Monday, May 4, 2015

Gotham: Season 1, Episode 22


Gotham
Episode Title: “All Happy Families Are Alike”
Channel: Fox
Director: Danny Cannon
Writer: Bruno Heller
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Runtime: 42 min
Rated: TV-14
Original Air Date: May 4, 2015

What's a show to do when it's struggled to tell a coherent story through its first season? Apparently you escalate the violence and continue to make the same mistakes as far as story telling goes, hoping the audience doesn't notice past all the blood flying.

Lets start with Fish Mooney. She made landfall back in Gotham with a new haircut and in apparent good health. Remember her getting shot in the stomach during her flight from the Dollmaker's headquarters? Well, the writers didn't. It's a good thing the crew she escaped with included a surgeon talented enough to save her life while she piloted a helicopter and a stylist capable of giving her new look. Otherwise the audience couldn't have been treated to her triumphant return. Ugh. Fish crossed paths with Selina on her way into town and after Selina gave her some lip, Fish decided this was a child she definitely needed on her crew.

Maroni's men tried to take Falcone out while he was picking up a chicken for dinner. Yeah, that's the errand Falcone is running when the hit goes down. The initial hit was unsuccessful and Falcone ended up in the hospital, strapped to a gurney. Everyone realized that this was the moment to take the throne away from him so he's in a bit of trouble. Penguin and Butch showed up first, but Penguin's desire to gloat caused him to miss his chance at slitting the old man's throat. Gordon arrived, arrested Penguin and Butch, and then decided that having Falcone in charge was the lesser of the available evils. Commissioner Loeb showed up escorting Maroni's men, told Gordon to beat it, and then following Gordon's predictable refusal set Maroni's men on him. Gordon managed to take out five armed men before Bullock arrived and they hustled off with Falcone to one of his safe houses, someplace no one living knows about, with Penguin and Butch in tow. Why did they bring those two? Because even through all of this Gordon won't leave them because they're “in his custody” which felt more than a little ridiculous.

Of course, Fish is waiting for them at the safe house. She and her band of ruffians, with Selina in a prominent role, capture the lot of them and tie them up. Fish promises all of them, save Bullock, death. Then she calls in Maroni to trade Falcone for her old territory back. Selina is perfectly willing to be involved with Gordon's death, which seemed really strange. She scoffed at the fact that they were, “sorta friends,” but her joining Fish's cause was absurd. Maroni showed up, and after a few minutes of being his charming self had the entire meeting looking dangerous. It was around this time that I found Gotham's lack of tension really hitting hard. I knew all of these characters had to survive this encounter, after all they make appearances in Batman's time. How can I feel that any of them is in danger...BLAM. One of the few good choices made in this show so far, Fish shot Maroni in the face. If that's a trend that will continue then we may finally have dramatic moments in store going forward.

In the confusion Gordon, Bullock, and Falcone got away. To be recaptured minutes later by Selina and company. The only purpose to their brief escape was to reveal that Falcone doesn't want to play the game anymore. After all the things Fish did to him this season, and everything he's presumably had to endure climbing to the top of the underworld, this seemed like an odd time for him to take his ball and go home. As he explained to Fish that he was done machine-gun fire erupted and Penguin burst onto the scene mowing down Fish's men. He moved to chase her down and Gordon and friends fled yet again. On the roof of the building Penguin and Fish are locked in hand-to-hand combat until Butch arrives. Apparently the writers did remember that he's supposedly been brainwashed, although there's been no hint that particular story element was still in play for weeks. He ended up shooting them both, then Penguin pushed Fish off the roof and into the ocean. A suitably comic-like ambiguous ending to the villain, just in case they ever want to bring her back. Penguin then annoyingly screamed into the night that he was the King of Gotham.

Over to the slightly less violent happenings. Dr. Thompkins declared Barbara physically healed from her ordeal, but in need of counseling. After a half-hearted attempt at refusing, Leslie agrees to have a sit down with Barbara and help her talk through what she endured. It goes exactly as suspected. Barbara's wide-eyed stare was pretty unnerving during the entirety of those scenes, and when she admitted to killing her parents it wasn't much of a surprise. She then attacked Leslie, who after some rough housing managed to subdue her. Gordon, Bullock, and Falcone walked in just in time to find Leslie over Barbara's unconscious form. Although the 'twist' with Barbara wasn't surprising, I do find it an interesting direction to take.

Bruce finally made some headway in his investigation into his father. After he and Alfred tore apart the late Thomas Wayne's study, Bruce remembered Lucius Fox's words from the episode before and tracked down his father's secret. A remote control that opened a passage into an underground portion of the grounds, hello Batcave. The only other thing of note was Ms. Kringle's discovery of Nygma's clue in her dead boyfriend's good-bye note. She didn't seem convinced of Nygma's professed innocence, and after she left he went off the deep end. Not only does he like riddles, he's also suffering from multiple personality disorder. The crazy went from minimal to extreme in a matter of seconds, which was off putting.

Conclusion: A fitting conclusion to the first season of Gotham, “All Happy Families Are Alike” was just as hit and miss as the entire season, with more misses than hits. The biggest positive takeaway from the episode is that they may finally be willing to deviate from the source material. This should help the series find some dramatic tension, I just wish it hadn't taken this long to get there.

Rating: 6/10

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