Gotham Season 3 Premiere Thoughts

"Better To Reign In Hell"

Well, the time has finally come for Gotham to make its grand return after such a magnificent 2nd season run (give or take a few episodes during the beginning and final episodes). So, how does the Season 3 premiere deliver overall considering how much the series has truly improved in its overall storytelling and entertainment quality?

Well, if you've followed along my Gotham episode reviews since the beginning, you'd know that I felt pretty mixed to negative about the first season until I eventually took a completely different turn after the series started to get miraculously good in its second run with fresh and interesting new characters and story arcs with a beautiful visual flare to match. However, during the course of the Season 3 premiere, I couldn't help but feel that I was forcefully being thrown right back into Season 1 territory of cringe-worthy over the top performances and abrupt tonal shifts that never feels warranted or earned whenever they appear. 

Almost every single thing that I enjoyed and disliked about this episode is piece by piece the exact same thoughts that I had about Season 1 (with some new additions of course). So, let's break down the positives and negatives for what the new season started us off with.

Pros:

Bruce & Alfred Enters The Battlefield

One of the greatest things that Gotham has delivered on since the beginning is showcasing the evolution of the Bruce Wayne character as well as his growing father-son like relationship with Alfred. You can feel the history between these two whenever they're onscreen together which is credited to the show's amazing storytelling as well as the amazing performances between both actors. I mention this to bring up the fact that, although the season premiere doesn't place the majority of its runtime on their story, we do get to see the two essentially step inside of the lion's den via the Wayne Enterprise boardroom, confront the entire board face to face, and of course face the consequences towards the end.

It was a fantastic way to show the fearlessness inside of Bruce Wayne regarding the mysterious Court of Owls while also reminding the audience of the powerful bond that Alfred shares with him as his guardian during a few spotlight confrontational scenes. Just incase you forgot that Alfred was a lot more than just a butler fetching breakfast for a young rich kid, you will surely be reminded here. I honestly cannot wait to see how this season presents the Court of Owls as the new powerful season villain lurking in the shadows.

We only get to see a glimpse of them here via the masked woman that we saw briefly during Season 2 and what I can only assume to be one of the Talons from the order during the ending home invasion sequence. Something tells me that we'll be in for a thrill ride of a mystery once we begin to see more owl masks popping up down the line.

The Rogues Gallery Continues

One of the greatest things to come out of Season 2 was its full introduction to the more colorful and interesting characters of the Gotham universe such as Mr. Freeze, Firefly, and Flamingo which is exactly what fans of the Batman universe like myself have been eager to see. After such a massive tease with the season finale cliffhanger showing a group of bizarre looking characters escaping out of a bus, it was one of the first times where it actually felt as though the sky was the limit for how far the writers can go in digging up some of the more obscure and possibly mutated characters deep within the comics.

We do get to see these characters in a much more focused light during this episode, but never enough that it felt like an overhaul of new villains being thrown at the screen. Instead, we only get to see a couple of the escapees show off their power to some degree which honestly had me geeking out at the thought of what the series might finally begin to show in the near future regarding super powered characters. Every individual in this circus parade of Indian Hill inmates is a fun "villain of the week" episode or interesting and deep story arc (like Freeze and Firefly) just waiting to happen.

This is both a feeling of excitement and fear all at once as these characters also have the potential of being completely under utilized and tossed to the side for something completely unnecessary. Fingers crossed right?

Cons:

Hey Gotham, your Season 1 is showing! Cover it up will ya?

So here's the part where I almost completely repeat my rant about the first season regarding major issues that almost caused me to stop watching the show altogether. First and foremost, I cannot emphasize enough on how much I'd like them to write off the Fish Mooney character for good. To put it simply, Jada Pinkett Smith's over the top "I am evil! Fear me now!" performance as one of the major villains of Gotham always seem to feel like it belongs to a completely different show where off the wall campy villains (and not the fun kinds either) are more welcomed. There's nothing wrong with a little cheese here and there, but I'm at the point now where I feel that there is simply no reason for her character to exist here especially given the gallery of potentially great villains making their debuts now.

