Gotham has been a roller coaster ride most of this season, its overly-fast pacing covering over its many flaws. But now that we’re at Episode 15, it’s time to decide whether this show is worth watching next season or not. I’m on the fence and it’s for a reason I never imagined when the…
Gotham offers such wonderful bits and pieces of stories. This episode was no different but, still, I always wonder what the show would be like if it tightened its focus. For instance, Oswald and Maroni’s confrontation, doled out in frustrating fragments. They played a game of ‘tell the truth,” at an isolated cabin in a…
Welcome back, indeed. This was the most coherent and compelling episode of Gotham to date. Not only did we get the usual surface fun—Oswald and Mama Kapelput, Fish being gleefully defiant—but the story reached far deeper in simultaneously giving Jim and victory and a defeat. Gotham's unpredictability has always been a strength, and that’s in…
“You think you’ve been careful so far?” Lest we forget, Harvey Bullock repeats the phrase three times, each more incredulous than the last in the latest Gotham. It’s a perfect line, well-delivered by Donal Logue, and points out the single biggest issue with Gotham: Jim Gordon should be dead by now. But for plot reasons,…
Somehow, I expected Gotham’s biggest flaws to have vanished in its return. But the quick cuts between stories, the failure to give Gordon any plan for accomplishing his objectives, and the introduction of Batman villains for no particular reason are all flaws in stark evidence in “Rogues’ Gallery.” It’s a measure of how off Gotham’s…
I expected a great deal from Gotham. I expected it would be mostly a police procedural. I expected to strongly feature Jim Gordon, one of my favorite comic characters, and I expected it to be a street-level story. I also expected it to be good. It is good. But not in any way I’d anticipated.…
This week Batman got a belated 75th anniversary present: the release of Legends of the Knight, a crowdfunded documentary that celebrates not only the crime fighting alter ego of Bruce Wayne, but more importantly the real-world impact that the character has had on readers and fans since his debut in 1939’s Detective Comics #27. “Batman…
This episode was called “Harvey Dent” but it should have been dubbed “Two-Face,” for the dual nature of nearly everyone involved, starting with those crazy kids, Bruce (David Mazouz) and Selina (Camren Bicondova). With far more subtlety than this show has shown so far, young Selina brings out the Bruce and eventual Batman selves in…
You’ll have to excuse me, I’m a little dizzy this morning from all those quick jump edits on Gotham last night. I appreciate the show wants a quick pace but this is becoming ridiculous. In no particular order, “The Mask” brought us Black Mask Fight Club, Jim getting a Dear John note from Barbara, the…
It’s time to give up on my hope that Gotham will become a dark, twisted and deep story that showcases what a scary place a superhero universe can be without extraordinary heroes. Instead, it’s time to embrace Gotham for what it is: a dark, twisted and sometimes over-the-top story of a city without a Batman.…
