S02.E02: Prior Criminal History

[Trini]

After her quick spin in the Batgear, Ryan Wilder is back to facing the daily challenges of life as herself. Meanwhile, Alice has a new, devious plan to get the attention of both Gotham and Safiyah (guest star Shivaani Ghai). With Kate still missing and the city in an uprising, Luke and Mary are desperate to find a stand in. In a pinch, Ryan dons the suit again and comes face-to-face with Alice for the first time. Back at Crows Headquarters, Sophie and Commander Kane try to uncover who may have had a vendetta against Kate.

Carl Seaton directed the episode written by James Stoteraux and Chad Fiveash.

Airdate: 1/24/2021

[scarynikki12]

I have to say that I loved the scene with Mary and Alice at the clinic. Alice sees her as another sister and doesn’t want to kill her so dare I hope this means we’ll be getting more between them since Kate’s gone?

Pissed off looks great on Sophie so I hope they let her keep this going.

That bat trick was clever. Well done Alice.

Ryan has an antagonist history with Sophie and the Crows. That should keep them at odds for a while.

Loved Ryan and Mary teaming up about her wearing the suit. New BFF alert! Two against one, sorry Luke.

Still doing the thing where the character reading does their own voiceover. Nice detail of Ryan writing to Kate now.

[Primal Slayer]

Using a stunt double for Kate for flashbacks, smart move. I was wondering if they'd do that since its pretty easy to get away with. Interesting that they are fine using a recast for Kates voice but not the entire character. And I am already over having Ryan write to Kate who wrote to Bruce and somehow Ryan was one of Kates last "saves"

Ryan was trained in half a dozen different martial art forms, will they give her an actual mentor or how did she afford that kind of training? Id say use Wildcat but....

Why do The Crows deal with simple robberies? And are we supposed to believe that they wouldnt look at video footage first? The concept of the whole thing is fine and its a way to connect Ryan to Sophie but its just not executed the best I feel.

I find it pretty hard to believe that Julia would be the kind to find herself with Alice/any criminal secretly hiding in the backseat of her car. Though the scene is fun.

Yes, Ryan just KNEW that there was an empty bus right in front of her....they couldve come up with something a little better.

"Batwoman?" No not really "well you are to me", if they had just left it at Batwoman?, it wouldve been better and less forced. Arrowverse writers love to drive a point home.

All of Alices scenes with everyone were top notch, she plays off of everyone rather well. 

Overall it was yet another decent episode and I love me some Alice but lord am I ready for some other big bads get some spot light. Gotham is a city that house(d)s Joker, Penguin, TwoFace, Clayface,Riddler, Poison Ivy, all these big time villains and I cant believe that Alice is the only big time bad around.

[TiffanyNichelle]

Mary talking Ryan through how to pose like Batwoman was pretty funny. I kind of like her and Luke's indulgent parent/strict parent vibe they got going over the Batwoman persona. It's awful that Ryan and Mary can bond over Alice killing their mothers though. I love that Mary is still angry as hell about her mother's death and clearly had been keeping it away from Kate.

I was surprised that they had Ryan figure out the Alice=Beth secret so fast. I thought they would wait to drop it as a big moment or just never have her find out.

Sophie and Jacob Kane are still the worst.

The ending with Ryan reading Kate's Bruce diary aka all her voice overs from last season was a nice touch. I guess the voice overs are coming back?

Edited January 25, 2021 by TiffanyNichelle

[bmoore4026]

"You are to me."  Oh, that got me in the feels.

And Rachel Maddow's back!

And we had a fun chase with the Batmobile.  Hopefully we get more of the Batmobile.

Edited January 25, 2021 by bmoore4026

[driver18]

20 minutes ago, TiffanyNichelle said:

Mary talking Ryan through how to pose like Batwoman was pretty funny. I kind of like her and Luke's indulgent parent/strict parent vibe they got going over the Batwoman persona. It's awful that Ryan and Mary can bond over Alice killing their mothers though. I love that Mary is still angry as hell about her mother's death and clearly had been keeping it away from Kate.

The ending with Ryan reading Kate's Bruce diary aka all her voice overs from last season was a nice touch. I guess the voice overs are coming back?

Add that I wasn't expecting Mary and Alice to have any "sisterly" scenes because Alice needs that sibling connection and I AM SO HERE FOR IT, and you pretty much nailed my favorite parts of the episode.

[Jediknight]

1 hour ago, Primal Slayer said:

Why do The Crows deal with simple robberies? And are we supposed to believe that they wouldnt look at video footage first? The concept of the whole thing is fine and its a way to connect Ryan to Sophie but its just not executed the best I feel.

They're law enforcement in Gotham, being incompetent and corrupt is part of the job.  I can buy them not looking at the video footage.

