Did ‘The Blacklist’ Finally Reveal Red’s True Identity?
Spoiler Alert
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for The Blacklist Season 8, Episode 21, “Nachalo.”]
The Blacklist is delving into long sought-after answers in its final Season 8 installments and the most recent episode, “Nachalo,” is teasing Red’s (James Spader) true identity.
In the penultimate episode, after revealing that he is N-13, the elusive spy that Liz (Megan Boone) had been searching for all these years, Red brings her to the headquarters of his operation in Latvia. There, he helps tell the story of her past and provides clarity regarding their connection.
Among the episode’s biggest takeaways are that Liz’s mother Katarina Rostova is still alive, and the woman she believed was her mother is actually a spy named Tatiana Petrova (Laila Robins). Where Liz’s mother actually is remains unclear, but Tatiana initially assumed Katarina’s identity to help the woman escape and protect Liz.
The real Raymond Reddington was Liz’s father and was killed by his daughter’s hand as a child when she shot him. Katarina went into hiding at this point and Liz was sent off to live with her adoptive father, Sam. Since the U.S government and the rest of the world was unaware of Raymond Reddington’s death though, Katarina created a new one who could watch over Liz.
(Credit: Will Hart/NBC)
Whoever Red is, he didn’t originally look the way he does now as a scene of surgery teases a transformation for the individual assuming the identity. While Liz is mostly preoccupied with locating her mother, answers don’t come before she’s shot and pulled from her fantastical walk down memory lane.
The culprit of the interruption is Neville Townsend (Reg Rogers), who shows up in Latvia with his own motivations. With the help of Dembe (Hisham Tawfiq), Red gets Liz into a bunker before setting decades of intelligence, Neville, and his men on fire in the space above them.
(Credit: Will Hart/NBC)
Could Red actually be Katarina or is it someone else we have yet to uncover? It’s clear viewers are on the brink of an answer and with Boone exiting the show as a series regular, it would only make sense that Red’s true identity would be unveiled before she departs. The reveal could also set up where the show will go in Season 9. Tune in to the Season 8 finale, “Konets,” when it airs June 23 to hopefully find out.
The Blacklist, Season 8 Finale, Wednesday, June 23, 10/9c, NBC
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How can Red be Katarina?? He slept with Anne.. I think she would have noticed what couldn't be changed in the 80s?? Really... Please keep Red a man and exciting,for me anyway..
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You make an assumption about Anne
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Red has had a lot of past female associations including Jennifer's mother.. so Katarina was a flaming lesbian?
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That was never shown about how intimate they got.
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The show totally got away from where it first started. It was much better when the focus was on the blacklist instead of the personal relationship between Red and Liz. I have come to enjoy the show less and less with each passing year. I hope the show gets back to the actual Black List from here on out.
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I hope that Red don't turn out to be Katarina. This is a great show, I liked it from the beginning. The story line and acting is top notch. If the writers make Red to be Katarina they droped the ball (lazy). The writers want show they are hipp. I will be really mad that I watched this great show for yrs and it has a cheap ending.
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i think red is lizs father in one episode it shows reds back is burned badly and somehow he survived the gunshot and to keep his daughter safe he gave her to sam and escaped
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Sorry Katarina's personality is 100% opposite Red's personality. Besides in Season 1 Red already admitted to being a boy as a child.
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Just here to say I hate the character Elizabeth Keen. She has so many issues and actually made a lot of people quit watching Blacklist.
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Red is liz father
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I think Reddington is Liz's Uncle. Her father's twin brother (explains the DNA match) Twins share DNA. He was sought out by Katarina and became Reddington.. Just my theory.
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No i am pretty sure Red is liz's mom.
That song . I'ts a mans world is a dead give away
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I think Red is Liz's Mother.
