Intergalactic Comics: Gotham: “Light the Wick” Review

Friday, May 19, 2017

Gotham: “Light the Wick” Review

By: Tyler Carlos (@tylos624)

This week’s episode of Gotham, while happily reintroducing some old villains I’m glad are back, felt like a bit of tease after the action packed events of last week’s episode. “Light the Wick” seemed to promise something a bit more impactful would happen in this episode, but with four episodes left this season, I guess I couldn’t expect the writers to put everything into one episode.

Caution: Spoilers ahead.

Starting with James Gordon, it seems like his time on the Court of Owls is already over after Katherine discovered that James actually broke into her house and found the key card to the Wayne Enterprises Lab. This was a short amount of time, but I am simultaneously surprised that Katherine didn’t see right through Gordon from the start. He has a reputation for doing the right thing, and the Court has a reputation for being an omnipotent presence in Gotham. But, either way, Gordon was able to finally figure out how the Court is going to bring judgment upon Gotham – and I gotta say I really like this.

Using the Tetch virus as the means of bringing destruction upon Gotham is a great way of tying the whole season together – as well as figuring out a way to bring Barnes, AKA The Executioner, back into the mix. This was one of my favorite moments of the episode, because this dude is pissed. He wants vengeance on Gordon so badly, which promises an exciting fight in a future episode. And using the virus as a bioweapon makes a nice connection to the Batman: Arkham Knight video game, or else even Batman Begins. They want Gotham to rip itself apart.

And with the return of Barnes came two more villains: Jervis Tetch, AKA The Mad Hatter, and Hugo Strange. Tetch only made a brief appearance, but that one moment reminded us where he is. As for Strange, he had a much bigger role in this episode, as he is the one who was able to actually weaponize the Tetch virus. Plus, he dropped a little hint that Fish Mooney is alive and well, and now I’m a bit desperate to see how she may play into all of this.

One character that has really gotten under my skin, though, is Leigh Tompkins. Every episode since James killed Mario, she throws in some jibe that she will never forgive him for doing so and that he is a monster. But I mean, come on, James saved Leigh from being killed. When James brought this up, she said that Mario only got the virus because The Mad Hatter wanted to hurt James. Well, what did she expect him to do? Just let a psychopath walk the streets of Gotham? It’s just time for her to stop blaming James and blame the man truly responsible.

Moving over to Oswald, I gotta say that his story was the biggest disappointment this episode. I felt like the previous episode promised a bit more action on his part. Firefly was the action star of his team, as she was the one that torched Talon (btw, how many Talons does the Court have?). The main thing that happened with Penguin is that he was locked up in a Court cage next to Nygma. But even their reunion felt a little anticlimactic. I don’t know, I just thought that there would be a little more something to this reunion.

As for Selina and Ivy, all that happened between these two was Ivy saving Selina using her trusted plants. It’s good to know that this actually how Ivy saved Oswald. But there was almost nothing else to this. All that happened was Ivy saved Selina and now Selina is off to kill the clone Bruce. It was just a bit simple.

Lastly, Bruce is doing well with his training, and it now seems that he is learning to control the anger, sadness, and loneliness he got when his parents died. Bruce’s part in the Court’s plan is still a mystery to me. The Court does everything for a reason; therefore, there is a specific reason they are training Bruce. I believe it must be for something beyond becoming the Batman. They want to turn him into something that will serve them. Perhaps they want him to be the next Talon?

Overall, this was a decent episode, though nowhere near the best of the season. With four episodes to go, there’s still plenty of time for the action I thought might happen in this episode. But with the return of these villains, and the hints at others, along with the new weapon to destroy Gotham, Jim Gordon is definitely in for the fight of his life.