Sunday, March 1, 2015

Gotham Recap: Red Hood

Your Gotham Girl is back with an all new recap! Spoilers ahead. And, as always, we’d like to remind readers that Gotham contains adult content and viewer discretion is advised.



Alfred’s old military buddy, Reggie, shows up at the manor, hard on his luck after struggling with alcohol. Bruce insists he stay with them a few days.

Reggie finds out Bruce is training. He gives him some tips on how to fight —  not according to the rules of boxing like Alfred teaches, but the ruthless ways of fighting one meets on the streets. Alfred sees them and puts a stop to it. Reggie apologizes in case he overstepped a boundary, and says it’s obvious how much Alfred has helped the boy. Alfred says Bruce is the one who helped him.

Butch takes out his father’s special wine, and drinks are shared as Reggie tells stories. All are enjoying themselves until the stories turn to the war. Alfred, ashamed of his actions during his time in the military, ends the discussion and says it’s time for bed.

In the night, Alfred catches Reggie stealing some of their belongings. He expresses his disappointment in his friend, and tells him all he had to have done is ask for help. Reggie says he’s in deep trouble; and when Alfred tries to make him put the stuff back, Reggie stabs him. As Reggie escapes the manor, Bruce finds the butler out cold and bleeding on the floor, and calls an ambulance. Jim gets a call alerting him to the situation and joins them at the hospital. Bruce, who is shaken by the attack, turns to Jim for comfort.

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Reggie, it turns out, was hired by the board at Wayne’s Enterprises. While at the manor, he took pictures of Bruce’s notes, to find out all he knows about the board’s actions. He tells them that, since Alfred is in the hospital, now is the time to make a move on Bruce.

Barbara, drunk and depressed, distracts herself by trying to help Cat and Ivy. She gives them free clothes and tells Cat she’s a beautiful woman. When Cat doesn’t believe her, she takes her to the mirror and tells her beauty is something she can use as a weapon to get herself further in life. Cat seems skeptical when she considers who this advice is coming from.

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Meanwhile, Oswald’s club is still doing badly. The comedian he hired is booed off the stage, and a problem arises when his employees inform him they have run out of alcohol. Not only that, Maroni owns most of the alcohol in Gotham, and the rest is owned by people he has under his thumb. Since Maroni hates Oswald with a passion, he won’t let him obtain any drinks for the club. Oswald is about to steal alcohol from some of Maroni’s men, when the cops come and confiscate it instead. It turns out the “cops” are actually Butch’s men wearing police uniforms. Butch had thought of a much better plan than Oswald did, and he gives the confiscated alcohol to his new boss.

Oswald is still suspicious of Butch, but Butch assures him the suspicion is unnecessary. He says that if the club tanks, Falcone won’t trust either of them anymore. Besides, Butch says, he’s done being a sidekick. Oswald claims to miss Fish Mooney, and asks if Butch does too.

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Surprisingly, Butch answers bitterly that Fish got what she deserved.

Fish, meanwhile, is going upstairs to meet the manager. She discovers that the manager is really only the assistant to the owner, Dr. Dulmacher. She refuses to talk to the assistant, insisting that she talk to Dr. Dulmacher herself. She says no one will leave the basement until he sits with her and negotiates terms. The manager offers her a shower and new clothes, telling her to freshen up, and they’ll talk again afterwards. Fish does so. When she returns, she asks the manager why they are stealing body parts from living people. He says the parts are used for their clients, as well as Dulmacher’s personal projects. As they talk, the manager begins admiring her eyes. Finally, he gives her a choice: either he kills her and all the people in the basement (all of whom are easily replaced with other captives), or he takes her eyes and leaves her to fend for herself blindly in the basement.

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Not wanting to let him have the upper hand or take advantage of her, Fish takes a spoon and gouges out her own eye, crushing it on the ground with her shoe.

On his way to a bank robbery, Floyd, the lead member of a gang, decides to don a red hood. It seems to give him a new confidence, and he takes charge of the robbery with energy. A guard close by attempts to shoot him, but every bullet misses.

