Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 2, Episode 18 - Power

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.

Plot

As Black Mask brings chaos to the streets of Gotham, leading an army made up of former Crows Security agents, Alice enacts a bold plan to save her sister. New alliances will be forged and new identities will be assumed, though it is uncertain who will emerge alive at the end of the night.


Influences

The Purge movies (scenes of chaos in Gotham, people being encouraged to commit crimes while wearing masks), Joker War (villain takes over Gotham and encourages people to dress as his henchmen( Captain America: The Winter Soldier (scene where an anti-hero saves the  hero from drowning, also Kate's brainwashing is similar to what happened to Bucky) the Batwing comic (Luke's armor, character of Menace), the Green Lantern: Sinestro Corps War storyline (people in Gotham showing support for Batwoman by hanging something in their windows) 


Goofs

The episode leaves Jacob Kane's fate up in the air. Kate mentions visiting him before going to National City, but that could prove difficult since Kate is still legally dead and Jacob was still in prison in Metropolis last anyone checked and there's no apparent reason he would be released even after Roman Sionis was revealed to be Black Mask - especially not on a day's notice. Even allowing that Kate is clever enough to come up with a fake ID to get into a prison, her having Circe Sionis' face is bound to raise some questions.


Performances

Camrus Johnson does some fantastic silent acting in the sequence where Luke uncovers the costume his father made based on his childhood designs.

Wallis Day does a fantastic job of replicating Ruby Rose's performance as Kate Kane here and it's a shame she apparently won't be continuing in the role.


Artistry

The sequences in which Luke saves Mary and confronts Tavaroff is classic comic book action and well-played on every level.


Bat Trivia

Reportedly, this episode was originally planned to be the penultimate episode of Season 2 Precisely why that was changed has yet to be revealed, but it is suspected that the final episode was going to be a crossover with Superman And Lois before the COVID pandemic necessitated cancelling all the crossovers for the 2020-2021 season.

Black Mask's plan in this episode is reminiscent of the Joker War storyline, where Joker tried to take over Gotham City after stealing Bruce Wayne's fortune and encouraged people to dress like clowns to join his gang.

In the original Batwing comics, Russell Tavaroff became the villain Menace after taking Snakebite, which in the comics was a refined form of Venom. The Arrowverse version of Tavaroff is transformed into a hulking berserker by a combination of Venom and the drug known as Snakebite.

The idea of the decent people of Gotham taking Black Mask's masks and making them into jack-o-lanterns to reject his ideas is reminiscent of Green Lantern: The Sinestero Corps War. In that story, Hal Jordan encouraged the people of Coast City to flee in the wake of an army of Sinestero Corps members. Instead, most people stayed in their homes and put green-tinted lights in their windows to show their faith in the Green Lanterns. This led to Coast City being dubbed the City Without Fear.

Roman Sionis having his mask bonded to his face thanks to Joker's acid flower is a nod to Batman #387, where Black Mask's face was welded to his mask after he fell into a fire.

The Sionis are said to live on Finger Hill. This is a nod to Bill Finger - the writer who created many elements of the Batman mythology. 

Mention is also made of an Adams Street. This may be a nod to legendary Batman artist Neal Adams.

At the end of the episode, Roman Sionis keeps saying the name Janus over and over. Janus was the Roman god of beginnings, transitions andendings and was traditionally depicted as having two heads.


Technobabble

With their usual systems shut down by the power outage, the Bat Team relies on walkie-talkies with a  five mile range.

Russell Tavaroff is given vaporized forms of both Snakebite and Venom, as Black Mask convinces him that the tranquilizing power of vaporized Snakebite will off-set the rage caused by Venom.

The vaporizer employed by Russell Tavaroff results in a longer Snakebite high without ODing. This leads Mary to the idea that she could use vaporized Snakebite to restore Kate Kane's memories by exposing her to a controlled dosage that would allow her to confront her greatest regret.

Luke's Bat-Suit has some limited flight capability, allowing him to jet up several stories in seconds.

Mary reworks the atomized Snakebite into an aerosol spray that can be administer at close range, like pepper spray.


Dialogue Triumphs

Black Mask (addressing Gotham City) Why are we allowing these self-serving bandits to dictate to us what the terms fair and just mean? We should be dictating these terms to them, so I'm asking you to join me for an evening of anarchy. Help me raze every single one of these moldering institutions to their foundations. I've dropped masks at a dozen street corners. Stand up, strap one on, become your own vigilante, and when the dust finally settles over our failed system, well, Black Mask will still be standing, ready to lead you to your liberation because you know what they say about power, huh? Use it... or lose it.

Batwoman: Dear Gotham, I loved being Batwoman, and I want you to know I never took wearing the symbol for granted... Because I know how badly this city needed a protector...  Someone to inspire hope, someone to prove that there's something better for us out there. You've always needed a hero, Gotham, but in this moment, maybe that's not me. Maybe it's a job for all of you now to trust what you know in your heart to be right and good and to find the courage to use that feeling as a uniting force against hate

(Circe regards Tavaroff as he is fitted with Bane's Venom harness.)
Circe: And you convinced your lab rat that the tranquilizing properties of the Snakebite's vapor would counteract the Venom's roid rage?
Black Mask: Well, let's face it. Everybody wants a bulletproof army, but nobody wants to deal with Bane's tantrums all day.
Circe: So you're building an indestructible army. Was Black Mask not scary enough?
Black Mask: Oh. I don't want to be feared, sweetheart. I want to be loved. 

(After Tavaroff seemingly dies.)
Black Mask: And they wonder why we test our products on animals first!

Ryan: Without the suit, the gadgets, the symbol, I'm just Ryan Wilder.
Sophie: Damn right you're Ryan Wilder, and this chick's about to learn that the hard way.

Alice: They really let anyone be a superhero these days, don't they?
Ryan: Trust me. You're not the only one in the car shocked I've served more time than you.
Alice: Oh, I'm serving my time, dear, just not in the traditional sense.
Ryan: (sarcastic) Remind me to get the name of your lawyer.
Alice: (softly) Safiyah's punishment is worse than a stint at Blackgate. By killing Ocean, she made sure I would spend the rest of my life in agonizing grief. She didn't let me say good-bye. 
(Ryan stops the Batombile, ignoring what Alice just said pointedly.)
Ryan: Okay. We're here.
Alice: I'm saying I get it. I get why you hate me.
(Ryan just blinks in disbelief at Alice, finally getting out of the car.)
Alice: (following after Ryan) Hey! Hey! I said I'm sorry.
Ryan: (angrily) What do you want? Forgiveness? Because you know what it feels like to have the one person who cared about you ripped from your life? Get this through your head. You don't deserve my forgiveness.
Alice: Why? Because you're the hero and I'm the villain? You're not a hero, Ryan, but you already know that! Which is why I'm here, which is why you're so desperate to get Kate back... because your city is falling apart, and you can't save it.
Ryan: (ignoring her) Put on your mask.
Alice:  What kind of hero kills the first woman they've ever met?
(That gets a reaction.)
Ryan: (tense) What are you talking about?
Alice: (calmly) Your biological mother died in childbirth, right? (growing more angry) See, when a girl leaves me at the whims of a madman with a fingernail extractor, my first task upon escaping is to learn everything about her, and I know that your first act on this earth resulted in Mommy's death, so if you want to point fingers at who killed the moms in your life...
(Ryan slaps Alice. Hard.)
Ryan: We are gonna find Kate. Then I'm gonna do everything in my power to dump your ass behind bars! 

(Alice throws a knife into Circe's back.)
Circe: You were really gonna stab your own sister in the back?
Alice: It's kind of our thing.

(Luke confronts Tavaroff in his new Bat-Suit.)
Tavaroff: What the hell are you?
Luke: Justice.
(Luke punches Tavaroff and sends him flying into a car, shattering the windshield. He is out cold instantly.)

Roman Sionis: You want to know why you failed as a villain?
Alice: Yeah. Unh. Please. How did you know?
Roman Sionis: You can't be bad and have feelings. You can't hate Batwoman and protect her identity. You can't hate your sister and risk your life for her. See, it's confusing. You can't sell a confusing message.
Alice: Says the freak with two names.
Roman Sionis: Oh. Two names, one goal. Black Mask terrifies the city. Roman Sionis rescues it.
Alice: (laughing) You know who was a great villain? The Joker!
(Alice sprays a stream of acid into Roman Sionis' face. He begins screaming and clawing at his face as she grabs his mask and forces it onto his head. He begins pulling at the mask desperately but it is stuck, forever trapping him in his guide as Black Mask.)
Roman Sionis: Aah! Nooo! It won't come off!
Alice: Good luck with your messaging. 
(Alice kicks the helpless Black Mask and knocks him down.)

(Ryan is asked by the parole board chair if she thinks she's changed since leaving prison.)
Ryan: Honest answer... No. I haven't changed. I am still the good, caring, intelligent human being I was the day I was wrongly arrested and the day I met my cellmate and the day I was dumped before this board and told I had a 75% chance of being a repeat offender, but since I know this committee wants to do the right thing today, allow me to give you the answer you need. Yes... I've changed. I've changed because I stopped seeing myself the way you see me and started seeing myself for who I am, a woman who has found her power. 

Ryan: I just want to say thank you. That suit changed my life in more ways than one, and it has been an honor to be able to wear your symbol.
Kate: I put that suit on to give back to my city. You put it on to survive. You know better than anyone what that symbol means to people who have no hope left. Batwoman's yours, Ryan.
(Kate offers Ryan her hand. Ryan takes it and they shake firmly.)
Kate:  As for Mary and Luke...
Ryan: They are my family, and I'm going to take care of them.
Kate: Thank you.

Continuity

Black Mask sends a broadcast to every home in Gotham City, announcing his intention to take over the town, encouraging anyone who is sick of the way the city is run to put on a mask and join him.

Black Mask also triggers a city-wide power failure.

Ryan writes a letter, as Batwoman, telling the people of Gotham she may not be the one to save them this time.

Sophie is reportedly on her way to the Bat Cave with supplies.

Mary heads to her clinic, knowing she'll be needed there.

Ryan determines where Black Mask is broadcasting from, based on a reflective image in the footage of his speech, which shows he is at the Channel 64 news studio.

Russell Tavaroff is seemingly killed after being given a combination of vaporized Snakebite and Venom mixed together. 

Luke explores his father's old workshop in the Bat Cave and finds a collection of old city almanacs, which allow him to find the address of the old Channel 64 studio at 5566 Olive.