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When Reddington finally told Liz about the fire he told her she got burned going back in and her mom got burned trying to get her back out of the house. In a previous episode Reddington showed he had burns on his back. He is Katarina. He also had a bond with her grandpa who claimed his daughter was Agent N13 and Reddington admitted being N13. So it was blame Katarina, she becomes Reddington and disappears forever. He prob became terminally ill from the hormone therapy after the cosmetic/sex change surgery (thus all the pills he was taking). He also told Liz she couldn’t know who he was until he died or she wound’t kill him. He also admitted he was with many women…and men when he came to power. He said in the finale he was there in the pic of her on the swing with her mom and finally when Liz was seeing her life flashing before her eyes she saw her mom holding her as a child and Raymond in the present making the same sad eyed face at her because it’s the…same person.
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YES! She is supposed to be a "psychologist," behavior analyst and an agent. I understand the trauma she went through and wanting to know the answers regarding her mother, father etc., BUT it seems that the whole show enables her to be a narcissist who winds up getting everyone around her hurt or killed! I'm sick of how Cooper allowed her to say or do anything and was always bending or breaking rules he made everyone else adhere to to help her no matter what she did! Uggghhh!!!!
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Red is not a woman
Something else will be the answer
It wont b that
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I bet you money he is. If you really watch the previous episode lots of times. The writers sure want you to believe it is
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I can't believe Liz dies without ever knowing the truth. He could have at least wispered to her. Something.
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So they pulled a PREDESTINATION, huh? Red is her mom? I'm done smh
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Cooper and Red knew each other while they served in the Navy together decades earlier. Cooper took the DNA sample from a piece of cloth the real Red bled on during one of their missions together while serving in the navy. Cooper had a paternity test done with a piece of the blood stained cloth having it analyzed against Elizabeth’s DNA. This only proved that “the Reddington” from the navy was Elizabeth’s father. Later on in the series Cooper compared fingerprints from a scotch glass that the present day Red had touched and compared them to the prints on file from Red’s navy days, but they didn’t match
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I think it got waaaay too convoluted and now to think Red might be her MOTHER??? If that turns out to be true I’m done.
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I don't think that the real Red actually died. Or he was Katarina.
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I really dont understand how can anyone think Red is Caterina, just because everyone is taking about trans rights doesnt mean that everyone is trans...
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Stay with me for a moment.
If Tatiana acted as if she was Katarina, could Alexander Kirk have acted as if he was Constantine? No one said Constantine was dead. What if he is Red and he cares for Liz so much because he raised as his own? A story to make Kirk a Constantine imposter would not be that hard to come up with.
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Yep! After Nachalo and Konets I'm firmly resolved that Red is Constantine.
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I think this finale was the most ridiculous fantasy I have ever seen...convoluted and way beyond belief. They could have done way better!!!
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Noooo... I don't want this series to have cheap end like Red being her mother.. think of another ending please!!
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The very opening scene of Season 1 might have a clue to Red's identity. The very first shot shows the FBI office and red sitting on the bench outside while a man puts a brown bag next to him and says "Must be good to be home again Sir." That was the first statement!!!!! Yes it can mean a lot of things but i just dont like the "Rederina" theory.
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It’s really become a bad story, specially then I hat to got online and realised that all have waited 8 season too find out who red is, same question popping up, repeating a story over and over.
Did I mention over and over again.!
Better shows out there!
So I’m finished waiting and waist my time.. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Sad it end up being so bad, the start was good..
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Harold Cooper did a DNA test between who we know to be Red and a shirt that the actual Red bled on before he went rogue. The DNA test matched and it also matched Liz. Therefore, Red is someone on Red's family side and a familial match to Red and Liz. For a match to be that close it would have to be a sibling/twin. It would have to be 86% or better.
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I don't believe they ever said they matched the DNA from the bloody shirt to both the Red we know and Liz. Harold only tested the DNA on the shirt against Liz's DNA.
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Do you remember the episode called "The Alchemist" (episode 12)? Red said that they Alchemist could actually "change" DNA - and that the only way to get the REAL DNA of one of his clients was to get a sample from the subject's hip/bone marrow. To me, that was the biggest giveaway that DNA couldn't be counted on as exclusion in this series. Go back and watch season 1 episode 12 and let me know what you think. 🙂
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This show has lost control. Horrible anymore.