[UnoAgain]

I too loved Mary walking Ryan thru hero posing.. And all of her gesticulations while explaining to Ryan were hilarious... Her and Luke's dynamic with Ryan is great... I spent all of last season defending Sophie... But man she's a tough one to root for...interested in Julia's reaction to Ryan.. Obvi she didn't know who she was yet... But now that the question has been raised I imagine  she'll be popping up at batquarters soon... Also my headcannon is that the rest of the floors of that place still house ppl who are working.  Its just the top floor that's empty... So will Ryan have to hide from Jacob and Sophie when she's around Luke and Mary.. Because regardless of the interrogation... They gotta at least suspect they knew and if all of a sudden a young fit black girl starts hanging around exactly when a new fit black batwoman shows up.. Even those two dolts would figure it out... I'm thinking the kryptonite shot will be a plot point for part/ the whole season

[Primal Slayer]

55 minutes ago, Jediknight said:

They're law enforcement in Gotham, being incompetent and corrupt is part of the job.  I can buy them not looking at the video footage.

But GCPD is still operating? I feel like we've seen the occasional cop car? Or was that just in the initial crossover when she first appeared?

[Lantern7]

Nice to see that Gotham City is full of idiots, no matter which show you watch. "Listen! You have to get out of here!" "WE LOVE YOU, BATWOMAN!!!" "I love you, too, but you're in grave danger!!" "WE STILL LOVE YOU, BATWOMAN!!!!" I guess the suit is bulletproof, but it doesn't come with a loudspeaker.

Mary and Alice continue to carry the load of the show and then some. Ryan is adjusting to her new status quo . .  .which is a feat, considering the huge shadow Kate has cast on the city. Loved Mary trying to coach her through posing as a superhero. The bit with the bus and the bats was inspired. The bit with the fear of bats? I can hand-wave it, along with Ryan getting saved by Batwoman. Every hero needs an origin. Of course, the real question is what Ryan will do when she's not Batwoman. She could be formally employed by Mary and/or Luke and/or take over operations of Kate's club, but either option would draw suspicion.

Once again, I like Alice. She's got the whole "villain getting her plans ruined" frustration bit down. Kinda like Oswald over on Gotham, nly a lot more attractive and a lot less neurotic. And now she's got a new bad woman to deal with.

[Primal Slayer]

1 hour ago, Lantern7 said:

Nice to see that Gotham City is full of idiots, no matter which show you watch. "Listen! You have to get out of here!" "WE LOVE YOU, BATWOMAN!!!" "I love you, too, but you're in grave danger!!" "WE STILL LOVE YOU, BATWOMAN!!!!" I guess the suit is bulletproof, but it doesn't come with a loudspeaker.

Apparently that scene is left over from Season 1 and they just changed the context of it and inserted Ryan into it.

[cambridgeguy]

6 hours ago, Primal Slayer said:

Apparently that scene is left over from Season 1 and they just changed the context of it and inserted Ryan into it.

Yeah, it would pretty much have to be unless the production wanted to give Covid restrictions a giant middle finger.

10 hours ago, Primal Slayer said:

Interesting that they are fine using a recast for Kates voice but not the entire character.

It's not a recast, they just decided to have the reader to the VO instead of Kate.  Which actually does make sense for Ryan because she has no idea what Kate sounds like. 

[Featherhat]

That was ok. 

I get Jacob and Sophie being very upset that they didn't know but I still wasn't on their side during the interrogations, even if Jacob and Mary later resolved to work together. And I get why Sophie didn't believe Ryan at first but again it's awkward. She's going to be outside the BW circle *again* and I wonder how that's going to work now all the connection she has with Ryan is as cop/detainee. It could be interesting to see two black female characters on different sides who ultimately want the same thing but they sucked at making it interesting last season with Kate/Sophie and Kate/Jacob. I also get why she's upset with Julia but it really wasn't her secret to tell and she should ask herself why Kate never told her despite working together on occasion. 

It's funny that all it took was a look from Sophie for Ryan to figure out that Alice = Beth Kane though. Even in corrupt Gotham it would take more than just being white for Jacob not to have killed openly mass murderer, terrorist Alice yet, although the general populace doesn't realise he's had several chances. Jacob was also publicly desperate to kill/apprehend the white Batwoman last season, he just couldn't catch her. 

My girl Mary is firing on all cylinders doing her Robbin Hood doctor job, trying to help Ryan and keep herself together but clearly still angry and grieving over what has happened and letting people know that as well as reading Alice the riot act. I loved when she was talking Ryan through posing. 

Gah that bat exploding out of Mouse was disturbing. I think Alice wins MVP of this episode and it's interesting that they're linking her directly to Julia and Safiyah as well as her suddenly deciding that Mary is her sister and wanting to have *someone* to play disturbing games with on a "family" level. She even sort of gave her blessing to Ryan and probably thinks having her in the suit is better than nothing. 

"You are to me" Arrowverse just doesn't do subtle and leave things unspoken if they can drive home the point with a sledgehammer instead. 

Ryan herself was still fine and she had some nice chemistry with Mary and even Luke, although it is still awkward trying to fit her into a role that was built around Kate not just Batwoman. She's not wrong that she can understand criminals but I do wonder where she picked up expert martial arts skills.

I actually appreciate that Luke the character that had the most ties to Batwoman and the least to Kate was the one that was unsure about Ryan taking over and reiterated Batwoman's code several times. 

Edited January 25, 2021 by Featherhat

[Chicago Redshirt]

One pf the more interestting parts of the episode for me was something that it largley had as a throwaway line: Ryan saying that the reason Alice hasn't been taken down is because of white privilege. 

