Gotham

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Gotham

Postby malosaires » Tue Sep 23, 2014 5:45 am

So Gotham premiered last night. I wrote a thing detailing my feelings on the pilot and the larger subject of cheesy television dramas, because it is most definitely a cheesy television drama. Short version, I think it has some potential, but needs to find some grounding in character to work.

What did you guys think?
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Re: Gotham

Postby Australia » Tue Sep 23, 2014 3:53 pm

Is there anyone in Gotham who isn't an orphan?

I didn't mind it, but to be fair, I'd just watched Under the Dome which while unintentionally funny, I haven't been able to ever take seriously, so anything would have been better. I hated the exposition. Characters referring to the villains as their well-known nicknames before they become evil (oh, get help, Riddler, you're Penguin, I'll become Two-Face later *looks at camera and winks* - well, that one didn't happen but when Harvey does get introduced, I'm sure that will be his line). I get that comic readers will know the villains by their true names but for casual viewers, it ruins any kind of tension, because we know they'll eventually become evil, though I guess this is Gotham City, so we know everyone's going to eventually become evil.

I've never been a fan of the serial police dramas but as long as the show doesn't immediately become CSI: Gotham, I'll give it a chance. The second Gordon puts on sunglasses and says "I guess some Penguins do fly", I'll stop watching.
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Re: Gotham

Postby DashaBlade » Wed Oct 01, 2014 7:47 am

I'm cautiously hopeful about the show. My problem is that shows which I am cautiously hopeful about, and which appear on FOX, tend to get canceled in the first or second season after they show a bunch of episodes out of order and ruin any hope of creating a narrative story arc.

It is indeed cheesy so far, but I don't usually count that against a show. If FOX gives it the chance to actually grow its beard, I think it has the potential to be pretty awesome, especially if they actually bother to use some of the canon as something besides a shout-out to fans of the comics.
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Re: Gotham

Postby Jack Road » Fri Oct 31, 2014 10:17 am

If you gave up on Gotham, come back just for this episode at least. It was written by the creator of The Tick, Ben Edlund. It doesn't solve all of Gotham's many many problems, but it is the best episode so far, by far.
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Re: Gotham

Postby Jack Road » Sat Nov 08, 2014 7:20 am

The Flash Thread is quickly becoming the DC Shows Thread. So I figure I'd head back over here to respond to Notch.

One thing that intrigues me about Robin Lord Taylor's portrayal of the Penguin is this quote from AV Club's Oliver Sava.

"As a gay man, I’m starting to have some serious issues with the depiction of Oswald Cobblepot on this series. While the show isn't explicitly stating that the character is homosexual, it certainly feels like the writers are implying that with their unpleasant, dated stereotypes. He’s a man with no interest in the opposite sex—he flat-out tells his mother this week that he doesn't date the women she’s constantly accusing him of seeing—and his obsession with a straight man pushes him to act irrationally. And then there’s his twisted Oedipal relationship with a mother that fawns over him and still washes him in the bathtub despite him being a full-grown adult. Combine all that with Robin Lord Taylor’s effete performance and you have the kind of demonized gay character that was largely accepted in the years before the gay liberation movement and subsequent LGBTQ campaigns to change public perceptions of non-straight individuals."

http://www.avclub.com/tvclub/gotham-spirit-goat-211052

I'm not sure how to take that. There seems to be this idea prevalent among critics, I'll summarize it here.

Party X was demonized for a long time.
Part of that was mocking stereotypes attributed to Party X
Now Party X is becoming more accepted.
We should avoid using those stereotypes in popular media until total acceptance is reached.

I understand the idea, but disagree with it on the grounds that eradicating stereotypes all together creates a new stereotype. One in which Party X's media portrayal becomes less character driven and more symbol driven.

Your thoughts?
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Re: Gotham

Postby 52xMax » Mon Nov 10, 2014 6:00 am

That might very well be a case of "reading too much into things".

If anything, I see Penguin as an asexual character. Or rather, he might lean one way or another in regards to sexual orientation/preferences, it's just that his bloodlust is higher on the list of priorities than his sex drive. It has nothing to do with being a homosexual, if indeed he is, but he strikes me more as a Norman Bates type of... well, psychopath.
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Re: Gotham

Postby Jack Road » Mon Nov 10, 2014 5:37 pm

Fair enough, I wasn't sure how to read that.
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Re: Gotham

Postby Matthew Notch » Tue Nov 11, 2014 2:22 am

I agree with Max too, and that's what my wife was going to say exactly as a matter of fact. Frankly I don't really give any consideration at all to Penguin's sexual orientation since it doesn't seem to play any role in his behavior thus far. All we have is this guy who seems like a real pushover but is, in fact, the most devious criminal genius on the show.

