The roll “Gotham” has been on lately slowed for me with “Tonight’s the Night.” It’s not surprising given that front and center this week was the Gordon/Barbara relationship, about which I have never cared, even before she was a crazy loon.
After a dumb dream sequence of her and Jim’s wedding rehearsal (which the Penguin pops into randomly as the priest), Barbara wakes up to a gift from Galavan. The new mayor is being a nervous nelly about Gordon being on to him. Not wanting to murder Gordon at the moment (more on that later), he instead decides to let Barbara off her leash as a distraction. Her big plan? To show up at the precinct and surrender, say she’ll only speak to Gordon, and sweet talk him into going somewhere with her.
Everybody – Bullock, Barnes, your dog, people who don’t even watch this show – knows this is a trap. But Gordon bullheadedly insists on playing along with her, hoping she can give him something on Galavan (in a scene earlier in the episode, Captain Barnes entertained his conspiracy theory more seriously than I thought he would, but still demanded to see concrete evidence before making a move on the mayor). Leslie in particular isn’t psyched by this plan, and not because she’s jealous Gordon tried to disarm Barbara with a kiss. “Her sickness and yours feed off each other,” she tells a dumbfounded Gordon. “You see an abyss and you run toward it. That’s not healthy.”
The story literally drives around in circles until Barbara, with Tabitha’s help, gets the jump on Gordon and then has Leslie abducted. Donning a wedding dress and wielding a shotgun (get it?), she has them brought to the church from her dream and then delivers a super long sermon about Gordon’s dark side, about her knowing Gordon better than Leslie, blah, blah, blah. There are some tiny bits that work in this sequence. I was legitimately surprised that, when Barbara tried to shock Leslie by exposing Gordon’s deal with the Penguin, Leslie revealed she already knew (I’ve actually come around on Leslie a lot the last few weeks). And it was interesting to see tension bubble up between Bullock and Barnes as they tracked down their missing comrades. Overall, though? Not the show’s best.
But before Barbara falls off the cathedral roof (which she somehow survives, boo!), she does reveal where the Galavans have stashed Mayor James. The cops find him and it’s the smoking gun Gordon needs to arrest Galavan, which he handles super professionally by stalking in and slugging him in the face. I can’t help thinking Galavan planned this turn of events for some reason, but I guess we’ll see next week.
So Galavan decided not to kill Gordon at the top of the episode because he feared his sudden death would upset Bruce when he needs the Wayne heir pliable and susceptible to his machinations. After a spoonful of Silver, Galavan makes his pitch to Bruce. First, he twists the knife by noting all the bad that’s been going on under the Wayne Enterprises banner – “toxic waste dumps, illegal weapons contracts, use of banned chemicals, nightmarish experiments.” Galavan then explains that he wants to buy Bruce’s majority shares, which would allow him to clean up the company while Bruce gets cash and closure. And finally, as a cherry on top of the sundae, he claims that he can give Bruce impeachable proof of who murdered his parents.
Now, this is straight-up blackmail and Bruce should be wondering why someone who’s always been nice to him is now ruthlessly dangling this carrot in his face. Thankfully, Alfred has my back, calling it “bloody extortion.” But Bruce raises the point that if he isn’t in a position to fix Wayne Enterprises himself, as a minor, it might be his moral responsibility to cede to someone who can. He also tearfully wonders if it’s wrong that he just wants it all to be over, a small character moment that reminds us that Bruce is still only a child, and that is wonderfully played by David Mazouz. In any case, Bruce changes his mind at the last minute, just before Gordon bursts in, but is stricken when Galavan burns the file on his parents’ death (which I’m guessing was fake anyway).
Edward Nygma’s subplot is mostly skippable. Wearing a jaunty cap, he heads out into the woods to give Kristen Kringle “as proper a burial as circumstances allow.” When a hunter stumbles across the scene, Edward of course has to whack him too. It’s all pretty boring. But then, in the episode’s final minute, we see this was all a set-up for Edward to cross paths with the Penguin, injured from last week’s shootout and begging for help. Cory Michael Smith and Robin Lord Taylor were a blast in the brief scene they shared last season so I’m looking forward to seeing where this team-up goes.
“Tonight the Night” wasn’t for me, but hey, there’s always tomorrow. What did you think of this week’s “Gotham?”
