‘Gotham’ 3.11 Recap: “And the Penny Drops…”

Somehow, I don’t think there’s such a thing as a good day for a wedding in ‘Gotham’. Seriously, why would anyone ever get married in this city?

Episode ‘Beware the Green-Eyed Monster’ opens with Mario murdering the lab scientist working on the test for the Alice Tetch blood infection. Imagining that the man is Jim Gordon, he crushes his skull with his bare hands. That’s not something a normal person does.

While Jim is investigating the death of the scientist, Mario sneaks up on him and knocks him out. Rather than kill him, he wants to do something he considers even worse. He’s going to make Lee hate Jim. The first step in this plan is to leave a clue written on Jim’s hand: the word “Arkham.”

When Jim awakes, he follows the clue to the asylum and questions Jervis Tetch. He wants to know who else could be infected with Alice’s blood. Tetch plays games with him and won’t divulge the info, until Jim outsmarts him and gets him to reveal that Mario is infected.

Jim arrests Mario (on what charge, exactly?) and forces him to take a blood test, but he’s perplexed when the results come back negative. Jim is convinced that Mario must be infected and has found a way to beat the test, but Harvey thinks he’s acting out of jealousy over Lee. Because they have nothing concrete to hold Mario on, Harvey lets him go.

At this point, Jim is acting even more irrationally than Mario. He goes to Mario’s house and pulls a gun on him, but Mario has Victor Zsasz as a bodyguard. They make Jim stand down, but let him go.

At the church on the day of the wedding, Jim tries to warn Lee that Mario is infected. She thinks he’s acting crazy and doesn’t believe him. She tells him that he needs to let her go. Jim realizes that this was Mario’s plan – to turn Lee against him. He tells her that he loves her, but she slaps him and says that she and Mario are leaving Gotham and that she’ll never see him again. A couple of Falcone’s goons haul Jim away and rough him up, preventing him from stopping the wedding. Lee marries Mario as planned.

Jim returns to work defeated, only for Lucius to tell him that he’s figured out how Mario beat the blood test. Jim obtains a warrant to search Mario’s house, but he and Lee have already left town.

Jim tells Falcone about the virus. Falcone agrees to have a couple of his men bring Mario back to town. That’s not good enough for Jim, so he shoots the two goons in the legs to hobble them and demands to know where Lee and Mario are.

They’re at a cottage on a lake. When Mario asks Lee about Jim, she admits that a part of her will always care for him. This drives Mario mad with jealousy. He hears voices in his head and sneaks up on Lee with a knife. Just then, Jim barges in, sees the knife, and instinctively shoots Mario dead (presumably). The knife falls in the water. Lee never saw it. She thinks that Jim just straight-up murdered her innocent husband.

I don’t think these two will be getting back together anytime soon.

Love Hurts

Setting in motion her plan to pit Ed Nygma against Penguin, Barbara taunts Ed about the fact that Butch was not Isabella’s killer. At this point, Ed thinks the murder was political retribution to get to Penguin through him. Barbara not-so-subtly drops a hint that Penguin in fact had Isabella killed. Ed thinks that’s ridiculous. What could be his motive? Using his own fondness for riddles against him, Barbara clues Ed in that Penguin is in love with him. Ed refuses to believe it.

Nonetheless, the seed of doubt has started to grow in his mind. He tricks Penguin into revealing that what Barbara said is true – he is in love with Ed. Ed is revolted.

Tabitha’s hand has been reattached and she has some minimal amount of function in it. She’s furious when she sees Ed again, but Barbara tells her to settle down. Ed says that he wants to destroy Penguin utterly. Barbara agrees to help, but has one condition. After they bring Penguin down, she wants to be the new crime boss of Gotham. Also, she makes Ed apologize to Tabitha for cutting off her hand.

Give a Hoot

After receiving the news that Volk was murdered, Bruce worries that the Court of Owls know that he struck a deal with the Whisper Gang. Because he still has the key that Volk told him opens a safe holding something that can destroy the Owls, Bruce plots a heist to break into an Owl-controlled building and open the safe. The problem is that the room has a high-tech security system with a laser grid across the floor. To get past that, he practices tightrope walking. Selina thinks this is all a bad idea and tells him she’s cutting out.

The day of the heist, Selina returns after all and insists on walking the tightrope, since she has much better balance and reflexes than Bruce. All the while, they’re being watched from afar.

Alfred distracts the guards at the building while Bruce and Selina slip in. Bruce holds the rope over the floor and Selina walks across. She opens the safe with a key. Inside is an owl statue. This is the dangerous thing that can destroy the Court of Owls? Selina grabs it, but an Owl assassin hits Bruce, forcing him to drop the rope. Selina falls into the laser grid and sets off the alarm. Alfred fights with the assassin when a mysterious woman (Ivana Milicevic) shows up from out of nowhere and kills the baddie. Selina is shocked. She announces that this is her mother!

Episode Verdict

I guess that’s the end of the Mario storyline, unless the show pulls a twist and has him survive the shooting. He’s a boring character, so I’d rather he just be written out. Unfortunately, Jervis Tetch is still around. He needs to go too.

The Bruce Wayne/Court of Owls stuff still feels like it’s moving at a snail’s pace. Introducing Selina’s mother is interesting, I guess. That depends on whether she gets anything worthwhile to do.

I like the idea of Ed feuding with Penguin. That could provide a decent storyline for the back half of the season.

This episode is the mid-season finale. The show won’t be back until mid-January. It honestly hasn’t left us with much of a cliffhanger. This third season has meandered quite a bit and is probably the show’s weakest to date. I hope it comes back stronger and more focused in the new year.

1 comment

  1. Paul Yont

    You forgot to mention one thing. At the end of the episode, if you look at Leslie Thompkins’s face, you see Mario’s infected Alice Tetch virus blood all over her, which means, Dr. Thompkins’s is now infected with the virus. Eventually, she will show signs of it, and find out the hard way that Jim was telling the truth. You’re right about Jim and Lee not reconciling anytime soon, she will be busy seeking treatment for the virus, if she can be cured. Mario made sure that the cure to the virus was compromised before he died. Yes, Jim shot Mario dead, Mario got shot in the chest twice, and one of the bullets hit his heart, so there you go.

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