History YMMV / TheBlacklist

* CompleteMonster: The Blacklist contains the [[Characters/TheBlacklistBlacklistNames most dangerous criminals]] to ever appear on the face of the earth, but there are still a few that manage to stand out above the rest:

* FanficFuel: Of what happened to Reddington after he went underground. When did he meet some of the blacklisters like Zamani, and why did he create the Blacklist in the first place?
* FanPreferredCouple: Lizzington and Keenler (Red/Liz and Ressler/Liz; see PortmanteauCoupleName below) are both far more popular than Liz/Tom, to the point where Liz/Tom doesn't even have an "official" ship name listed on this wiki.
* HesJustHiding: After the death of [[spoiler:Liz]], this became a fairly frequent reaction. [[spoiler:The large number of unresolved plotlines relating to her is probably a rather large part of the reason, as is the fact that she's already faked her death once before, as is the fact that killing her off puts this show nearly in ''Series/GameOfThrones''-level AnyoneCanDie territory. However, with an entire episode focusing on Reddington's highly OOC grief over her death, it's seeming less likely.]]
** Ultimately [[spoiler:PlayedStraight. Liz is revealed to be alive and hiding in Cuba in the season 3 finale. Mr. Kaplan faked her death in order to protect her from Reddington's lifestyle. Unsurprisingly, Red is furious when he finds out about it, not just because of [[EtTuBrute the perceived betrayal of one of his closest friends]], but because, by sending Tom and Agnes to reunite with her in Cuba, [[NiceJobBreakingItHero Mr. Kaplan has unknowingly led Alexander Kirk to Liz and Agnes]].]]

* ReplacementScrappy: Alina Park. She was brought in to replace Samar Navabi after Mozhan Marno’s departure from the show, and many fans immediately took a dislike to her, comparing her unfavorably to both Samar and their shared predecessor Meera Malik. Park herself was seen as boring, hypocritical, and poorly-written, especially compared to Samar, who had a detailed backstory and complex motivations. The fact that many people found Samar’s PutOnABus situation deeply unsatisfying didn’t help. While fans disagree about exactly when the SeasonalRot started to a set in, many saw the replacement of Samar with Park as a major downgrade that hindered the show, and audience ratings started to drop not long after it happened (albeit mostly due to ArcFatigue, but still.)

* Adorkable: Aram. He's a trained FBI agent who rides his bicycle to the black site, plays hacky sack with his computer nerd buddies on the weekends, stores cat videos on his work laptop, and is the [[TinyGuyHugeGirl the tiny guy]] in his relationship with [[StatuesqueStunner Samar.]]

* [[spoiler:Liz's death in "Mr. Solomon"]] sparked a debate among fans of the show, especially since she was pregnant at the time. Some believed that the writers [[spoiler:"killed" her]] in order to save her for a future arc. Others believed that she [[spoiler:(in-universe) faked her death in anticipation of warnings given to her by Red. Rumors started on the internet that Liz may return for the fourth season, and the fact that she faked her death was eventually confirmed in the finale]].
* [[spoiler: Liz's actual death in season 8 following Megan Boone's departure. Liz had always been a BaseBreakingCharacter, and many fans were happy to see her go, but others are concerned that her apparent death will prevent the show from reaching a satisfying conclusion for its central arc. Some also simply believe that Liz deserved better.]]

* BrokenBase: [[spoiler:Liz's death in "Mr. Solomon"]] sparked a debate among fans of the show, especially since she was pregnant at the time. Some mention that the writers [[spoiler:"killed" her]] in order to save her for a future arc. Others mention that she [[spoiler:(in-universe) faked her death in anticipation of warnings given to her by Red. Rumors started on the internet that Liz may return for the fourth season and the fact that she faked her death was confirmed in the finale]].

* FanficFuel: Of what happened to Reddington after he went underground, when did he meet some of the blacklisters like Zamani and why did he make the Blacklist.

%%* PlotArmor: Crap on a spatula, if Liz didn't have this she'd be dead. Picking up the IdiotBall and being TooDumbToLive are practically character traits for her. Try some actual examples if you want to bring back this entry.

** Tom and Elizabeth Keen along with the FBI task-force. A portion of the fan-base immensely dislikes the plots regarding the Keen's domestic troubles having claimed that they are a side-show which distracts from the main plot featuring Reddington. As for the FBI task-force criticism was directed at how some of the characters were under-used or boring in comparison to Red. Agent Ressler in particular gets this due to his JerkAss tendencies. Megan Boone's performance as Liz Keen is a massive sticking point. A significant portion of the fan-base believes she's a inexperienced, wooden actor who does not match the formidable James Spader during their scenes together while the other section disagrees and thinks she needs more time to settle into the role.
** Madeleine Pratt. A whole lot of CharacterShilling leading to a whole lot of InformedAbility. The show tries to show her as a {{Chessmaster}} above almost all others, but everything shown on screen is disappointing and not as impressive as the show seems to think it is. She's also the first Blacklister to get away at the end of the episode, despite an embarassingly weak showing.
* SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped: Basically the case in "The Mombassa Cartel" which is at times comes close to being a PSA about the illegal poaching and animal trading industry.