Alice shows up at Kate's apartment and tells Ryan that Safiyah won't be a problem anymore.

Mayor Akins is killed by Black Mask's rioters.

Ryan recruits Alice to help her get into Black Mask's hideout to recover Kate.

While going through his father's workshop, Luke finds some drawings he made of a Black Batman as a kid. He then realizes his father wrote some notes on the drawings, leading to the discovery of a working Bat-Suit based on Luke's crude design. 

Russell Tavaroff is brought to Mary's clinic, having apparently survived his heart stopping earlier.

Mary recognizes the Snakebite in Tavaroff's arm wonders how he got it when Batwoman shut down the Snakebite distributors. 

Alice read Ryans mail, which consisted of a power bill, a post-card from Angelique and a reminder she has a parole board hearing the next day.

Alice looked into Ryan's background after Ryan abandoned her in 212.

Mary tells Luke about her idea to expose Kate to atomized Snakebite to restore her memory over the walkie-talkie. Luke says he thinks it might work.

Black Mask's rioters break the Bat-Signal.

Alice tells Ryan to chase after Kate/Circe while she keeps Black Mask busy.

Vesper Fairchild read's Batwoman's letter to Gotham, saying it was dropped off at multiple news outlets around the city. 

People begin setting up the Black Mask masks as jack-o-lanterns as a sign of solidarity with Batwoman.

A crazed Tavaroff starts chasing Mary up the fire escape of her building. 

Luke shows up, in his costume, and catches Mary as she is dropped over the side of her building.

Luke knocks out Tavaroff with one punch.

Mary gives Ryan the aerosol Snakebite.

Alice attacks Black Mask with The Joker's acid flower. This causes the mask to become melded with his face, ruining his plan to save the city as Roman Sionis after "driving off" Black Mask and his gang.

The Gotham White Pages from several years ago gives the Sionis' address as 2325 Finger Hill.

Trigate is the only bridge out of the city near 5th and Grey Street.  It can be reached by turning left on Adams onto Riverside Street.

Alice catches up with Ryan and Circe/Kate and goes over the edge of the bridge with Circe/Kate after a brief struggle, wherein Ryan sprays them both with the Snakebite aerosol. 

Alice's biggest regret is not getting a chance to say goodbye to Ocean before he died. Her hallucination gives her a chance to do that.

Kate's biggest regret is not being able to save Beth as a teenager. In her hallucination, she opens up the basement door in the Cartwright house and finds Beth before she became Alice.

Alice saves Kate from drowning, as Kate failed to save her as teenagers on the bridge.

Ryan performs CPR on Kate with Alice's assistance. (Alice either doesn't know CPR or was too panicked to remember how to do it.)

Several policemen happen by and recognize Alice just after Kate wakes up and confirms that her memory has been restored.

Vesper Fairchild's show the morning after the bad night starts with her telling Batwoman that her resignation has not been accepted and that the city still needs her.

Ryan goes to her parole hearing and is asked if she thinks that she has changed. Ryan says she has not, because she was a good person before she was sent to prison 

Ryan is released from parole early for good behavior, based on her parole officer's recommendation

Luke and Mary tell Kate about the events of 213 - specifically how Ryan saved Mary from a Cluemaster's deathtrap and how Luke is apparently seeing Stephanie Brown now.

Luke tells Mary and Kate about his childhood Batsuit designs and his dad making them a reality.

Kate says she realizes now that as much as she wants to save Alice, first she has to want to start being Beth again.

Kate and Ryan both like vegan pizza.

Kate tells Ryan that the Batwoman mantle is hers now and asks her to watch over Luke and Mary.

Kate meets with Sophie at the Hold-Up.

Kate reveals that she's planning to go search for Bruce Wayne, after visiting her father and then is going to see a friend in National City - presumably Kara Danvers.

Kate and Sophie confirm their attraction to one another, but decide they both deserve something a little easier.

Ryan says their first priority needs to be recovering the Batman villain trophies that Black Mask stole from the Bat Cave.

Ryan suggest they build the new Community Center in the space over Mary's clinic, now that it is legitimate, making it into an all-on one mental-health, physical health and safe space for children and teens.

Black Mask is revealed to be locked up in Arkham Asylum.

Ryan is able to bribe her way into visit Alice with only $40.

Alice tells Ryan that she discovered something odd in her records: her biological mother didn't really die in childbirth and is still alive.

The lost Batman villain trophies are seen floating downstream, including one of the Penguin's umbrellas and the Mad Hatter's hat. The episode ends with the vial of Poison Ivy's plants open on the shore and a vine snaking out of it.


Untelevised Adventures

Kate leaves Gotham City to tell her father she is okay and meet with a friend in National City before going off to find Bruce Wayne. The showrunners confirmed this is the last time they plan to use Kate Kane in the Arrowverse.


The Bottom Line

A largely satisfying finale, though the fate of Jacob Kane is left unresolved and Kate's moving on out of the series is a bit rushed. Still, the episode is more satisfying than it is not and it creates some good ground for Season 3 to explore.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 2, Episode 17 - Kane, Kate

 For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.

Plot

As Alice and Safiyah cross paths once again, Black Mask raises the stakes in the battle for Gotham, as Kate Kane goes to work, thinking she is Circe Sionis pretending to be Kate Kane.


Influences

Batwoman: Rebirth and Batwing


Goofs

It's a minor thing and all part of the drama of superheroes, but one wonders why Black Mask even bothers bringing Ryan into the police station when the police in his employ could have just killed her and said she was "resisting arrest."

"Circe" leaving the rest of the Bat-Team alive is similarly nonsensical, but at least there there's a possibility that Kate is influencing her actions.


Bat Trivia

Circe steals the weapons and tools of several classic Batman villains from the Bat Cave; not all of which are identified in the episode. The identified items are a sample of Clayface's mud, one of Killer Croc's teeth, Joker's acid flower, Bane's Venom distribution pump (and Venom) and a sample of one of Poison Ivy's plants. The unidentified items are the Mad Hatter's hat and one of the Penguin's umbrellas.


Technobabble

Mary identifies the drug used to knock her, Luke and Sophie out as haloperidol. Side effects include nausea, confusion and vomiting. 


Dialogue Triumphs
.
Ryan: Guys, she went from attacking Mary to ditching Sophie to treating half the lesbians in Gotham to an open bar. Is anyone else worried about what she's gonna do when she wakes up?
Sophie: Well, if I found out my memory had been wiped and then reprogrammed into a dead supermodel, I'd go on a 12 hour bar crawl, too.

Black Mask (addressing the Crows) Every one of you signed up to protect this city with a noble purpose in your hearts, and what did you get in return? Your hands tied by corrupt politicians who care more about some criminal's rights than what is right, a system more concerned with the red tape than the red blood running through our streets. The people you're there to defend would rather defund. Well, I'm here to pick up the tab. I'm gonna give you the tools you need and the free rein to use them, so what do you say? Who wants to take off the gloves... and put on the mask? 

Roman Sionis: I am merely a concerned citizen trying to restore justice to a lawless city like you.
Ryan: We are nothing alike.
Roman Sionis: We both wear masks to avenge the wrongs perpetrated against us. I must say I feel that, uh, given the right push together we could give this city its soul back.
Ryan: Yeah, and all I have to do is give up mine.
Roman Sionis: Well, now you're just being selfish. Why should you be the only masked vigilante who gets to be the arbiter of justice? Why shouldn't everyone have the same opportunity? After all, it feels good, doesn't it?
Ryan: It does. It feels good to fight for people who are powerless, people trapped by a broken system, people like your daughter. I know what happened to her, how she was assaulted, how the Crows covered it up, made her look crazy, then threw her in Arkham, where she suffered and died. Where she was murdered. You know what? Maybe we do have something in common because... I know that rage you feel, the need to make someone pay, but using her to justify what you're doing is dishonoring her memory.
Roman Sionis: I don't put much stock in the words of a repeat drug offender. Neither do judges for that matter, not that you're going to live to see one. No hard feelings, Wilder, but I can't have you getting in my way. Good-bye, Batwoman. 

(Safiyah is offering Alice a place by her side.)
Safiyah: Come back with me. Come home.
Alice: You want me to come back to Coryana with you? (laughs) Well, that depends. Do you have any non-smoking rooms available? No, because I'm pretty sure that I turned your little island into an all-inclusive ashtray.


Continuity

This episode opens roughly 10 hours after Kate disappeared in 216.

Ryan questions a security guard as Batwoman, noting that the machine pistol he carries is far too high-end for a typical security guard. This, and his ammunition, reveal that he's part of the False Face Society.

The Rebirth make-up line includes two perfumes called Rekindle and Remember, which Ryan uses as improvised pepper spray to torture the guard.

The guard has no idea where Black Mask is, save that he's gone underground. He also doesn't know where "Circe Sionis" is.

Luke has had no luck tracking Kate with facial recognition scans through satellites or traffic cams.

Mary confirms non one matching Kate's description has been checked in at the hospitals or morgues.

Kate is eventually found in the Hold Up, buying drinks for everyone. The team doesn't notice this until a report of a belligerent drunk who acts like she owns the place.

A seemingly drunk Kate recognizes Mary's face this time, but claims not to remember how she knows her.

Mary goes off to look for Alice and finds her with Ocean's body in his subway car base.

Mary lies and says that Kate is doing fine and that she just came to Alice to thank her for helping.

Alice says she should have left Gotham with Ocean when she had the chance.

Luke gives Kate her old journals in a bid to jog her memory.

Luke makes reference to Kate surviving gas attacks (106), a bomb-throwing bird (117) and a vampire (113).

Kate recalls not liking the beach.

Luke gives Kate the keys to her motorycle.

"Kate" is revealed to be Circe Sionis, pretending that she's an amnesiac Kate, apparently having had her doubts in 216 quieted by Black Mask.

"Circe" gives Black Mask Kate Kane's journals, which she describes as a user's manual to the Batcave.

Safiyah says there is one more thing she needs from Black Mask before she will give him her blessing to continue with his plans for Gotham City.

Ryan starts packing up to move out of Kate's loft.

Sophie offers Ryan space on her couch, but Ryan already has a new apartment lined up.

Black Mask recruits the recently fired Crows for the False Face Society.

Russell Tavaroff is among the recruits, but Black Mask notices he looks hesitant. When Tavaroff says he doesn't want to go from being a cog in one machine to being a cog in a different machine, Black Mask says he understands and will help Tavaroff become a machine in his own right.