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When the cops come and have him and his gang cornered, the gang throws the money out at people on the street, using the distraction to help them escape. The next day, newspapers everywhere tell the story of what they’re now calling the “Red Hood Gang”, comparing them to Robin Hood because of their “charity” to the people on the street. Floyd is thrilled by their new title. He believes the hood is a symbol of good luck. However, one of the other members of the gang, Destro, decides he wants to wear the hood himself. He murders Floyd and takes the hood, becoming the gang’s new leader.

Jim and Harvey are placed on the case. They discover the gang didn’t go for any of the vaults, but just took what was in the registers. They also learn the gang was in and out of the bank in under two minutes. A worker at bank reports that there was a smoke bomb let off in the bank recently, which they had previously dismissed as a prank. Jim asks for surveillance footage of the incident. While watching the footage, they see Floyd let off the smoke bomb, trigger the alarm, and time the police response in order to see how much time they would have for a robbery later. They also notice Floyd is wearing a work shirt for Kleg’s Auto. The two detectives visit Kleg’s Auto, only to find Floyd’s dead body in the refrigerator.

Destro, as the second Red Hood, leads his gang in another robbery. Unfortunately, he isn’t nearly as competent as his predecessor. At the pleadings of the patrons inside the bank, the gang again releases some of the stolen money into the air. With so much money being given away, none of the Gotham citizens want the Red Hood Gang to be caught. Jim also grimly realizes that, since all it takes is a red hood in order to adopt the persona, the Red Hood is a figure that may never die

A witness comes to the station who claims to have seen the face of the second Red Hood. After narrowing suspects down based on his description, the witness picks Destro out of a line-up. They let Destro go, but watch him secretly from their car, hoping he’ll lead them to the rest of the gang. Destro goes to his apartment, where another member of the gang is waiting for him. He’s ransacked the apartment looking for the hood, and demands Destro give it to him so he can use it to impress his girlfriend. Destro refuses, and the gang member shoots him. At the sound of the gunshot, Jim and Harvey run into the apartment. Jim calls an ambulance. They also find rejection letters from multiple banks, denying Destro a loan. All of them except one are banks the gang has robbed. Jim and Harvey realize the remaining bank must be the gang’s next target.

Jim and Harvey catch up with the gang as the third Red Hood is about to lead them in the robbery. The detectives tell them to drop their weapons; but instead, the Red Hood starts firing at them. A shootout ensues, in which all of the men in the gang are killed. The red hood drops to the ground. Later, it is picked up and put on by a child on the street.

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Final Thoughts: 

Besides a couple of surprises involving Alfred and Fish, not much happened in this episode. Though, after meeting Jerome last week, this week introduced to a few more possible Jokers.

In the comics, The Joker is sometimes presented as a failed comedian, like the one we saw in Oswald’s club. The Joker is also known for once adopting the Red Hood persona. Almost all of the members of the Red Hood Gang in this episode had something of a Joker-ish personality. But they were all quickly proven to be red herrings as they were killed off one by one. At the end, however, we see the red hood picked up by a child on the street. Could he actually be the real Joker? We can’t know for sure. But my money is still on Jerome being the real deal. And it’s not (I hope) just wishful thinking. We’ve seen plenty of possible Jokers on the show so far, but none were advertised as much as Jerome was. The showrunners definitely want him to stick out in our minds. Although... is that because he’s the genuine article, or because the showrunners are trying to trick us?

It was interesting to see more of Barbara and the young girls together. Cat might have shrugged off Barbara’s advice about using beauty as a weapon, but it clearly will have some effect on her later in life. No matter how we feel about Barbara, it looks like she had a hand in shaping the future Catwoman persona.

I am also very intrigued by Butch’s behavior.

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Last time we saw him and Fish together, he seemed to be absolutely in love with her. Now he says “she got what she deserved”? What exactly did Victor Zsasz do to him to change his alliances so much? Or is it really just a ploy to trick Oswald?


What’s To Come: 

It looks like it will be some time before we have any more news on future episodes. Rumor is we have one more episode to enjoy before the show goes on a short hiatus. Once Gotham returns a few weeks later, we’ll have three more episodes before the season’s grand finale is revealed.



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