Round Two: Gotham

Gotham: Season 1, Episode 2 “Selina Kyle” (C+)

Perhaps I was too optimistic about the prospects of this show based off the pilot, and now I’m worried that this show will rapidly devolve just like other shows that are meant to be for sophisticated audiences but take on an all too simplistic air when it comes to portraying heroes and villains. This show has clearly defined its good guys – Jim, Cat, Bruce, and Alfred – and everyone else might as well be wholly evil. That doesn’t exactly make for great drama, but it can create plenty of cartoonish behavior and unfulfilling storylines. I can’t deny the creepiness of the snatchers, particularly the woman portrayed by Lili Taylor, who first made an impression on me as Lisa on “Six Feet Under.” She was joined by Frank Whaley, whose last gig was as FBI Agent Van Miller on “Ray Donovan.” While they were clearly the baddest of the bad, even the not-quite-villains have sinister movies, like Richard Kind’s Mayor James and Zabryna Guevara’s Captain Essen, who far from convincingly told Jim that she couldn’t order him to break the law but that he should anyway. Jim’s behavior is questionable and inconsistent, as he made Harvey believe that he killed Oswald but readily admitted to him that Barbara was the one who leaked the story about the child snatchers to the newspaper. Oswald is leaving quite a trail of destruction in his wake, and it won’t be look before word of his being alive gets back to Gotham, though Fish may be preoccupied with hating Carmine for the way he is treating her.