Ryan overhears Circe, as Kate, telling Luke and Mary that she can't wait to get back in the costume.

Ryan moves back into her van and drives back to where she first found the Batwoman suit.

Ryan is arrested by CCPD officers that are also False Face gang members on suspicion of being a Snakebite dealer.

Alice cremates Ocean and scatters his ashes on the beach. She is joined by Safiyah. 

As Ryan is taken into GCPD HQ, Roman Sionis gets in the patrol car while the cops stand watch. He tells her that he knows she is Batwoman . She, in turn, lets him know she knows he is Black Mask.

Sionis tells Ryan that he's going to have her killed.

Sophie shows "Circe" the letter that Kate wrote her revealing her secret identity.

Ryan uses her one phone call to warn Luke that she's been arrested and Black Mask likely knows who all of them are if she's been exposed.

Luke, Sophie, "Kate" and Mary begin planning how to rescue Ryan. However, "Circe" reveals herself and knocks them all out with tranquilizer darts.

Ryan's parole officer is called and reads her the riot act, not believing her when she says she is innocent. She also doesn't believe it when Ryan tells her that she is the new Batwoman.

Four police officers attack Ryan and her parole officer after she says she needs to speak to Judge Hamada. After Ryan is able to knock all four cops out, the parole officer believes she is Batwoman.

The parole officer offers Ryan her car keys and badge to get out of the parking garage/

Safiyah tells Alice she came without guards because Alice wouldn't kill her if it wasn't fun.

Safiyah says a storm is coming to Gotham and Coryana is the only place Alice may be safe. She offers Alice a place by her side.

Mary, Sophie and Luke wake up locked in the Batcave elevator.

Mary says that Kate must be fighting Circe for control, because that's the only reason they weren't killed. 

Circe steals several items from a Bio-Hazard container deep in the Bar Cave.

Ryan comes to the cave and fights Circe to free the others. 

Safiyah tells Alice that she intends to regrow her Desert Rose fields using the plant Ryan Wilder gave her and a Poison Ivy vine sample that should allow her to accelerate their growth. 

Safiyah also tells Alice that she's getting the sample from Black Mask, in exchange for having killed the man responsible for assaulting his daughter and having her sent to Arkham. 

"Circe" beats Ryan and escapes the Batcave, telling Ryan not to feel bad because Kate wasn't strong enough to beat her either.

Alice stabs Safiyah with a Desert Rose dagger, agreeing that killing her wouldn't be fun but making her suffer will be fun and that they can talk after she gets her family back.

Luke determines that Circe stole all the dangerous weapons Bruce had confiscated from his enemies over the years.

Black Mask offers Tavaroff the Venom system once used by Bane.


The Killing Jokes

The villains make the mistake of not killing the heroes when they are helpless for the sake of drama.


The Bottom Line

An oddly sedate penultimate episode, which raises the stakes for the season finale but doesn't feel all that tense despite that.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 2, Episode 16 - Rebirth

 For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.

Plot

When a familiar foe descends upon Gotham, Ryan and Mary find they must rely on each other more than ever. Alice has a has a new mission and gets an unexpected ally to join her, as Luke Fox makse a decision with the assistance of John Diggle.


Influences

Batwoman: Rebirth and the new 52 Batwing title.


Performances

David Ramsey has a brief but commanding performance as John Diggle.

Wallis Day has a commanding turn here, as both Circe Sionis and Kate Kane trying to break free of her programming.


Artistry

The nightmare sequences of Kate's mind being trapped in the Cartwright basement with Circe Sionis are truly horrific.


Technobabble

Jacob Kane uses a DNA scanner to confirm Circe Sionis is Kate Kane.

Luke has a tool for unsealing sealed digital court records.


Dialogue Triumphs

(Roman Sionis is watching the news with Safiyah on a monitor in his office.)
Roman Sionis: I expose Kane as the godfather of a fraudulent security racket, and now these cloying half-wits in the fake news are crowning him a hero.
Safiyah: Haven't you done enough, Roman? You imprisoned the man's daughter, then brainwashed her into your own.
Roman Sionis: He murdered my Circe.
Safiyah: So toying with Kane's daughter is your way of... feeling better about him killing yours?
Roman Sionis: I apologize, Your Royal Highness, but when you gave me the details of Kate Kane's flight out of National City, you knew exactly what I had in mind for her.
Safiyah: Speaking of you owing me a favor, I was hoping to employ your daughter's services to settle my affairs in Gotham. I have reason to believe that Circe's unique attributes could benefit us both.
Roman Sionis: Whatever it is, I don't want her involved. She's finally got her life back.
Safiyah: Last I heard, she was running around with a tree stapled to her face.
Roman Sionis: Oh, she's ready to make her grand reentry into Gotham's influencer life. After all, my P.R. team covered up the incident that landed her in Arkham to begin with and her death, yada yada. They've put together a very millennial cover story to explain her disappearance. Three words... Malibu Rehab Retreat. This is the crown jewel.
(Roman clicks a remote control. The monitor switches to a make-up commercial. Circe is the model and the voice over artist.)
Circe: A life lived but once is a life lived not at all. The newest line from Janus Cosmetics has arrived... Rebirth.
Roman Sionis: It wasn't enough that she believed she was my Circe. Between the new face and a strict regimen of Janus restorative burn cream, she now looks like her, too.
Safiyah: I know Enigma gave her Circe's memories, but who gave her Circe's face?
Roman Sionis: If you can believe it, that rambling sewer rat Alice.
Safiyah: You brought Kate Kane and Alice together? When was this?
Roman Sionis: Two days ago. Why?
Safiyah: Alice is Beth Kane, you idiot!

(Jacob's DNA scanner confirms Circe Sionis is Kate Kane.)
Jacob: Heh. My god. It really is you.
Circe: You've got me confused with a dead girl.
Alice: No. You've got you confused with a dead girl.

(Alice and Ocean are walking away after Ocean politely introduced himself to Jacob while dropping off a bang full of Kate's belongings.)
Alice: This "Mr. Kane" thing is definitely weird for me.
Ocean:  I want the guy to like me. Call me old-fashioned.
Alice: If you told me I'd be in the Crows headquarters with my father, my sister, and my... boy toy and I wouldn't be the one in cuffs...
Ocean: No one ever accused you of being predictable.

("Circe" describes being trapped in the same cell Alice was locked in as a child.)
Alice: That's the basement I spent my childhood in. You've been there. Do you remember?
"Circe": It's... it's more of a feeling. I'm... I'm screaming, but I can't get your attention.
Jacob: That... that's not what happened.
Alice: Maybe it's a metaphor. Circe's subconscious is a cell, and Kate needs me to free her.
Jacob:  How can you be sure?
Alice: Because it's all I ever wanted.

Batwoman: Are you Kate Kane?
Kate/Circe: Can I get back to you on that?

Tavaroff: Buddy, Gotham City is our town, and the House always wins.
(Tavaroff reveals his cards. The crowd cheers. It's a good hand.)  
Luke: I mean, people do say that. It's true. The House does win a lot because it cheats. But then sometimes, I mean, the House is just so damn stupid that it can cheat and still manage to lose.
(Luke reveals his cards. The crowd groans. It's a better hand.)
Diggle: Heh. The man made a straight.
Luke: What no applause for that... for that gut-shot straight draw? I mean, and the speech? No style points for that?
(Luke is answered with stony silence from the cops.)
Luke: Okay. Whatever.

Diggle: What you have to remember is that we all end up in the same place eventually, man, and you'll see your father soon enough. What changes with time is what you get to tell him you did while you were on the earth.
Luke: Okay. So... I'm just supposed to ignore the fact that I'm still angry as hell?
Diggle: No, brother. Don't ignore it. Use it. You carry the torch for the great Fox family. You stand for justice. You're gonna need anger to win that fight. 

Jacob: Yes, she's my daughter, and her name is Beth. She's not a monster. She's a victim of evil men and women who stole her childhood and manipulated her mind, of a father who... who didn't come through for her when she needed him. Beth has had the hardest life of anyone I've ever known, and yet... she has this humanity inside of her. I can't imagine ever having that strength, so if Gotham is angry at me, then so be it. I ask only this of them as a father. When you judge Alice for her crimes, remember Beth.

Safiyah: There's nothing left of Coryana. Your scorching was thorough and complete. Nine villagers perished in the blaze, so if you have managed to maintain a list after all these years, do include them in your grand total.
Alice: (defiant) You told me you had my sister. What did you expect?
Safiyah: If I'm honest, that. A tantrum Because at the end of the day, Alice, you're just a spoiled child who believes she deserves more than she's earned. 


Continuity

Batwoman saves a man with a briefcase from being killed by a ninja. The attack occurs at a rooftop lot above Harper's Plaza. The ninja gets away with the man's laptop.

Batwoman has to call 911 herself since Luke isn't manning the comms. Luckily the operator is a Batwoman fangirl.

Luke says he's going to need some more time to recover from his recent trauma before he can help in the Batcave again.

Russell Tavaroff is released on bond, making him a free man until he faces trial on charges of falsifying evidence to justify shooting an unarmed man.

Jacob Kane is being hailed as a hero in the local press for speaking out against the culture of corruption in the local police. This annoys Roman Sionis, who was trying to expose Jacob as the head of a fraudulent security company.

Roman Sionis is confirmed to have been working with Safiyah.

Roman was informed about Kate Kane's flight to National City in the Season 2 premier, thanks to Safiyah. 

Safiyah wants to recruit "Circe" to do a job for her, but Roman says he's trying to get his daughter back into her old life as an influencer and he's making her the face of his new make-up line: Rebirth.

Roman Sionis confirms that it has been two days since the events of 214 and Alice making a flesh mask for "Circe."

Roman had no idea Alice was Beth Kane; a fact that Safiyah informs him of, when he reveals that Alice was responsible for creating the mask that made Kate Kane into Circe Sionis.

Alice and Jacob Kane work together to kidnap "Circe."

Ryan breaks into a government safehouse, with Mary guiding her in place of Luke. She notes with disgust the safehouse has a bidet in the bathroom, yet she couldn't get hand soap built into the new community center.

The man Ryan saved earlier in the episode was a lawyer who worked with judges to place people in Witness Protection and relocate them into new lives. The laptop the ninja stole was full of top-secret information on the relocated witnesses

Sophie helped Mary with a few of the particulars, such as hacking the phone records of the lawyer to determine who he called to warn that their identity was compromised. The safehouse Ryan goes into belonged to the first man on the list.

