Spoilers Gotham - Season 2
- Thread starter Commander Richard
- Start date
It's not about realism, it's about the kind of character I want Jim Gordon to be. Now he's a corrupt cop who's committed murder for the mob and will have to cover it up for the rest of his life. That's not Jim Gordon. That's some other character who happens to share his name.
I tuned into this series expecting it to be a long-form version of the story we saw in Batman: Year One and Batman Begins/The Dark Knight, the saga of Jim Gordon cleaning up the most corrupt police force in the country by being the one cop who refused to compromise his morals (past a certain point that included cooperating with a caped vigilante) and who inspired others in the department and the city government to show the same courage and stand with him. Instead, we've gotten a story where Jim has ended up just as badly corrupted by the system as Bullock and everyone else before him. He didn't break the system; it broke him. He has now failed in the mission he started out with. And I'm not interested in the story of his failure.
"Questionable" would've been okay. But they jumped right to felony murder the first time out. That's just taking it too far, and it's typical of this show's inability to judge how far it should or shouldn't go.
Except that, as io9's review pointed out, how does it make sense to give the Riddler a split personality when they've just promoted Harvey "Two-Face" Dent to a series regular???? Are they going to have two characters with split personalities? Or are they just going to completely abandon any resemblance to the comics characters who share these characters' names?
I thought it would be funny if Galavan had killed him. If they'd gone to all this trouble to make us think Jerome was the future Joker and then just, wham, killed him in the season premiere, that would've been genuinely clever and interesting. So naturally they didn't do it.
I understand what you are saying about Gordon, but it makes sense to me that he would have to do some nasty things to get to a position where he can clean things up.
I won't deny I did have the same thought about Riddler, but this was just one scene so I'm more than willing to keep an open mind. I'm not expecting the split personality thing to last anyways, at this point I think it's just him starting to lose it, and eventually the darker personality will take over and become Riddler.
Does Two-Face usually even have a split personality? I know that has been a element of some adaptations, but I thought he was usually just a guy obsessed with duality.
I won't deny I did have the same thought about Riddler, but this was just one scene so I'm more than willing to keep an open mind. I'm not expecting the split personality thing to last anyways, at this point I think it's just him starting to lose it, and eventually the darker personality will take over and become Riddler.
Does Two-Face usually even have a split personality? I know that has been a element of some adaptations, but I thought he was usually just a guy obsessed with duality.
Again, yes, "some nasty things" I could live with, but jumping straight to killing a guy -- the very first time he does a job for Penguin -- is just taking it too far. It's crossing a line. Heck, it's crossing the line that he set for himself in the pilot, the line that defined what made him different from the other cops -- namely, his refusal to kill in service to organized crime. Now that he's crossed that line, the game is over. He's lost. At this point, he's no longer qualified to clean anything up, because he's a murderer. Any pretense of cleaning up the system is going to be a cynical lie as long as it's built on a crime of such magnitude. He can't be the champion of honest, clean police work if he has to spend the rest of his career covering up a murder he committed. That would make him just as corrupt and hypocritical as Loeb.
The Riddler shouldn't even be insane. That's misunderstanding the character. He should be a devious, calculating mastermind. Obsessive, yes -- the traditional portrayal is that he has an irrational compulsion to leave clues to his crimes -- but compulsive behavior is not the same as full-blown psychosis.
It varies, but the general idea is that he's torn between a good side and a bad side -- two conflicting inner drives so evenly matched that he can't decide between them without flipping a coin.
EDIT:
I need to correct my earlier comments. I looked into the legal definition of self-defense, and while normally the aggressor in a fight cannot claim self-defense, there are two exceptions. One is if the aggressor attacks with nonlethal force and is met with lethal force. The other is if the aggressor withdraws from the fight and the other party keeps going after them. I suppose both of those apply here. Jim assaulted the mobster and his men to take their money, then fled with it, and they pursued and shot at him. I think that meets both of the parameters that would make it self-defense even though he was the aggressor.
Still, it doesn’t matter, because the death happened during Jim’s commission of a crime, and that makes it felony murder. Even if the guy had died by accident while chasing Jim -- if he’d had a heart attack or been hit by a bus crossing the street -- then Jim would still be on the hook for felony murder, because the death wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t committed the felony.
