Gotham Episode 2.08 recap and a preview for next week
Barbara wakes from a nightmare in which she is at the rehearsal for her and Jim’s wedding. In her dream, the wedding doesn’t go as planned, with Penguin as the priest, Theo as the organist, and it ends with her being held at gunpoint by the Arkham inmates while Lee arrives to marry Jim. When Barbara wakes, she pushes aside a pile of whips and collars and other BDSM toys to see a big gift box signed “Love G.” This is from Theo, and she loves it. This scene is intriguing because it shows the two sides of Barbara as depicted by her two lovers: Tabitha with the sex toys; Theo with what we later discover is the wedding dress she bought for her wedding with Jim. It only makes it slightly creepy that Tabitha and Theo are siblings. Anyway, Theo promises Barbara that today is the day she gets to kill Jim Gordon. He will be busy with other plans.
At GCPD, Jim is pushing to convince Barnes that Theo is a criminal. Barnes is happy to believe that is true, but wants proof. As “luck” would have it, Barbara strolls into the station and turns herself in.
In the interrogation room, Barbara will only speak to Jim, and of course, she wants him to rough her up. Jim just wants to help her, knows she is a good woman, just sick. Barbara starts crying, so Jim approaches and comforts her with a kiss. She is so excited that he still has feelings for her, and she wants to show him something. It’s a surprise and it isn’t far. If he goes with her, she promises to “tell him everything.” Lee, who was watching the interrogation, thinks Barbara is severely mentally ill, but Jim wants to play along, let Barbara think she is in control. Barnes thinks it is risky, but okays the mission. He has new Strike Force team members who will follow Jim, Bullock, and Barbara in a tactical vehicle. Barnes pulls Bullock aside and tells him about his concern that Jim will get “sucked into the mind games.” Lee pulls Jim aside to voice her own concerns: that he has a sickness that plays off of Barbara’s: “You see an abyss and you run to it.”
Barbara, Jim, and Bullock head out, with Barbara giving directions from the back seat. Jim tries to talk to her the whole time, trying to get her to divulge any information. All she will talk about is the wedding she was planning with Jim, that she still loves him. Bullock wants to call the whole thing off. Jim insists on a little more time with her, so when Barnes calls the car back, worried they are heading into a trap, Bullock pretends they have a bad connection and hangs up. Seconds later, the squad car is T-boned by a big rig. Tabitha and her goons open fire on the Strike Force. With the help of the squad, Barbara is freed and Jim is tranquilized. Bullock makes it back to the station, and Barnes is furious that he disobeyed and sends him home. Of course, Bullock doesn’t listen to his boss, and while replaying the audio recordings from his time with Jim and Barbara, realizes that Crazypants is going to take Jim to a church to “marry” him. Barnes takes some convincing, but eventually follows Bullock’s tip.
Jim wakes to find that the insanity has only just begun. He is in a church, tied to a chair, and Barbara appears in the wedding dress she bought for their wedding, clutching a gun instead of a bouquet. A priest and a handful of random witnesses are also there. All bound, all gagged. Jim insists he doesn’t want to die, and that he never lied to Lee. Barbara doesn’t believe that, so Tabitha wheels in Lee. As a sign of good faith, Barbara admits the mayor is alive and well, being held in a warehouse down by the port. She thinks she is going to ruin Lee and Jim’s relationship by asking Lee how Jim got back on the force, but Lee already knew all about the guy Jim killed while collecting for Penguin. This is a surprise to Barbara, but that doesn’t stop her, and she takes out a knife, promising to cut off Lee’s face to prove she loves Jim more. Lee tries to distract her with flattery over her dress, and Crazypants takes the bait. Jim finally cuts through his binds and tackles Barbara with a gun. She taunts him to shoot her, and sirens wail in the distance. As if on cue, Tabitha and her goons come in and shoot the place up, with the Strike Force right behind them. Barbara disappears, but only for a moment. Jim chases her up into the rafters.
Barbara attacks Jim with a knife and the pair tumble about, eventually smashing through a stained-glass window. Barbara falls out, and Jim grabs her by the hand in the nick o’ time. He tells her to hold on, but she doesn’t. She tells him she loves him then lets go. Jim screams as she plummets to the ground. The bushes break her fall. A concussion and a handful of bone fractures, Barbara is in critical condition, but alive. Lee “needs to talk” to Jim, but will do so when “all this is over.” Of course, living in Gotham, it will never be “over,” but we will let Lee have her moment.
Barnes is not too happy about the way the night played out, until Jim gives up the tip on the mayor. The squad hurries down there and find the mayor, his head locked in a box. Without hesitation, the mayor IDs Theo Galavan as the one who did this to him.
While Barbara is playing fake wedding, Theo is buttering up Bruce. He convinces the boy they both want the same thing: a safe, clean, prosperous Gotham. Theo claims that Wayne Enterprises is behind all sorts of heinous acts: weapons contracts, toxic dumping, human experiments. He feels confident that he can clean all those things up and wants to buy out Bruce’s 51% of the company. Bruce would be a cash billionaire, and as a signing bonus, Theo offers Bruce a file that contains everything he needs to know about the man who killed his parents. He gives Bruce until the end of the day to decide.
Alfred thinks Theo’s plan sounds like extortion; Bruce says it is a negotiation. “There is a thin line between extortion and negotiations,” he informs Alfred. “But there is a line,” is his response. Bruce just wants to put it all behind him. He is worried about those that will suffer while he is waiting to become the man capable of bringing down Wayne Enterprises (or at least the Evil Division) and more than anything is worried about the legacy of his father. Alfred reminds him that Bruce is his father’s legacy.
Even still, Bruce decides to sell. More than anything, he wants to know who killed his parents. But that night, at Theo’s office, Bruce hesitates when it comes time to sign. Good thing, because as he informs Theo he doesn’t want to sell, Jim and his back up storm into the office to arrest Theo for the kidnap and torture of the mayor. Before they handcuff Theo, he tosses the file on Bruce’s parents into the fire.
Also: Ed has taken Kristen out to the woods to bury the trunk her carved-up body is packed into. While there, he has one final picnic laid out for the two of them. The “romantic” interlude is interrupted by a nosy hunter. Ed knocks him out with the shovel, then realizes he won’t fit into the hole unless Ed cuts him up. He trudges back to the car to retrieve his bone saw, and when he returns, he sees someone has been eating his picnic. With a sigh, Ed collects his saw and a flashlight and heads into the woods to track down this elusive sandwich thief. It is deep into the dark of night before he comes upon a small camper with all the lights on. Penguin stumbles out, begging for help before he collapses.
Check out a preview for next week’s episode, “A Bitter Pill to Swallow.”