Ryan determines the first witness on the list was blind.

Ryan finds the first witness dead, with a sword still stuck in him. She also finds the ninja, who she recognizes this time as Tatiana, who tells her to stay out of this as it isn't her fight.. 

Ocean delivers a bag of Kate's personal belongings to Crow's HQ, where Alice and Jacob run a DNA test confirming that she's Kate.

Alice explains that since they don't know the key phrase Enigma set up to deprogram "Circe" they will have to slowly job Kate's memory with familiar objects.

Jacob learns that Enigma transformed Kate into Alice and removed her capacity to love.

Mary and Ryan identify the blind man Tatiana killed as Ezra Castellanos - the man whose eyes were gouged out by Circe Sionis five years earlier - an incident first mentioned in 213.

The case around Ezra and Circe's incident was sealed by the courts, but Mary is able to use a tool Luke has to get around the seal. Circe was a model who claimed self-defense after being assaulted at a party. She was sent to Arkham and Ezra, fearful of retaliation from Roman Sionis, went into Witness Protection. 

Ryan asks Mary about Alice asking her if someone named Circe had come after her in 215.

Luke uses a fake GCPD ID to get into a private club for police officers and security personnel

Luke confronts Tavaroff, whom he notes won the Crow's Hold 'Em tournament for two years in a row He says he just came to play some poker.

The altercation between Tavaroff and Luke is witnessed by John Diggle; ARGUS agent, former vigilante and Oliver Queen's brother in arms.. Diggle was last seen in F610.

Kate liked punk rock as a teenager.

Jacob shows "Circe" a bag which he found a joint in. He grounded her for the entire summer, but it turned out to be the best summer of her life.

Alice tells "Circe" about how Kate had a huge crush on a girl named Jenny Goldberg because she was a skateboarder.

Alice gives "Circe" a mug with "MIND READER" spelled out in rainbow letters. It was a gift from when Kate was struggling to cell her sister that she was a lesbian but Beth had already figured it out and made the mug to let Kate know she knew and was okay with it.

"Circe" says that she's having visions of being locked in a basement room that smells of formaldehyde Alice recognizes the description as August Cartwright's basement lab.

.Kate's mind emerges briefly after Alice takes her hand and says she's going to free her.

Ryan calls Luke to ask for his help, but he says he's busy with the poker tournament.

Luke says he wanted to die and that he's too depressed over the state of the world to want to live in a world where he gets shot for no reason and the gunman gets out of jail in a day and is confident the charges will be dropped.

Jacob calls Mary and tells her that Kate is alive and with him at Crow's HQ.

Jacob also tells Mary that Roman Sionis is Black Mask and that he brainwashed Kate into thinking she was his daughter, Circe.

Mary tells Jacob they think Circe is connected to Safiyah somehow, just before Tatiana and the False Face Society storm Crow's HQ. 

Jacob is captured by the False Face gang.

Alice tells Kate/Circe to run. She escapes, but is captured by Tatiana.

Mary calls Ryan while she's enroute to Crow's HQ and tells her that her father matched Kate's DNA to "Circe" and that she's been hypnotized to believe she is Circe Sionis.

Mary makes reference to the skull fragment evidence Julia Pennyworth had that Kate was dead from 209.

Ryan finds Kate and brings her back to Wayne Tower.

John Diggle introduces himself with his real name and says he's from Star City, in town on a contract for ARGUS.

Luke is able to win the final game and clean out Tavaroff by pulling a straight.

Jacob is taken before Roman Sionis. He reveals that he knows he is Black Mask.

Roman Sionis, in turn, reveals that he knows Beth Kane is Alice and that he intends to reveal that to te press.

Roman also reveals that his False Face society includes several GCPD officers, including the two in the room, who arrest Jacob with aiding and abetting Alice's escape from the police

Roman threatens to kill what family Jacob has left after making them suffer greatly if he tries to reveal anything about the Sionis family to the press.

Tavaroff attacks Luke in an alley after the poker game, but is stopped by John Diggle.

Kate/Circe told Ryan about how Jacob and Alice were trying to jog her memory at Crow's HQ before the False Face goons and Tatiana attacked.

Mary greets Kate/Circe in Kate's office, but isn't recognized.

Kate/Circe does recognize Sophie Moore, who arrives shortly after that.

In Kate's mind, Circe Sionis begins to threaten the teenage Kate. 

Mary injects Kate with a syringe full of benzos - something she's taken to carrying on her as it's a handy weapon in Gotham City.

Ryan, Mary and Sophie guess that Tatiana probably captured Alice to take her to Safiyah, so she could get revenge for the destruction of the Desert Rose fields.

Ryan says she will give up the last Desert Rose in the Batcave to save Alice's life, if Alice really is the key to restoring Kate's memories. This still leaves them with the problem of finding Safiyah.

Diggle heard of Lucius Fox's case and put together some hints as to who Luke was during the poker game.

Diggle tells Luke about how his father was a marine who died while deployed overseas when he was a boy.

Diggle tells Luke he understand what it's like to lose a father and be angry about injustice, but you have to do something to make Earth a better place before you can go be with your dad. He advises him to take his anger and use it to help others.

Luke notices that Diggle seems pained. Diggle confirms that he's had some fogginess and dizziness lately. When Luke offers to call in a contact at Gotham General's world-renowned neurology lab, Diggle says he's already got an appointment with them the next morning.

Diggle notices that the Bat Signal is blinking in Morse code. He and Diggle both recognize the message - NEED FOX HELP.

A news report reveals that Jacob Kane was arrested and word has been leaked that Beth Kane is Alice.

Jacob tells the reporter Dana DeWitt that Alice is his daughter and that she's the victim of evil me who manipulated her and that nobody can judge her.

Luke is informed that Kate is still alive.

Luke is able to track down where Safiyah is in Gotham.

Ryan goes to Safiyah as Batwoman and offers her Desert Rose plant for Alice's life. Safiyah agrees to the trade.

Ryan tells Safiya about how the plant is the last connection she has to her adoptive mother. When Safiyah asks why she would trade it for Alice, Ryan says that revenge is short-lived and she owes Kate Kane a debt for the symbol she created and the chance it gave her at a better life.

Safiya has never met Kate Kane before.

As Ryan and Alice leave, Alice gloats that she's gotten away with everything. Safiyah merely says again that Alice believes she deserves more than she earned. It is then that Alice notices Tatiana is not there.

Sophie stays with Kate, as Circe takes over her body again. However, Circe is beginning to realize she's not in her own body

Alice ditches Ryan to go find Ocean.

Alice finds Tatiana and kills her, before finding Ocean's body.

Mary talks to Jacob on the phone. He tells her the judge granted his petition to be transferred to a prison in Metropolis and to change the venue of his trial to Metropolis as well.

Jacob tells Mary not to bother trying to help him win his case as Roman Sionis has the deck stacked too heavily against him. He also tells her to work with Alice so they can maybe get Kate and Beth back.

"Circe" escapes and returns to Roman Sionis, demanding to know why she has Kate Kane's memories, DNA, finger prints and how she knew where she hid the booze in her office.

Safiyah appears and threatens to tell "Circe" the truth, if Roman doesn't.


The Bottom Line

An amazing episode, despite being packed full of exposition and a need to reveal various secrets to various characters and catch them all up on what we, as the audience know. Still, there are a lot of great character moments, some effective horror imagery and, for extra added pleasure, a John Diggle cameo kicking off a new Arrowverse storyline.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 2, Episode 14 - And Justice For All

 For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.

Plot

Ryan faces a new challenge, as Gotham City's Snakebite addicts become desperate for more than their next fix. Meanwhile, Mary finds a surprising ally in dealing with the medical consequences of the crisis, as Alice confronts Enigma with her knowledge of what truly happened to her sister.


Influences

Zombie horror movies. The idea of a new Snakebite formula turning people into crazed cannibals appears to be based on the real world stories of people acting like zombies after smoking bath salts.


Performances

Nicole Kang nails the monologue where she tells Jacob off for becoming a Snakebite addict.


Artistry

The direction does a great job of capturing the zombie movie aesthetic.

The script is smartly written, with Richard Monaghan being established to offer a more personal view of the Snakebite crisis.


Bat Trivia

The title of this episode changed several times in preproduction, originally titled "...And Justice For All" and also being titled "Within Limitations" and "Within the Limitations" before being titled "And Justice For All" without the ellipses. 

Luke makes mention of a part of Gotham City called Amusement Mile. In the comics, this is a district, usually located by the waterfront, where the city located most of its fun fairs, theme parks and other entertainments in better days. Naturally the abandoned fair-grounds are usually taken up as secret hideouts for The Joker.


Technobabble

Kate Kane went through days of uninterrupted hypnosis after having her psyche shattered to convince her that she was another person. This is a far more involved process than what Enigma did to turn Beth Kane into Alice, which involved simply removing Ocean from her subconscious.

Mary says that Jacob was 10 chest compressions away from flatlining during his last Snakebite binge.

According to Mary, the original Snakebite formula contained psilocybin from the mushrooms and diethylamide from the Fear Toxin.

According to Mary, the new Snakebite formula that is turning people into zombies looks like "a Latin midterm from Hell." It contains mephedrone, which causes panic attacks, mood swings and violent episodes. She also notes that Richard Monaghan's glucose levels are super-high, which would explain why he feels hungry. 

The GCPD put out a 10-33 call for Batwoman. This is the code for a general Emergency.

Mary says the new Snakebite formula causes a mephedrone spike so intense it changes the composition of the users pupils. Since the original Snakebite accessed the hippocampus, which acts as the memory storage archive of the brain, Mary thinks the new formula is making people crave memories, which, thanks to some major synaptic misfirings, leads them to eat brains to try and get other peoples' memories.

According to Mary, a controlled dose of clonazepam will sedate brain activity, which will neutralize the effects of the mephedrone and force the bad Snakebite out of the user's systems. 


Dialogue Triumphs

(Ryan is going crazy trying to figure out how she can balance patrolling and dating.)
Ryan: How did Kate date?
Luke: Terribly. Why do you think she was so broody all the time?
Ryan: Okay, but I don't brood, so we're gonna have to figure something out.
Luke: Well, welcome to the glamorous life of double identities. Most people you care about are only gonna get to know one of you. So either step up your lying game, or get your brood on. 