The real reaosn in Alice's particular case is Plot Armor. Just in the two episodes this season Jake, Julia, Mary and now BW 2.0 have all had face-to-face confrontations with her, with only BW 2.0 making any real effort to apprehend her. I can buy that Mary is too shook and unprepared to have a gun or anything to try to capture or kill Alice. But Jake literally went to Wayne Manor to arrest her and let her escape because of her truth bomb. Yes, Julia was stabbed by Alice. But she doesn't have a gun on her or in the car to shoot her? Or the ability to call for reinforcements? And BW 2.0 has all sorts of martial arts training and a supersuit with weapons. Alice can fight her to a draw? Really? Did Alice ever show that sort of prowess versus Kate?

But that said, I wonder how much TPTB meant for us to think about white privilege in Gotham and in the real world that creates Gotham.

Like in a world parallel to our own, where situations like George Floyd etc. exist, how can there be supervillains who remorselessly kill again and again? I get that BW and Batman don't kill. But cops do. Random people do.

It made me rack my brain for Bat-villains who were people of color and I had a tpugh time coming up with ones. Not including Two-Face and Catwoman who have been race-swapped. I guess technically comic Bane is Latino of some sort.  Lady Shiva is Asian. The best I could come up with for Black Bat-supervillains were Black Spider, Bronze Tiger and I think one of the Electrocutioners. 

[Primal Slayer]

28 minutes ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

 

The real reaosn in Alice's particular case is Plot Armor. Just in the two episodes this season Jake, Julia, Mary and now BW 2.0 have all had face-to-face confrontations with her, with only BW 2.0 making any real effort to apprehend her. I can buy that Mary is too shook and unprepared to have a gun or anything to try to capture or kill Alice. But Jake literally went to Wayne Manor to arrest her and let her escape because of her truth bomb. Yes, Julia was stabbed by Alice. But she doesn't have a gun on her or in the car to shoot her? Or the ability to call for reinforcements? And BW 2.0 has all sorts of martial arts training and a supersuit with weapons. Alice can fight her to a draw? Really? Did Alice ever show that sort of prowess versus Kate?

The batsuit is only bullet proof, it doesnt give them enhanced abilities unless I missed that part. Alice has a long Xena-like history where she's encountered a lot of powerful people and likely had various mentors. And Ryan couldve been trained in all sorts of martial arts but it doesnt mean that she is a master of those arts. Should being trained by (I assume) some random martial artist give you the same quality as being trained by someone in the LOA? (of course in the Arrowverse it technically does lol but still)

[Chicago Redshirt]

15 minutes ago, Primal Slayer said:

The batsuit is only bullet proof, it doesnt give them enhanced abilities unless I missed that part. Alice has a long Xena-like history where she's encountered a lot of powerful people and likely had various mentors. And Ryan couldve been trained in all sorts of martial arts but it doesnt mean that she is a master of those arts. Should being trained by (I assume) some random martial artist give you the same quality as being trained by someone in the LOA? (of course in the Arrowverse it technically does lol but still)

The suit itself doesn't give any enhanced strength or anything like that. But it  traditionally comes with a utility belt and and a number of weapons -- Batarangs, knockout gas, and so forth -- that would mean that there would have been no need to engage in a fist fight with Alice. 

I don't remember S1 very well, so if it was documented that Alice has somehow had martial arts training,OK. I would still say that a fight between a highly trained trained martial artist without a multi-million dollar protective suit on the one hand and a merelycompetent martial artist in a multi-million dolar protective suit should probably only end one way.

[tennisgurl]

The scene between Mary and Alice was definitely the best scene of the new season so far, I love the idea of Alice deciding that, because Mary is her "only sister" now, they can have something of the antagonism/familial relationship that she had with Kate, where they try to stop each other but also still semi secretly care about each other, now that Kate is gone. They do have a complicated history, even if its a different one than the one Alice had with Kate, but I think that this could be a pretty good substitute for the Kate/Alice relationship that made Alice work so well as a villain. 

I really hope that everyone (and the audience) finds out what happened to Kate soon, dragging it out and giving the characters hope that Kate might still be alive just seems kind of cruel, especially after everything that happened with Beth. We know that Kate wont come back, because RR isn't coming back, so I guess their only options are them finding out that Kate is dead, or that she is just somewhere else and isn't coming back. The best they can hope is probably something like finding out that Kate felt all angsty about everything that happened last season and is off on a quest of self discovery with Bruce in offscreen land and she gives her blessing to Ryan as the new Batwoman, but it seems more likely that she's dead, just they don't want to confirm it yet. Maybe the show doesn't want to actually kill her off, because either they think its cruel or they think the optics are bad, but I hope they give us an answer soon. 