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Bruno Heller says they will definitely include The Court of Owls at some point, but he won't say when. The fact that he is dramatic about not saying when we'll see them makes me think they'll pop up sometime fairly soon.
As for the whole Gordon thing, I do understand what you're saying, I just don't feel that strongly about it.
I do agree with you about not wanting to Ed Nygman to be insane, but I'm not going to totally right off the character yet.
EDIT: I was skimming through Spinoff Online/CBR's recap of last night's Gotham, and came across a great quote describing the Jerome/Barbara scene in Arkham.
As for the whole Gordon thing, I do understand what you're saying, I just don't feel that strongly about it.
I do agree with you about not wanting to Ed Nygman to be insane, but I'm not going to totally right off the character yet.
EDIT: I was skimming through Spinoff Online/CBR's recap of last night's Gotham, and came across a great quote describing the Jerome/Barbara scene in Arkham.
They've released a new trailer for next week's episode which calls Barbara, Jerome and Co. the Maniax. I love it.
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So when's the bar exam, Christopher?
Given the scene as it unfolded, I'd love to hear the case for felony murder and not self defense...
Voluntary manslaughter?
Given the scene as it unfolded, I'd love to hear the case for felony murder and not self defense...
Voluntary manslaughter?
Felony bad judgement.
Jim entered the room unarmed to request money that was owed. No crime.
Gun was pulled on Jim. Jim was assaulted and threatened with death. Jim defends himself. No crime on Jim's part so far.
Jim takes the money. This was the grey area. Grey because simply taking money even if it is owed would be theft. That said, from a viewpoint of personal ethics, the money was owed so it wasn't stealing, even if the law does not allow it. This is actually an important plot point. Think about it, had Penguin asked Jim to commit some random robbery he would have refused. The request was something that could be rationalized.
In the parking garage, the other guy shot first. Jim is less of a criminal than Han Solo. Remember him?
As I said, felony murder applies regardless of how the death occurred. If you choose to commit a crime and someone dies as a result of the events of that crime, then that's felony murder even if you had no direct involvement in the death. See my example above where the person fleeing the police was charged with the murder of the bystander hit by the pursuing police car. The ultimate responsibility lies with the person they were chasing, because the chase wouldn't have happened at all if not for that person's choices.
Granted, I was wrong about self-defense not applying to the circumstances, so maybe there's a case to be made for self-defense as a viable defense against felony murder in this context. I'm able to look up basic definitions, but not seek out specific comparisons like that.
You know what? I'm going to write to the Law and the Multiverse blog, which covers legal questions in comic-book or SF worlds, and put the question to them. It should be right up their alley.
EDIT: Okay, I've sent them the question. No guarantee they'll answer, though -- the blog hasn't been very active lately.
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Also, you're completely forgetting that this is Gotham City. Like no one else is doing anything illegal? We all know what Penguin said about Loeb was a lie. How much of Gotham's legal system is like Loeb to some degree.
And compared to real life, where cops very rarely convicted of crimes, Jim should be just fine.
In Gotham, with all the corruption, it's easy for Jim to go free. All the witnesses to Jim's crime are dead, right?
And even if alive, would any of them want to get implicated for the crimes they also committed?
Morally speaking, i am not sure if it's murder, as much as unnecessary killing of people who would kill others (and may have already in the past). NOT a good place to be for sure...but not unredeemable...
Court of Owls would've been a great idea to pivot the series on, frankly.
No, I'm not forgetting, because it's fundamental to my objection. As I have, in fact, explained in detail, the very thing that troubles me is that Jim has now become corrupted by the Gotham system. He can no longer be the one uncorruptible cop who inspires others to join him in cleaning up the system, because now he's become just as compromised as everyone else. Any career advancement he achieves now will be based in that very corruption. I haven't "forgotten" that, because it's the whole foundation of my problem.