Ryan: Do you know Mary's cell?
Luke: No.
Ryan: What about the clinic?
Luke: No.
Ryan: (to the desk officer watching the holding cells) Who actually knows people's numbers by heart anymore?!
Luke: Do you really think that's helping anything?
Ryan: Excuse me, Mr. "Pardon us, officer. We'll turn the music all the way down".
Luke: Okay. What exactly would you like to say to me right now?
Ryan: We could have used your backup.
Luke: Yeah. I was your backup, but, no, excuse me for trying to defuse the situation peacefully!
Ryan: Peacefully? That's a privilege.
Luke: A priv... A privilege. Okay. (sighs) Ryan, I'm sure that you think that growing up with rich white kids taught me how to play nice, but it taught me how to keep my head down. There is a difference. I don't just run into fights when I know I can't win.
(There's a long pause as Luke paces and Ryan stares at the floor.) 
Luke: Okay. How about we just focus on getting out of here?
Ryan: Yeah.
Luke: (crossing to the phone) Uh, Sophie. I could call the Crows hotline and see if they can connect me.
(Enter Sophie, escorted by a police officer.)
Sophie: Yeah. That's definitely going to voicemail.

(Alice is sitting on a couch, talking to someone. As she rambles, we see that Enigma is strung up behind her)
Alice: These conversations are always so awkward, Dr. Rhyme, but I think it's time that I moved on, you know, found a new therapist, someone who actually had my best interests in mind, someone who would mention in my therapy sessions to erase my sister from my memory that she's actually alive and, uh, not only alive but brainwashed by you into believing that she's some dead girl named Circe Sionis. Needless to say, Dr. Rhyme, you're fired.

Mary: Thank you for this. I don't know what I would have done without you.
Jacob: Don't thank me. None of these people would be alive right now if it weren't for you and this clinic.
(There is a long pause as Jacob looks with Mary with what seems to be respect.)
Mary: You wanted to see Kate and Beth again, didn't you? That's why you kept using. The Snakebite let you redo all of the mistakes you made with them and gave you a do-over.
Jacob: (sighs) Yeah. You're right. I wanted to see Kate and Beth again.
Mary: What do you want me to say, Dad? Do you want me to feel sorry for you? You don't think that I wanted a do-over? I lost all the same people that you did. I feel the same pain that you do every day, every night because I lost everything, too, except I'm not trying to escape it. I'm trying to learn how to live with it because apparently I was dumb enough to think that you would do the same thing for me. You want so badly to live in this fantasy with the two daughters that you lost that you can't see that you are losing the one daughter you have left.

(Alice tries to revive Enigma without success.)
Alice: What did you do?
Ocean: The thing I knew you couldn't.
Alice: So you picked now to get your revenge on her for screwing with our heads?!
Ocean: This has nothing to do with that.
Alice: Then why kill the only person who can help me get Kate back?!
Ocean: Because I don't want you to get Kate back! (pause) I don't expect you to get it.
Alice: Oh, I get it. You're jealous because you think if I get Kate back I won't want you.
Ocean: I... love you.
Alice: (stunned) What?
Ocean: You said it yourself. You sat in a cell for years waiting for your sister to find you. Did she? Am I the only one who finds it ironic that freedom is Kate's emotional touchstone? How nice must that be. Tell me something, Alice. After you escaped and you finally came face to face years later, did she even recognize you? Did Kate recognize you the way you recognized her through the burns, the new voice, the different personality? No. No. And Kate tried, but you were too hard to fix, Alice. And when she had to choose between her city and you, what did she choose, huh?
Alice: (bitterly) You've made your point.
Ocean: She chose a bunch of strangers over her own twin. She locked you in another cell. She gave up on you. That's not love, Alice. That's apathy. Kate is toxic, and you're better off thinking she's dead. 
(Ocean turns around and leaves as Alice begins crying silently.)

Continuity

Alice is able to make Kate Kane into the spitting image of Circe Sionis, facially. The likeness is so good it stuns Black Mask.

Black Mask agrees to let Alice live for what she's done.

Alice tries to stay, saying she should stick around in case the skin doesn't stick to the musculature. Black Mask threatens to cut out her tongue if she says anything about what she's seen.

A new Snakebite formula hits the streets - one that is blue rather than red and yellow.

Ryan encounters a woman eating another person as Batwoman at the Gotham Presbyterian church, apparently having gone feral and turned to cannibalism. 

Ryan holds a fundraiser for the Sheldon Park Community Center at The Hold Up.

Luke tells Ryan that another partly-eaten body was found at Amusement Mile, suggesting there's another "zombie" running around.

Ryan ditched a date with Imani to go out as Batwoman the night before. She told her that she had to help Luke after his mom broke her ankle. Luke finds this out after Imani asks how his mother is.

A group of white GCPD officers show up and try to shut down the fundraiser because of a noise complaint. It is implied, however, that they are racist, based on how they look at the crowd of largely Black and Latina attendees and make reference to "you people" being loud.

When Ryan points out that they are in a bar, the cops say they can't hold a fundraiser in a bar without a permit so the only options are shutting down or paying a fine and getting a black mark on their liquor license.

Luke and Ryan are arrested after Ryan reacts to one of the police officers touching her.

Sophie arrives the Hold Up as the GCPD are winding things down. She is arrested after she questions the officer in charge of the scene regarding the details of the "crime."

Luke and Ryan are unable to use their one phone call because they don't have any of Mary's phone numbers memorized.

The action briefly focuses on a seemingly rich man who went crazy after using the new Snakebite formula. He exhibits signs of super-strength, denting a dumpster with one punch. His name is later revealed to be Richard Monaghan.

Sophie says Ryan shouldn't have touched the cop as it escalated the situation. Ryan counters that the only reason Sophie is in holding with them is because she wasn't wearing a Crows Security uniform.

Alice confronts Enigma and threatens to kill her unless she helps her get Kate Kane back.

Enigma says that they'll need a simple object unique to Kate to rattle a core memory.

Mary keeps Jacob in her clinic for observation, despite his protests that he feels fine.

Jacob tells Mary about how he was first injected with Snakebite by some False Face gang members in 210.

Mary notes that she found 16 puncture marks on Jacob's body, indicating he sought out Snakebite to use on at least 7 occasions.

Richard Monaghan comes into Mary's clinic and ties himself to a bed using a medical restraint after asking Mary for help.

Alice returns to Ocean's lab, where she stashed a bag with some personal belongings. She finds Ocean is there waiting for her.

Alice tells Ocean that Kate is alive.

Alice shrugs off Ocean's offer to help her, but he says he wouldn't be there if he didn't want to help.

Richard Monaghan knew about Mary's clinic because she helped a friend of his who had overdosed on heroin.

Richard Monaghan reveals that he turned to Snakebite after his wife died in a car crash. He spent his time while high talking with his wife and having the deep conversations they never had the chance to have in real life.

Sophie reveals that she became a cop because she thought it was important for there be Black people patrolling Black neighborhoods, having grown up in a community where all the cops were white.

Ryan says she respects that, but that The Crows don't exist to serve the ideals police are meant to upheld - they're a wall between the rich and reality.

Sophie, in turn, says that Ryan gets to choose when to make a difference, but Sophie chose to he out there all the time with her face exposed to the world.

A white man named Eli is thrown into holding with Luke, Sophie and Ryan. He claims to be oppressed, like them, though he was accused of trying to steal a station wagon.

Eli tells them about how Gotham City is apparently besieged by zombies.

The GCPD put out a call for Batwoman and light the Bat-Signal.

Imani bails out Luke, Sophie and Ryan, having gotten a civil rights lawyer involved in their case.

Imani asks Ryan out that evening, but Ryan says she has a thing she has to do.

Jacob learned how to suture a wound while serving in the military.

Jacob helps Mary out as victims of the zombie attacks are brought in to the clinic.

Sophie tries to take command at Crows HQ, but is given a hard time about this (and her arrest) by Russell Tavaroff.

All of the zombie reports occurred within a four block radius of the old Gotham Presbyterian church.

Tavaroff points out the old Gotham Presbyterian church is outside of the Crows' jurisdiction. Sophie says that doesn't matter when innocent lives from around the city are in danger.

Luke secures several doses of clonazepam to treat the Snakebite zombies. Unfortunately, it has to be injected to be effective, meaning Ryan has to get up close to the zombies to treat them.

Alice and Ocean return to Enigma's office.

Enigma had no idea Ocean was still alive.

The item Alice brought to unlock Kate's memories are the keys to her motorcycle.

According to Alice, she was the first among the twins to walk, talk and wear a training bra.

Kate's motorcycle is a red Triumph.

Alice says that to Kate the motorcycle symbolized freedom.

Enigma reminds Alice that she won't be getting back the sister she dreamed of - she'll be getting back th e woman smart enough to lock her up in Arkham.

Enigma says that in addition to the object trigger, Kate will need a trigger phase to start the process of regaining her memories.

Ocean kills Enigma by snapping her neck before she can tell Alice what Kate's trigger is.

Tavaroff and the men he's leading gun down all the addicts in the church rather than try to subdue them, in defiance of Sophie's orders.

Unbeknownst to Tavaroff, Batwoman was in the church as he was shooting the Snakebite addicts, having taken cover under a pew while fleeing the zombie hordes. 

Jacob tells Mary she saved a lot of people and none of the people they helped that day would be alive without their clinic.

Mary guesses that Jacob was using Snakebite because it let him see Beth and Kate againand reads him the riot act for not appreciating the one daughter he has left to dream about the two he lost.

Richard Monaghan breaks his bonds by chewing off his own fingers and runs out into the streets in a frenzy.

The same police officer who arrested Ryan, Luke and Sophie finds Richard Monaghan and tries to talk him down non-violently. He is attacked, but Batwoman saves him.

The police reports that there were 22 victims in total as a result of the zombies created by the new Snakebite.  The Crows are credited on the news with having kept the death toll down.

Sophie tells Ryan that she is quitting The Crows.

Ocean says that he killed Enigma because Alice is better off not having Kate in her life and she's killing herself trying to recover the relationship they had as girls.

Ryan tells Imani there's a part of her life she can't share and things are complicated, but she can't share that with her despite knowing she deserves better.  Imani accepts this, after jokingly asking if Ryan is in the CIA or something like that. She says it's preferable to being afraid of her sleeping around.

Luke spots Eli as he's breaking into a car. After taking pictures of him in action, he tries to talk him out of stopping.

Agent Tavaroff  happens to drive by at that moment and asks what is going on.

