Recap / Gotham S 5 E 4 Ruin

Directed by Nathan Hope

Written by James Patrick Stoteraux & Chad Fiveash

Gordon and Penguin are forced to work together and alliances are shaken when Lucius, Nygma and Barbara all have different ideas of the culprit behind recent events at Haven. Meanwhile, Selina continues her quest for revenge against Jeremiah.

Tropes

• Ambiguously Gay: While Jim and Harvey are, ahem, talking to Zsasz, he sassily asks them if they want to strip-search him to make sure that he isn't responsible for blowing up Haven. A moment afterward, an officer walks in and tells Jim that Lucius is calling him. Zsasz's reaction?
  Zsasz: I'd let Alvarez do it. He's handsome.
• Asshole Victim: Jeremiah kills a child slaver for complaining about his work schedule.
• Big Damn Heroes: Penguin has a moment like this when he shows up at the GCPD with a large stockpile of weapons and ammo, giving the GCPD the edge they need to hunt down Zsasz.
  • Bruce and Alfred later rescue Selina from being killed by Jeremiah's Mooks in the nick of time.
• Call-Back:
  • Posters from Penguin's run for mayor in early season 3 are all over Zsasz's territory.
    • His Pax Penguina from the beginning of the previous season are hung up in the courtroom they set up for Zsasz's trial.
  • Zsasz asks if Penguin is still sore about him siding with Sofia Falcone the previous season, cheerily suggesting that Penguin should get over that.
• Casual Danger Dialogue: Zsasz spends the entire episode either under fire or in the custody of an angry mob who want him dead. Despite this, he acts as if he's out at the grocery store and cheerfully shrugs off everything that happens to him.
  Zsasz: Oh hey guys! What's up? (Fires a rifle at the GCPD)
• Character Death:
  • Selina stabs Jeremiah in the chest repeatedly, seemingly killing him.
  • The rescued child from the first episode is also revealed to have died in the explosion along with hundreds of other refugees.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Bruce effortlessly beats up all of Jeremiah's thugs while being cuffed to a gate.
• Despair Event Horizon: By episode's end, having lost the trust of the people and nominal authority in Gotham, Gordon has hit rock bottom. He didn't even bother to turn on the spotlight.
• Disc-One Final Boss: Zsasz is this for Gordon's storyline. He puts up quite a fight but it captured halfway through. Penguin then turns against Gordon and becomes the antagonist for the rest of the episode.
• Downer Beginning: Haven getting blown up is the tip of the iceberg. Jim is forced to order their drinking water be used to put out the fires, he finds out that the child he had deputized has most likely been killed, and then reports that 311 people were killed, 49 injured, and at least 2 dozen are unaccounted for.
• Even Evil Has Standards: None of the villains react well to seeing Haven being blown up and hundreds of refugees being killed and wounded.
  • Penguin is horrified to see the building go up in flames and is actually so upset by it that he is unable to move for several moments.
  • Barbara puts her vendetta against Oswald on hold because she believes that whoever blew up Haven is so twisted that they must work together to stop them.
  • Riddler strongly disapproves with the violence and willingly helps Lucius with the investigation (after some prodding) and later genuinely hopes that he will catch the culprit. Unaware that he’s the one who did it.
  • Zsasz shows a twisted version of this when he insists that he would never take credit for someone else's work.
• Evil Is Hammy: Jeremiah has fully become this, making bizarre and grandiose speeches to his slaves and Chewing the Scenery by ranting to himself and Ecco.
• From Bad to Worse: The reveal that there is a third personality within Nygma's psyche, one more malevolent and destructive than Ed or Riddler could ever hope to be.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: If you look closely in the scene where Ecco is taking the new workers away/Selina is revealed to have infiltrated the group, in the background you can see Jeremiah first look around as she stares after Ecco, then spin his entire body round to face her, indicating he's caught on to her presence— foreshadowing the events of the following episode.
• Hannibal Lecture: Defied. Jeremiah starts to calmly taunt Selina when she stabs him in the chest, but she then stabs him over and over again to shut him up.
• Heroic BSoD: Both Gordon and Oswald have one when they witness the carnage of the Haven explosion.
• Hope Spot: In the mock trial, Jim delivers the new evidence of Zsasz's innocence and appeals to the jury's humanity. There is a pause, then they resume clamoring for blood.
• Horrifying the Horror: Zsasz is thrown when Gordon has finally had enough of him and readies himself for an old-fashioned shootout, declining to participate and telling Gordon he needs to get some rest.
• Kangaroo Court: Penguin puts Zsasz in one, even taping his mouth shut so that he can't defend himself. The whole trial is practically a humiliation session for Zsasz before they have him killed anyway.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Penguin and Zsasz remain unaware that Sofia was the one who had her father killed.
• Mad Love: Jeremiah and Ecco are now in a loving relationship where they happily murder and enslave people.
• Mood Whiplash: The largely comical scene with Riddler breaking into the old woman's apartment ends with the shocking reveal that he himself was the one who blew up Haven while being influenced by his other personality. He then proceeds to murder the woman by pushing her wheelchair out a window.
• Mythology Gag: Jeremiah's smocky white coat and straight razor licking both come from Batman (Grant Morrison), where the Joker went so far as to split his own tongue.
  • Riddler kills the bombing witness in the same way he murdered his boss in Batman Forever.
• The Nicknamer: Ecco has taken to calling Selina 'curls' after her curly hair.
• Off with His Head!: Penguin attempts to have Zsasz executed with a guillotine, though Gordon stops him before it can take place.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Gordon steadily loses more and more hope as the episode continues. Zsasz picks up on it when Jim tries to get him to participate in a duel, declining and telling him to get some rest instead. When Barbara shows up at the end, she notices that the spotlight isn't turned on, showing that it seems like Gordon has given up.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Selina puts on a helmet in order to blend in with Jeremiah's child slaves. It works despite her being the only one with curly hair and significantly taller than the other slaves, though Jeremiah is probably too loopy to care or notice.
• Pet the Dog: Of a sort. Zsasz rewards Gordon for saving his life by... deciding not to duel and most likely kill him.
• Red Herring: The GCPD believe that Zsasz is responsible for the bombing for most of the episode, but it is revealed halfway through that he had nothing to do with it.
• The Reveal: Riddler is the one who blew up Haven by firing an RPG at the gas line. Though he did it while being controlled by his unknown Split Personality and is shocked to learn that he is responsible.
• Sequel Hook: After Selina has apparently stabbed Jeremiah to death, he's shown being enveloped in some kind of mysterious gas.
• The Snack Is More Interesting: Zsasz casually drinks a slushie while waiting out gunfire from Penguin and the GCPD.
• Sanity Slippage: While he had already become severely Ax-Crazy, Jeremiah's stoic demeanor has largely disappeared and he has adopted some of his brother's more demented traits such as speaking dramatically and frequently raving to himself. He has also embraced his Mad Love relationship with Ecco.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: Literally.
  Jeremiah: Well, Selina, I must say-
  Selina: (stabs him) Don't. Say. Anything.
• Slashed Throat: Jeremiah casually dispatches one of his henchmen this way after he protests that the tunnel cannot be built on time.
• Suicide Mission: Selina comes very close to being killed after she accomplishes her mission to kill Jeremiah. It's only due to Bruce and Alfred's intervention that she survives.
• Too Kinky to Torture: Zsasz only compliments the table when Bullock slams his head down on it. Even when Penguin has him tied up and ready to execute, he seems darkly amused.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Harvey tells off Jim for trying to get into a gun duel with Zsasz after saving his life.