Monarch Douglas Bank

"Monarch Douglas Bank" is the second episode of the second season of the American crime drama The Blacklist. The episode premiered in the United States on NBC on September 29, 2014.

Plot[]

The FBI is alerted to a robbery at the Monarch Douglas Bank in Warsaw, Poland, since it is headquartered in the U.S. headquarters and hence under FBI jurisdiction. Although nothing seems to have been stolen, the FBI believes the records of criminal transactions must have been the robbers' target.

Red receives a parcel which contains a bloody tooth (taken from Naomi, whom Berlin is still holding).

Upon arrival at the bank, the FBI discover that the real purpose was the kidnapping of an employee, Kaja Tomczak. Liz and Ressler locate Kaja, who explains that all of the bank's transaction records are stored in her head via her photographic memory. She was actually trying to escape, because she was a virtual prisoner due to her value to them. Strickland, the bank manager, sends a team to recapture her, but they are defeated by Samar Navabi, the Mossad agent. Red arrives and brings Kaja to his plane, and through the account number she gives him, drains Berlin's accounts. He meets with Berlin and extorts him with his money in exchange for the safe return of Naomi. But the FBI has frozen those accounts. Red keeps the swap appointment just the same, and the accounts do have money in them (Liz arranged this), so Naomi is returned to him. The next day Cooper meets Samar in a park to review her file on Reddington, facilitating her recruitment into the task force.

Reception[]

Ratings[]

"Monarch Douglas Bank" premiered on NBC on September 29, 2014 in the 10–11 p.m. time slot.^[1] The episode garnered a 2.8/8 Nielsen rating with 10.51 million viewers, making it the second most-watched show in its time slot behind the season premiere of ABC's Castle, which collected 10.75 million viewers.^[2] It was also the thirteenth highest-rated show of the week.^[3]

Reviews[]

Jodi Walker of Entertainment Weekly gave a positive review of the episode, stating: "So it’s pretty impressive that the followup to last week’s Blacklister-of-the-week premiere manages to pile on the narrative question marks, give some definitive movement to the Berlin storyline, catch a whole heap of criminals, and put Peter Stormare, and his hook, and James Spader, and his hat on one park bench."^[4]

Rebecca Jane Stokes of Den of Geek gave the episode four out of five stars, stating: "The Blacklist has The Spader Factor working in its favor, something it uses with great alacrity when casting not just the man himself, but with its featured guest stars. Casting Peter Stormare as Berlin, Red’s big bad wife abducting enemy in extremes is just the perfect amount of strange."^[5]

References[]

External links[]

• "Monarch Douglas Bank" at IMDb