Eli claims that Luke is the car thief and attacked him after he tried stopping him.

Luke reaches for his phone to show Agent Tavaroff the pictures he took. Taravoff responds by drawing his gun and shooting Luke in the chest three times.

The episode ends with Luke on the ground, passing out.

The Bottom Line

A smart, well-written and topical episode that evokes the best spirit of the Denny O'Neil days of Batman, with one hell of a cliffhanger.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 2, Episode 13 - I'll Give You A Clue

 For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.

Plot

When Sophie is forced to face an old enemy from her rookie days with The Crows, Ryan, Mary and Luke are also drawn into the sinister game of the man known as Cluemaster. Meanwhile, the tables are turned on Black Mask after he takes Alice captive, as Jacob grows more addicted to Snakebite.


Influences

The Batman comics of Chuck Dixon (use of Cluemaster and Stephanie Brown)


Goofs

Sophie refuses to call the Crows since Cluemaster would consider that cheating. Yet she thinks nothing about taking help from Ryan, Mary and Stephanie or calling Luke in to assist. 


Performances

Morgan Kohan has a fantastic first turn as Stephanie Brown. Hopefully it will not be her last appearance on the show and she'll be given more to do than act as Luke's love interest.


Bat Trivia

The Cluemaster (aka Arthur Brown) first appeared in Detective Comics #351 in May 1966 and was created by Gardner Fox and Carmine Infantino. A failed quiz show host, Brown turned to crime and adopted the gimmick of leaving clues to his crimes before he committed them, differentiating himself from the similarly-themed Riddler in that he didn't bother to phrase his clues in the form of riddles.
Despite joining with several other villains to form the Injustice League, Cluemaster was largely forgotten until a  Dark Age of Comics revamp spearheaded by writer Chuck Dixon, which introduced his daughter, Stephanie.

The Arrowverse version of Cluemaster is cut from the same cloth as the original, being a failed game show host named Arthur Brown who turned to crime.  

Stephanie Brown first appeared in Detective Comics #647 (August, 1992) and was created by Chuck Dixon and Tom Lyle. The estranged teenage daughter of Cluemaster, Stephanie adopted the masked identity of The Spoiler and began leaving clues for the police and Batman to warn them of her father's crimes without risking her mother being endangered. Stephanie would later enter into a romantic relationship with the Tim Drake Robin and assumed the mantles of both Robin and Batgirl later in her career. 

The Arrowverse version of Stephanie Brown adopts a similar role, having been responsible for turning in her father and allowing Sophie Brown to take the credit for figuring out his hints to his identity. This version of Stephanie Brown was much closer to her father, who took a hand in training her in ciphers and cryptography as a child and used her as a sounding board for the questions on his quiz show.

One of the clues in Cluemaster's game show makes mention of Lazlo Valentin - the secret identity of Professor Pyg.


Technobabble

The puss caterpillar is the larval form of the Southern Flannel Moth. It is of the genus Megalopyge.

Ceasar and Playfair are two popular ciphers.


Dialogue Triumphs

(Batwoman is interrogating a False Face Society member.)
Batwoman: Where's Black Mask? Let me guess. You're more scared of him than you are of me.
False Face Member: You have a code. He doesn't. Do the math.
Batwoman: I love math. Here's some. There are three bones in your ankle. If I break two, how many are left?

Ryan: So you woke up to discover you were covered in some coded message?
Stephanie: You say that like your dad doesn't write cryptograms on you while you're unconscious. 

Black Mask: Ohh. The once-powerful queenpin of Gotham now protecting the city's hero. It's pathetic. I've had enough of this. Give me Batwoman's name, or end up all over my Malbec.
Alice: What's in a name? Circe, Black Mask... Roman Sionis.
Black Mask: What did you do?
Alice: Circe told me her father rescued her from the Arkham breakout, so I got to thinking how would dear, old dad feel about his precious daughter hanging out with a guy who wears a kinky skullcap? Unless dear, old dad is the guy in the kinky skullcap.
Black Mask: You just gave me three reasons to kill you.
Alice: Relax. This is a good thing. You happened to kidnap Gotham's most illustrious skin seamstress. I... I make faces, human faces. If you want your daughter to stop hiding behind that cheeseboard, then let me help you. I can give you your beautiful daughter back.
Black Mask: Tell me how.
Alice: Oh, I'll do one better. I'll show you.


Continuity

5 years ago, Sophie Brown was responsible for busting a would-be supervillain who called himself the Cluemaster on her first day with Crow's Security. This case went on to make her career. 

The Cluemaster, aka Arthur Brown, was sentenced to 13 life sentences for his crimes. 

The Cluemaster escaped on the 5th anniversary of the day of his arrest.

The Crows are still more interested in capturing Batwoman than Black Mask.

Jacob goes to the park which was Beth and Kate's favorite place and hallucinates them on the swings, after taking a dose of Snakebite.

Black Mask threatens to cut off Alice's fingers, one at a time, until she tells him who the new Batwoman is.

Ryan returns home to find Sophie hanging out with Mary.

Sophie was given a bottle of tequila for her five year anniversary with Crows' Security.

Sophie affirms that she's a lesbian rather than biexual.

Sophie, Ryan and Mary wind up playing Never Have I Ever - a drinking game where a person drinks a shot for every outrageous thing they've done.

Mary once had sex on an airplane but she is quick to note it was a private plane.

Ryan is revealed to have accidentally sexted Mary while messaging someone named Imani. This is the woman Ryan met at the community center fundraiser in 210.

Ryan makes Sophie do a shot by saying "Never have I ever compromised my values to support a white supremacist organization."

Sophie does a shot for "has kissed Batwoman."

All three women do a shot for "has been saved by Batwoman."

Kate saving Ryan as Batwoman occurred in the flashback of 202.

Mary discovers an insect in the tequila bottle that at first she thinks is the traditional worm.

The worm is identified as a puss caterpillar, which is the most venomous caterpillar in North America and one of the deadliest in the world. However, a single one is not deadly to adult humans. 

After this, Ryan reads the card that came with the bottle and finds out that it came from Cluemaster rather than Sophie's coworkers.

The note from Cluemaster reads ""A girl's been poisoned. (Not you. That's no fun.) Can you save her before midnight? I'll give you a clue, hot shot: Probably not. Love... Cluemaster".

Arthur Brown was the host of Quiz Bowl - a game show local to Gotham that was a rip-off of Jeopardy. After being fired, he went on a killing spree, leaving clues to his crimes for the police to find.

Sophie says they can't call the other Crows or the police, as Cluemaster will see that as cheating.

Based on the words "hot shot," Ryan heats the bottle, revealing a strange symbol. Sophie recognizes it as the logo for a shooting range she frequented as a cadet.

Alice rips out one of her own finger nails to escape Black Mask's trap and frees her hand.

Alice tries calling Jacob Kane to beg for help. Unfortunately, he's stoned and, confused as to why Beth is calling him when he sees her in front of him, tells Alice she has the wrong number.

Cluemaster was finally caught after he sent a letter to the newspaper regarding his plans to bomb a party celebrating the top-winners of Quiz Bowl. Someone else solved the puzzle and called in the tip that Arthur Brown was the Cluemaster to the Crow's Tip Line while Sophie was answering the phones.

Mary finds a bottle of antihistamin and a note reading "Just a nip should do the trick" before a woman in a glass box is revealed.

The woman is Stephanie Brown, Cluemaster's daughter.

The puzzle to free Stephanie involves four colored targets and four boxes - each a different color, with a different animal on it. The boxes were chained together, which Ryan determines is a reference to the food chain. The targets have to be shot from the top down: bobcat, bird, spider, fly

Sophie's training as a sharpshooter was first revealed in 107.

Stephanie Brown, once freed of the glass box, is revealed to have a cryptogram written on her upper torso that is apparently the next clue.

While threatening Alice, the fake Circe Sionis tells Alice that the last person who tried to one-up her had their eyes gouged out.

Alice recalls meeting Circe Sionis while in Arkham and how she was committed after poking out the eyes of some corporate bigwig. This leads to her figuring out that Black Mask must be her father, Roman Sionis. 

Alice asks Circe about being trampled to death during a riot at Arkham, but she denies dying.

Sophie reveals that Stephanie Brown was the one who solved the Cluemaster's puzzles and called in to the Crow's Tip Line, asking her to take credit for it.

Stephanie says her father used her as a barometer for his puzzles, so she's an expert at cryptograms and ciphers.

Stephanie taunts Luke with a puzzle based around her name, naming clues involving strong women - "I'm smarter than my king, my technology protects Wakanda.... You think it'd be as easy as kissing a frog. I woke a monster by reading from The Book of The Dead... I helped lay an iron giant to rest.  As smart as I am mighty, the chosen one still gets all the credit." These are references to Shuri from Black Panther, Tiana from The Princess and The Frog, Evie from The Mummy, Pepper Potts from Iron Man and Hermione Granger from Harry Potter - S-T-E-P-H.

Luke sees the phrase "You're Stumped" written on Stephanie's back. They decide this must be the basis of a substitution cipher based around the catchphrase from Quiz Bowl.

Sophie, Ryan and Mary decide to check out the old Quiz Bowl set while Luke and Stephanie work on the code, since Cluemaster said he wanted to "finish what he started."

Ryan and Mary are caught in a deathtrap as a recording of Cluemaster offers them more time if they answer some trivia questions about Gotham's criminals.

The first question involves "a poor man's version of Cluemaster." The answer is The Riddler.

Stephanie graduated from MIT in the class of 2016, having skipped several grades.

Luke makes reference to having been accepted to MIT, but never going, due to the trauma of his father's death.

Stephanie knocks Luke out after figuring out the cipher.

Ryan figures out that a question about a "frosty foe" who gave The Dark Knight "a run for his money" is about The Penguin rather than Mr. Freeze.:

Angelique used to work in the backroom casino at The Iceberg Lounge.

The final question is about the new Batwoman fighting a certain tally-taking hitman.

Ryan's fight with Zsasz as Batwoman occurred in 203.

Sophie suggests calling Batwoman for help, but Ryan tries to dismiss the idea.

Mary tries calling Luke for help, but he's still unconcious.

Alice offers to make Circe Sionis a flesh mask to hide her burn scars. 

Sophie finally says that she knows Ryan is Batwoman.

Ryan tells Sophie how to enter the Batcave and what tool to bring her.

Ryan thinks Sophie only went to Mary hoping to liquor her up and get her to confirm that Ryan was Batwoman.

