Gotham: Red Hood

February 23, 2015 9:52 PM - Season 1, Episode 17

Gordon and Bullock investgate an unusual bank robbery involving a crook with a garish costume. An old friend comes to visit Alfred. Bruno helps Penguin make a booze run. Fish goes to see the prison's manager. Barbara continues to hang out with Cat and Ivy.
posted by Small Dollar (22 comments total)

wtf fish??? Why?
posted by davidmsc at 10:01 PM on February 23, 2015

Superfluous subplots are all fun and games until someone loses an eye.
posted by Catblack at 10:51 PM on February 23, 2015 [4 favorites]

I've only been watching this on and off and that moment with Fish made me go "WHAT THE WHY NO WHAT" at the TV.

The final scene was a neat little twist that neither my neighbour nor I were expecting at all.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:49 PM on February 23, 2015

I was enjoying the episode until the Fish scene. Had to turn the channel. Far too over-the-top graphic for my taste.
posted by Thorzdad at 5:44 AM on February 24, 2015

If they're bringing in the Red Hood I might have to get caught up with this.
posted by Pope Guilty at 1:53 PM on February 24, 2015

I tell you what: Of all the places I thought this wandering Fish Mooney plotline might go, I was definitely *not* expecting it to tie in to the seemingly long-since-forgotten dollmaker kidnapping ring from Episode Two. Gotta give 'em credit for that one.
posted by mstokes650 at 2:30 PM on February 24, 2015 [2 favorites]

I thought for a moment this morning I had dreamed that scene.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 2:54 PM on February 24, 2015

(I've seen a lot of people elsewhere say what Fish did made no sense, but the logic seemed pretty clear to me. She either did it out of spite, or -- and I think this is it, because it's so preposterously cold-blooded and pragmatic it works, especially in this universe -- because she knew they needed a set to sell to their clients.

ETA: My big question after last night's episode: Did Butch set Fish up? I presumed her kidnapping was random to this point, but saying "she got what she deserved"...hmmmm.)
posted by kittens for breakfast at 3:10 PM on February 24, 2015 [2 favorites]

Once again, this show frustrates me with tiny glimpses of promise (the Red Hood plot started well, as did the Alfred's SAS-buddy plot) that are ultimately overwhelmed by the sheer dumbness of basically everything else.

I liked the basic idea of the Red Hood story -- the concept that wearing a mask can turn someone into something a bit more than what they are -- and the subtle Joker allusions throughout showed that Gotham doesn't have to constantly jab the audience in the ribs with the foreshadowing. But by the end, it devolved into a bunch of guys fighting over a magical lucky ski-mask, and the point was lost.

Barbara's ongoing subplot went from superfluous to sort of troubling; The whole "use your beauty as a weapon" bit with Selina came out of precisely nowhere, and compounded the show's already rather problematic handling of Barbara's bisexuality.

The eyeball scene, when taken in the context of last week's episode, made it clear that Fish Mooney's idea of a sure fire power-play tactic is gnawing her own leg off before checking to see if it's actually caught in the trap. The show wants us to think that she's a dangerous, gutsy lady with plans inside of plans, but nearly every move she's made in the past 3-4 episodes hasn't made one tiny lick of sense.
posted by Strange Interlude at 9:51 PM on February 24, 2015 [3 favorites]

Gee, I wonder if Alfred will survive.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 4:21 AM on February 25, 2015 [2 favorites]

I really love this show, in a "it's so bad, it's good" kind of way.
posted by entropicamericana at 7:39 AM on February 25, 2015

Gee, I wonder if Alfred will survive.

You jest, but wouldn't it be great if he did die ?
posted by Pendragon at 8:08 AM on February 25, 2015 [3 favorites]

I've already written this show off as a crazy, misguided alternate reality to the comics, films, and cartoons, so I keep waiting for something like that to happen. I don't know what it would accomplish to have Alfred randomly murdered six months after the Waynes, but by gum, it's something.
posted by Strange Interlude at 8:27 AM on February 25, 2015 [3 favorites]

The whole "use your beauty as a weapon" bit with Selina came out of precisely nowhere, and compounded the show's already rather problematic handling of Barbara's bisexuality.

