NSA agent who was first introduced as Aram's girlfriend. She was mistrusted by Ressler and Samar who believe she is a spy for Alexander Kirk. Their suspicion was confirmed in "The Thrushes" and Aram realized who Janet really was. She returns to assist him in "The Architect" and they resume dating for a bit. In "Dembe Zuma", she shakes Samar up when she discovers her feelings for Aram. He ends his relationship with Janet for good when he discovered that she testified against him in order to get her criminal record expunged
- Enrique Murciano as Julian Gale, a Special Agent with the FBI and an old friend of Donald Ressler. He is totally dedicated to pursuing Reddington, and he and Ressler worked together on the FBI's anti-Reddington task force before it was disbanded. He is assigned to investigate the murders of the eighty-six individuals whose bodies Mr. Kaplan exhumed, among which is Diane Fowler's. He discovers fingerprint evidence potentially linking Reddington to Fowler's murder, but it proves inconclusive. He decides to investigate Liz Keen in hopes that she will lead him to Reddington. When they meet, Liz has serious mistrust in Gale suspecting he may be up to something. Her suspicion proved correct in The Debt Collector, when she spots Gale shooting Red. In "Mr. Kaplan/Mr. Kaplan Conclusion", it's revealed that Gale is working with Kaplan to help destroy Red and the Task Force. When he confronts her later on about losing the immunity deal between Red and the FBI believing it was his only chance to indict them, she tells Gale that he still has her and her testimony could help him in exchange for her gaining immunity. Later on, Gale is confronted by Hitchin who warns him and those involved with the inquiry to drop the case against the FBI. When he confronts her with the belief that Red bribed her, Hitchin threatens Gale into compliance by warning him she could still revoke his badge if he continues to investigate further. Gale calls Kaplan to inform her about the cancellation of the grand jury. Heading inside his car in anger, Red and Dembe confront Gale and takes his burner phone to locate Kaplan and Liz.
- Leon Rippy as The Hunter, a loner who saves Mr. Kaplan from death after Red shoots her and leaves her for dead. He bombs his home and commits suicide rather than reveal Mr. Kaplan's whereabouts to Red.
- Matt Servitto as Sebastian Reifler, a doctor treating Alexander Kirk, the Task Force uses his association with Kirk to track down Kirk.
Introduced in season five
- Michael Aronov as Joe "Smokey" Putnum, a circus carney and master of logistics who attempted to steal money from a neo-Nazi drug smuggling cartel. He was saved from prosecution by Red and recruited to be Red's new right-hand man in his reformed organization. In season 6, he secretly uses Reddington's resources to build a drug smuggling operation while the latter is imprisoned. In "Lady Luck", Reddington discovers his betrayal and kills Smokey.
- Aida Turturro as Heddie Hawkins, Smokey's partner in their attempt to steal money from a neo-Nazi drug smuggling cartel. She was freed from imprisonment by Red and recruited to be Red's new money manager in his reformed organization.
- Evan Parke as Norman Singleton, a NYPD detective serving as a member of Ian Garvey's task force who was introduced in "The Informant". He investigates Liz Keen's involvement in the death of one of Garvey's henchmen over a few episodes. In "Mr. Raleigh Sinclair III", after learning about her plans to track down Tom's murderers, Singleton convinces her to let him assist her in it. In "Pattie Sue Edwards", Singleton is killed by Garvey after he finds out the truth.
- Fiona Dourif as Lillian May Roth, a bartender who works at Tom's Pub in Baltimore. Liz takes her to the apartment she lives in to try to get her cooperation. In turn, Lillian revealed that Garvey was visiting her because he protected her and her mother, Naomi, from Red when he was abusing them. She also mentions that she is Red's daughter named Jennifer and that she had been in Witness Protection for 20 years. in "Ian Garvey: Conclusion" Jennifer confronts Ian for Tom's death and asks him if he will kill Red. Ian doesn't answer her, but admits the past 20 years she has lived in hiding has been a lie. Jennifer finally confronts Red, asking him if he was even happy to see her again and admits her disappointment when he barely recognizes her. She tells him that Ian rescued her from the disappointment that she and Naomi both faced when they learned about his criminal career. In "Sutton Ross", Jennifer joins Liz in her quest for revenge and to expose the imposter after realizing that the bones belonged to the real Raymond Reddington. In “The Corsican”, she helps Liz get Red arrested to prevent him from becoming aware of their investigation. In "Marko Jankowics", Jennifer, fearing that she is becoming as ethically compromised as Red, decides to abandon Liz's search for Red's true identity.