Ryan is working out pretty well as a new Batwoman, even if there are times when you can feel her awkwardly getting shoehorned into Kate's story or the show really going overboard on getting us to accept her as Batwoman, like Ryan conveniently finding a page in Kate's diary/letters to Bruce where she talks about saving Ryan and how Ryan is why Kate does what she does, and then Ryan doing the same thing for another girl who tells us that, yep Ryan is totally Batwoman you guys. Plus, Ryan's Most Tragic Backstory Ever is still rather over the top, even by the standards of superhero backstories, to the point that it can feel like the writers really wanting us to feel for her and her struggle right away. I do like the idea of her reading Kate's letters about her time as Batwoman for inspiration, and Ryan writing to Kate, it keeps Kate a part of the show even now that she's gone. 

I did enjoy a lot of Ryan learning how to be Batwoman with Luke and Mary helping her out, especially Luke reminding Ryan about the Batfam code against killing (which makes sense, as he is the person most connected to Batman as Batman now) and, hilariously, Mary telling Ryan how to pose as Batwoman on the top of a building. Standing dramatically on top of buildings really is a major part of being a Batperson. When they aren't hitting us over the head with Ryan's tragic past or going over the top to remind us that she is the new Batwoman now, I like Ryan as a character, and Javicia Leslie is doing a great job with her performance. 

Sophie being pissed off and grieving at least gives her some more to do, but I fear that she might be even more sidelined than ever now that Batwoman isn't even her love interest, which was a big part of her character, besides being Jacobs number two. I did find her reaction to Ryan saying how she "totally knows" why Alice isn't dead, and then finding out that Ryan has no idea about the missing daughter drama and just thinks its racism, to be kind of funny. She was so baffled at the idea that Alice is still alive because of something as mundane as white privilege. 

[Katsullivan]

I'm glad I'm not the only one that was taken out by Julie in the backseat urban legend. I loved Mary coaching Ryan through the heroic pose. Ryan writing to Kate is a nice nod to season 1, but I wish they'd figured a less hamfisted way to start it. I think that's the problem with this season and the recast of sorts - it's all a bit hamfisted to fit Ryan into a story/world that was built for Kate. It's still enjoyable, but there are already dangling threads like Sophie, beginning to fray.

[Featherhat]

7 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

I really hope that everyone (and the audience) finds out what happened to Kate soon, dragging it out and giving the characters hope that Kate might still be alive just seems kind of cruel, especially after everything that happened with Beth. We know that Kate wont come back, because RR isn't coming back, so I guess their only options are them finding out that Kate is dead, or that she is just somewhere else and isn't coming back. The best they can hope is probably something like finding out that Kate felt all angsty about everything that happened last season and is off on a quest of self discovery with Bruce in offscreen land and she gives her blessing to Ryan as the new Batwoman, but it seems more likely that she's dead, just they don't want to confirm it yet. Maybe the show doesn't want to actually kill her off, because either they think its cruel or they think the optics are bad, but I hope they give us an answer soon. 

 

This. I can see why they might be leery of killing off their leading lady who is also a lesbian but if that was such a big issue then they should have just recast the character. 

Kate leaving Gotham and going on some sort of quest and we never see her again also doesn't really do her justice as she left so many characters and threads there and we're not going to see a scene where she had Jacob have a big reunion so whilst it's understandable that he doesn't want to make the same mistake again, it's also heart breaking. IF they keep the characters hoping and occasionally saying "I'm not giving up!" only to eventually give up or never get a resolution, it's not exactly great TV. I do think they should bite the bullet one way or the other sooner rather than later. 

16 minutes ago, tennisgurl said:

Plus, Ryan's Most Tragic Backstory Ever is still rather over the top, even by the standards of superhero backstories, to the point that it can feel like the writers really wanting us to feel for her and her struggle right away. I do like the idea of her reading Kate's letters about her time as Batwoman for inspiration, and Ryan writing to Kate, it keeps Kate a part of the show even now that she's gone. 

I like Ryan a lot as a character and JC is charismatic but this made me chuckle. They have a good actress who works well with the rest of the cast even though the character herself is rather awkwardly jammed in there. They don't need to give her the most tragic backstory ever for her to fit in. The Standard Tragic Superhero Backstory would have sufficed. Instead she has three parents already pre murdered/died under tragic circumstances, AND she grew up in the system AND got wrongly convicted AND keeps getting hauled in for questioning AND can't get a job because she's a black felon AND mysteriously learned martial arts AND got rescued by Batwoman before. Even Sara Lance and Oliver Queen think that's a lot. 

[Primal Slayer]

1 hour ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

The suit itself doesn't give any enhanced strength or anything like that. But it  traditionally comes with a utility belt and and a number of weapons -- Batarangs, knockout gas, and so forth -- that would mean that there would have been no need to engage in a fist fight with Alice. 

I don't remember S1 very well, so if it was documented that Alice has somehow had martial arts training,OK. I would still say that a fight between a highly trained trained martial artist without a multi-million dollar protective suit on the one hand and a merelycompetent martial artist in a multi-million dolar protective suit should probably only end one way.

Ryan barely knows how to use the suit not to mention that Alice has spent a year battling her sister...the bat suit isnt that scary to her. She knows what its capable of.

[Chicago Redshirt]

3 hours ago, Primal Slayer said:

Ryan barely knows how to use the suit not to mention that Alice has spent a year battling her sister...the bat suit isnt that scary to her. She knows what its capable of.

