“Gotham” 2.5 – Scarification (7 out of 10) – Written by Bruno Heller and John Stephens, Megan Mostyn-Brown Based on characters created by Bob Kane, Bill Finger, Howard Chaykin, Frank Miller, Greg Rucka; Starring Ben McKenzie, Donal Logue, David Mazouz, Sean Pertwee, Morena Baccarin, Erin Richards…; Rated TV14. Aired on Fox 10/19/15.
“Gotham” backslid a little bit this week with “Scarification,” we learned a little bit more about key characters while also meeting another young version of one of Batman’s villains. The episode over all was decent but felt a little bit more like season one than any other episode this season. We’ll start with the newest rouge to enter the gallery, Firefly.
Fans of the comics will instantly recognize the name but not the character. This is the first time in Batman history that Firefly is a woman. In the shows case Bridgit Pike is the little sister of the city’s professional arsonists. When one of them die during a police raid on what can only be described as the bad guy Costco she has to step in and take his place in the gang. I like the twist the show put on Firefly and it was nice to get a little back story into the character before they started committing their crimes.
Even though this episode was more of the lets show Batman’s villains as kids model from season one what did set it apart was Firefly’s arc wasn’t completed in just one episode. We’ll see her again next week and no doubt she’ll be dealing with the fallout of accidentally killing one of the strike force officers. I really like that we got to dig into the character a little first and I hope this becomes standard for new villains we meet. It gives the impression of a journey for the villain rather than a cheap ploy to try and get viewers. Because we will never see the villains in all their glory in this show it’s important to their beginnings.
As for the cops’ death, it didn’t have any weight behind it. The strike force officers haven’t been around long enough to care about them yet. Capt. Barns is becoming more of a mystery, we know he’s new to Gotham thanks to Gordon’s line “Welcome to Gotham,” after a rocket launcher was fired at them during a raid but other than that no new information.
Galavan stepped further into the light with us learning more about how his family was removed from Gotham’s elite by the Wayne family over none other than a girl. A lot of fans of the show have speculated Galavan has ties to Ra’s al Ghul or at least has that vibe going on. We now know there is an overseas cult that Galavan belongs too and that they are sending warriors to Gotham. Other than the “cliffhanger” that their mission is to kill Bruce Wayne we will have to wait for more information.
I personally hate episodes that end with death threats against Bruce or with him in mortal danger. We know that he’ll be fine so unless the attempt on his life will further his arc into becoming Batman or reveal the truth about Galavan it doesn’t hold a lot of interest for me. I hope that is a storyline that gets wrapped up quickly and not dragged on for half the season. I’d even be okay with Galavan betraying the cultish group and saving Bruce’s life in a further attempt to pull him into his fold. This will make the sting of Galavan’s betrayal hurt even more and would lead to Bruce having trust issues as he becomes the hero we all know and love.
Overall I didn’t love the episode but I didn’t hate it either. Gotham continues to be one of the darker shows that is on Mondays and this week was no exception. We saw a man get his eye cut out, another explode because of the c4 down his pants and best of all we saw a Penguin who seemed even further unhinged than before over his mother’s kidnapping. He beat one of his henchman half to death with a fire poker and then cuts off Butch’s hand. How far he’ll go to bring down Galavan and get his mother back is what I’m most interested in with the story so far. Season two remains head and shoulders above season one regardless of a small set back this week and as long as they don’t slip back into the season one method that shouldn’t change.