‘The Blacklist’ Season 9 premiere begins with plot twist

(NBC) – NBC’s crime thriller “The Blacklist” returns tonight, Thursday, Oct. 21, for its season premiere on a new night for the show.

The Season 8 finale, which aired back in May, threw fans for a loop. Actress Megan Boone, who played Elizabeth Keene, was killed off just moments before she was about to kill Raymond “Red” Reddington, played by James Spader.

Costar Hisham Tawfiq, who is cast in the role of Dembe Zuma, said Boone’s exit puts a whole new spin on the Season 9 premiere. The episode will jump forward two years with the FBI task force disbanded.

“It picks up also, what I think I can say, one of the team members being harmed or kidnapped,” said Tawfiq. “And that kind of brings, for lack of a better word, the Avengers together just to deal with this moment. But even with everyone coming back together, it doesn’t look like it usually has in the past.”

“The Blacklist” premieres in its new time slot tonight, Thursdays at 8 p.m. followed by the 500th episode of “Law and Order: SVU” at 9 p.m. and then “Law and Order: Organized Crime” at 10 p.m. on NBC4.