Heartwarming / Batwoman (2019)

Season 1

1x01: Pilot

• Despite Batman having disappeared three years prior, many citizens of Gotham still believe in him and rally a mass protest when the city tries to shut off the Bat-Signal.
• While brief, it's clear from the flashbacks that Kate and Sophie really were in love. Even years later, all it takes is learning Sophie is in danger for Kate to return home and do everything in her power to save her.
  • After jumping off a ledge with Sophie to safety, they share a Held Gaze as Sophie realizes her savior is not Batman. Kate simply puts a finger to her lips before leaving, adorably flustered.
  • While it quickly turns into a tearjerker, Sophie is touched Kate came back for her when they reunite.
• Catherine and Mary throwing a welcome-home party for Kate. Despite Kate's issues, she and her stepfamily do care about each other.
• Kate's fond recollections of Bruce and the advice he gave her, showing how much she looked up to him. It eventually motivates her to take up the Bat mantle.
  • The fact that Bruce was still able to have a close relationship with his surviving family despite their many tragedies is heartwarming in itself.
• Mary is revealed to be using her medical skills and funds to run a free underground clinic for Gotham's underprivileged. Kate is impressed and commends her sister's actions.
  • In hindsight, Kate's words are especially sweet when it's revealed how distant she usually was from Mary.
• Jacob apologizing for being brash with and overprotective of Kate, and offering her a chance to join the Crows. While Kate declines, she clearly appreciates her dad coming around and acknowledging her potential.
• When seeing Kate fly away, a young girl excitedly calls out, "It's Batman!" Later, a child in Mary's clinic describes how he saw the Bat fly. Kate may be on the fence about officially succeeding her cousin (for now), but she's already inspiring the city to be hopeful again.

1x02: The Rabbit Hole

• Mixed with tearjerker, Kate's devotion to her long-lost twin sister. She refused to stop looking for Beth after her disappearance, and is now determined to find and prove Alice is Beth.
  • While it has unintended consequences, Kate saving Alice from drowning after a bomb blows up the latter's prison transport van counts. Despite everything she's done, Alice is still her sister.
• After butting heads for much of the episode, Luke and Kate become Fire-Forged Friends after he saves her using her suit's defibrillator.

1x03: Down Down Down

• Mary's interaction with a child patient at her clinic as she gives the little girl a shot.
• Mary's unsubtle attempts to push Sophie towards Kate and even sticking up for her stepsister by reminding Sophie how she broke Kate's heart.
• It's brief, but Kate and Mary share a laugh as Mary maintains her socialite facade in front of Sophie.
• When Alice breaks into the Kane penthouse, she finds a box full of Kate's childhood mementos, including the map Kate used in her search for Beth. Despite her vendetta, Alice can't help but smile at her twin's determination to reunite with her. Crossed over with Tearjerker.
• Kate quickly connects and banters with a bartender named Reagan at the party, and at the end of the whole ordeal, Reagan asks for her number.
• Kate officially embracing the mantle of Gotham's Bat, realizing she has to be herself instead of like Bruce.

1x04: Who Are You?

• After Batwoman saves a young girl from a bomb, the child is starstruck, even gingerly touching Batwoman's face in awe.

1x07: Tell Me the Truth

• In an unusual way, Jacob making sure Sophie understood what resigning from Point Rock meant and she wasn't making a rash decision, since she had no family present for her hearing. Also the fact that he was there to support Kate.
• Even if Kate didn't see it that way, the fact that Julia was looking out for her in London at Bruce's request.
• It's a slight tearjerker, but Sophie confesses to "Batwoman" (who she thinks is Kate) that she wants her to give up her vigilantism because she can't bear to lose Kate, and she would've left Point Rock with her if they had the chance to do it again. Julia even compliments her speech.
• Kate makes amends with Julia and they part ways as friends. Before leaving, Julia encourages Kate to not be afraid of letting people in.
• Kate finally making some time for Mary, by inviting her to help design the interior of her future gay bar.
• Alice sabotages the gun that could kill Batwoman, risking the anger of a mysterious and powerful figure in order to protect Kate.