Most of what I'm talking about isn't about nuances of the suit. It (presumably) inherently cushions blows in hand-to-hand combat to a certain extent. While she hasn't gotten any training in its use, where the Batarang(s) are should be prety basic. 

I don't remember many fist fights between Kate and Alice, but the main reason it would be plausible that Kate didn't mop the floor with Alice the way she does with Alice's goons and numerous bad guys is a) Alice is also highly trained (which I don't remember, but then again, a lot of S1 is a blur) b) Kate was holding herself back out of sympathy for her sister or c) plot armor/the need to have Alice be a recurring villain.

Knowing what the suit is capable of doesn't matter much when someone has thrown a Batarang upside your head. 

[appositival]

I felt sorry for the bats. So how exactly did Alice bio-engineer bats to carry the magic ninja toxin?

[possibilities]

40 minutes ago, appositival said:

I felt sorry for the bats. So how exactly did Alice bio-engineer bats to carry the magic ninja toxin?

I felt bad for them, too. I think she got them to be poison carriers by luring them to feed on the rat that fed on Mouse's poisoned corpse. I guess bats are immune to the poison? 

 

But do bats really eat rats? I thought they ate small insects and fruit.

---

First Batman disappears. Now Batwoman. Maybe the Hero will disappear at the end of every season, off to a retirement community for burned out Heroes.

[thuganomics85]

Despite being the top dogs amongst the Crows, both Jacob and Sophie pretty much got schooled by Luke and Mary during their attempts at "interrogation."  Granted, I will probably always give the edge to Luke and Mary in most scenarios...

Another episode that was mainly about implementing Ryan into all aspects of the show and strengthening her relationship with the rest of the cast, but I think they're doing a solid, if steady job.  Curious to see what will come out of the clear tension between her and Sophie.  And I'm already digging the vibe between her and Luke/Mary, especially since it is hilariously almost becoming a parental one, with Luke as the scolding and over-protective father and Mary as the more supportive mother.  Hope we get more bits like Mary trying to walk Ryan through a heroic pose!

Definitely down for more Alice/Mary scenes, since they are my favorites.  Alice potentially clinging to Mary now since she's her only "sister" left could be interesting, even though I suspect Mary would disagree with me there!

I was going to say that Julia seemed to shake off that stab to the ribcage pretty well, but then I remember how quickly she got over the electro shock torture last season.  Those Pennyworths are tough!

Vesper Fairchild returns!

If the actual Bruce ever does return, he is going to be so annoyed over how many people know his secret identity now!

[quarks]

1. Loved Mary coaching Ryan on How To Stand Dramatically On Top of a Building, Cape Waving in the Wind. It did make me a) wonder how much time Bruce Wayne spent practicing that and b) if previous Arrowverse superheroes, Kara and Clark aside, have avoided the whole cape thing because they didn't have time to practice posing. 

2. Did not love the bats eating the mice, like, ugh, show. 

3. Did not buy that Julia, supposedly a highly trained spy/soldier, would not take a moment to check the back seat of her car and keep the back doors locked. Fun though that scene was.

4. And once again, I find myself asking what, exactly, this show is doing with Sophie. The problems in just this episode:

a. Failing to check the video before questioning Ryan, making Sophie look like someone unwilling to do basic investigation/due diligence

b. Letting Ryan realize that Jacob had some sort of personal connection with Alice - allowing Ryan to connect the dots with something she could easily take straight to the press. (I mean, Rachel Maddow keeps saying, "Talk to me, Gotham!" so Ryan even has a journalist of sorts to contact.)

c. Failing to save the city from the bats and wasting some of Mary's time as Mary was trying to head out with the serum to save the city.

d. Heading out to meet Alice with zero backup and getting herself knocked out by a minor recurring player.

e. Getting angry at Julia for not telling Kate's secret, instead of realizing that this makes Julia more trustworthy, not less.

All against the background of Ryan saving the city in her first approved outing in the Batsuit, Julia figuring out Alice's location from some dirt, and Alice doing a pretty spectacular first battle/step in her war against this year's Big Bad.

Sure, some of this was for general infodumping/letting Ryan compete for the title of Most Tragic Backstory in the Arrowverse. But most of it just served to make Sophie look like a terrible cop.

As Arrow demonstrated back in the day, that's a hard problem to get around. Because a city with a competent police force/legal system doesn't need a vigilante (unless said city is attacked by metahumans, in which case you have a different show). So Gotham only needs a Batwoman if the police force/legal system are incompetent/corrupt. And since Sophie is part of the police force/legal system - Well. 

Add in that she's a now-former love interest, and. Well. I hope the show can find something to do with her, but so far it is not looking encouraging. 

[Stardancer Supreme]

I thought it was clever of Alice to use poison bats in her bid to get Safiyah's attention.  I expected that device she was holding to be the detonator to a huge bomb planted in the square. 

On 1/24/2021 at 9:09 PM, Primal Slayer said:

Ryan was trained in half a dozen different martial art forms, will they give her an actual mentor or how did she afford that kind of training? Id say use Wildcat but....

Why do The Crows deal with simple robberies? And are we supposed to believe that they wouldn't look at video footage first? The concept of the whole thing is fine and its a way to connect Ryan to Sophie but its just not executed the best I feel.
 

