Previously on Gotham, Jim Gordon stopped a couple of time-traveling child-snatchers from selling Catgirl into slavery while Renee Montoya and Crispus Allen scooted around town trying to find out who killed Oswald Cobblepot. However! Oswald Cobblepot was not dead at all, just hitchhiking upstate leaving a trail of dead bodies and tuna sandwich wrappers behind him. Carmine Falcone taught Fish Mooney a lesson by beating up her boy toy, so she shouted a lot and flipped some tables and wore a lot of backless dresses.
A guy from child services drops off Catgirl at GCPD, much to the dismay of Harvey Bullock whose two main feelings in life are: I am not going to work and I HATE EVERYTHING. The only reason he doesn’t knock Catgirl across the room with ham fists is Jim Gordon scoots her to safety and makes a deal with her about how he can keep her from getting shipped “upstate” if she can help him find the shiny-shoed guy who killed the Waynes. Ten minutes later, she has broken free from the place he handcuffed her in Crime Alley and he is in the sewer covered in gutter gunk. Point: Catgirl.
Across town, a billionaire banker prick does Ponzi scheme stuff, and then he finds himself handcuffed to a weather balloon, flying high (and dying high) above Gotham. And then one of GCPD’s finest gets tied to a weather balloon and suffers the same fate. And by “GCPD’s finest,” of course, I mean “the latest Gotham City cop who does stuff like use his trophy of commendation to beat the stuffing out of the citizens he’s questioning.” It doesn’t take Jim Gordon very long to realize there’s a vigilante on the loose, and so he goes to the (no joke) “weather balloon factory” to find out who the heck is causing these shenanigans.
While he’s doing that, Renee Montoya and Crispus Allen are dogging his steps because they’re convinced he offed Oswald Cobblepot (whose poor mother is sitting home alone right now dressed like the Mad Hatter, making stacks and stacks of tuna sandwiches, watching Twin Peaks on repeat on Netflix). They confront him about it and when he refuses to confess, Renee just breaks right the hell into Barbara Kean’s house to warn her about her fiendish fiance.
Babs: Dude! Creep, much? Montoya: Dude, wake and bake, much? It’s 10:30 in the morning and it smells like a Rastafarian convention in here. Babs: It’s none of your beeswax, Renee. God. Montoya: Fine, but is that all you’re doing? Babs: That and watching The L Word reruns, something that’s also not your business. Montoya: I hate to keep bringing this up, but Jim Gordon shot Oswald Cobblepot in the face on the orders of Carmine Falcone. Babs: You just don’t like him because I love him. Montoya: I mean, that’s fair. The way I am so close to you face staring at your lips would seem to indicate that I want to do more than break into your house and chastise you for smoking up. Also, though, he’s crooked. Babs: You should leave now. Montoya: Should we make out first? Babs: Yes. Babs: No. Babs: Wait, yes. No. I don’t know! Go away!
Obviously Barbara is going to end up with Jim, but holy lord, that chemistry is smoking like a … Gotham cop’s fiance sitting at home in her bathrobe in the middle of the day. No, but for real. I didn’t breathe for that whole two minutes. Every time I watched that scene. Which was seven times. So, 14 minutes of not breathing, total.
What is Fish Mooney doing today? I’m glad you asked. She is ordering a hit on Carmine Falcone’s girlfriend, for starters, and then ordering a hit on the guy she was shagging that got beaten down by Carmine’s goons last week, and looking Carmine straight in the eyeballs like, “Ah, so sad to hear your girlfriend got shot to death by some muggers. What a town!” Carmine’s all, “When I find out who killed her, both the guy with the gun and the guy who gave the order, I will make them pay with their own blood and guts.” Mooney smiles because this show needs her way more than it needs another angry white man. Do your worst, Falcone. This is Gotham, not Rosewood. Black people don’t die from falling off a chair!
She and her bare back also meet with Allen and Montoya. She tells them that Gordon pulled the trigger on Cobblepot and Montoya goes, “Proof, though? Do you have proof? GIVE ME THE PROOF!” Fish doesn’t bite (sorry), but does point them in the direction of Carmine Falcone, who gave the order.
Anyway, obviously Oswald Cobblepot is not dead. He shows back up in Gotham and goes on an immediate murder spree. First he slices open a guy for one hundred dollars for which to buy sandwiches (of course!) and then he chops off a man’s legs so he can steal his shoes which are the exact kind of shoes a person needs to work in a restaurant. The next day he goes to work as a dishwasher at a restaurant that is frequented by mob bosses, and he spends the whole time waddling around and eavesdropping and talking about Mother to anyone who will listen.
Anyway, after a priest (who was known for molesting children) gets swiped up by Balloon-Man, Gordon and Bullock finally track him down. And Balloon-Man tells Jim a real and eerie thing: The police have had their chance to clean up the city, and the only thing they’ve managed to do is get more and more awful. So there’s a new breed of crimefighter and that breed is vigilantes and so watch out.
At Stately Wayne Manor, young Master Bruce refuses to eat no matter how much Alfred wallops him with a cane in the name of sword-fighting. Meal after meal he goes hungry, until he sees the thing about the Balloon-Man on the news. A guy who uses gadgets and street smarts to bring criminals to justice when the police are too corrupt or incompetent to do it. Bruce eats a bite of mashed potatoes and has a think. The Balloon-Man did good things but in a bad way. What if there was a guy who did good things in good ways? What if-“EAT YOUR GODDAMN BEANS,” Alfred shouts, smashing through the door and brandishing a whip.
Bruce Wayne eats his beans.
Next week: Fish Mooney is gonna get her gaymo on, apparently. Also, the prop department gave Renee Montoya a hat, and my pants are on fire, so.