* UnintentionallySympathetic: Stewmaker. Despite being a hired corpse-dissolver for various criminals, he still doesn't kill any of said victims himself -- and even when he eventually does attack someone ([[spoiler:Liz]]) directly, at least there's still no real indication that he's going to actually dissolve her '''''antemortem'''''. [[spoiler:Therefore, some fans can't help but agree with Liz's YouMonster reaction to Red ultimately dissolving Stewmaker '''''alive''''' in his own acid, which is supposed to come off as a KickTheSonOfABitch moment instead.]] It also doesn't hurt that Stewmaker is genuinely AffablyEvil, has an ObliviouslyEvil mindset regarding his reputation on the Blacklist, and literally invokes PetTheDog toward his -- well -- dog.
* UnintentionallyUnsympathetic: Liz. Sure she gets dragged into a world which she has no experience in surviving but portions of the fan-base loathe her due to her perceived incompetence, emotional nature which causes her major mistakes, and the fact she constantly gets played for a fool by Reddington despite attempts to play up her status and skills can be rather grating to some viewers. Also, her seemingly constant reliance on a male character to function whether on the job or in her personal life has made the portion of the fan-base which dislikes her consider her a weak character. And it may be in part due to ProtagonistCenteredMorality by fans, but her blaming Reddington for the danger she's in -- when she is in danger literally because of whose daughter she is -- makes her seem like an ungrateful brat considering everything Red did to keep her alive and clear her name in the first half of season three. After she's freed, she and Red hug, and then she very quickly becomes resentful of him...taking basic steps to protect her after her birth name becoming publicly known has made her a target.

** "[[Recap/TheBlacklistS1E13TheCyprusAgency The Cyprus Agency (No. 64)]]": Owen Mallory, formerly [[ConArtist Michael Shaw]] is No. 64 on the list. He runs a supposed adoption agency called the Cyprus Agency. Initially believing that the Agency kidnaps children just to sell them towards the wealthy, when FBI task force led by Elizabeth Keen delves into the agency's darkest secrets they find out the truth is far worse. Instead of kidnapping children, the agency kidnaps women all over the world regardless of age and puts them into comas, where [[SerialRapist Owen himself would rape them]] so [[MandatoryMotherhood they can produce children]], even injecting sedatives to prolong the comas and the process. He has done this to many women, and if some of the women die he simply has his employees dispose of them. He also [[BadBoss isn't very good to his employees either]], as such when he has his employee kidnap a college girl and said employee makes a mistake, Mallory callously shoots him. When Elizabeth finally catches him she sees how many [[BreedingSlave women he kept in comas and raped]], which is in the dozens, and those are just the women still alive. When she asks him why he did all this, he says that as a child in the adoption system he felt that [[ThePerfectionist he wasn't perfect]], and by kidnapping all these women to rape, they could make his children, thus "[[ItsAllAboutMe ensuring his legacy]]" and making it so he won't feel that way anymore.

* WhatAnIdiot: In "Anne", Reddington warns the officers in a Cottonwood Hills police station that not sending him out to be given to Neville Townsend will get them all killed. Naturally, one of the officers named Brandt [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere tries to leave without his sidearm as he doesn't want to be seen protecting a known spy and criminal]], but [[CopKiller Townsend's men kill him anyway]].

* SugarWiki/HeReallyCanAct: Elizabeth Lail wasn't too known for her acting. But watch her play the tragic antihero Natalie Luca and you'll see Elizabeth Lail is talented despite being only 24 years old.

* SpoiledByTheFormat: Somewhat averted with this show's use of two-parters with a single Blacklist Name - despite the AntagonistTitle, the show avoids using "Part 1" and "Part 2" to differentiate multi-parters, which are instead titled normally for the first episode (eg: "[Insert Name] ([Insert #]); after the episode ends on a cliffhanger, however, the 2nd part uses "Conclusion" in place of the number. This enabled the show to surprise people when "Anslo Garrick" took two episodes to resolve (despite being a MidSeasonFinale, it was still something that hadn't been done before on the show), and would help the writers if, in the future, they pulled another two-parter for a villain at an unexpected time in any future season).

