This episode is a backdoor pilot for a spin-off series featuring some starring and guest starring actors from main series: Famke Janssen (Susan "Scotie" Hargrave), Ryan Eggold (Tom Keen), Edi Gathegi (Matias Solomon) and Tawny Cypress (Nez Rowan). The spin-off was titled The Blacklist: Redemption (2017) and was canceled after eight episodes.
Hargrave's wall includes a picture of Famke Janssen, who portrays Hargrave, with Nelson Mandela, the first black president of South Africa.
A plot point here is a Hispanic Senator (Diaz) that is running for U.S. President. The air date was May 12, 2016. At the time of production, a Hispanic Senator, Ted Cruz, was running for U.S. President. In early May he suspended his campaign. A second plot point involves the Russian Kirk seeking to influence the White House via Diaz. Evidence was manufactured that Russia had provided assistance to the winner of the Presidential election, Donald Trump.
Famke Janssen and Edi Gathegi both played characters in Marvel's X-Men movies. Janssen played Jean Grey/Phoenix in X-Men (2000), X2 (2003), X-Men: The Last Stand (2006) and X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), and Gathegi played Darwin in X-Men: First Class (2011).