The only sexual orientation thing that annoys me is Barbara Gordon's ex-relationship with Montoya, and that's only because it seems like that whole plot point was sort of wedged in at the last second, and seems a little insensitive to me. Like, "how do we explain that this detective is talking to Jim's wife? WAIT! LET'S MAKE THEM LOVERS! OMG" and that's kind of dumb and manipulative. I'm probably doing what Max is talking about, reading too much into it. I do a lot of thinking from the gut, though, and that's the feeling my gut gets from that particular plot point.
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Re: Gotham

Postby 52xMax » Tue Nov 11, 2014 1:57 pm

The Barbara/Montoya thing was I think more of a nod to the comic book fans which also served as a convenient plot device. Barbara's maiden name (I believe she's not married to Gordon at this point) is Kane, which in addition to being an allusion Batman's "creator"* is also the surname of Kathy Kane, aka Batwoman, a character totally unrelated to Batgirl/Barbara Gordon (daughter of Jim and Barbara). So in this universe not only is Gordon's wife the future mother of Batgirl, she also plays the role Batwoman played in the comics as Montoya's lover.

Spoiler: show
Speaking of names, I'm becoming good at spotting the future villain. Either that or the showrunners suck at foreshadowing. And I'm not even talking about Black Mask, I'm referring to the preppy bully. As soon as I saw him I knew he was going to be an asshole, and before he even spoke and asked those creepy question about parents dying I knew it was Tommy Elliot, which was later confirmed when they go to his house and Bruce "hushes" him pretty good.

I wonder if Bruce is becoming pals with a certain Harvey Dent in a future episode.



* True Batman and comic book fans know it was actually Bill Finger who did most of the heavy lifting in the creation of the Dark Knight.
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Re: Gotham

Postby Australia » Tue Nov 25, 2014 9:42 am

So this was an actual line during an interrogation this episode.

"I haven't mentioned your name out loud."
"Out loud?" *stares seriously* "What about whispering?"

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This fucking show. It's the writing Gotham relies on but not the one it needs.
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Re: Gotham

Postby KleinerKiller » Fri Mar 13, 2015 3:09 pm

If I have one major problem with this show so far, it's that it has the general focus of a goldfish with ADHD.

They already have a compelling plot line -- the steadily escalating conflict between Falcone and Maroni, with Penguin playing both sides and the GCPD caught in the middle. When that's the focus, as in "Penguin's Umbrella" (the best episode so far), the result can be exactly as gripping as everyone was hoping the show would be. The trouble arises when the show diverts its attention elsewhere for the sake of nothing in particular.

Bruce's arc is mildly interesting, but ultimately feels like an afterthought most of the time.
The ad nauseum scenes of Riddler being a creepy dick to that one girl at the GCPD are awkward and pointless.
Fish never worked as a character, and her new arc in the organ-harvesting compound is lifeless and almost laughably silly.
Selina, Ivy, and Barbara have absolutely no bearing on anything anymore, but they have to be kept around because reasons.

It feels to me like they're trying to combine the numerous running storylines of Game of Thrones with the gripping procedural feel of Criminal Minds, but without bothering to set up enough interesting characters and high stakes to make anyone care.
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Re: Gotham

Postby KleinerKiller » Wed Apr 22, 2015 4:33 am

Having caught up to the episode just before the newest one, I have a few thoughts.

Spoiler: show
Now that Dr. Dulmacher (*sigh*) has apparently been taken down and Fish is off the island... What the hell was the point of any of that? Nothing on that island was at all relevant to the central plot. It was all nonsensical, time-wasting BS. Sure, Fish is now heading back to Gotham with a small army of hobos, but considering that the show has never given me reason to give a damn about her, all I'm doing is drumming my fingers until Penguin slaughters them all.

I'm also not sold on the new "Christian Grey, but edgy" villain, but I'll reserve full judgement until we get to see more of him. If he makes good on the threat in the preview and kills Barbara, he may well be my favorite character.


