Gotham

There are a lot of moments where I can't take this show seriously, but that's okay. Life's too short to be Christopher Nolan all the time. I'm glad they're resisting the urge to just be Grimdark like most anything Batman these days.

Honestly, aside from Balloonman, I'm having trouble remembering any particularly campy elements of the show. What are you guys talking about? Or was it just that particular episode.

Also, for the record, I don't think this show is the worst thing since Schumacher. In fact, I think they're doing a very good job.

That dude and the ATM.

I just want them to stop putting Bruce in each episode, having him follow the happenings of Gotham City. Jim hasn't made any progress with the Wayne murders (the most recent episode excluded, perhaps). Its nice to see Bruce having some semblance of a childhood, its great that they like the child they found to play him. But at least move him out of Gotham City, and keep him the hell away from Catgirl.

I actually like the inclusion of Bruce. He's used pretty sparingly, in my opinion. Just enough to keep diehard people watching the show just for the Batman factor interested. The fact that his relationship with Alfred isn't as cozy as we're used to seeing is also cool, and I like how poorly adjusted he is. I can completely buy this kid as being someone who would grow up to have the mental issues Batman has. He's also taking an interest in Gotham politics and stuff, which isn't something normally addressed in the character of Bruce Wayne. The actor isn't pushing it, compared to say, the (admittedly enjoyable) hammy performances of Penguin or Riddler.

I really want Riddler to get more development than being a Drop-In Character that winks at the audience every sentence...

I think Viper is one of the few times I've actually liked Bruce's screentime and Nygma isn't that bad, but I can agree with the rest.

I'd actually prefer they don't develop Nygma, or any of the others too much. If the show moves too quickly and allows the various supervillains to reach a recognizable form too early on, we'll have the issue of being at the point where there ought to be a Batman, but he's still only a preteen.

In general, while I'm enjoying the first few episodes, I don't know how sustainable the premise is.

I think people's concerns with longevity are unfounded. It's more than possible for characters to make progress then recede, developing in different directions essentially. Not everything has to be a straight march to their eventual characterizations.

I can see 2-5 seasons for this show depending on ratings.

What are the odds of a timeskip to teen! or even young adult!Bruce after two or three seasons?

Considering the producers' attachment to the character is derived from their love of the actor, not likely.

@kingtiger

Unfortunately the last time a DC comics show did that it was called Smallville. Now, I confess, I actually liked Smallville. I have all ten seasons on DVD, and there are episodes in there that I have watched so many times that I'm surprised I haven't worn out the discs. That said, the show had massive problems, and I would rather not see this one go the same route. So when I see a character taking steps towards becoming who they'll eventually be, only to then retreat, that worries me.

I'm not overly familiar with how Batman's origin story is dealt with in the comics, but I don't remember a lot of the story of Bruce's life between the death of his parents and his decision to don the cowl. Much like how Smallville filled in Clark Kent's formative years, I suppose that Gotham intends to do the same for Bruce Wayne. But whereas Clark was the central character of Smallville, we see that Bruce begins as only a small piece of a colossal machine.

Gotham is a city that is rife with institutional corruption, gangs, warring factions and millions of people. Clark dealt with superpowered villains and individual criminal acts as exceptions. Bruce lives in an environment where the system itself is rotten to the core.

Well... the thing standing in the way of them having Bruce grow up from a child to being Batman over the course of the show is his presence, I guess. Once he gets a bit older, much of the time between his parents' death and donning the cowl will be spent... not in Gotham. Though having him leave and show up seasons later on all grown up is possible. But then, that's also a very long time on top of that.

Still, if they're shifting things around I hope they have the bat fly in through the window at some point. Even if he's too young for him to believably decide to become Batman at that point, it'd still be a nice Call-Forward. Like, something that lingers in his mind for a while, until he's an adult and he remembers it in a moment of inspiration.

I didn't watch Smallville too much, but from what I saw I felt the problem was less that they were developing the characters in unique directions and more that they were trying to write "dramatic" plots while avoiding developing the characters too much past the point where they could keep milking those plots as much as they could. When they did develop characters, in any direction, Smallville (at least imo) was at its best.

edited 26th Oct '14 11:52:23 PM by KnownUnknown

Biggest problem with Smallville was how quickly the entire concept became The Artifact. On paper it was supposed to be about "The Early years of Clark Kent" but overtime he did damn near everything (formed the Justice League, faced all the major players of his Rogue Gallery, develop a close personal antagonistic relationship with Lex Luthor, entered into a relationship with Lois Lane) all before he actually became Superman.

And I think that's people's greatest fear/paranoia with Gotham. That all these Supervillains are going to keep appearing all before Bruce Wayne actually grows up and becomes Batman, which would completely defeat the implication that it was "The Batman" that attracted all the crazy to Gotham.

I'm not attached to the idea that Batman's rogue's gallery appeared because of Batman. At all. Those people all existed before Batman, even if they were young and not necessarily criminals yet. Let them show up in their own time.

