Spoilers Batwoman - Season 1

[Turtletrekker]

1. How does a multi-billion dollar company just disappear in three years? Sure, the CEO disappears, but, it's not like everyone just looks at each other and go, "Well, I guess that's it then, I guess I'll go work for Starbucks." The company itself has assets, at the very least, wouldn't someone swoop in and take it over? It's a mystery I don't think they will go into, and I think it was done for aesthetic reasons.

As per Elseworlds part 2...

Oliver: "Apparently, after he left, Bruce's board of directors went to town with a bunch of aggressive get-rich-quick deals."

Also in Elseworlds, Kate says that she's in the process of turning the Wayne building into a real estate development firm.

 

[Avalon]

Speaking of which, it's not that good a misdirect if Batwoman has to drive into the Wayne Foundation garage before reaching the secret passage to the Batcave. The tunnel exit should be somewhere a lot more distant and unconnected to any known Wayne property, especially that one.

An arguably larger problem: the license plate on the motorcycle. (My son caught this, I didn't.)

 

[Professor Zoom]

As per Elseworlds part 2...

Oliver: "Apparently, after he left, Bruce's board of directors went to town with a bunch of aggressive get-rich-quick deals."

Also in Elseworlds, Kate says that she's in the process of turning the Wayne building into a real estate development firm.

That is something that would’ve been great to repeat in the pilot for those who don’t remember a line from a cross over almost a year ago.

Or for those who never saw the cross over.

But, YMMV.

 

[DigificWriter]

^ Why would you expect the writers to 'repeat' information that hasn't yet been revealed in-universe?

 

[dahj]

So, episode two gave us name drops of Wonder Woman and Robin on Earth-1.

I guess I spoke to soon the other day when I said a team-up with Wonder Woman was unlikely.

Interesting that both Sophie and Alice/Beth recognized Kate's eyes

That's actually ripped right from the comic page:

Speaking of which, it's not that good a misdirect if Batwoman has to drive into the Wayne Foundation garage before reaching the secret passage to the Batcave. The tunnel exit should be somewhere a lot more distant and unconnected to any known Wayne property, especially that one.

I'm sure Bruce put up some sort of anti-surveillance thingy around the building, and a massive parking lot with maybe multiple exits would be a convenient excuse on how someone got "lost" in a potential chase.

On that note, I don't think this is the "main" Batcave, there's no room here for a Batmobile, a Bat-Plane, Bat-Boat, Bat-Copter, Bat-Atomic Pile... This was probably just a backup for when something bad was happening and Bruce was in the office so that he doesn't have to go all the way back to the mansion and then back to the city during the worst commute hours.

 

[Christopher]

On that note, I don't think this is the "main" Batcave, there's no room here for a Batmobile, a Bat-Plane, Bat-Boat, Bat-Copter, Bat-Atomic Pile... This was probably just a backup for when something bad was happening and Bruce was in the office so that he doesn't have to go all the way back to the mansion and then back to the city during the worst commute hours.

As mentioned above, they're drawing on the '70s comics when Bruce and Alfred moved out of Wayne Manor and moved their operations to the Wayne Foundation building full-time. Luke did call it the Batcave, and the fact that the trigger for accessing it is the actual necklace Martha Wayne was murdered in suggests it meant more to Bruce than just some handy annex. Also, Kate remembered that necklace from when she played in this office as a child 15 years before.

As for what it has room for, there seem to be side tunnels leading off somewhere, I think. So there may be other sections we haven't seen yet.

 

[dahj]

Luke did call it the Batcave

Luke obviously isn't on first name basis with the thing though, so he might have just inferred the name from the fact it's a cave with bats and bat-stuff in it.

Also, if there's no robot dinosaur, a giant penny and a certain playing card it clearly isn't it.

 

[CorporalClegg]

a certain playing card it clearly isn't it.

The Queen of Clubs?

 

[dahj]

The Queen of Clubs?

Nah, that's me in my twenties.

 

[CorporalClegg]

 

[Christopher]

Luke obviously isn't on first name basis with the thing though, so he might have just inferred the name from the fact it's a cave with bats and bat-stuff in it.

Huh? He's obviously known about it since before Batman disappeared, and was in Bruce's confidence about it. He wasn't surprised by its existence, just afraid that Bruce would fire him for letting Kate discover it. He knows what Batman's equipment does even though the far more combat-trained Kate didn't recognize it. He spoke with pride about the "literal perfection" of the suit, and was able to modify it somehow to fit Kate, implying that he had a hand in its creation.

 

[Professor Zoom]

^ Why would you expect the writers to 'repeat' information that hasn't yet been revealed in-universe?

Oh, lord, I don't know why you feel the need to be so excruciatingly pedantic.

I would call it repeating, because I exist in a linear existence, regardless of the time line of a fucking TV show. The information about Wayne Enterprises, as @Turtletrekker pointed out, was stated once before... thus, for me, it would be repeating information. Information that I feel is actually important as it provides context of why this big building and this big company seem to have been abandoned.

And it doesn't seem like it would be some grand secret that needs to be kept until Oliver Queen reveals it, to us, a year ago.