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No, the "original" Raymond Reddington had an affair with Katarina and he was her biological father. How could they make the "new" Raymond Reddington her mother. So now they can just magically create a taller, bigger framed "man" - seriously. This would be a horrible reveal.
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I know who Reddington truly is I found out I believe between seasons 5-6 where they flash back with memories and no it’s not her mother
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I think the true identity of “Present day Red “ will either never be revealed and left to the audience’s imagination, or he will turn out to be a male relative of "Navy Red”, Elizabeth’s real father.
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I believe that Katarina somehow found a way to transfer her consciousness/memories into the man she chose to pose as Reddington. She knew Liz wouldn't be safe as long as she was physically alive. Katarina's body doesn't exist anymore in the physical form in my opinion.
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Man, This isn't the twilight zone
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It's already been noted Katarina dabbled in memory manipulation with Liz (changing the roles of the people the night of the fire, suppressing those memories completely, etc.)
I'm just not sure why Dembe would say to Red, "I'm not sure Elizabeth will ever be ready to learn about what you did to Katarina." if it was just as simple as you changed from a woman to a man. I feel if it were as simple as that, Liz would just be happy to know he is her mother.
I'm not against the theory that it's just as simple as Red being Katarina, I was on that theory for a long while, I just started to branch out because of things people have said in the show, such as Red saying "it's not that simple" when Liz asks him who he is to her. I dunno I just feel if it's just "I'm your mother" it would be totally simple for him to tell her. Just hope they reveal it sooner rather than later.
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I hope that red is not Liz s real mother. That would be awkward. Raymond does not need a sex change. He had a love affair with Ann. Those episodes were awesome. Ann would have acted differently.
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I believe Red is Katerina because if y’all remembered Red said if he told his true identity before he was suppose to die she wouldn’t want to kill him
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I believe that red is Liz‘s mom that she went under reconstructive surgery and became red And Von watching out for her daughter and her granddaughter and that’s how she knew so much about both sides Russian intelligence and also the United States
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In the season 8 ('Nachalo' episode) where Liz had her family talks with everybody involved in her story, the real Reddington confirmed that he had a wife and a daughter, who was Jennifer, before being assigned with Katarina.
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bruh if that is true im gonna be mad that I wasted so much time on this show
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I'm so sick of Liz.
5 seasons is all for me. It was an awesome show I couldn't wait to watch. Now, this Liz is so annoyingly selfish and aggravating omg I can't. I'm so done. All red ever did was protect her and she's a freaking witch to him for it.
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I just said the same thing! And "his" stature and his "relationships" that involved sex etc. It would make more sense to find out that her real, biological father, that she thought she shot and killed somehow survived that and the fire etc.
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She was real Raymond's daughter, Katarina being Red explains why Red cared so deeply about Liz, but not so much about Jennifer. if Red were the real Raymond, he should have been shown to care about both... (as the real Raymond did before he died)
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I do agree that I brought up the fact that the show did not show the present Raymond Reddington seeming to care at all that Jennifer was killed? RR (the original) was her real, biological father. If they make the present RR Katarina it is only because of where our country has gone at present - it would ruin the show!
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The prints wouldn't match because he's not real Reddington but brothers wouldn't have the same finger prints
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And the DNA test would have revealed it was female or male. And Cooper doesn't seem to be the type to ignore that fact when he's "satisfied" that Red now matched Red of old.
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I actually quite watching several years ago and I hated quitting. I lost interest when all of baby drama back and forth and when Tom was killed (although I love him now on New Amsterdam) but my point was it deviated so far from the original reason why Red turned himself into FBI. I wanted so badly for Red to be her real father and to have his staunch reasons to keep her in the dark for her own safety but it go too obscure and bizarre. I was hoping someday it would get back to it and stay there but it didn't. Im sorry Megan is leaving the show tho and I love James immensely!