Now that I would be interested in seeing.  Ryan's timeline is a bit fuzzy, as they all are on shows like this; so she was a ward of the state until she turned 18, got sent to prison for 18 months, gained and lost her foster mother mere moments after getting released and managed to cross paths with Kate 2 months before her disappearance?  How long was she on the streets after her foster mother's death?  I would like to know how and when Ryan got her martial arts training as well...

I guess GCPD/Crows are totally clueless and corrupt. Sophie remembered Ryan from her previous brushes with the law, yet didn't at least think that the black girl in the Batwoman suit seemed familiar? Even after Ryan spoke to her?  Jacob's all het up because a Black woman is in his daughter's suit.  Yuck.

[possibilities]

I wonder if they're planning to send Sophie off to be with Kate once Kate is discovered to be alive on an Island with Bruce Wayne, sipping cocktails. 

[RobertDeSneero]

13 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

One pf the more interestting parts of the episode for me was something that it largley had as a throwaway line: Ryan saying that the reason Alice hasn't been taken down is because of white privilege. 

I'm hoping that race is something they try to tackle on this show because I am curious to see how the typical subtlety of the Arrowverse is applied to such matters.  

Quote

It made me rack my brain for Bat-villains who were people of color and I had a tpugh time coming up with ones. Not including Two-Face and Catwoman who have been race-swapped. I guess technically comic Bane is Latino of some sort.  Lady Shiva is Asian. The best I could come up with for Black Bat-supervillains were Black Spider, Bronze Tiger and I think one of the Electrocutioners. 

R'as al Ghul, Jezebel Jet, and Killer Croc.

I expect them to make Sophie attracted to the new Batwoman.  And maybe have Ryan meet Safiyah and have a fling before finding out she is a villain.  Or possibly have Ryan and Julia hook up.  They've got a bunch of lesbians running around.  They're bound to put two of them together in some fashion at some point.  I don't think they can make this a proper CW show without some sort of relationship angst.

[Trini]

I was afraid they had gotten rid of the Vesper radio show, so I was so glad to hear Rachel Maddow's voice at the end!

So the secret (Kate was Batwoman) is out between all the main players, but Sophie and Jacob still don't know (for sure) that Luke and Mary were working together with her. I hope that at some point, sooner rather than later, that everyone can be on the same page and the same team. Although, I'm not so sure it would work with Jacob being head of the Crows.

In the meantime, I'm loving the Luke/Mary/Ryan Bat-team dynamic even though it's a bit contentious right now. I'm sure things will smooth out later.

So now even with her gone, Ryan still got Kate's endorsement through that letter.*  I know that they are making an effort to connect Ryan to everyone so that the next Batwoman isn't just some rando who found the Batsuit -- but I still see her as a rando who found the Batsuit. But I'm still sticking around to see how this goes.

*(How much bad blood must there have been if they couldn't get Ruby to do a couple voiceovers? I was thinking that she might make a guest appearance at the end of the season to wrap up her story, but now I'm not so sure.)

 

4 hours ago, possibilities said:

I felt bad for them, too. I think she got them to be poison carriers by luring them to feed on the rat that fed on Mouse's poisoned corpse. I guess bats are immune to the poison?

But do bats really eat rats? I thought they ate small insects and fruit.

The ENTIRE plan was nonsensical. (Bats don't eat rats - or human corpses. The bats biting/eating Mouse would not be a way to distribute the poison. Where did Alice even get a device that specifically herds bats?? Hamilton Dynamics just whipped up a cure overnight from blood that wasn't even stored properly. (some STAR Labs level of logistics right there!))  But we're working with *Gotham* logic here, in which the city that's supposed to be the most grounded is actually the most wacky! So of course Alice's plan worked exactly as she intended.

Interested in seeing how this Safiyah works as a 'big bad'.

[Chicago Redshirt]

33 minutes ago, RobertDeSneero said:

I'm hoping that race is something they try to tackle on this show because I am curious to see how the typical subtlety of the Arrowverse is applied to such matters.  

R'as al Ghul, Jezebel Jet, and Killer Croc.

I expect them to make Sophie attracted to the new Batwoman.  And maybe have Ryan meet Safiyah and have a fling before finding out she is a villain.  Or possibly have Ryan and Julia hook up.  They've got a bunch of lesbians running around.  They're bound to put two of them together in some fashion at some point.  I don't think they can make this a proper CW show without some sort of relationship angst.

Yeah, I get that the Arrowverse doesn't do politics of any sort well (see Arrow on gun control and Supergirl on immigration) but there's always a chance something might beat the crowd. I thought Black Lightning had interesting things to say about race from time to time.

I almost included Ra's, but I don't think he has really been portrayed as a person of color generally. Hadn't heard of Jezebel Jet till this post, and from what I am seeing from Googling, she barely counts as a supervillain. I haven't read the origin story of Killer Croc to know one way or another if he is descended from people of color. I suppose "Waylon Jones" could be black or white.

[cambridgeguy]

7 hours ago, Stardancer Supreme said:

Jacob's all het up because a Black woman is in his daughter's suit.  Yuck.