1x10: How Queer Everything is Today!

• When Kate unmasks, Parker not only recognises her instantly, she also knows Kate is gay from seeing her in an article about "30 Lesbian CEOs Under 30". This suggests Parker already looks up to Kate as an out-and-proud role model.
  • In the aftermath, Parker not only promises to keep Kate's identity a secret, but admits it felt empowering knowing a superhero is like her, which no doubt resonated with real-life LGBTQ superhero fans.
  • When Batwoman comes out as a lesbian, Parker is shown beaming while reading the story.
• Luke baking and decorating a cupcake for Kate's birthday.
• Mary forgiving Kate and giving her a hug.

1x11: An Un-Birthday Present

• After getting over their paranoia, Kate and Mary welcome Alternate!Beth with open arms.
  • The images of the past with Kate and Alt!Beth showing their long and happy life together.
  • Mary, Luke, Kate, and Alt!Beth celebrating Kate and Alt!Beth's birthday together.

1x12: Take Your Choice

• For all that they're a pair of lunatics, the source of Mouse's love for Alice and his naming her his Family of Choice is very touching.
  "She was my family. She accepted me. All of me. The scars, the burns, the face you raised me to believe were too repulsive for the world to see. You looked at me, and you saw a monster. She saw the window to the world. I will never, never betray her."

1x15: Off With Her Head

• The opening flashback shows that Kate and Beth got their treasured garnet necklaces from their mother, Gabi, as a gift at their Bat Mitzvah. Gabi expresses her love for her daughters through their Jewish faith before they share a group hug.
  Red is a very symbolic color. It's the color of love, but it's also the color of passion, courage, war. At one point or another, you're going to have to wrestle with all of these emotions, and what defines your character is how you balance them. So keep me close to your heart, because I'll be thinking of you when I wear mine.
  • The song playing during this scene, "Mother" by Ingrid Michaelson, adds to the (bitter)sweetness.
• Despite wanting Alice shot on sight not too long ago, when Jacob finds her on the verge of suicide from the Fear Toxin, he saves her life and later drapes a blanket around her shoulders as she recovers.

1x16: Through the Looking-Glass

• Mary unexpectedly showing up at Reggie Harris's appeal to support Luke, citing her own experience of losing a parent and having the killer go free.
• Julia reveals Lucius Fox was her godfather.

1x17: A Narrow Escape

• Despite having every reason to hate her sister, Alice's Happy Place in Arkham is shown to be a fantasy where she and Kate just hang out together playing computer games.
• Julia assures Kate she'll always be there for her and urges her to get back to work.
• An unnamed woman in a homemade Batsuit is shown to be taking up the mantle of Batwoman after she stopped answering the Batsignal, not through violent acts of vigilantism, but by saving people from a bombed building and trying to inspire hope. At the end of the episode, after she gets hurt helping Mary protect her patients in her clinic, Mary declares that she really was Batwoman.
• Despite accusing Kate earlier in the season of barely acknowledging she exists, it turns out that there have been times when Kate has helped out her stepsister, and Mary has always looked up to her for that. It is these acts—not the heroics she does as Batwoman—that Mary cites as to why Kate is a hero to her.
  • Better yet, this speech is what finally convinces Kate to return to being Batwoman.

1x18: If You Believe In Me I'll Believe In You

• Kate taking the time to formally apologize to Mary not only for underestimating her ability to be badass when required, but for shutting her out all this time. When Kate admits the reason was her fear of losing another sister, you can see how much it means to Mary to finally be acknowledged by Kate as Beth's equal.

1x19: A Secret Kept from All the Rest

• Kate hugging Luke and telling him
  Kate:"We both know there is no Batwoman without Luke Fox."

1x20: O, Mouse!

• Evil as he is, Mouse truly loves Alice and makes a genuine effort to get her to turn away from vengeance and leave Gotham for a place where they can just be happy together.

Season 2

2x01: What Happened to Kate Kane?