- Karl Miller as Pete McGee, a disgraced doctor who assists Tom in his quest to identify the bones given to him by Mr. Kaplan. Pete disappears after Nik is interrogated and killed. Tom finds him later but Pete is killed by Ian Garvey because he is unable to provide any useful information.
- Ana Nogueira as Lena Mercer, Pete's girlfriend who reluctantly assists Tom with his search for Pete. Ian Garvey kills her after determining that she is unable to provide any useful information.
- Lenny Venito as Tony Pagliaro/"The Mailman", a corrupt U.S. Postal Service employee who manages a ring of thieves that use postal vacation notices to steal from unsuspecting postal customers. Red discovers his scheme and adapts it to create a network of safe houses for criminals trying to avoid detection. He later serves as Red's henchman on dangerous jobs.
- Happy Anderson as Bobby Navarro, one of Ian Garvey's henchmen, tasked with killing Tom and Liz. He fails and Liz later kills him in a close quarters fight.
Introduced in season six
- Christopher Lambert as Bastien Moreau, AKA The Corsican, an assassin for hire obsessed with keeping his true identity secret. He has extremist nationalist beliefs and will only act to advance his political beliefs. He has his appearance altered by Dr. Hans Koehler to look like a specific security official so that he can bomb the United Nations but is foiled by the Task Force. Anna McMahon then tricks him into retrieving an important file with compromising information about President Diaz. Moreau views the file and discovers that McMahon lied to him and vows to find out why. He is killed by Mr. Sandquist before he can reveal what he knows about the file.
- Becky Ann Baker as Roberta Wilkins, the Federal judge overseeing Red's trial. She is a serious and sober jurist who is troubled by the government's initial denials of involvement with Red and then the government's apparent extortion of Red to obtain a guilty plea in his trial.
- Ken Leung as Michael Sima, the assistant U. S. Attorney prosecuting Red. He is a capable attorney but demonstrates himself to be capable of unethical behavior in his zeal to convict Red of his crimes.
- Mike Boland as Jim Macatee, the warden of the Federal prison where Red is being held prisoner. Macatee successfully pressures Red into mediating a dispute between rival prison gangs. Red later subdues and impersonates Macatee as part of a failed plan to escape the prison.
- Coy Stewart as Vontae Jones, a young prison inmate befriended by Red. Vontae provides Red insight into the prisoners and their allegiances. He also scrounges for hard to find items in prison for Red. Red arranges for Vontae to be paroled after his immunity agreement is restored.
- Ben Horner as Mr. Sandquist, a Secret Service agent and body man for President Diaz who also serves as an assassin for Anna McMahon. He kills Bastien Moreau to prevent the truth about her plot from being revealed. He attempts to kill First Lady Miriam Diaz to prevent her from telling the truth about President Diaz's hit and run accident but fails. He is killed by Ressler in a shootout.
- Brett Cullen as The Stranger, an old friend of Reddington who appears to know many secrets about his past. Reddington calls on his help to pursue Katarina Rostova. At one point, he goes by the name of Frank Bloom. Eventually Katarina kidnaps him, addressing him as Ilya Koslov, and tortures him to obtain information on an attempt on her life that he helped engineer with Dom. Reddington later rescues "Frank" after Katarina flees.
Introduced in season seven
- Natalie Paul as Francesca "Frankie" Campbell, a former combat medic initially in Katarina Rostova's employ. She helps free Reddington from captivity, later revealing that Katarina had ordered her to allow him to escape. Reddington takes her under his wing and has her perform various odd jobs for him. Eventually Reddington stages an elaborate ruse to test her loyalty as he grooms her to take Samar's place on the Task Force. When she fails the test and attempts to betray him to Katarina, Reddington kills her.
- Elizabeth Bogush as Elodie Radcliffe, a wealthy, thrillseeking woman whose husband was severely brain-damaged after participating in a gathering of Les Fleurs de Mal. She goes undercover with Aram to infiltrate the group and help the FBI bring them down. Aram saves her from death when she is selected to play the group's lethal game. After the FBI arrests Les Fleurs de Mal, she and Aram begin an intimate relationship. Eventually her husband dies, and Aram becomes suspicious after learning she stands to inherit millions from his estate. His investigation reveals Elodie murdered her husband, and Aram then has her arrested.
Episode links