Now, off with you and pedantry.

#Amazo

 

[DigificWriter]

If people are watching Kate's adventures chronologically by narrative, there's no reason for them to know the information you're asking for until they get to the Elseworlds crossover, which takes place between the events of the Batwoman S1 episodes "Down Down Down" (which airs next Sunday) and "Who Are You" (which airs the Sunday after that).

And stating that isn't being pedantic.

Regarding Luke, he clearly knew that Bruce was Batman, but "The Rabbit Hole" establishes that he was otherwise just a regular "security guy" and is having to learn things 'on the fly' just like Kate.

 

[dahj]

it would be repeating information. Information that I feel is actually important as it provides context of why this big building and this big company seem to have been abandoned.

Wouldn't it make more sense though to repeat that when it becomes relevant to the plot, i.e. when she actually starts moving in.

 

[Professor Zoom]

Wouldn't it make more sense though to repeat that when it becomes relevant to the plot, i.e. when she actually starts moving in.

It makes more sense to me to do it in the pilot, because I wanted to know why is there this big abandoned Wayne Enterprise building in the middle of Gotham? What happened to the company? And I think it's a couple of lines. Kate breaks in, she's like, WTF? Where the people at? And Luke can say, "When Bruce left, the Board got aggressive and sunk the company, and here we are." I don't see any reason to delay it.

Something, because it just seems weird to me. Even if, ultimately, it turns out there's more to the story, it seemed like a weird unspecific thing that would be an easy fix. And it wasn't a mystery that added to the story of the pilot for me.

 

[dahj]

It makes more sense to me to do it in the pilot, because I wanted to know why is there this big abandoned Wayne Enterprise building in the middle of Gotham? What happened to the company? And I think it's a couple of lines. Kate breaks in, she's like, WTF? Where the people at?

I kinda disagree, the pilot already had a lot of exposition to go through, and some of the clunkier parts were dialogue that basically dumped exposition, which I'm fine with really because pilots gotta pilot, but you've got to draw the line somewhere. This is a serialized show after all, not everything has to be addressed right away.

I think the abandoned Wayne Tower contributed to the mystery of "where is Batman?" which for me was enough for the background worldbuilding of the state that Gotham is in, and it just doesn't strike me that "Where is Pam from accounting?" was super important that it just had to be raised and answered right then and there.

 

[Professor Zoom]

I kinda disagree, the pilot already had a lot of exposition to go through, and some of the clunkier parts were dialogue that basically dumped exposition, which I'm fine with really because pilots gotta pilot, but you've got to draw the line somewhere. This is a serialized show after all, not everything has to be addressed right away.

True. But, Batman being gone, Wayne Enterprises being gone, I think are important to the plot of the pilot. It's the role that Kate is going to step into. So, I feel it would be worth a line or two. There was other places that could've been cut to make room for a line or two.

I think the abandoned Wayne Tower contributed to the mystery of "where is Batman?" which for me was enough for the background worldbuilding of the state that Gotham is in, and it just doesn't strike me that "Where is Pam from accounting?" was super important that it just had to be raised and answered right then and there.

I think though saying with Bruce out of the picture Wayne Enterprises collapses speaks to the importance of having that central character -- not that I need Kate to be CEO or something-- but, it speaks to the idea that one person can make a difference, one person can push against our darker impulses.

And I don't think saying why Wayne Enterprises would resolve the mystery of... anything. Again, in a later episode, it could be reveled there's more to the truth of Wayne Enterprises current state or what was spoken was, in fact, wrong.

 

[JD]

A pretty good second episode.
It was kinda nice that Sophie recognized Kate right away when she saved her last week, it's always nice when there's at least one character who isn't a complete moron.
I was a bit surprised when Luke was so clueless about how the work the stuff in the Batcave, I had been assuming he was going to end up being Kate's Felicity, minus the love interest angle.
I did not expect another face to face with Kate and Beth/Alice so soon, I figured they would go at least a few more episodes before they ran into each other.
I was expecting to see Kate or Luke add the hair and red suit logo this week, so I was a bit surprised she spent all of her suit time in the episode in the plain Batsuit.
The Earth-1 Batman must not have been a very big guy if it was so easy to alter the suit for Kate.
That last scene with Kate's step mother was interesting....

 

[Christopher]

The Earth-1 Batman must not have been a very big guy if it was so easy to alter the suit for Kate.

I'm hoping it'll turn out that Luke based the body on a leftover Batgirl suit. It would make more sense in terms of the speed of the modification, and it would establish the existence of a Batgirl (perhaps setting up an appearance by Oracle later on, tying into Oliver's statement several seasons ago that the name was already in use).

 

[Henoch]

The Earth-1 Batman must not have been a very big guy if it was so easy to alter the suit for Kate.

I find it impossible that Luke can "recut" the Batman suit into the Batwoman Suit; he must have made a new one from scratch cannibalizing the same technology imbedded into it like bullet proof, communications, life sign sensors, defibrillator, etc. Kate said it (or at least the Batman suit) cost over 10 million dollars . Did the extra costs to make the Batwoman suit come out of Luke's security budget for the building? Is Bruce secretly sending money to Luke?