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if your theory is correct, so it can explain why kirk set red free after he whispered in his ear. what if red told him that he is actually katarina not reddington. you could see the indescribable surprise on kirk face when he heard reymond words whispered into his ear and then he looked at red eyes and i think he could see the truth in them.
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Red said he wasn't her father he didn't say he/she wasn't her mother.
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because it wasnt just a face change she had the works done to be Raymond, and in the show Raymond says hes been with women and men.
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Raymond is Katarina the operation was on her to make her Raymond to look after Liz
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I hope reddington is actually her father.
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Totally agree 💯 %
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Season 8 is basically Elizabeth trying to kill Red? For real??? C'mon! You can do better netflix
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My thoughts on the whole Black Iist twisted paternity issues is simply this, the creators of the blacklist have done an incredible job of making up secrets and putting out to the fans of the show snippets of spy stuff, identities stolen, faces changed and good verse evil, they wait till fans write in with their ideas about the actual list, different identities and plot crossovers and the general public are giving the creators and writers new and unthought of stories that they then develop into new plots in the story line. I love the continuity of relationships that have developed in TBL I also love the different criminal identities but please stop giving them ideas your not getting paid the big bucks, they are. Wake up people it's all a good tale to tell, lies, murder, secrets, black oops just enjoy it.
Cheers Donna Queensland Australia
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I watched the show all the time, but now it got away from the Blacklist and it's not what it used to be. Red is not out there taking down the bad guys like he used to. Now that Megan Boone is gone, the show isn't the same.
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I think Red is the Russian husband of Katarina, the guy she was in a loveless marriage with.
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How in the hell could she be "transformed" from her tiny figure and shorter statue to the character we know as Raymond Reddington (James Spader). That is so unrealistic! And throughout the show they show him having relationships that most definitely implied sexual intimacy as well - so how does that work? If this is what they do they ruined a really great show just to go woke? It is stupid!
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Maybe it's true but if so it wouldn't be a sex change surgery it would probably she moved her consciousness to this body ;they altered their bodies like the movie the change up
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That DNA test was done on the blood from a shirt from a LONG time prior to. The REAL Reddington that Cooper knew, the Real RR; BEFORE Liz shot him. So of COURSE, it would show that DNA as male. That shirt was NOT from Spader's Red. The blood from that shirt was NOT compared to Spader's Red's blood.
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I think it was hinted that she put it together in that flashback that juxtapositions Red and Katarina, a second before Liz dies...
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Red IS her mother. Liz did find her eventually.
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And yet for some reason, you're not stating your solution. 😉 Nah, Katarina is Red. It's the only thing that makes everything fit.
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Katarina was possibly bisexual or gay. It's mentioned she wasn't in love with either her husband or Raymond Reddington. She does mention having been sent to be with both men and women as a spy. Red also mentions in the finale that when he came to power, he was with both men and women.
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Except "Anne" saw him as a man. She was married to a man. And they implied that they had sexual relations - so how do you explain that?
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I couldn't agree with you more! It's the ONLY thing that makes sense, and it's as hinted as the show could possibly get away with without stating it explicitly in the finale. Even stuff like how Katarina mentioned she was sent off to be with both men and women for her country's sake, while Red mentions having been with both men and women.
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Lis got it a second before she died. You can see it in the flashbacks, she juxtapositions Katarina holding Liz as a kid, and Red holding her.
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Katarina didn't change her sex because she was trans. She changed it to protect her daughter. Not the same thing.
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Red didn't think that Tatiana was Katarina, he called her by her assumed name, just like he had everyone referring to him by his, even though people like Dembe and Mr. Kaplan obviously knew he wasn't Raymond (Dembe) /Mr. Reddington (Mr. Kaplan).
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That's right!!!
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If Red is really Katarina, wouldn’t he have told Elizabeth the fake Katarina, is just that, fake.
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What should happen is that Red should turn out to be Mr. Rostova, who took over as Raymond Reddington after Liz killed him. Which would make him her actual father.