To be fair, as soon as that phrase escaped her lips, Selina called her out. "How'd that work out for you?"
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:53 AM on February 25, 2015 [2 favorites]

But is that even in character for Barbara? All we've seen her do in 17 episodes is drunkenly flounce around her apartment while single-handedly sabotaging all of her personal relationships. If her beauty is a weapon, then it must be a sock full of nerf.

And even if it was, it still comes across as though Barbara was attempting to sexually groom a homeless girl with lavish gifts and praise, which just feels like a particularly gross and perniciously stereotypical thing for an LGBT character on a prime-time TV show to do. I can't imagine that it made it from the writer's room to the table read to the final episode without somebody pointing that out, but here we are.
posted by Strange Interlude at 10:27 AM on February 25, 2015 [4 favorites]

And even if it was, it still comes across as though Barbara was attempting to sexually groom a homeless girl with lavish gifts and praise

You forgot "underaged," and yes, it was very bizarre.
posted by entropicamericana at 10:33 AM on February 25, 2015 [4 favorites]

The next sock puppet here absolutely should be called A Sock Full of Nerf.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:41 AM on February 25, 2015 [1 favorite]

The eyeball scene, when taken in the context of last week's episode, made it clear that Fish Mooney's idea of a sure fire power-play tactic is gnawing her own leg off before checking to see if it's actually caught in the trap.

I about lost my keyboard to that. Thanks.

And yeah, that's how this is coming across: we're definitely intended to get the impression that Fish is super cornered and dangerous, but they keep doing it in situations where she definitely has the option of exerting violence on someone *else*, and so it just makes her look crazy. (Like, this could still work if the Dollmaker had a hostage that rendered her unable to hurt his goons or something, but they're not even really trying, here.)

I've already written this show off as a crazy, misguided alternate reality to the comics, films, and cartoons, so I keep waiting for something like that to happen.

Me too. I know they won't, but the only thing that could make Gotham an interesting piece of Batman fiction - as opposed to a trainwreck that I observe in a hopeless attempt to determine what drugs are being passed around by the writers - is for it to jump to fully alternate continuity somewhere. Alfred dies. Bruce dies. Gordon ends up with Dr. Thompkins instead of Barbara, without pulling a Smallville Jimmy Olson scenario. Edward Nygma becomes a hero and stays one. *Something.*

(I've been hoping for this to be a world where Bruce Wayne never ends up as Batman, personally.)
posted by mordax at 11:14 AM on February 25, 2015 [3 favorites]

It certainly looks like that's where they're heading. If Young Bruce gets too much closure on his parents' murder and succeeds in rooting out the malfeasance at Wayne Industries, then what motivation does he have to become Batman?
posted by Strange Interlude at 11:20 AM on February 25, 2015 [1 favorite]

I can see the 11 o'clock Gotham news now: "Joseph Chill, CEO of Wayne Industries, was arrested last night when..."
posted by entropicamericana at 12:20 PM on February 25, 2015 [2 favorites]

It certainly looks like that's where they're heading. If Young Bruce gets too much closure on his parents' murder and succeeds in rooting out the malfeasance at Wayne Industries, then what motivation does he have to become Batman?

Unfortunately, that's also the reason I don't think it'll happen - whomever calls the shots on Gotham isn't big on making sense.

I can see the 11 o'clock Gotham news now: "Joseph Chill, CEO of Wayne Industries, was arrested last night when..."

I'd be so thrilled to see something like that. I wish alt continuity had more traction in US entertainment, instead of being relegated mostly to shitty reboots.
posted by mordax at 2:18 PM on February 25, 2015

(I've seen a lot of people elsewhere say what Fish did made no sense, but the logic seemed pretty clear to me. She either did it out of spite, or -- and I think this is it, because it's so preposterously cold-blooded and pragmatic it works, especially in this universe -- because she knew they needed a set to sell to their clients.

The manager said that he'd have no problem killing Fish and everyone in the basement. This isn't a Scaevola-esque 'prove my toughness' situation.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:44 PM on March 8, 2015