BWW Recap: THE BLACKLIST Introduces Agnes, But Who Just Left?

Many people, seeing the trailers for this week, went around the Internet asking if Liz's baby dies in this episode. Right away: No baby dies in this episode. On the other hand, something looks like a game-changing death for sure. On the yet another hand, this is The Blacklist, so I'm suspicious that All Is Not As It Appears. But on the Even More Hands count... Megan Boone was pregnant this year, and priorities change, so... take that as a hint of Things To Come in this recap.

Not-Tom and Liz flee in the wedding car from the Chapel of Death, while the feds, Red, and Red's minions fight off Solomon's mercs. The mercs flee as police sirens approach, but Solomon is already gone; he's got Eyes somewhere else with plenty of computers and maps and brains who's directing him to follow that Just Married car. Red calls Liz to direct her to a safe location; as Liz tells him she doesn't have to listen to him, the car gets sideswiped. Not-Tom tells Liz she must be crazy to think that her mother is just trying to meet her, because that doesn't require Mr. Solomon and a bunch of crazy shooters taking down an entire wedding party. Man has a point, Liz. With Solomon and mercs in pursuit, Not-Tom manages to drive the car under a truck. Aram will miss that poor car.

By the time Solomon gets to the car, though, Not-Tom and Liz have survived and fled into a nearby hospital. They hide in a room and Solomon can't find them, but Liz starts feeling like total crap and so once-and-future hubby carries her to the ER. Where she naturally goes into labor.

The cleanup crew at the church finds super-tech that even Aram can't track. But Super-Aram can find DNA on one of the super earpieces that tracks to a missing soldier. Solomon's Eyes and Earpiece Voice are directing him to the hospital. Not-Tom and Red touch base over Liz's, ahem, dead body, to have Mr. Kaplan move her to a "private ICU." It's a fancy makeshift one in a closed nightclub, where Mr. Kaplan, Dr. Nick, and nurses will have the delivery. Liz tries to blame Red for everything in the universe while Dembe, Red, and Mr. Kaplan alternately bicker and angst to themselves. Mr. Kaplan thinks that Liz might be right, it is Red's fault -but only because he had everyone convinced that he could keep Liz safe.

Dr. Nick calls for an emergency C-section. Liz is edgy because she wanted the perfect delivery. Not-Tom, realizing they are in a nightclub, adjusts mood lighting and puts on a VINYL copy of the annoying old chestnut, "You're Having My Baby." That song stunk when it came out, BLACKLIST music directors. Red, Dembe, and Kate Kaplan angst to themselves even more. However, a Baby Drink and Wet -so obviously fake it hurts -is delivered, and appears to be as dead as a Baby Drink and Wet until Dr. Nick's mad doctoring skills produce crying baby after a lack of respiration or fetal heartbeat, and hey, look, a girl! Liz wants to name her Agnes for Sam's mother. Not-Tom hates it.

Aram and his mad computering skills track down the missing soldier's wife, who has gotten weird calls from numbers that eventually trace back to a house in Columbia Heights, which Ressler and Samar find empty but for massive computer setups and cables. Aram says it could connect with half the Eastern seaboard. A camera sees Ressler and Samar and the system is shut down remotely by Eyes before the team can find anything.

Nick wants to put Liz into a medically induced coma because amniotic fluid has entered her system and will wreck her lungs. He puts her on a bipap machine while Mr. Kaplan commandeers more hospital equipment, as they need a ventilator and cardiac equipment. Liz finally, FINALLY apologizes for being a bitch to Red, who's only ever helped. Red notes "it's the children the world almost breaks who come back to save it." He means Liz. They hold hands. But her lungs are going. She needs a full hospital. Red delegates Not-Tom to stay with the baby. Mr. Kaplan fears a high-speed convoy will attract attention. He agrees and calls Cooper with an unidentified plan that involves FBI backup.

Eyes sees an ambulance that wasn't dispatched and sends Solomon to follow it. Lo and behold, it's a decoy. But Solomon manages to come upon the real ambulance, shoot the driver, and advance on it even as Liz starts fading. Nick starts with paddles, and Red starts losing it quietly. This is not pretty. Samar, Ressler, and a team pull up, although it's clear that the mercs are all dying at Samar's hands, because she has mad killing-bad-guys skills.

Ack, Liz has flatlined, Nick has called time of death, and Red is even more massively losing it, Nick is losing it, and Ressler is losing it. Red is clinging on to Liz's hand as if it's the last other thing in the universe, and even as Kate Kaplan tells him he needs to be evaculated to avoid the local police finding him, he's hanging on to Liz's face. He announces that they'll keep the body and make all arrangements themselves. As Dembe helps him to the car, he faints. Ressler, with him, is also ready to collapse.

Cooper looks glumly over the Post Office from the balcony. Aram looks glumly at some technology. They look at each other, and the gloom quadruples. Samar breaks down in the street while collecting Solomon's gang's super-tech weapons. Kaplan personally body-bags Liz and maintains one degree of stiff upper lip, but she's a tick away from losing it herself.

Red returns to Not-Tom and the baby. No one dares to suggest that the sonorous strains of Paul Anka were probably what killed Liz. Not-Tom thinks he can't do it alone, but Red says he'll be a great dad. Red takes the baby and turns into the previously unknown Cuddle Monster Red, and surprisingly does not kill Not-Tom and take the baby himself.

The baby's name is Agnes. Red approves.

All right, world: IS LIZ REALLY DEAD? If she isn't, does Red know or not? If she is, does this explain how Jacob Phelps (Not-Tom) and Mr. Solomon spin off to the new show? If she is, will the loose ends of Liz's relationship with Red ever be explained? For that matter, if she isn't, will the loose ends of Liz's relationship with Red ever be explained? And most particularly, if she is dead, is there really a show? Her death is a game changer - but is it permanent, and is it a shark jump? Inquiring minds want to know, so post below or at @MarakayBWW.

Photo Credits: NBC Universal