Mary points out that Sophie hasn't acted on the information that Ryan is Batwoman or turned her in.

Mary tells Ryan about what Sophie told her about Jacob using Snakebite and how she's starting tot hink that might explain his odd behavior.

Sophie brings the baton that lets Ryan and Mary get off the pressure plate safely.

The clue in the cipher pointed to Stephanie Brown's childhood home.

Cluemaster asks Stephanie to join him. She declines and tells him that she was the one who turned him in five years ago after solving his puzzle.

Cluemater seals himself and Stephanie in his car and releases a toxic gas.

Luke shows up in time to save Stephanie, having solved the cipher on his own after waking up.

Stephanie kisses Luke and tells him to call her but doesn't given him her number, guessing he can find it on his own.

Cluemaster is taken to the hospital and then back to jail.

A few homeless men bring a strung out man into Mary's clinic. It is revealed to be Jacob, who still has a Snakebite injector jammed in his leg.

Sophie tells Ryan how she figured out she was Batwoman by finding the tech in Mary's car in 211.

Sophie also tells Ryan about how she erased her record with the crows to keep them from identifying her based on a blood sample she left behind as Batwoman in 212.

Circe Sionis is confirmed to have died in the fire at Arkham Asylum in 119. Alice recalls stepping over her body as she made her escape.

As she is fitting "Circe" for her mask, Alice recognizes her as Kate Kane, as she has their father's eyes.

Location

Gotham City - 2015


The Fridge Factor

Sophie Moore is revealed to have built her entire career on a lie and taking credit for what a teenage prodigy did. Then again, given that she's also portrayed as being stupid enough to drink strange liquor without reading the card saying who it is from, this isn't exactly a huge shock.


The Bottom Line

The biggest problem with this episode is that it left me wanting a show focused on this version of Stephanie Brown. I'd love to see  a show based around a super-genius vigilante rebelling against the legacy of her criminal family rather than the continued adventures of Sophie Moore: Bad Detective. Thankfully, everything else is engaging, even if the main plotline is a bit unsatisfying and serves no purpose beyond dragging most of the characters secrets into the open. Maybe I stand alone in being more interested in Alice messing with Black Mask or Stephanie Brown being brilliant than the main characters... but I doubt it.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 2, Episode 12 - Initiate Self-Destruct

 For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.

Plot

Ryan is faced with a difficult decision that could expose her as Batwoman, creating a rift in the Bat Team. This leads to an unlikely alliance with Alice, who has her own score to settle with Black Mask. Meanwhile, Black Mask's plans for Kate Kane begin to unfold, as Sophie tries to decide where her loyalties truly lie.


Influences

Every Batman story where Batman forms a reluctant alliance with a villain in the name of the greater good, particularly the Halrequinade episode of Batman: The Animated Series. (Alice and Ryan have a similar scene where Alice starts playing with buttons in the Batmobile.)


Performances

Javica Leslie and Rachel Skarsten have great chemistry and the best parts of the episode center around them bantering with one another.


Artistry

The script is witty, with some great dialogues.


Bat Trivia

Black Mask makes reference to a Sionis family tradition of every family member having a replica mask made to decorate their casket. This is a nod to the comics, where Black Mask made his mask from the black wood of his father's coffin.

Mary's clinic is revealed to be located on Park Row in Gotham City. This is the same street where Thomas and Martha Wayne dies. In the comics, the once nice Park Row neighborhood deteriorated afterward and became known as Crime Alley by the time Bruce Wayne was an adult.

While using her night vision, Batwoman's coordinates were shown as being 42° 5' 23" N, -75° 6' 13" E, placing Gotham in the real-world location of Delaware County, New York, on the north of the Pepacton Reservoir. This is, it should be noted, far and away from where Cisco Ramon's map of Post-Crisis Earth showed Gotham City to be located (i.e. near Chicago, Illinois.)


Technobabble

Enigma tells Black Mask that while she has repressed Kate Kane to turn her into Circe Sionis, psychologically and behaviorally, she could do nothing to alter her voice. This was due to larynx damage during her kidnapping and subsequent torture.

Luke determines that Black Mask kept tabs on his drug labs with video feeds. This allows him to track the IP address of the cameras to get the location of the lab where Angelique was being held.

Luke has Mary deliver a targeted kill drive to Sophie - a device that, when introduced to the Crows' computer system, will scramble the data of the Batwoman blood test results.


Dialogue Triumphs

Black Mask: Masks have taken on various meanings over time. Deceit. Disguise. Cheap entertainment. But as Jung once said, we all wear masks, both to create an impression upon others but also to hide our own true natures.

Sophie: I thought you should know the Crows are in the process of extracting your DNA profile from blood spatter found at the Snakebite facility. Once they have that, they're gonna upload it to the national DNA registry. Of course, they'll need something to match it against, so you should be good unless of course you've ever been in the system. Anything you want to tell me?
Batwoman: Other than you need to destroy that sample?
Sophie: It's already being processed. They'll have the profile in a few hours. Arrest warrant won't be long after that.
Batwoman: I better use what time I have left to save the one person who had the guts to testify against Black Mask. Remember her? The one the Crows were supposed to protect?

(Batwoman enters the False Face drug lab. She finds several dead men, burned, and Alice in the middle of torturing another one.)
Batwoman: What the hell is this, barbeque for one?
Alice: Batty, what brings you here? Oh. Was it the odor? Honestly, I've been at this so long I can hardly smell it.
Batwoman: Why are you here?
Alice: The False Face kidnapped a friend, so I've been popping by their known hideouts, seeing if someone would be willing to spill his possible location.
Batwoman: I'm looking for someone they kidnapped, too.
Alice: Really? Her name wouldn't happen to be... pbb... I don't know... Angelique by chance?
Batwoman: How do you know that?
Alice: Well, according to Mr. Extra Crispy over here, when Angelique couldn't conjure up the special sauce that gives Snakebite its bite, Black Mask took her phone and used it to track down the actual chef, who does know all herbs and spices.
Batwoman: You're talking about Ocean.
Alice: Mm-hmm.
Batwoman: I thought you killed him.
Alice: Heh. Well, that's completely besides the point.
Batwoman: Which is?
Alice: Angelique and Ocean are apparently being held at a place that is more fortified than this one, and quite frankly, I need backup, by which I mean someone to stand behind so that the bullets don't hit my visage.
Batwoman: Damn. You're crazier than everyone already thinks.
Alice: Well, enemy of my enemy, doesn't that mean...
Batwoman: That you're still the bitch who murdered my mom.
Alice: Touché. But I'm also the bitch who knows where our beloved cooks are. 

(Batwoman and Alice are sitting in the Batmobile, observing a distant watchman.)
Batwoman: Okay. You draw him out, I'll take him out. Think you can handle that?
Alice: Sure.
(Alice reaches over and starts honking the horn of the Batmobile.)
Batwoman: What the hell are you doing?
Alice:What you asked.

Alice: If they were harmed in any way, I swear to you on my headless mother's grave...

(Alice has just finished knocking out a guard.)
Batwoman: Oh, my God. You love him.
Alice: I just kicked him for no reason.
Batwoman: Not him. Ocean.
Alice: Ocean? What? N-No.
Batwoman: Is that your boyfriend?
Alice: I drove a knife through his heart.
Batwoman: Well, for you, that's not a no.
Alice: Oh. That's true. 

Alice: Just a little piece of advice from an antihero to a hero. You can't save everyone. Not without losing who you are.

(Alice is being strangled by the masked Kate Kane.)
Alice: Help me!
Batwoman: Good luck with that.
(Batwoman turns around to leave.)
Alice: (desperately) I remember your mom. Cora. I remember her. Short hair, purple sweater. I lied about forgetting her. Now help me... please.
Batwoman: Like you said, can't save everyone. 
(Batwoman turns around again and leaves Alice for dead.)


Continuity

With the aid of Enigma, Black Mask hypnotizes Kate Kane to believe that she is his daughter, Circe Sionis.

Black Mask gives Kate a mask based on his daughter's face, which had been buried with her.

Black Mask tells Kate that she was badly burned after escaping from a fire in Arkham Asylum. This seems to be a nod to the events of 119 and would explain why Black Mask blamed Batwoman for his daughter's death, as The Crows blamed Batwoman for a riot at Arkham Asylum and the fire that followed.

Circe Sionis was apparently an inmate at Arkham Asylum.

Alice wakes up in bed with Ocean and tries to sneak out before he wake up.

As Alice is making her escape, she runs into three members of the False Face Society. They taser her and she blacks out as they are beating up Ocean.

Sophie learns about the sample of Batwoman's blood which Agent Tavaroff found in 211. She also learns that he's been authorized, by Commander Kane himself, to run a full analysis comparing it to the national DNA registry.

Sophie tries to talk to Jacob about focusing so many of the Crows' resources on Batwoman, but he refuses to talk to her, being high on Snakebite.

Luke is able to determine the location of the False Face drug lab where Angelique was being held.

Sophie lights the Bat-signal to warn Batwoman that the Crows have her blood.

Sophie does not tell Batwoman that she knows who she is now.

Ryan is not scared and says she'll use what time she has left to catch Black Mask.

Sophie says she will do what she can to destroy the sample.

Luke is in favor of dropping Angelique's rescue to focus on recovering the blood sample. Ryan tells him to help Sophie if he thinks it's that important.

Ryan discovers Alive in the middle of torturing the False Face gang members in the lab when she gets there.

Alice tells Ryan about Ocean's kidnapping and guesses that she's there looking for Angelique.

Alice suggests they team up since Angelique was apparently taken to the same place as Ocean. Ryan reluctantly agrees.

Sophie tries to sneak into the lab with the Batwoman blood sample, but finds another agent is sitting with it and watching it as it finishes compiling.

The False Face Society members holding Ocean and Angelique start recording them making a batch of Snakebite.

Mary delivers a targeted kill drive to Sophie that she can use to destroy the blood test results. She also offers to act as a distraction, so that Sophie can gain access to Jacob Kane's computer to use it.

Sophie figures out that Mary works with Batwoman as well.

Ryan handcuffs Alice outside the drug lab once they take care of all the guards on the outside.

Sophie finds out they are uploading multiple investigations to the DNA database at the same time as the Batwoman sample. This leaves her unable to use the kill drive, as it will also destroy all those records.

Mary's clinic is revealed to be located at 8845 Park Row.