Overall, the focus is still abysmal, and nothing has that "lead-up to the finale" feel with just three episodes to go. I can't help but feel like they blew their load early with "Penguin's Umbrella" and are stuck trying to awkwardly mop up.
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Re: Gotham

Postby Dr. Ambiguous » Wed Apr 22, 2015 9:35 am

This show really went off the rails about 8 or so episodes ago. When I started watching the show, it was more a show I wanted to like than a show I did like. A show about Jim Gordon being a cop? Yeah, I can get down with that. And at first, the show was struggling to find it's footing, but it started to pick up, and I thought it was going to start getting good. The show managed to take Penguin, who is a character who I've never liked, and make him interesting, and he's easily the best part about this show (though that's not exactly a high bar). The show peaked with E7, The Penguin's Umbrella, which was pretty good, and it was the show started to develop. Then it dipped a bit, but not enough to be much of an issue, I still held out hope, and then it went on mid-season break,

Hoo boy. It came back from the mid-season break and it gave us some shitty episodes, and then it went completely off the fucking rails. Spoilers for up through E22:

Spoiler: show
God, does this show get stupid after the mid-season break. Jim gets transferred to the Asylum, and they fail to do anything interesting there, and then shuffle him back after a couple episodes. It was pointless, does little to develop anything story-wise, except introduce his new love interest, who isn't compelling, and could've easily been introduced without it.

Then we have the episode with the Graysons, which was fucking dumb as balls. And the way that episode treats magic as possible, when the show as every indication of being set in the real world annoyed the hell out of me, and it's probably the worst episode of the show so far. It was fucking stupid.

This Ogre villain isn't really all that compelling, and he just feels like a poor man's Patrick Bateman. Know what I want to do every time I see him? I want to go watch American Psycho again. Cause it's way better than this drivel. His acting for the character just feels... I'm not sure I can quite put my finger on it, but something about it seems very off. Hollow? Forced? Not sure. Maybe it's just because of how much it reminds me of Christian Bale's far superior performance in American Psycho.

Fish. Fucking Fish. Fish fucking Mooney. When the show started I didn't much mind Fish. She wasn't exactly a great character, but I could tolerate her. Ever since she was almost killed she's become absolutely insufferable. Know what they should've done? Killed her. And... Bruce? Her right hand guy, his name is slipping my mind right now. Their escape seemed cliche, hollow, a cop-out (to killing them), and stupid. They should've just died, sometimes characters need to die to tell a good story, but apparently that's not something that Gotham is interested in doing. The arc with her on the fucking island with the organ collector is pointless, irrelevant to the main story, uninteresting, and dumb. It just makes me want to tune out, and it feels like shitty filler. I can't be brought to care about her, nor do I know why the show expects me to give a damn about what happens to her. She can die for all I care. More than that, I want her to fucking die at this point. But now she's escaped, and going back to Gotham, and probably about to do something that won't be in any way a good story.

Huh. That ended up far more critical and angry than I expected. Oh well.

A couple more general complaints. The show has a lot of cheesy elements to it, like malos pointed out in his OP. I don't mind the cheesy mafia stuff too much. Sure, it's cliche, but I can deal with that. The cheesy cop stuff bugs me a bit more, but it's not too much of an issue. Though both are a detriment to the show. Sometimes though, it gets to be just too much. But I digress.

Young Bruce Wayne is an insufferably annoying little shit who annoys me even more than Fish. Bruce, right now you are just a little boy, and you are a precocious little shit, and a pretentious bastard. I groan anytime he's on screen. I don't want to watch you try to act all adult and mature, I don't want to see your fucking face. I just want this show to focus on Jim Gordon, the cops, Penguin, and the mob for now. It's not the greatest thing ever, but it's at least something that doesn't make me want to punch the screen. Young Selena Kyle can be annoying at times, but for the most part I don't mind her.

I don't know why I still watch this show. Seeing as there are only 3 episodes left for the season, I might jump ship after that.
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Re: Gotham

Postby KleinerKiller » Wed Apr 22, 2015 2:03 pm

Dr. Ambiguous wrote:This show really went off the rails about 8 or so episodes ago. When I started watching the show, it was more a show I wanted to like than a show I did like. A show about Jim Gordon being a cop? Yeah, I can get down with that. And at first, the show was struggling to find it's footing, but it started to pick up, and I thought it was going to start getting good. The show managed to take Penguin, who is a character who I've never liked, and make him interesting, and he's easily the best part about this show (though that's not exactly a high bar). The show peaked with E7, The Penguin's Umbrella, which was pretty good, and it was the show started to develop. Then it dipped a bit, but not enough to be much of an issue, I still held out hope, and then it went on mid-season break,

Hoo boy. It came back from the mid-season break and it gave us some shitty episodes, and then it went completely off the fucking rails. Spoilers for up through E22:

Spoiler: show
God, does this show get stupid after the mid-season break. Jim gets transferred to the Asylum, and they fail to do anything interesting there, and then shuffle him back after a couple episodes. It was pointless, does little to develop anything story-wise, except introduce his new love interest, who isn't compelling, and could've easily been introduced without it.