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We all know Mr Kaplin took Liz to Sam
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Red is not Kat yes while both were N13 it is because the N13 was given to the name of the file and as both the real Red and the real Kat were both in that file they were both N13
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The shirt is before reddington went rogue and before the fire where Liz shot him
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How do you explain his fall in love with Anne if he was Katarina?
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what is true identity of red? if he is an imposter so how possibly he could know these much about real red? i mean all facts and information about real red, his colleagues, his works and secrets that only real red knew? we assume that katarina has given this info to imposter red, but did she really know everything about real reymond?
who was Jennifer reddingtone? was she the daughter of real red or the one who pretests to be red? in season 5 she introduced her father under the name reymond reddington. so she must be real red daughter but it seems she belongs to imposter red
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i dont understand is red liz father or the is another story to it
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As shocking as it is it’s the only thing that makes sense. My girlfriend thinks I’m crazy, but there’s just way too much evidence and hints. And chew on this. Reds personality is a lot like the younger Katerina. Not the older one, who was a fake. And the interaction between red and katerina’s father including when he said “you put me here” (the cabin) makes more sense, too. If it was father/daughter. When you put all the pieces together, it just feels right. I don’t think it has to do with trans anything I just think it’s brilliant writing and it really does fit in and make sense for the rest of the story and the rest of the series
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what if liz has a brother ??? js would that make sense ?
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No and they never will.
When I worked on the show it was revealed that it would never be revealed. And that Dunbe will burn Lizs letter
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I think Red is her father. How did they all talk to Liz in 21 if there all dead, and her moms in hiding?? Looks like Liz would never shut up about finding her mom,like she did with the Truth. I won't the TRUTH is all we've heard for ever. She cased it, more than having her family.
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Is Red going to raise liz's daughter?????
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Ikr like what’s going to happen to agnes
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Red is the mom! and i think it was good they killed off liz because she didnt really do anything for the story! The acting was boring...
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I think it’s Katarina or her husband !
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An issue would be showing red romantically involved with anne, and it not being an issue between them.
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It is looking like Raymond Reddington is Katarina and here is my reasoning. Two related items in the last two episodes. On the operating table creating the new Reddington it was said that since no one knew what he looked like you can make the new Reddington look like anything you want. And then they play this i a man's world -- James Brown, dropping a hint that the person was a woman and now a man. The second clue was in the last episode where Reddington tells Liz she can not read the letter until he is dead because if she knew who Reddington was she would not kill him. The only person she would not kill is her mother Katarina. Posted this further down as as reply to a lady that said she called this years ago. Congrats to you.
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I thought that to but then why when fake katarina stabbed red red said stuff like hello katarina so how could red be katarina bc red thought katarina was katarina
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I really cant comprehend how ppl are still refusing the obvious explanation that red is catarina!! I called this since season 3!! The writers gave mountains of clues to it.. its the only way everything makes sense! All shreds of doubt dissspeard for me 3 seasons ago
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SO how did Katarina go from being 5-5 or so to being 6ft tall simply from a sex change? Nope he's not her
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I told my husband when Liz started looking into Red’s true identity that he is her mom. I called this plot line a long time ago. My husband thought I was crazy.
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Think you are right. Two related items in the last two episodes. On the operating table creating the new Reddington it was said that since no one knew what he looked like you can make the new Reddington look like anything you want. And then they play this i a man's world -- James Brown, dropping a hint that the person was a woman and now a man. The second clue was in the last episode where Reddington tells Liz she can not read the letter until he is dead because if she knew who Reddington was she would not kill him. The only person she would not kill is her mother Katarina.
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Red is Liz's Mother
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Red is Liz's mother.
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Wouldn't that be progressive. If that is the big reveal, It'll be like Game of thrones season 8, a disaster.
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Oh please...Liz's mother?
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Or 7 years of Lost!
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I totally agree. To bad liz did not live long enough to find out the truth
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yep I agree
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