• In flashbacks, Ryan's adoptive mother Cora was shown to genuinely love her and accept her for being gay, in sharp contrast to how Sophie's mother dealt with her coming out, or the complicated relationship between Kate and her dad.
• When Kate's plane crashes near her van, Ryan's first instinct is to rush to the wreckage to help any survivors, and she manages to save the pilot.
• As Jacob mourns the apparent death of yet another daughter, Mary hugs him. And for once, he hugs her back.
  • Mary also delivers a Cooldown Hug to Luke to stop him from blaming himself for Kate's apparent death.
• Ryan decides to research Kate Kane while Mary decides to look up Ryan, and thus Ryan learns about Kate's activism and Mary learns about all the shit that Ryan has lived through. Both women come away from their respective researches with their perspectives changed; Ryan decides that maybe the Batsuit isn't just a fancy weapon for her to exploit for her own ends, while Mary decides that maybe she was wrong about trying to keep the suit in the family.

2x02: Prior Criminal History

• In a sharp turnaround from the previous episode, Mary is fully on board with the notion of Ryan becoming the new Batwoman, at least on a temporary basis.
• Ryan saves a young homeless girl from an explosion. When she tries to be modest and insist that she's not the real Batwoman, the girl says that as far as she's concerned, Ryan is.
• In the end, Ryan finds Kate's letters to Bruce, and discovers that there was an entry about their brief encounter when Kate saved Ryan from being mugged. Inspired, she starts writing a letter to Kate.

2x03: Bat Girl Magic!

• At a memorial for Kate, Mary writes a traditional Jewish blessing: "May your memory be a blessing."
• Alice becoming more compliant to Safiyah's wishes when the latter reveals that she has Kate in her grasp, inferring to Alice that she must do as Safiyah says if she wants to reunite with her twin. Later, when Safiyah arranges for Sophie and Alice to be returned to Gotham for a favor that Alice apparently conceded to make happen, Alice was rather adamant not to leave Coryana without Kate in tow. But Safiyah was prudent enough not to have the twins on her domain at the same time, lest one frees the other and both escape from her grasp, and tells her that Kate Kane shall be brought to Coryana when Alice departs. This implies that in spite of everything, the cold and calculating killer who used to be Beth Kane still loves her twin sister.
  • Sophie and Alice's return to Gotham; ignoring that they are on opposing sides of the law - and, under normal circumstances, the former would be arresting the latter without blinking - the fact that they were unconscious and only came to after a car drove and honked past them, and awoke to find themselves practically sleeping in each other's arms was rather captivating. Kate will be so incensed! Even more endearing was Sophie apparently agreeing not to cuff Alice when the latter reveals Kate may still being alive, as incarcerating her would void all chance they have of determining Kate's present whereabouts because then Alice would not be able to enact the task that Safiyah delegated to her.

2x04: Fair Skin, Blue Eyes

• Ryan is recruited by a little black boy who yanked on a store door and triggered the alarm, risking arrest to get her attention. Of course she agrees to help him find his brother.
• Ryan and her ex Angelique had one hell of a Meet Cute - they were foster kids in the same group home who bonded over reading comic books. When Ryan was kidnapped by the Candy Lady and about to break under her cruel treatment, Angelique refused to dismiss her as a runaway like everyone else and had gotten herself kidnapped in order to help Ryan escape.
• When Mary finds out that Ryan is still living out of her van, she totally insists that Ryan become her new roommate. Ryan immediately accepts.
• Though Ryan is too late to save Kevin from the Candy Lady, she does manage to stop him from being initiated into the False Face Society. Batwoman talks him down from crossing the line into murder by assuring Kevin that she and his brother care about him, and he can be more than a thug.
  • In the process, she saves Jacob's life from the gang. Her interaction with Kevin seems to make him finally consider that Batwoman may be a hero after all.

2x05: Gore on Canvas

• Evan's reason for wanting to steal the Napier painting was that they knew it was important to possibly getting Kate back, and they felt they owed it to Kate to try and obtain it.

2x06: Do Not Resuscitate

• When Ryan is in the hospital waiting to be seen by a doctor, Angelique bullies an orderly into getting her seen faster.