If you think I'm talking about whether he can get away with it, then you've completely missed my point. I'm talking about whether he should get away with it. I'm talking about his morals as an individual. If he depends on the intrinsic corruption of Gotham City to keep him out of jail, then he's just as bad as everyone else, just as selfish and dishonest. Even if he stays free and advances his career, he's still failed as a person, because the system has beaten him and made him a part of its corruption. At this point, the only way he can show integrity is to confess his actions and pay his debt to society, and we know he's not going to do that because it'd be the end of the series.
But legally speaking, it probably is, and Jim Gordon is supposed to be a person who cares about the law. Arguing that he should be able to weasel out of it and be "just fine" is ignoring what defines and motivates him as a character. That's not the way he would look at the situation.
Like I said, maybe there is a way that he could be exonerated on self-defense grounds, and I've asked Law and the Multiverse to weigh in on that issue (although there's still the conspiracy issue with the murdered guard). But the only way he can be exonerated is if he turns himself in and gets cleared by a jury. If he just covers it up and lies about it for the rest of his career, the act of lying permanently taints him and everything he does. You can atone for doing wrong, but only if you admit to the wrong.
The writers have now clearly outlined the morality and ethics of the show: the ends justify the needs. Jim Gordon wants to end police corruption and make Gotham a better place. To do this, he has no choice but to become corrupt, and possibility make Gotham a worse place for the time being.
Gordon is now the kind of guy who will kill 10 people to save 100. If you can't watch a show with a protagonist with that mentality, maybe this show isn't for you.
Gordon is now the kind of guy who will kill 10 people to save 100. If you can't watch a show with a protagonist with that mentality, maybe this show isn't for you.
Christopher, let's look at the very end, and the very beginning.
Commissioner Gordon is one who is not following the rule of law, and leas in reality & behind the scenes (perhaps). He allows Batman to operate, and not arrest him for all of his violations (such as perhaps home invasion, vigilantism, etc.). While Batman's crimes are minor compared to Gotham's worst, it's still breaking rule of law.
I am sure all the information leaked to Batman over the year is also pretty serious.
While he despises Loeb...to a degree Gordon becomes just like him. To the outside world, Gordon is squeaky clean (which Penguin was implying in his threat to Loeb), he's really not. Maybe not as bad as Loeb, and doing it for the "right" reasons, but still like him to a degree. That's traditional comics Gordon was as well clearly Gotham Gordon.
And Gordon at the beginning of the show was no angel either. When he agreed to kill Penguin, had that been an undercover officer rather than a corrupt one, Gordon would've been busted with conspiracy to commit murder. And if anyone outside of Gotham found out about it, couldn't the feds bust him as well...for at least not trying to report the crime of conspiracy?
And though he didn't kill Penguin, the end result was that Penguin murdered others. (If the average sustained in the 2nd half of the season, Penguin's death count is at least 25). I am not sure how many Gordon knows about, but i'm sure at least a couple by the time of his deal with the devil. So he's broken rule of law by not trying to take down Penguin.
if we had a "morality scale", 1 being Jokerish/Penguinish evil to 9 being absolutely morally correct (perhaps Bruce at this point..maybe 8)... You may see Jim as a 2 or 3...but i think perhaps the series will bobble him between 4 & 6.
And perhaps his low points are what inspires Bruce to become Batman.
I wonder if we'll see David, as he grows older, as Bruce do some pre-Batman attempts... either as an unnamed vigilante, or maybe even briefly take the name Nightwing (I am not expecting Batboy! ).
Commissioner Gordon is one who is not following the rule of law, and leas in reality & behind the scenes (perhaps). He allows Batman to operate, and not arrest him for all of his violations (such as perhaps home invasion, vigilantism, etc.). While Batman's crimes are minor compared to Gotham's worst, it's still breaking rule of law.
I am sure all the information leaked to Batman over the year is also pretty serious.
While he despises Loeb...to a degree Gordon becomes just like him. To the outside world, Gordon is squeaky clean (which Penguin was implying in his threat to Loeb), he's really not. Maybe not as bad as Loeb, and doing it for the "right" reasons, but still like him to a degree. That's traditional comics Gordon was as well clearly Gotham Gordon.
And Gordon at the beginning of the show was no angel either. When he agreed to kill Penguin, had that been an undercover officer rather than a corrupt one, Gordon would've been busted with conspiracy to commit murder. And if anyone outside of Gotham found out about it, couldn't the feds bust him as well...for at least not trying to report the crime of conspiracy?