Then we have the episode with the Graysons, which was fucking dumb as balls. And the way that episode treats magic as possible, when the show as every indication of being set in the real world annoyed the hell out of me, and it's probably the worst episode of the show so far. It was fucking stupid.

This Ogre villain isn't really all that compelling, and he just feels like a poor man's Patrick Bateman. Know what I want to do every time I see him? I want to go watch American Psycho again. Cause it's way better than this drivel. His acting for the character just feels... I'm not sure I can quite put my finger on it, but something about it seems very off. Hollow? Forced? Not sure. Maybe it's just because of how much it reminds me of Christian Bale's far superior performance in American Psycho.

Fish. Fucking Fish. Fish fucking Mooney. When the show started I didn't much mind Fish. She wasn't exactly a great character, but I could tolerate her. Ever since she was almost killed she's become absolutely insufferable. Know what they should've done? Killed her. And... Bruce? Her right hand guy, his name is slipping my mind right now. Their escape seemed cliche, hollow, a cop-out (to killing them), and stupid. They should've just died, sometimes characters need to die to tell a good story, but apparently that's not something that Gotham is interested in doing. The arc with her on the fucking island with the organ collector is pointless, irrelevant to the main story, uninteresting, and dumb. It just makes me want to tune out, and it feels like shitty filler. I can't be brought to care about her, nor do I know why the show expects me to give a damn about what happens to her. She can die for all I care. More than that, I want her to fucking die at this point. But now she's escaped, and going back to Gotham, and probably about to do something that won't be in any way a good story.

Huh. That ended up far more critical and angry than I expected. Oh well.

A couple more general complaints. The show has a lot of cheesy elements to it, like malos pointed out in his OP. I don't mind the cheesy mafia stuff too much. Sure, it's cliche, but I can deal with that. The cheesy cop stuff bugs me a bit more, but it's not too much of an issue. Though both are a detriment to the show. Sometimes though, it gets to be just too much. But I digress.

Young Bruce Wayne is an insufferably annoying little shit who annoys me even more than Fish. Bruce, right now you are just a little boy, and you are a precocious little shit, and a pretentious bastard. I groan anytime he's on screen. I don't want to watch you try to act all adult and mature, I don't want to see your fucking face. I just want this show to focus on Jim Gordon, the cops, Penguin, and the mob for now. It's not the greatest thing ever, but it's at least something that doesn't make me want to punch the screen. Young Selena Kyle can be annoying at times, but for the most part I don't mind her.

I don't know why I still watch this show. Seeing as there are only 3 episodes left for the season, I might jump ship after that.


I completely agree on all counts except for lil' Bruce Wayne. His arc right now is forced and pointless, but the kid who plays him has proven that he's a great actor, and he does what he can with the shoddy script. Every so often, as in the part where he beat down proto-Hush, he knocks it out of the park. Of the elements in the show that DESPERATELY need to be trimmed, he's one of the last I'd like to see go.

I, myself, would much prefer it if Selina Kyle just fucked off already, but I'll save my full complaints about her until the season wraps.
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Re: Gotham

Postby KleinerKiller » Sat Apr 25, 2015 6:57 am

Having watched the third-to-last episode, "Under The Knife", I'm... surprisingly more impressed than I have been. This just might bode well for what little remains of the season.

Spoiler: show
As much as I hate to admit it, Ed's starting to grow on me. This time, he was more than just a creepy dickhead who couldn't take a hint -- he was a creepy dickhead who knew when some abusive fucker needed a good gutting. We all saw the murder scene coming (mostly because the promos couldn't help but spoil it), but it was fairly powerful in the moment.

And as campy as they were, I enjoyed Penguin's segments as well. The confrontation with Maroni was a tad predictable, but it worked to put both men directly at odds and lead up to what I imagine will be open war. Reassuring his mother afterward was almost emotional, but his mother predictably derailed it with her cartoonish antics. Killing the flower guy was unnecessary, but as usual, Robin Lord Taylor managed to sell it with his performance.

Those positives aside, I'm still not at all invested in the hunt for the Ogre. I want one person watching the show right now to raise their hand and tell me that they care whether Barbara lives or dies. Nothing about that story arc is working, and cutting back to it from the two segments I liked / tolerated felt like a complete waste of time.


Overall, not great, but it felt just a bit more focused and tense than the previous fare. If the quality ratchets up from this point, as I hope it will, we just might get a season finale worthy of "Penguin's Umbrella".
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