“It becomes a white noise after all.”
That’s what Gotham seems to be doing for me lately, and not in the sleep better/reduce stress/calm your mind/improve your focus kind of way. It’s more akin to Morpheus telling Neo in The Matrix “You don’t know what it is, but it’s there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad.” This series will slowly drive me mad, and thankfully my Toronto Blue Jays swept the American League Divisional Series on Sunday, otherwise I would have told the Boss Man my patriotic duty was for the Jays rather than Gotham.
There are more questions than answers in this week’s episode, titled New Day Rising. The first is how does Jervis Tetch, a.k.a. The Mad Hatter, survive being shot by Alice? Did he hypnotize the bullets into making a right hand turn? That would be the most impressive display of trajectory since the Kennedy Magic Bullet theory.
Gordon heads to Sirens to speak with Babs for info on Tetch, but she doesn’t offer up any. What she does, however, is give a solid display of flirty and Bat-crazy, demonstrating why we need more Babs in the episodes. Question two – why are Babs and Tabs (absent from this episode) marginalized in the show? The question extends to many of the female characters – Lee is back, but only in two short scenes, though one provides Gordon with the inspiration to break the hold Tetch has on him. Selena has some time, but is tied up quickly and needs Five’s help to be rescued. Which leads to question three – why do women always need a man’s help on this show? We have many strong characters who are women, yet don’t really get the opportunity to flex their literal or figurative muscles and must rely on the men to do all the heavy lifting.
Tetch hypnotizes the Tweed brothers to help him bust into GCPD and take Alice, who was turned in by Gordon for the bounty money. He also planted a deeper post hypnotic suggestion in Gordon so he feels the urge to kill himself every time he hears a ticking clock. Question four – the trope for hypnotism is that one cannot hypnotize another to do something they wouldn’t normally do. So why can Hatter easily suggest that Gordon kill himself? Alice tells him it’s because he already struggles with those deep, dark urges, but we really haven’t seen evidence of that, save for harder drinking, some reckless behaviour that wasn’t out of place in previous seasons, and talking like Christian Bale’s Batman as if he slugged back a can of Draino. Alice knows all about dark impulses, as she says the reason she is terrified of Tetch; he used his powers to control her all her life with “thoughts a brother shouldn‘t have” about his sister, which is about as far as Fox will go in alluding to incest – this isn’t Game of Thrones or HBO, after all.
Harvey gets one of the captured Tweeds to give up Tetch’s location, and he and Gordon storm in to save the day. But alas, Alice falls to her death in the melee, impaled on a pipe that pipes her blood down to the ground and makes contact with Barnes. Question five – why did Alice have to die? This is related to question three, as it appears many women are killed off and discarded very easily and more often than their male counterparts. Why the need to kill Alice unless she was only a means to get Barnes infected? That could easily have been done with the blood Tetch drew from Alice earlier. In addition to Tabs, Valerie Vale is absent from this episode. Was she merely a tryst to have Gordon feel worse when he meets up with Lee, only to realize later he has issues?
Question six – why is it easy for Gordon to break Tetch’s spell, when no one else could? Was it due to the pep talk Lee gave him about moving on versus letting go, or that Gordon, being our hero, has the strength of will to do so?
Question seven – why aren’t we getting more Harvey? At least he had one decent quip –“I bet I’d be a kickass P.I.” Yes you would, Harvey, alongside Thomas Magnum and Jim Rockford. Now that would be a great show, the three of them together.
Penguin’s story was the most interesting, but it leads to question eight – I know Penguin is rather pale, but he wears enough rouge to resemble Arthur Carlson in his bid for council on WKRP in Cincinnati? Penguin desperately wants to be Mayor, but he can’t shake his past, so he has Butch bribe officials to rig the election in Penguin’s favour. Nygma, as campaign manager, picks up on this and is confident Penguin can win on his own. Nygma takes matters into his own hands, ensuring the election would be clean, and low and behold, Penguin wins by a landslide. Question nine – when will Butch, who seems rather jealous of Penguin’s bromance with BFF Nygma, attempt to kill Nygma? El Predicto says this will reach a boiling point sooner than later.
Then of course there is Bruce’s story with Five and Selena. Question ten – how does a seventeen year old look old enough to serve drinks, even at an illegal betting house? She realizes Five is an impostor when he reveals the knife wound after the rescue. He meets up with Bruce and Alfred and realizes Bruce has no answers about his origins, so he attempts to leave Gotham, only to be abducted by Kathryn and the Court of Owls.
Mad City: New Day Rising doesn’t do much to push the intrigue level, raise any stakes, nor allow its talented cast to let loose, especially Erin Richards, Cory Michael Smith, and Robin Lord Taylor.
While I normally don’t share personal information I feel compelled to say something here; Gotham gave me a fever, and the only prescription is more Harvey.
If things don’t get better, I’m going to have to file my Gotham viewings under protest with the Boss Man.
Tune in next time – same Bat-time, same Bat-channel.