And though he didn't kill Penguin, the end result was that Penguin murdered others. (If the average sustained in the 2nd half of the season, Penguin's death count is at least 25). I am not sure how many Gordon knows about, but i'm sure at least a couple by the time of his deal with the devil. So he's broken rule of law by not trying to take down Penguin.
if we had a "morality scale", 1 being Jokerish/Penguinish evil to 9 being absolutely morally correct (perhaps Bruce at this point..maybe 8)... You may see Jim as a 2 or 3...but i think perhaps the series will bobble him between 4 & 6.
And perhaps his low points are what inspires Bruce to become Batman.
I wonder if we'll see David, as he grows older, as Bruce do some pre-Batman attempts... either as an unnamed vigilante, or maybe even briefly take the name Nightwing (I am not expecting Batboy! ).
You know, it would save a lot of trouble if people would actually read everything I said rather than skipping over the important parts. I've made it extremely clear over and over again that it's a matter of degree. I've said very explicitly that some degree of compromise would be viable, but taking him right to murder is crossing a line, taking the compromise too far. I have used the phrase "crossing a line" several times, so it should be clear to any observant reader that I'm talking about a matter of degree, not absolute black and white. If you just aren't listening to the things I'm saying, then there's no point trying to discuss this with you.
As far what we want or expect Jim Gordon to be, he isn't, and can't be, an uncompromisingly lawful goody-two shoes. Some iterations have had him more hard-nosed than others, but even the most vanilla Jim Gordon accepts and encourages Bruce Wayne to break the law because Jim Gordon alone can't clean up the city.
And Jim can't clean up the city. The city can't be clean for at least 8 or 10 years until Bruce is active and in costume. Jim has to fail right now, and he has to learn from his failure that being the only clean cop isn't going to change the world. This episode shows us some of that.
I think the critical thing missing in this conversation is that the whole affair wasn't just arbitrarily tossed in. The conversation between Jim and Bruce, with Alfred interjecting, was brilliant. And it couldn't really have happened without the Loeb/Penguin catalyst.
For young Bruce to apply critical reasoning to the ethical situation is a wonderful reveal of who he is going to become, why, and what his own boundaries will be.
For present day Jim to listen and have such respect for a young teen to take what he says to heart is just as wonderful a reveal of the kind of relationship and trust that the future Jim and Bruce will have for each other.
This conversation was "show, not tell." We actually get to see their relationship evolving here. This is what I hoped for from the show, and it was properly set up and well executed.
As far as the camp goes, I enjoy it. It's fun. It makes the show something other than another police procedural with the name "Jim Gordon" in it. I can watch a dozen police procedurals if I want something overly serious ( and really not all that much more realistic.) Gotham is fun to watch, it's kooky, I enjoy it.
And Jim can't clean up the city. The city can't be clean for at least 8 or 10 years until Bruce is active and in costume. Jim has to fail right now, and he has to learn from his failure that being the only clean cop isn't going to change the world. This episode shows us some of that.
I think the critical thing missing in this conversation is that the whole affair wasn't just arbitrarily tossed in. The conversation between Jim and Bruce, with Alfred interjecting, was brilliant. And it couldn't really have happened without the Loeb/Penguin catalyst.
For young Bruce to apply critical reasoning to the ethical situation is a wonderful reveal of who he is going to become, why, and what his own boundaries will be.
For present day Jim to listen and have such respect for a young teen to take what he says to heart is just as wonderful a reveal of the kind of relationship and trust that the future Jim and Bruce will have for each other.
This conversation was "show, not tell." We actually get to see their relationship evolving here. This is what I hoped for from the show, and it was properly set up and well executed.
As far as the camp goes, I enjoy it. It's fun. It makes the show something other than another police procedural with the name "Jim Gordon" in it. I can watch a dozen police procedurals if I want something overly serious ( and really not all that much more realistic.) Gotham is fun to watch, it's kooky, I enjoy it.
I'm not saying it's OK, or that it should be ignored, I just don't think what happened totally ruins the character from this point on. From some of the other posts on here it sounds like at least some of the other people on here feel the same way.