** [[VillainWithGoodPublicity Floriana Campo]], from season 1's "[[Recap/TheBlacklistS1E2TheFreelancer The Freelancer (No. 145)]]", is one of the worst, despite not even being on the list. She acts as a human rights activist by day, fighting against the Everhardt Cartel, but by night actually runs said cartel, which is [[HumanTraffickers one of the largest slave trading cartels in the world]]. As the leader of the cartel, she has hundreds if not thousands of men, women, and children kidnapped, has her insignia branded on their back, and sells them to her wealthy clients either as {{sex slave}}s or as manual labor. Through these methods, she has ruined the lives of many, just so she could make her own life luxurious. When her husband gets too close to discovering the truth, she murders him in cold blood. She has proven to be so vile, [[EvenEvilHasStandards even Reddington despises her]].
** Owen Mallory, formerly [[ConArtist Michael Shaw]], from season 1's "[[Recap/TheBlacklistS1E13TheCyprusAgency The Cyprus Agency (No. 64)]]", is No. 64 on the list. He runs a supposed adoption agency called the Cyprus Agency. Initially believing that the Agency kidnaps children just to sell them towards the wealthy, when FBI task force led by Elizabeth Keen delves into the agency's darkest secrets they find out the truth is far worse. Instead of kidnapping children, the agency kidnaps women all over the world regardless of age and puts them into comas, where [[SerialRapist Owen himself would rape them]] so [[MandatoryMotherhood they can produce children]], even injecting sedatives to prolong the comas and the process. He has done this to many women, and if some of the women die he simply has his employees dispose of them. He also [[BadBoss isn't very good to his employees either]], as such when he has his employee kidnap a college girl and said employee makes a mistake, Mallory callously shoots him. When Elizabeth finally catches him she sees how many [[BreedingSlave women he kept in comas and raped]], which is in the dozens, and those are just the women still alive. When she asks him why he did all this, he says that as a child in the adoption system he felt that [[ThePerfectionist he wasn't perfect]], and by kidnapping all these women to rape, they could make his children, thus "[[ItsAllAboutMe ensuring his legacy]]" and making it so he won't feel that way anymore.

* MemeticMutation: In the forums, someone who's seen the show will quote Reddington's lines.

** The German license plate seen in the following episode is even more egregious. While actual plates look like this: [1-3 city code letters] [DMV badge] [2 random letters] [2-4 random numbers], ''in that order''. For Dresden (where this part of the episode takes place), a possible license plate would look like this: ''DD:PS 814''. What we get in the series is ''[=DD17=]:36F9''. Ouch.

** The German license plate seen in the following episode is even more egregious. While actual plates look like this: [1-3 city code letters] [DMV badge] [2 random letters] [2-4 random numbers], ''in that order''. For Dresden (where this part of the episode takes place), a possible license plate would look like this: ''DD:PS 814''. What we get in the series is ''DD17:36F9''. Ouch.

* Owen Mallory, formerly [[ConArtist Michael Shaw]], from season 1's "[[Recap/TheBlacklistS1E13TheCyprusAgency The Cyprus Agency (No. 64)]]", is No. 64 on the list. He runs a supposed adoption agency called the Cyprus Agency. Initially believing that the Agency kidnaps children just to sell them towards the wealthy, when FBI task force led by Elizabeth Keen delves into the agency's darkest secrets they find out the truth is far worse. Instead of kidnapping children, the agency kidnaps women all over the world regardless of age and puts them into comas, where [[SerialRapist Owen himself would rape them]] so [[MandatoryMotherhood they can produce children]], even injecting sedatives to prolong the comas and the process. He has done this to many women, and if some of the women die he simply has his employees dispose of them. He also [[BadBoss isn't very good to his employees either]], as such when he has his employee kidnap a college girl and said employee makes a mistake, Mallory callously shoots him. When Elizabeth finally catches him she sees how many [[BreedingSlave women he kept in comas and raped]], which is in the dozens, and those are just the women still alive. When she asks him why he did all this, he says that as a child in the adoption system he felt that [[ThePerfectionist he wasn't perfect]], and by kidnapping all these women to rape, they could make his children, thus "[[ItsAllAboutMe ensuring his legacy]]" and making it so he won't feel that way anymore.