2x08: Survived Much Worse

• Ryan choosing to receive a Desert Rose instead of Kate from Safiyah because, as she explains to Alice, she trusts that the woman who used to be Beth wouldn't be able to actually kill her sister.
  • And Ryan is right. Alice finally subverts her usual Ignored Epiphany and accepts that getting revenge on Kate for perceived slights won't change her circumstances, so she decides instead to rescue her sister.
• With the field of Desert Roses in flames and Ryan's last hope for survival seemingly destroyed, Sophie agrees to sit with an ailing Ryan so that she won't die alone. Fortunately, it turns out that the Bat-Plant had a Desert Rose growing in it the whole time.

2x09: Rule #1

• Ryan's letter to Kate, accepting the Batwoman mantle and promising to honor the woman who inspired her. She caps it off with "May your memory be a blessing."
• This episode introduces Jordan Moore, Sophie's little sister, who still loves her since she came out, in sharp contrast to their mother.
• Luke and Mary reluctantly allow Ryan to give Angelique time to consider going to the police about the murder of the Police Commissioner. While they are skeptical that Angelique will do the right thing, they agree to back Ryan after having repeatedly second-guessed her in the past.
• After spending much of the season being selfish and amoral, Angelique decides to take the fall for the murder of the Police Commissioner... in order to protect Ryan from the False Face Society's wrath. She finally found something that she cared about more than money or her freedom.
• Ryan decides to lay out a new plan for how she and her team will operate. One, they will always have each other's backs. Two, they will hold each other accountable. And three, they will use their resources to build something new in Gotham to replace the drugs and gangs.

2x10: Time Off For Good Behavior

• The opening of Jordan's community center, where Ryan and Mary are clearly ecstatic at being being a part of the outreach program.
  • Also, Ryan and Imani bonding over their desire to help at-risk kids with the community center.
• It's brief, but Sophie comforting Julia over her missing memories of searching for Kate.
• At Ryan's request, Sophie agrees to secure Angelique's safe release from prison in exchange for giving up the commissioner's real killers.

2x11: Arrive Alice

• While it's a tense scene, Alice's vision of Kate insists her sister still has love to give and she won't stop believing in Alice.
  • Following this, Enigma explains that Alice's reunion with Ocean unlocking her memories of him proves that despite everything she went through, she is still capable of love and attachment.
• Enigma fully restoring Alice and Ocean's memories of their relationship. In the end, Ocean gets Alice to implicitly admit she doesn't regret what happened between them.

Season 3

3x01: Mad as a Hatter

• Luke discovers that his Batwing suit includes an AI with the voice of his late father.
• After a truly hellish day, the Bat-Team comes together to celebrate Mary earning her MD, with Ryan giving her a short but heartfelt toast:
  "Mary, you have probably saved more lives than anyone in this city. You are the person I go to for advice, for a shoulder to cry on, for... let's face it, pain meds. You didn't need an M.D. for the people who love you to know that you are a true hero."

3x02: Loose Tooth

• Sophie offers to give Ryan information about her birth mother, but Ryan declines, as she already considers the Bat-Team to be her real family.

3x09: Meet Your Maker

• Alice is genuinely afraid for Mary's life as the latter is forcibly drawn towards the original Poison Ivy.
• Sophie and Ryan finally get a Big Damn Kiss.

3x10: Toxic

• Luke talks himself through a panic attack, and finally stops his armor from locking up without disabling the safety measures.
• The team finally manages to get Mary out of Pam's influence and restore her back to normal. She'll be haunted by her actions as Poison Mary for a long time, but at least she'll be haunted as herself.
• Despite everything Ivy's done, Renee makes a deal to keep Pamela out of jail by taking her away to Coryana, an island with lots of plants and no industry.

3x12: We're All Mad Here

• Alice chooses to take the rap for the man Mary killed when she was Poison Mary.
• Mary is ecstatic when she learns that Ryan and Sophie are officially a couple.

3x13: Are We Having Fun Yet?

• To keep Mary happy, Ryan agrees to go and offer the buzzer to Alice... but manages to convince Alice that she doesn't need the buzzer to cure herself. Instead, they work together for once and maneuver Marquis into position so that Alice can use the buzzer on him, restoring his capacity for empathy.