That's a leap - he's not pissed because she's black, he's pissed because it's obviously not Kate.  Jacob has many faults but he's never been shown to be a racist and he's always been anti-vigilante.

7 hours ago, Stardancer Supreme said:

Sophie remembered Ryan from her previous brushes with the law, yet didn't at least think that the black girl in the Batwoman suit seemed familiar? Even after Ryan spoke to her?

Remember, this is a universe where trained reporters, police officers, Luthors, etc. are completely fooled by a pair of glasses.  The bigger leap will be if Sophie ever sees Ryan suddenly hanging out with Mary and especially Luke, but for now she doesn't seem to inclined to cross into Luke's storylines.

[Rushmoras]

Eh, new season is only mildly interesting to me. No more crazy psycho sister dynamic, so not very interesting. The only thing that is, is Alice, hope they don't decide to off her until the end of the season (if they do, that's when I am bailing out of here).

Anyways, during the flashback of what's her name, she throws a knife in to the palm of a baddy, then goes to say thank you to Batwoman. OK, but the bad-guy is still a threat. Don't turn your back on him, jesus effin christ!

So, now, what, what's her name gonna squat in the batcave? But she has no normal job and is virtually broke and homeless. Will... um... what's his name be her sugar-daddy now, or something? I mean, Batwoman does not get paid.

How did Alice put a bat inside Mouse? That's some shit from the Mummy with Brandan Freiser.

Um, the other sister's speech about they should take care of Alice. Um, no. If anything, you should be rooting for more chaos. She's the only thing that's good in this show now.

So, whose the League of Shadows wanna-be at the end?

Sorry, for using what's their names or equivalents, but honestly, I can't remember most of their names even after a full season 😀

Oh, almost forgot, Alice had a prime opportunity to pop a bullet between Ryan's (is her name Ryan?) teeth, cause she shot first. but, alas, only aimed at the armoured parts. 😀

Edited January 26, 2021 by Rushmoras

[quarks]

14 hours ago, Trini said:

*(How much bad blood must there have been if they couldn't get Ruby to do a couple voiceovers? I was thinking that she might make a guest appearance at the end of the season to wrap up her story, but now I'm not so sure.)

I'm not 100% sure that the lack of voiceovers is because of bad blood; it could be because Ruby Rose doesn't have access to a studio/sound equipment wherever she's living now, and/or doesn't feel comfortable heading to one because of Covid protocols. Rachel Maddow, in contrast, has been at her MSNBC studio nearly every day except for when her partner came down with Covid. She could easily use her own equipment in studio or pop down a couple floors to the soundstages/recording studios at 30 Rock. I'm not sure if Rose has the same access/flexibility, and I can't imagine the show's sound engineers would have been thrilled with a voice track recorded over Zoom.

Meanwhile, Batwoman is going well out of its way to remind us that a) no one found a body, and b) this is the Arrowverse, where no one who has appeared in more than three episodes ever really dies. Sure, some of that is for plot/character purposes - Luke presumably wouldn't be as resistant to the idea of Ryan wearing the Batsuit if he knew, absolutely 100%, that Kate was dead - but some of it seems to be setting up some sort of eventual "surprise" return by Ruby Rose for the 100th episode or series finale or whatever.

 

[appositival]

4 hours ago, Rushmoras said:

How did Alice put a bat inside Mouse?

The writers obviously think that bats are weasels with wings. They eat mice, they burrow into their victims, and they go for the throat. Yes, yes, domesticated weasels act nice, but play-bites are just their way of checking to see if you are 'ripe' yet.

You would think that the bats would have gone home if they just turned the bat-annoyer off.

20 hours ago, possibilities said:

I think she got them to be poison carriers by luring them to feed on the rat that fed on Mouse's poisoned corpse.

This makes sense. Basically the writers don't know the difference between poison and a disease. The Magic Ninja Poison is obviously communicable among bats.

For a show about bat-people you would think that they might have done a bit of research, but in the Anvil-verse it's generally "plot uber alles".

 

[immortalfrieza]

On 1/25/2021 at 9:51 AM, Chicago Redshirt said:

The real reaosn in Alice's particular case is Plot Armor. Just in the two episodes this season Jake, Julia, Mary and now BW 2.0 have all had face-to-face confrontations with her, with only BW 2.0 making any real effort to apprehend her. I can buy that Mary is too shook and unprepared to have a gun or anything to try to capture or kill Alice. But Jake literally went to Wayne Manor to arrest her and let her escape because of her truth bomb. Yes, Julia was stabbed by Alice. But she doesn't have a gun on her or in the car to shoot her? Or the ability to call for reinforcements? And BW 2.0 has all sorts of martial arts training and a supersuit with weapons. Alice can fight her to a draw? Really? Did Alice ever show that sort of prowess versus Kate?

Not to mention the ability for Alice, easily the most wanted person in all of Gotham to apparently waltz into the parking lot of a supposed elite police force, hide in an agent's car, and then walk straight out without getting arrested.

21 hours ago, appositival said:

I felt sorry for the bats. So how exactly did Alice bio-engineer bats to carry the magic ninja toxin?

