‘The Blacklist’ gets early renewal from NBC

NBC is putting “The Blacklist” on its renewed list.

The peacock network announced Tuesday it has ordered a full 22-episode second season of its breakout fall drama.

The Monday series has established itself as the biggest debut of the season, developing quite the following in its post-”The Voice” time slot — Monday night it even tied with the popular singing competition as the No. 1 show on broadcast in the 18-49 demo.

Basically, an early renewal was a no-brainer.

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Adding historical context, NBC’s release notes that “The Blacklist” is NBC’s most-watched new drama eight weeks into its run in 19 years — since its sci-fi drama “Earth 2” in 1994 (which, ironically, lasted one season).

The drama features James Spader as criminal mastermind Raymond “Red” Reddington suspiciously helping the U.S. government catch international criminals.

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“The success of ‘The Blacklist’ demonstrates that inspired storytelling is alive and well in broadcast television, and I’m impressed on a daily basis by this creative team’s imagination and the extent to which they will go to capture this grand vision on film,” Bob Greenblatt, the network’s chairman of entertainment, said in a statement. “With gratitude to both our partners at Sony Pictures Television and our NBC development executives who took a great script and shepherded it into a great series, I hope that Red Reddington never runs out of names to bring down on his list!”

“The Blacklist” recently aired its fall finale and will return Jan. 13 with new episodes before taking another break to make way for the Winter Olympics. It joins Fox drama “Sleepy Hollow” in the camp of freshman shows already given the green light for a second season.

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