GOTHAM RECAP AND REVIEW: SEASON 1 EPISODE 4 ‘ARKHAM’

Gotham takes a break from the eccentric this week. Instead it focuses more on the high stakes politics between two big crime bosses over the fate of our beloved city. Spoilers.

All things lead to Arkham. At least for this week, they do. According to Oswald Cobblepot — who unceremoniously drops by Gordon’s apartment — there’s a sort of bidding war going on over what will become of the now empty Arkham City lot. You read correctly, Gothamites, there’s a whole section of Gotham called Arkham City. Falcone wants it so he can build low-income housing and refurbish the closed Arkham Asylum. Maroni just wants to turn it into a dumping ground — his way of giving Falcone a giant middle finger, more or less. Incidentally, Falcone’s plan is actually what the Wayne’s have been working on before they died. Either way, Arkham City is a huge chunk of land, and whichever boss claims it will supposedly have the upper hand in control over Gotham.

And then councilmen start dropping like flies.

The first is Councilman Jenkins, who’s a supporter of Falcone’s plan. He and his aide are stabbed through the head with a metal spike wielded by an assassin. The second is Councilman Zeller, a Maroni supporter. He’s killed by getting stuffed in a metal barrel and then burned alive in front of the old Arkham Asylum building. The killer is the same assassin, by the way. What the frick?

Bullock and Gordon go to the prison to visit a hit-man for hire in hopes of gaining some insight on who they’re dealing with. My, the amount of information two cartons of cigarettes can buy. The prisoner names Richard Gladwell.

The detectives go to Gladwell’s place of work. I don’t know what he does for a day job, but I want to work there. The office has a grand, albeit pretty dark, 1920s art deco vibe. But that’s not all, everyone seems to be using typewriters instead of computers. What? Is Tom Hanks their boss, or something? Sign me up!

Gladwell spots Bullock and Gordon before they spot him. He books it to a hiding spot towards the back, behind some supply shelves. He’s more than ready to take on Gordon with his metal spike, but the detective doesn’t go any farther down the shelves. Instead, Gordon walks back to Gladwell’s desk where Bullock is already looking for clues. They find a note with the letters “CLM” on it.

Back at the station, neither Bullock nor Gordon knows what it means. Then Bullock gets the idea to check what Fish Mooney knows. I’d seriously love to see her process for procuring valuable information. She either knows it all, or has enough insight to guess what’s going on and what will happen next. She let’s Bullock in on how Falcone’s hold over Gotham is slipping. Losing even a piece of Arkham will be the beginning of the end of the old man. Of course she seems happy about this, saying that even if her boss falls, she always has a “plan B.”

If you remember from last week, Cobblepot starting working as a dishwasher at Maroni’s restaurant. We know he’s trying to gain Maroni’s favor in some way, but we just don’t know how. This week, he shows his mettle by protecting a bag of Maroni’s money during a robbery at the restaurant. The trigger-happy thieves kill the restaurant manager and take all of Maroni’s money, all except for the bag Cobblepot swiped and hid in a refrigerator. Maroni and his men reward Cobblepot by making him the restaurant’s new manager. This puts the promising future crime boss in a position of procuring little bits of valuable information.

Like I said earlier, Cobblepot unceremoniously makes a visit to Gordon’s apartment. The reason for this is that he wants to become Gordon’s “agent.” In other words, because he believes Gordon to be the last good man in Gotham, he wants to help him save the city. Gordon, rightfully so, doesn’t trust him. As a show of faith, Cobblepot tells him that Gladwell will kill again on the night of the vote for what is to be done with Arkham.

By now, all of the councilmen and the mayor are under police protection. On a hunch, Gordon checks to see who are on protection detail. When he gets to the Mayor’s list, he finds officers with last names that match the note he and Bullock found at Gladwell’s desk: C, L, M. Gordon rushes off to the mayor’s house and finds that the officers are missing from their cars. He goes to retrieve the mayor himself and relocate him to a safer place. The dumbest move Gordon could have done was try to leave through the front door. Of course! Gladwell is already there. A fight ensues. At the last minute, Bullock shows up (he got Gordon’s message about Gladwell’s next hit) and they both shoot Gladwell dead before he could make a last ditch effort at killing the mayor.

The vote goes as planned. Instead of Arkham going to one or the other, however, a compromise was made. Falcone and Maroni split Arkham, giving them the allowance to go ahead with their respective projects. This comes as a surprise to Gordon, and even young Bruce who had been quietly hoping some resemblance of his parents’ plans for Arkham won out through Falcone. The results of the vote seem to be a small lesson for Bruce, who may or may not begin to realize just how powerful fear and intimidation can be.

Some things of note:

Fish Mooney is auditioning torch singers for her club. In reality, she wants the girl to be a secret weapon for her aforementioned “Plan B.” We have no idea what Plan B is just yet, but it definitely requires a certain seductive skill set that’s enough to catch Mooney’s attention. The auditions came down to two girls. Instead of a sing-off, or whatever, Mooney makes them fight over the position. Literally. The winner is a girl named Liza. We may need to keep an eye on this one.

Montoya’s seed of doubt continues to run its course through Barbara, who begins asking about Oswald Cobblepot. She heard the name from Montoya, that Falcone ordered Gordon to kill him. However, she doesn’t realize she had already met him, alive and well, after the fact. When Gordon wouldn’t tell Barbara the truth, she leaves him. Also, she came clean about being in a lesbian relationship with Montoya. Gordon seemed to be more pissed about that than anything else.

The front gates of Arkham Asylum look just like how it’s normally depicted in the comics and cartoons. It’s kinda of eerie how well they did.