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TV Talk: Agents of SHIELD and Gotham

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The Fall TV season has officially started and it’s more super heroic than ever.  This week has already seen the premiere for Fox’s new Batman prequel show, Gotham, and the return of ABC’s Marvel without super heroes show, Agents of SHIELD.  Neither show was great.  But both were watchable which is more than I was expecting.

Let’s start with Gotham.  The show is at least partially based on the critically-acclaimed comic book series, Gotham Central.  Gotham Central told stories of the Gotham City Police Department from the point of view of the cops.  It was NYPD Blue set in a world of crazy super villains.  Batman was rarely seen, but he did exist.

The show makes a crucial change in that it is set prior to the existence of Batman.  The first scene of the pilot episode is the murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne.  I have to give Gotham credit for their handling of the iconic scene.  I have probably seen these events depicted dozens of times.  But the episode did a good job of capturing Bruce’s horror and helplessness.

Most of the cops on the scene seem pretty uninterested.  Harvey Bullock as played by Donal Logue actively wants to avoid the entanglements of a major crime scene.  But his new partner, Jim Gordon, played by Ben McKenzie, has already committed them to solving the case by comforting young Bruce.

gotham pilot

The pilot episode focuses on the differences between Bullock and Gordon.  Gordon is young and idealistic.  Bullock is shabby and corrupt.  As the episode progresses you get the sense that Bullock is a good person underneath.  He may have even started off like Gordon.  But his time in the GCPD has worn him down.  Now he does what he needs to do to get by.

The show features appearances by several of Batman’s future foes before they became the colorful villains we know.  The episode opens with a young Selena Kyle (aka Catwoman) skulking around Gotham silently committing petty crimes and witnessing the Wayne murder.  It’s an odd inclusion because the character is given no lines.

The Riddler shows up as coroner with a penchant for riddles.  We also meet a young Poison Ivy whose father is a suspect in the Wayne murders.  For some reason, the show changed the character’s name from Pamela Isley to Ivy Bloom.

Oswald Cobblepot (aka the Penguin) gets the most screen time of the established villains.  He is a lackey for a crooked club owner played by Jada Pinkett Smith.  As Fish Mooney, Smith vamps it up and chews scenery like she’s starving to death.

As a procedural cop show, Gotham works pretty well.  Gordon and Bullock are strong characters and I look forward to seeing how their contrasting styles put them at odds.  But the Batman stuff is a mixed bag.  Having these characters show up just serves to remind the audience that this is a Batman show with no Batman.  Time will tell whether or not Gotham can be interesting enough to hold audience’s attention without its star player.

Next: Agents of Shield

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The post TV Talk: Agents of SHIELD and Gotham appeared first on Lebeau's Le Blog.


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