* CompleteMonster: The titular Blacklist contains the most dangerous criminals to ever appear on the face of the earth, but there are still a fair few that manages to stand out above the rest.
** [[SmugSnake Floriana Campo]], who appears in season 1's "The Freelancer", [[BitchInSheepsClothing acts as a human rights activist]] by day, fighting against [[TheSyndicate the Everhardt Cartel]], but by night [[MoleInCharge actually runs said cartel]], which is [[HumanTraffickers one of the largest slave trading cartels in the world]]. As the leader of the cartel, she has hundreds if not thousands of men, women, and [[WouldHurtAChild children]] kidnapped, has her insignia branded on their back, and sells them to her wealthy clients either as {{sex slave}}s or as [[WeWillUseManualLaborInTheFuture manual labor]]. Through these methods, she has ruined the lives of many, [[ItsAllAboutMe all while just so she could make her own life luxurious]]. When her husband gets too close to discovering the truth, she murders him in cold blood. She has proven to be so vile, [[EvenEvilHasStandards even Reddington despises her]].
** [[TheSociopath Owen Mallory]], formerly [[ConArtist Michael Shaw]], is [[YouAreNumber6 Number 64]] on the Blacklist and appears in the season 1 episode, "The Cyprus Agency (No. 64)", where he runs a supposed adoption agency called the Cyprus Agency. Initially believing that the Agency kidnaps children just to sell them towards the wealthy, when FBI task force led by Elizabeth Keen delves into the agency's darkest secrets they find out the truth is far worse. Instead of kidnapping children, the agency kidnaps women all over the world regardless of age and puts them into comas, where [[SerialRapist Owen himself would rape them]] so [[MandatoryMotherhood they can produce children]], even injecting sedatives to prolong the comas and the process. He has done this to many women, and if some of the women die he simply has his employees dispose of them. He also [[BadBoss isn't very good to his employees either]], as such when he has his employee kidnap a college girl and [[YouHaveFailedMe said employee makes a mistake]], he callously shoots him. When Elizabeth finally catches him she sees how many [[SexSlave women he kept in comas and raped]], which is in the dozens, and those are just the women still alive. When she asks him why he did all this, he says that as a child in the adoption system he felt that [[ThePerfectionist he wasn't perfect]], and by kidnapping all these women to rape, they could make his children, thus " [[ItsAllAboutMe ensuring his legacy]]" and making it so he won't feel that way anymore.

** She's done with Red. Hoo boy, is she done with him. Sometimes multiple times an episode. Because he's evil and bad and doesn't care about anyone but himself. Until she needs him to connect all the dots for her (because she's really bad at her job, and only has it because of him). She likes him better then.

** Floriana Campo, who appears in season 1's "The Freelancer", acts as a human rights activist by day, fighting against the Everhardt Cartel, but by night actually runs said cartel, which is one of the largest slave trading cartels in the world. As the leader of the cartel, she has hundreds if not thousands of men, women, and children kidnapped, has her insignia branded on their back, and sells them to her wealthy clients either as {{sex slave}}s or as manual labor. Through these methods, she has ruined the lives of many, all while just so she could make her own life luxurious. When her husband gets too close to discovering the truth, she murders him in cold blood. She has proven to be so vile, even Reddington despises her.
** Owen Mallory, formerly Michael Shaw, is Number 64 on the Blacklist and appears in the season 1 episode, "The Cyprus Agency (No. 64)", where he runs a supposed adoption agency called the Cyprus Agency. Initially believing that the Agency kidnaps children just to sell them towards the wealthy, when FBI task force led by Elizabeth Keen delves into the agency's darkest secrets they find out the truth is far worse. Instead of kidnapping children, the agency kidnaps women all over the world regardless of age and puts them into comas, where Owen himself would rape them so they can produce children, even injecting sedatives to prolong the comas and the process. He has done this to many women, and if some of the women die he simply has his employees dispose of them. He also isn't very good to his employees either, as such when he has his employee kidnap a college girl and said employee makes a mistake, he callously shoots him. When Elizabeth finally catches him she sees how many women he kept in comas and raped, which is in the dozens, and those are just the women still alive. When she asks him why he did all this, he says that as a child in the adoption system he felt that he wasn't perfect, and by kidnapping all these women to rape, they could make his children, thus " ensuring his legacy" and making it so he won't feel that way anymore.

* MagnificentBastard: Raymond "Red" Reddington starts the show by turning himself over to the FBI to assist them in taking down a supposedly-dead terrorist, who is just the first out of many in the eponymous Blacklist. He follows that up by constantly manipulating the Feds and criminals to pursue his own agendas. Raymond goes against the worst criminals in the world, constantly outplaying them and leading them to ruin while working towards his own master plan, using others as bait or pawns in his schemes. In one famous incident, he outwits human trafficker Floriana Campo and leaves her poisoned out of his revulsion towards her business, but not before destroying her good name and watching her beg for her life. Despite his ruthlessness, Raymond truly respects those who work for him and cares greatly about series heroine and FBI agent Elizabeth. A man with nerves of steel, Reddington rarely ever loses his temper or composure, frequently playing cop and criminal for his own mysterious ends.

* AntiClimaxBoss: In-Universe: Reddington has been on the FBI's Most Wanted list for decades, yet at the beginning of the series he surrenders without a fight even as a dozen heavily-armed police converge on his position. No doubt they were flabbergasted.
** In "Anslo Garrick", it's revealed that [[spoiler:Red is personally this to Ressler, since he spent years unsuccessfully hunting him, even ending a relationship in the process.]]