Everyone feels as though they play a significant role exclusive to that character's journey which is one of the more highlighted elements of the storytelling in Gotham. With Fish's character however, there seems to be a few liberties being taken just to force in a few more minutes of screen time with the character, which for me is a few more minutes of mediocrity that can easily be replaced with something much more interesting and/or entertaining. I also have the same issue regarding the Barbara Keen character (especially performance-wise here), but something tells me that we will actually see a complete transition with her making her a bit more manageable down the line. However, her grand evil laugh moment during this episode was possibly the most cringe-worthy scene in the entire series thus far.

Keeping with the theme of Season 1's greatest hits of failure returning, I was definitely getting that feeling of the episode failing to keep consistent with the beautifully dark and mysterious atmosphere that the series keeps shoved in the background somewhere in order to randomly insert comedic elements just for the sake of being "edgy" at times. This comes in the form of scenes where a character (mostly the villains) would deliver a punch line or react to something in a very immature or out of left field manner during what is suppose to be a serious or horrific moment. Needless to say, Gotham's version of "twisted humor" constantly struggles to be funny in my opinion.

There are rare moments where it works beautifully (which can mostly be found within Season 2 regarding the Penguin) and others where it usually falls completely flat. There is a nicely presented comedic side to Gotham, but I'd argue that it actually belongs to the more heroic side such as Butch and Jim's banter as well as Alfred's reactions to crazy events. If the writers can only find a balance between all of these elements (as they've shown in the past), then I'd argue that we'd have one of the most enjoyable comic book series on television period, but until then, we'll just have to hope for the considering this is just the first episode after all.

Overall Thoughts

Overall, Gotham's Season 3 premiere was a mixed bag of a viewing experience. You have promises for more interesting story arcs and new characters to explore like Valerie Vale who makes her debut in this episode played wonderfully so far by Jamie Chung. You also have Gordon taking on a new direction as a bounty hunter, Bruce Wayne finally confronting the Court of Owls, and Indian Hill's experiments running rampant in the streets.

Unfortunately, you also have a heavy focus on Fish Mooney (a character that is heavily disliked by myself and quite a few fans of the show), Barbara Keen possibly going even more over the top than before as the forcefully presented "crazy bitch" character, the abrupt tonal shifts that drove me crazy during Season 1, and the possibility of refreshing villains being highly underutilized. 

This is definitely shaping up to be one interesting season if this season premiere is any indication. Here's hoping for an incredible Season 3 giving people another reason why they should definitely add Gotham to their list of comic book TV shows to binge and geek out over.

Bonus Content

Villain Teases

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I was thinking that Killer Croc in his early stages was the guy standing to the right of Ms. Peabody here.

Just one episode in and I've already filled my head with questions pertaining whether or not the characters we got glimpses of were original creations or ripped straight out of the comics with a completely new design and backstory. Did we actually see characters like Hush creeping around, Croc robbing a pharmacy, and more without knowing it yet? So many questions and an entire season to contemplate and geek out over

Was that Gordon Fighting Killer Croc?

This one still has me scratching my head. It's a pretty decent scene to introduce the audience to the idea of Gotham slowly being invaded by "monsters" as we're used to seeing even more profoundly within other Batman related media outlets, but I'm still not convinced that we saw Killer Croc here considering another character teased that looked a lot more reptilian in a previous episode and later shown standing behind Ms. Peabody.

The Answer to Ivy's Rapid Aging Re-Cast

Ever since the casting for Ivy was revealed to be a young woman instead of the child actress that we were presented with previously, there have been several theories as to how the show would explain this miraculous growth spurt. Well, it's cool to see that not only was she targeted for death (which is pretty traumatic for a child), but the fact that she barely escapes while getting affected by an age accelerator meta-human is pretty interesting and refreshing. 

Nygma's Speech

It's always nice to see arguably my favorite character on the show since Season 1 make his return (although pretty brief). I thought it was great for them to remind the audience how brilliant Ed was after he solves a seemingly impossible puzzle in a matter of seconds. But even more impactful is the fact that he motivates Penguin into taking down Fish through a clever wordplay regarding nature.

Episode Rating: 7/10