And if a year or two down the line Bruce starts taking action and cleaning up Gotham's corruption with his resources and his guile instead of his fists, that would be awesome.

How old is the idea that Batman himself attracted his rogues gallery to Gotham? I know it was a theme in the Nolanverse films, but was it an issue in the comics?

Since this is an alternate continuity, there's no reason why the reverse couldn't be true. A new breed of criminals come on the scene to replace the "old school" mobsters, and Bruce decides that in order to fight them, he should become a new type of crimefighter, since the police are either corrupt or incompetent.

After all, there's plenty of precedent for most people regarding "The Batman" as just an urban legend. Having Bats be a celebrity is counter to the aura of mystique he tries to project.

Well, in the comics it was more of an indirect thing - Batman's efforts in bringing down the mob were indirectly instrumental in allowing the "freaks" to take over Gotham's underworld, and while most of his enemies are obsessed with killing or defeating Batman most of them would have been nasty people despite it or were even nasty people before it (Batman just gave them a focus). The Long Halloween makes a good case for it also being part Two-Face's fault, as he was the first person to really rally all the Gotham supervillains together (which didn't last, of course, but it gave them clout as the new major criminal force in Gotham).

Though there are still a few villains that specifically only exist because of Batman and only really work when put up against him - Joker, of course. Riddler. Two-Face, arguably. Hush, definitely.

You can't really "bring down" a large criminal empire, since there's always somebody willing to step up and take charge. Which is exactly what Mooney and Cobblepot seem to have planned. If the boss goes down, somebody moves up. The Dark Knight did it well, with Gotham's mob bosses trusting Lau, opening the door to a RICO charge (which should have been brought by the US Attorney, but whatever).

Of course, what Oswald is saying is that there's going to be a huge gang war between the Falcones and Maronis, and it seems that he wants to be the man left standing when the dust settles. What's probably going to happen is that after the fighting dies down, Gotham's underworld is divided into smaller fiefdoms, each under the control of its own gang leader. Possibly you have different "trades" that belong to each Villain.

So for example, you have Penguin running protection rackets, Joker or Scarecrow involved in drugs, Two-Face has gambling, Riddler could do frame jobs or cleanups.

@Lawyerdude

There is nothing inherently wrong with that idea. The problem, though, is that if it happens within the next couple of seasons, Bruce is too young to be Batman. This leaves us with either a) Gordon taking on the supervillains by himself and being effective, in which case, who needs Batman? or b) Gordon and his colleagues being totally ineffective against the supervillains and the show becoming unwatchable.

Now, maybe they'll avoid this. Maybe, despite all current indicators (which would appear to be speedily moving towards a Mob War and the fall of the current dons) Falcone, Maroni, et al, will be able to hold on for a few seasons, despite the pressure from the likes of The Penguin. If so, great. We get a situation where Gordon and company have been effective at clearing out the normal criminals, but Batman is still needed for the supervillains. That's what I'd like to see. I just don't know if we're going to get it.

It can take time to bring down and carve up a criminal empire. Perhaps the first season will end with the Mob War actually breaking out. The second season can take us through the Dons' ever-shrinking sphere of control. Meanwhile Gordon does what he can to fight the good fight, while Bullock and his ilk are fine just to let the scum kill each other off.

Also I like how Mooney planted the Honey Trap for Falcone, although if I were him, I'd probably be too suspicious that the absolutely perfect girl would just happen to show up right in front of me. But that's probably the point. Falcone has been on top for too long that he's become complacent.

You misunderstand me. In Batman's early years it wasn't a case of destroying organizing crime, but radically altering who had control of it.

In the comics, it mainly happened by way of Batman and Gordon weakening the major crime families until Two-Face's vendetta, Holiday, and various other catastrophes killed off the heads of all of Gotham's organized crime families, destabilized their power base and left a lot of them fleeing to greener pastures, at which point Penguin (who was a "freak" in their eyes) and supervillain gangleaders (like Joker, Two-Face, Riddler and such) and mercenaries and such took over for a while. By the time the organized crime families recovered, they were at a severe disadvantage and constantly had to vie with supervillain mob bosses (like Penguin, of course, but also Ventriloquist, Black Mask and Great White Shark, most recently) or in some cases Intergang for power, plus every few years some maniac or another offs all the non-supervillain mobsers for some reason anyway. They never went away, but a major theme in the earlier days of Batman's tenure was the fall of people like Falcone and the rise of the supervillains.

edited 27th Oct '14 2:43:22 PM by KnownUnknown

New episode soon. Spirit of the Goat. Crazy stuff.

Agh, I forgot! Can anyone fill me in on anything I missed in the first ten minutes or so?

Creepy Nygma is creepy.

edited 27th Oct '14 5:16:49 PM by KnownUnknown

First ten minutes was the original killer and Harvey's past with the case.

edited 27th Oct '14 5:32:29 PM by Eagal