The title of the episode alone makes it sound like a love story, and perhaps in a way it is one. The episode starts out with our darling couple: Penguin and Nygma, two white guys with sunken eyes and alarming thinness. Nygma is fluffing his hat and posing with him for photos, and Butch is off to the side looking increasingly angry. Apparently being bumped from No. 2 to No. 3 in the crime world in a huge deal; I wonder how all the nameless minions must feel.
In previous episodes, Penguin told us that he was becoming mayor to impress his father, but in this episode he finally brings his mother into it. In fact, he doesn’t bring up his father at all, which I think is wise. Penguin has always been known for his mommy issues, and we should just stick to that. He just wants to make her proud because she was “the only one that ever believed in me.” Didn’t he just say basically the same thing about Nygma a few moments ago? Is Penguin now looking at Nygma as a mother figure? Their relationship is just really weird.
Of course, since the mommy issues are brought up again, we have to make them incredibly worse. The Red Hood Gang comes and shoots up the statue of his mother, but not Penguin himself. Why do all that and not just kill him? Even the gang themselves don’t understand, but they clearly seem inexperienced considering they didn’t have anyone watching their hideout door. Butch walks right in, but turns out that he is their leader. I think that jealous Butch might be my favorite Butch; he does a lot of fun and interesting things when he is frustrated.
Meanwhile, Nygma is leading the search for the Red Hood Gang, and everyone is the GCPD goes deathly silent when they see him walk in (as if they haven’t seen him on TV before this). Barnes grumbles about his lack of power, Harvey makes sarcastic comments, Lucius makes threats, and Lee straight up punches him in the face. While she was cautious about mentioning her fiancé’s last name to Gordon, she preaches it now, and uses it as leverage against Nygma. I hope this means that Lee punches a lot more people in the face when they are being dicks; that might solve some unresolved issues in this show.
Besides investigating the Red Hood Gang, Gordon persuades the GCPD to search for Ivy on the request of Bruce. Gordon thinks it’s sweet that Bruce is doing this for Selina, while he vehemently refuses that they are a thing. Gordon can’t really judge, considering his conversation with Val that morning consisted of her saying she can’t stay another night because “that would make it a thing.” Both our boys have difficult love lives; it’s the most relatable part of this show. They have a heart to heart about their girls (essentially their conversations wouldn’t pass a reverse Bechdel test), and Gordon insists that Bruce should tell Selina about his feelings, and Bruce calls him out on his new relationship with Val. Overall, both of them have their relationship status on Facebook set to “it’s complicated.”
The GCPD hasn’t found Ivy, but they have found her sweater from a woman in her 20s. The GCPD is convinced that the man that interacted with her isn’t lying (and I’m just happy to hear that he is alive and Ivy isn’t a killer – yet), and they basically drop the case. Are they even going to try to track down the woman? I know that they don’t think the woman is Ivy, but the fact she had her sweater is still enough to assume she interacted with Ivy at some point. No wonder Gotham voted Penguin for mayor; nothing can be worse than their GCPD as it currently is.
The Red Hood Gang is told to blame their acts on Penguin in front of the press, and Penguin is determined flaunt his power and take them down. He enlists help from Barbara to do so, and we finally get to see Barbara and Tabitha be the power couple that they are, as they kidnap guys and track down Butch before even the famous Riddler figures it out. To be fair, Nygma does figure it out moments afterwards, but still I got to give my girls some credit for their good detective work and impressive blackmailing skills. Now Butch owes Tabitha a favor, but he probably isn’t that worried about it considering that it would just be another excuse to talk to her. Since she lets him go, he still gets the opportunity to kill the Red Hood Gang to make himself the hero and get on Penguin’s good side again. Penguin is so grateful that Butch even gets some time in the spotlight of the media too.
But Nygma isn’t having it. He is suspicious, and considers Butch a 300-pound gorilla, so he is a little jealous too. In the end, it is Butch’s metal hand that gives him away, and unfortunately that is a tough accusation to get around. Nygma won’t kill him for betraying Penguin though, because he wants Penguin dead. Nygma’s intelligence was never meant for someone in the No. 2 position, whereas Butch’s strength was always meant for right hand man. As Nygma sees it, the best solution is to kill Penguin, and he is going to get Butch to do it. It was incredibly upsetting to see their relationship as just an act, but I wasn’t very surprised by it either; I can never guess Nygma’s true goals or intentions at any point. Even Butch sees it as cruel to kill Penguin when he has done so much for Nygma, but Nygma is prepared as always, and threatens to hurt Tabitha if Butch doesn’t kill Penguin.
