If The Mask is to be believed, then there must be something in the water if as many of Gotham’s wealthiest account for its most insane, as we’ve come to be told. Fatter pocketbooks feed sicker minds (or so the city’s hypnotists would indicate) and for the most devious, sanity is all a game of theatrics hid behind faces of all kinds. Last week, Gotham introduced us to a decidedly absurder face behind the chaos.
Richard Sionis – a rather subtle twist on who comic fans will recognize as Roman Sionis, The Black Mask – is a wealthy entrepreneur looking for a good time, namely in the form of pitting his workers to the death. The fight club imagery (and by that we mean the David Fincher film) is intricately juxtaposed against both the after office hours bloodsport it’s meant to convey and all the anarcho-capitalism of its inspiration. Would-be Uncharted actor Todd Stashwick of Justified fame slips on the role like a glove with icy charm and terror. It’s a shame to say that his untimely conclusion comes without any sort of ceremony.
It doesn’t help that the police virtually call out the rather outlandish nature of his particular pass time in their infrequent commentary on how crazy the city’s getting. It would have been better to play it close to the vest and not call out the absurdity so much, much less tie everything to the Waynes’ deaths. If Sionis was holding these kinds of events for this for years, how would their allegedly employable winners ever explain their overnight amputations to the public? At least they made something out of Edward Nigma’s amusing autopsy rants. “What does a dead man and an emu have in common?” Exactly, Nigma. Exactly.
Despite the clumsy logic, the fallout from Jim Gordon’s stand against the mob was very much still present here. Gordon’s bubbling resentment of his coworkers was a satisfying touch and Bullock finding himself ostracized for once undeniably led to Donal Logue’s finest scene yet. Bullock’s “rousing speech” of sorts was the kind of comedically endearing moment that got the cops off their asses and to aid Gordon in the end, if not entirely win their trust.
What developments we got from the Gordon household only turned another tired chapter in the Jim/Barbara melodrama – and by this point, its tug-of-war is failing to pull either of them in interesting directions. Jim’s double-life has yet to sell a believable tension between him and the Missus to-be, much less establish a compelling chemistry. If Barbra’s inexplicable talent at dipping in and out of relevance isn’t enough of a frustration, then her constant indecisiveness only continues to subvert what should be her role as Jim’s moral compass. She’s essentially left Gordon twice now, once out of when she was lied to and another when told the truth. If they’re are really no monsters, then there’s little reason.
Beneath all their newfound lip-service, tensions continued to simmer between Fish and Penguin too in a delightfully awkward dinner that managed to serve up a nasty stabbing and one dead umbrella boy. While we learned a few mundane updates regarding Liza’s plan gone nowhere, what we really learned was about Fish herself. After what seems like all too long, we finally understand her vendetta against Falcone as it related to a tragic childhood trauma– albeit it in conjunction with an onstage performance by a woman that could’ve been her mother. It was all rather refreshing to know there’s something behind Fish’s cruel eyes, if not too little too late.
Meanwhile, it was another fight club at Master Wayne’s prep school which undoubtedly stole the best, if not perplexing scene of the episode. Despite a slightly strange instance where it seemed like Bruce was about to get his ass kicked after slapping a certain Tommy Elliot – and then somehow didn’t – The Mask accomplished a good deal conveying just what kind of anger Bruce is hiding as well as his relationship with Alfred. All the better that Alfred should be the one to essentially enable his young ward’s violent desires by chauffeuring him to the bully’s house for Bruce to bash his face in. Repeatedly. If Bruce keeps treading along this path at twelve, he’s likely to become Batman when he’s sixteen, but it’s only logical that a rougher Alfred should be part of that equation.
The finale alone earns points just in terms of the most fluid choreography that’s been seen thus far. Pitting Gordon in the ring against Sionis lent some suspense to the episode’s climax as did its terrific free-flowing action, or as much as a smallish office space can accompany. It’s further disappointing that it should take an all-too-silly turn of events with Sionois’s sudden samurai fixation. That’d at least explain his office’s sword-laiden collection, at least.
The fact that Gordon’s relationship with his coworkers had become a critical topic was excellent as was, believe it or not, Bruce’s bully story. Though Alfred and Bruce have yet to figure out how to fit into the show, The Mask took great strides in forging their future partnership into something far more. The ideas behind the Black Mask arc meanwhile played its hand rather well, even if it folded more often than it won. If anything, evil never dies – not in Gotham. Hopefully the same is true for our very own Sionis.