# Speaking of killers - Raymond Reddington **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [June 21, 2025, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924 "2025-06-21T02:14:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![mixdenny](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mixdenny/32/2962_2.png) [@mixdenny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mixdenny)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924/1 "2025-06-21T02:14:22Z")
Confession - I’m not much of a prime time TV or current movie viewer. My TV tastes run to the Automotive, History, Science and Discover channels along with whatever movies make it to regular TV or “Movies on Demand”, not to be confused with any kind of pay-per-view. I don’t pay. Despite this I have managed to view a few classics in their entirety. Seinfeld, The Sopranos, Breaking Bad and the Fargo series come to mind. But thanks to hours of watching YouTube I have found numerous shows I _should_ have watched. House, for instance. And Reacher. I watch any scene from them that pops up on YouTube. Also, thanks to not seeing many actors since their early roles I can be quite surprised to see how they look today. I had no idea Brian Cranston played Walter White and Tom Whatley until after Breaking Bad. I had to go back and look at the Seinfeld episode to believe it. James Spader. The only thing I ever saw him in was Sex, Lies and Videotape and I would much rather I hadn’t seen that slimeball at all. Until a scene from The Blacklist graced my screen. Wow, who is this guy? I sought out as many scenes as I could find and even then it wasn’t until I read about the back story that I realized it was the present day, somewhat rotund, Spader! I love that cocky, eloquent, all-too-self-assured killer role. No one can put a bullet though someone’s forehead with a bemused smile like Raymond Reddington. I think Spader has created a character just as indelible as Tony Soprano or Walter White. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924/2 "2025-06-21T03:58:02Z")
Oh man. He was fun as crap as Atty. Shore in LALaw. And Stargate..you never watched Stargate? I, too enjoy his roundness these days. ---
**Author:** ![DWMarch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dwmarch/32/1010_2.png) [@DWMarch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DWMarch)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924/3 "2025-06-21T05:00:00Z")
James Spader is definitely the best part of The Blacklist but should you be tempted to watch the series, I’ll warn you that it is ten _very long_ seasons of _considerably variable quality_. I’ll spoiler code some of the weirdness from later seasons: There are at least a few people who are killed by CGI but nonetheless gross weaponized beetles and another episode featuring killer sex robots. The show does have a lot of good music in it though. The final episode has a version of “Knocking on Heaven’s Door” that is better than the original by far. > [@Beckdawrek](#): > > Oh man. He was fun as crap as Atty. Shore in LALaw. Alan Shore, who started on the final season of The Practice and then went on to star in several seasons of Boston Legal alongside William Shatner. > [@Beckdawrek](#): > > And Stargate..you never watched Stargate? For clarity, the movie rather than the show(s). ---
**Author:** ![PlaceboTarget](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/placebotarget/32/1073_2.png) [@PlaceboTarget](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PlaceboTarget)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924/4 "2025-06-21T06:36:59Z")
> [@DWMarch](#): > > I’ll warn you that it is ten _very long_ seasons of _considerably variable quality_. I remember I started watching it and soon it became so bad that I was shocked people enjoyed ten seasons of it. ---
**Author:** ![DETXL](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/detxl/32/19366_2.png) [@DETXL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DETXL)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924/5 "2025-06-21T07:39:59Z")
> [@PlaceboTarget](#): > > I remember I started watching it and soon it became so bad that I was shocked people enjoyed ten seasons of it. Spader as Reddington is very watchable at being quippy and clever in basically exactly the length of time that fits into a YouTube short, which is also how I found it before picking up the full series. I realized I had started hate-watching it and mostly gave up after the sixth or seventh scene that played out, like, > Reddington: \ > Reddington: “Ah, I remember the last time I was shot in the chest. It was outside of a little bistro in _Arles_. Monsieur Letourneau’s. Dembe _insisted_ he wanted to try _bouillabaisse_. Have you _been_ to Arles, Liz? It was where _van Gogh_ did some of his _finest_ paintings. Of course, after that, I had my _ribcage_ replaced with titanium… and _kevlar_.” > Reddington: \ > Reddington: “It makes getting through airport security hell, but at times like this it _does_ seem like a good investment.” And then he adjusts his hat and strides off because it turns out he wanted them to shoot him and it was part of some gambit so he could confirm by the sound of the bullet that it was made by the Blue Locust, the most feared assassin of a secretive organization that has elected every politician since 1984 and he’s condescendingly surprised the FBI has never heard of even though they have also never been mentioned by Reddington before and will never be mentioned again. But from a watching clips point of view, it’s grand 😛 Raymond Reddington is written like Hannibal Lecter as seen in a particularly witty teenager’s fanfic, so it’s just all the scenes where Hannibal Lecter is improbably clever and flawless, and Spader apparently was born to play that role. He is delightfully charismatic. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 7:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924/6 "2025-06-21T07:54:57Z")
> [@PlaceboTarget](#): > > I remember I started watching it and soon it became so bad that I was shocked people enjoyed ten seasons of it. I watched the first episode, liked it well enough. Watched another several and found it sorta entertaining, but my eyebrow started quirking. I began to wonder if this would be one of those superficially interesting shows that would start irritating me (like, say, Burn Notice). Because it was mostly Spader’s charisma + mystery. Spader is written as the sort of mannered, impossibly brilliant character that could quickly devolve into a caricature and many seasons of drawn out mystery can just be annoyingly frustrating and with a usually unsatisfactory conclusion. Read up on the series, including some spoilers and decided yep - not worth any more of my time. Cut my losses and bailed. ---
**Author:** ![Nametag](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nametag/32/406_2.png) [@Nametag](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nametag)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924/7 "2025-06-21T17:56:05Z")
It was clips from this show that inspired my “I want to hear James Spader recite ‘The Hunting of the Snark’” thread. But I was never tempted to watch the show. ---
**Author:** ![MacDoc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/macdoc/32/18696_2.png) [@MacDoc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MacDoc)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924/8 "2025-06-21T19:09:07Z")
Don’t tempt me …I love **Blacklist** including both leads and if I dive in will not surface for a few weeks as I did not keep current with it. ---
**Author:** ![mixdenny](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mixdenny/32/2962_2.png) [@mixdenny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mixdenny)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speaking-of-killers-raymond-reddington/1019924/9 "2025-06-21T23:01:41Z")
> [@Beckdawrek](#): > > Oh man. He was fun as crap as Atty. Shore in LALaw. > > And Stargate..you never watched Stargate? I did catch a lot of LA Law and I have seen Stargate but don’t recall Spader in either one.