It's definitely a weird toxin. The tiny minuscule amounts of it left over in Mouse's corpse are apparently enough even divided up among dozens of bats to... not kill the bats yet poison who knows how many people? It's a toxin, not a bacterial or virus. Diluting it would make it ineffective.

4 hours ago, Rushmoras said:

Eh, new season is only mildly interesting to me. No more crazy psycho sister dynamic, so not very interesting. The only thing that is, is Alice, hope they don't decide to off her until the end of the season (if they do, that's when I am bailing out of here).

I'm the opposite, I can't wait for them to kill off Alice... though I doubt it will ever happen. Maybe if they did they could bring in other Bat villains that are 1000 times more interesting than Alice could ever be, not that that's difficult.

[Primal Slayer]

16 hours ago, Trini said:

*(How much bad blood must there have been if they couldn't get Ruby to do a couple voiceovers? I was thinking that she might make a guest appearance at the end of the season to wrap up her story, but now I'm not so sure.)

Even if there isnt that much bad blood, they likely dont want to pay Ruby to do voiceovers. Could be a Shannen Doherty situation wherein they'd have to pay her what she was making as a lead. But I think its pretty clear that this wasnt a complete mutual parting and there was bts drama.

[Chicago Redshirt]

2 hours ago, appositival said:

You would think that the bats would have gone home if they just turned the bat-annoyer off.

I will buy into the notion that there was no obvious off-switch to the device. Luke suggested just smash it, and Ryan was like that might not work and it might leave the bats around biting people.

I know that the bats were venomous somehow but I was kind of sad they all had to be blown up.

Also, I don't know if we should be happy, sad or indifferent about the twist/homage to the classic Batman: Year One. In it, Bruce gets in a jam and is surrounded by a corrupt SWAT team in an abandoned building. To help escape, he activates a bat-attracter so that they swarm the building and allow him to ride off on a motorcycle as they provide cover. Eventually he turns it off and the cops following the crowd of bats ride off a pier.

[AnimeMania]

8 hours ago, Rushmoras said:

Oh, almost forgot, Alice had a prime opportunity to pop a bullet between Ryan's (is her name Ryan?) teeth, cause she shot first. but, alas, only aimed at the armoured parts. 😀

Alice said she was testing to see if the Batsuit was real or a cheap Halloween knockoff.

[CletusMusashi]

Alice and her ridiculous bat-plot belonged in one of the Tim Burton movies.

[immortalfrieza]

15 hours ago, CletusMusashi said:

Alice and her ridiculous bat-plot belonged in one of the Tim Burton movies.

I hear it was based on a similar plot in the Batwoman comics where Alice did the same thing. Though there it was at least an actual disease the bats were infected with instead of a toxin and thus the idea was much more plausible.

Edited January 28, 2021 by immortalfrieza

[possibilities]

I personally have had enough of Alice. It's too much the same every episode. 

[Msample]

Was I the only one laughing at the supposedly high tech Crows using .....a schoolbus to haul troops around? Of course it came in handy at the end.

[Joe Hellandback]

2 good things in this, firstly Mary coaching Ryan into heroic poses (no hands on the hips, leave that for WW). Secondly Ryan giving her "If she was white" nonsense and the look of incredulity from Sophie.  

[John Potts]

I'm surprised nobody on Team Bats replied under interrogation - "Enemies? Well let's see - there's that crazy Alice and her gang and the Crows have her under a shoot to kill order. That should give you more than enough suspects!" Though how the Crows are still employed is a mystery - while the GCPD are public servants and so hard to dismiss, the Crows are (I think?) a purely private force. Given they seem utterly incapable of stamping out the Wonderland Gang, wouldn't they have been fired by now?

I guess we're going with race (reasonably enough!) as the primary social issue over Gay Rights for this Season. 

Is Safiyah(?) a character I should know?

Couldn't WayneCorp give Ryan a job? And shouldn't Ryan mention the wound to her shoulder? She was literally in Mary's illegal clinic during their discussion!

Loved Mary coaching Ryan on a suitably heroic pose. The show needs a few moments of levity.

On 1/25/2021 at 3:02 AM, bmoore4026 said:

And we had a fun chase with the Batmobile.

I loved Ryan's admission that she wasn't used to going over 40!

On 1/26/2021 at 6:39 AM, Trini said:

The ENTIRE plan was nonsensical. (Bats don't eat rats - or human corpses. The bats biting/eating Mouse would not be a way to distribute the poison. Where did Alice even get a device that specifically herds bats?? Hamilton Dynamics just whipped up a cure overnight from blood that wasn't even stored properly.

It would have made more sense if he'd died from a virus rather than poison. In that case, the virus could have multiplied inside Mouse and/or the bats. A dog whistle was probably all they needed to draw the bats (it's what Batman used in Batman Begins - not sure it would work that way IRL, but it has provenance). The fact that Hamilton can duplicate the rare cure I just put down to comic book science!

On 1/25/2021 at 2:09 AM, Primal Slayer said:

Using a stunt double for Kate for flashbacks, smart move. I was wondering if they'd do that since its pretty easy to get away with.

And fights in general. Pretty sure the fight between Ryan and Alice was two stuntpeople (except the close ups).