All this poor party-goers now have to witness what looks like the last standing Red Hood Gang member shoot up the club in order to get to Penguin. And just when it looks like he is about to kill Penguin, Nygma throws in another twist. Turns out it was all just an elaborate plan to ruin Butch. Penguin now knows the truth of Butch’s involvement in the Red Hood Gang, and threatens his life as if he wasn’t already shot a few times in the process already. Barbara is laughing at the show of violence, and doesn’t seem concerned at all with the fact her girlfriend is being held hostage in the back as leverage against Butch; watching Butch attempt to strangle Nygma is far more interesting and entertaining. There is moment where we are unsure if Nygma survived the strangling, but he wakes and the image of Penguin holding Nygma is comically romantic. Afterwards, when Penguin is making tea to heal Nygma’s sore throat, Nygma admits that he would do “anything for you,” and Penguin goes for a hug that I swore was going to be a kiss for a moment. I’m not sure whether Nygma is telling the truth, or whether he is truthfully plotting to overtake Penguin, but at least we still can watch their relationship for the time being.
Despite this horrible situation in the club, Bruce evidently thinks that it’s finally the right moment to admit his feelings to Selina (maybe pick a less bloody night? It’s Penguin’s party, what else would you expect?). However, Selina is distracted by a young woman who seems to know her, but she doesn’t recognize her at all. Ivy is just messing around with her a little bit, and I admit that Selina probably deserves that treatment. Despite the fact that she is working, worried about this Ivy character, and has to ask to if Bruce is really himself, Bruce still sees this as the perfect time for a romantic heart to heart on the roof. Even when he is working up to admitting his feelings, Selina gets impatient and calls him boring, but even her clear irritation doesn’t stop this kid. I don’t know what else she could do at this point. Selina doesn’t react much better to his feelings, and calls him out on his isolation from other girls and their socioeconomic difference separating them. He may be angry at how ridiculous it seems that she is denying him for his wealth, but at least she isn’t using him for money. In the end, she leaves him confused, but he got a kiss out of it, so I don’t think that he is too upset. I wonder if him or fake Bruce was a better kisser.
Our other “it’s complicated” boy is hijacking Val’s dinner. Gordon tells the perv to get lost, and reveals to Val that he will tell her everything she wants to know about Alice for her report. Why is he telling her everything? That’s not exactly a healthy relationship if he feels compelled to tell her confidential police information just because she refuses to ever stop her reporter mentality. I’m just a little wary that she is just going to use him for information, and Gordon doesn’t deserve that kind of treatment, especially right now with Lee and her fiancé in town.
Lee is spending her nights in the lab, researching Alice’s condition. Barnes tells her that he wants to keep updated on the findings, and Lee reports that after 3 days, the rats showed increased strength and stamina, but then one rat killed all the others. I’m not sure why he doesn’t just tell them that he was infected. I would think that he would want to keep everyone safe, even if that meant he had to be isolated from everyone. Maybe he is just excited that he doesn’t need to use his cane for a few days.
However, since Alice is dead, Tetch found another girl to play the part of Alice. He kills her quite quickly though, and uses her blood as ink to write Gordon’s name. Of course. Because everyone has to go after him – not the police who were with him, but just Gordon. Which reminds me, Fish Mooney hasn’t shown her face in a while either. Though, if I don’t see someone on screen, I usually just assume that they are plotting against Gordon.
Overall, this episode was basically filled with a lot of love stories. Gordon and Val, Bruce and Selina, Barbara and Tabitha, and arguably Penguin and Nygma as the best couple of the bunch. The title of “anything for you” says it all. Even in the craziness that is GOTHAM, these characters still care about one another, which makes me care more for them as well. I’m a sucker for a good dynamic between characters.
Written by Nicole Teeters, GOTHAM Beat Writer -- Click here to read Nicole's posts
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