Mary has changed her mind about making her clinic legitimate and shows Jacob what she has done to bring it up to code. This includes proper storage, certified nurses and doctors and Mary limiting her aid to doing the paperwork.

Mary notices that Jacob is sweating and seems anxious to leave.

Jacob notices that Mary's fax machine, the official means of notifying the police of suspicious patients (such as anyone with a bullet wound) is unplugged. He shrugs this off, however, saying that he can live with the compromise if it means Mary is talking to him again.

Sophie is able to destroy the record with Batwoman's identity before Agent Tavaroff can open it.

While covering her tracks in Jacob's office, Sophie finds his Snakebite kit.

Once Ocean and Angelique are done making the Snakebite, the False Face member filming them gets ready to kill them. He shoots Ocean before Batwoman steps in to save them.

Batwoman tells Angelique that Ryan sent her.

Ocean had apparently been talking non-stop about Alice ever since being captured.

Angelique helps Ocean to escape as Batwoman goes back for Alice.

Batwoman runs into "Circe" and the two fight.

Alice joins the fight, having freed herself, but is overpowered by "Circe".

Ryan abandons Alice, leaving her to the mercy of "Circe".

"Circe" seems to freeze up while looking at Alice, seeming to remember her somehow.

Sophie stops by Mary's clinic and asks if she's noticed Jacob acting strangely.

Mary talks about Jacob signing off on her compromise, which Sophie says seems out of character.

Sophie shows the Snakebite kit to Mary and says she thinks Jacob is using the drug.

Mary refuses to believe Jacob is an addict.

Angelique goes to Ryan and thanks her for all she did to save her.

Angelique says she's worked out a deal with the Feds and is going into Witness Protection. She wants Ryan to come with her.

Ryan refuses, saying she's not ready to give up on making Gotham a better place so kids don't suffer like they did.

Kate took Alice alive and took her to the Sionis home. Black Mask is ready to kill her, but suddenly changes his mind, saying there is one way she might be helpful.


The Bottom Line

A solid episode which establishes the depths of Black Mask's evil while giving us some great moments with Alice and Ryan playing off of each other.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 2, Episode 11 - Arrive Alive

 For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.

Plot

With Angelique in Black Mask's clutches, both Batwoman and the Crows are anxious to rescue her and tripping over each other in the process.This leads to an uneasy alliance between Ryan and Sophie, as the two attempt to infiltrate the False Face Society's courier network on their own, after Sophie is taken off the case. Meanwhile, Alice confronts Enigma, hoping the woman who created may also erase her memories of her twin sister.


Influences

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Alice's dreams under hypnosis) ,The Fast and the Furious, Tokyo Drift and urban racing movies in general.


Performances

Laura Mennell has an interesting performance here as Enigma. It would be easier for her to disable Alice while she's under, and yet she does not. This suggests that, on some level, she truly is trying to be a healer to someone she wronged, in much the same way that she honestly seemed to be trying to help Jacob Kane work through his grief even as she was setting him up in the last episode.


Artistry

The episode is full of great action sequences, from the car chases to the final fight between Batwoman and Black Mask.


Bat Trivia

This episode introduces a Crows' agent named Russell Tavaroff who has a reputation for using excessive violence. In the comics, Russell Tavaroff was the name of a supervillain called Menace, who appeared in the Batwing comic as an enemy of Luke Fox. Curiously, he was also addicted to a drug called Snakebite, but that drug was a Venom derivative quite different from the drug in the Arrowverse.

One of the delivery vans used by the False Face Society is for a florist called Mr. Bloom. This was also the name of two different characters in the modern Batman comics. The first, Daryl Gutierrez, was a scientist who developed seeds that gave random superpowers to those who consumed them. The second Mister Bloom was an unknown man, who stole the technology of the first and became the arch-enemy of Jim Gordon's Batman, when he assumed the Batman name while wearing a mechanized suit.


Technobabble

Sophie makes reference to street racing terms such as red-lining, backpedaling and asks if Ryan knows how to measure a car's camber and airflow.

The Batmobile has an artificial intelligence that can drive the car on its own and subtly assist a human driving without them knowing it. (Ryan is annoyed to discover this, as she thought she was getting better at handling the Batmobile.)

Luke has also created a portable version of the Batmobile AI that can be plugged into any car.


Dialogue Triumphs

Black Mask: (To Angelique, while pushing her face toward a broken flash full of acid.) Well, the final ingredient will be delivered soon. And if I've gone through all this trouble just to find out you can't cook after all, well... At least I have what I need to dissolve your body.

Enigma: You were working with Julia Pennyworth.
Alice: And I appreciate you sending her on a long vacation because I need some alone time with you.
Enigma: Safiyah hired me to erase your memories of Ocean. You're obviously here to get them back. I assume that's what this is all about. From what I recall, you were in love, I made you forget your feelings and consequently helped turn you into... you.
Alice: Keep them. I don't need the hassle.
Enigma: (confused) Then why did you track me down?
Alice: I have someone else I need to forget. My sister. Kate. 

(Enigma hypnotizes Alice.)
Enigma: Focus on what your senses are telling you, what you hear... what you feel.
(Alice goes under and is suddenly on top of Ocean, making out with him on the floor of his subway lab. Alice quickly breaks the kiss.)
Alice: Whoa. That happened fast.
Ocean: It's almost like you'd rather be here with me.
Alice: (shouting to sky) Are we sure we're in my subconscious? (muttering) What am I doing in Ocean's sex dream?
Ocean: I'm guessing you brought me here to apologize.
(Ocean tries to pull Alice back into his warms but she pushes him away.)
Alice: Ugh!
Ocean: Why'd you kill me?
Alice: Wouldn't you like to know? 
Ocean:(angrily)You killed me for nothing.
Alice: You would have done the same to me.
Ocean: No. No chance in hell. There's screwed up, and then there's you.
(Alice suddenly wakes up in the real world, as the real Ocean enters the office with a gun drawn. Alice draws a knife but Ocean knocks her to the ground.)
Alice: (confused) Is this real? This feels real.
Enigma: You tell me. I thought you said you killed him!
Ocean: I'm alive. And very pissed off.

Black Mask (looking at a Batarang): Now that is some terrific branding. But you should really consider bringing a gun to a gun fight.


Continuity

The False Face Society has been pulling a number of high-speed heists on various chemical plants, getting the materials they need to make Snakebite.

Angelique is under heavy guard, being the only person apart from Ocean who knows what is needed to make Snakebite.

The Snakebite formula is toxic unles cooked using Ocean's secret method.

The Crows think Angelique is alive based on the fact that they didn't find her body among the dead after she was abducted.

Ryan offers to help Sophie with finding Angelique using her contracts, but Sophie shuts her down.

Luke traces the eye-witness descriptions of the cars that ambushed the Crows' SUV carrying Angelique to a heist later that same day at Gotham Pharmaceutical. 

Luke determines that the one thing the False Face Society lacks to make more Snakebite is Scarecrow's Fear Toxin, which is a much rarer commodity. 

Luke flags the cars so they will get an alert as soon as any traffic cam detects them.

Ryan refuses to let Sophie know what they are doing, given how The Crows let Angelique get captured.

Alice briefly pretends to be Dr. Evelyn Rhyme after a new patient - a recently divorced man named Jackson - enters her office while Alice is there.

Alice kills Jackson after Dr. Rhyme gets there.

Alice reveals that she knows Dr. Rhyme is Enigma.

Enigma wrongly assumes Alice has come to have her memories restored. Instead, Alice asks her to remove her memories of Kate.

The False Face Society uses new recruits to act as couriers, delivering stolen chemicals between drop points using street racing cars, with directions being texted to them en route. Anyone who fails to keep up the required speed or makes a wrong turn is "burned" and locked out of any further False Face contact.

Sophie went undercover to try and infiltrates the False Face Society as a courier, but is burned after Batwoman stops her car.

Alice tells Enigma about her hallucinations of a teenage Kate in 209.

Enigma theorizes that Kate is a manifestation of Alice's moral compass.

Enigma says that Alice is a monster but a rational one and that in order to safely remove her memories of Kate she must first confront the part of her that is making her hallucinate Kate.

The False Face Society has killed three separate Crows' agents in the past week.

Jacob takes Sophie off of the False Face Society operation and places it under the command of a Crows' agent named Tavaroff.

Tavaroff is described as being the sort of agent who will scorch the earth to get to the False Face Society and won't care much about getting Angelique back alive.

Jacob seems to be more bloodthirsty and angry than usual - presumably a side-effect of the Snakebite use.

When Sophie tells Ryan what happened, Ryan volunteers to try and infiltrate the False Face Society in her place.

Alice is placed under hypnosis. She sees the teen Kate again as they were riding in the back of their mother's car when they were 13. Ocean is revealed to be driving the car, when Alice finds she can't get rid of Kate or just wish her away.

Mary agrees to loan Sophie and Ryan her car.

Sophie reaches out to Luke, who has to pretend that he doesn't know Ryan when they meet.

Luke sets up a fake ID for Ryan, giving her the name Robyn Wilde.

Luke also gives Ryan a comms they can use without Sophie hearing them, a tracking device to place inside the Fear Toxin and a portable version of the Batmobile AI.

Luke warns Ryan about teaming up with Sophie, saying that they're rising exposing her secret identity.

Enigma tells Alice that Ocean showing up in her vision is proof that she is still capable of feeling emotion and attachment, for all Alice claims to be beyond emotion and a master manipulator.

Sophie calls Ryan as she's waiting to start the heist, telling her there's a drone watching them, suggesting Black Mask is watching the whole operation. This means they can't stop and plant a tracker in the fear toxin, like they'd planned.

Ryan says she can manage it, despite the fear toxin containers being double-sealed and unstable.

Luke steers Mary's car remotely while Ryan opens the far toxin container and plants the tracker.

The Crows shoot at Mary's car while Ryan and Luke are making their getaway.

Ryan makes the delivery successfully.

Sophie decides to go after the False Face Society on her own and is captured.

Alice tells Enigma to erase her memories of Ocean as well.

Alice has a vision of Ocean where they kiss in his subway lab before he angrily asks why she killed him.

Alice wakes up as the real Ocean storms into Enigma's office with a gun drawn.

Ocean explains how Safiyah spared his life in 208, giving Alice a dagger soaked in Desert Rose to use to kill him.

Ocean says he was in Gotham City on other business, but he wanted to find Alice to ask her why she killed him.

Alice says it was because she thought it was the only way to get Kate back.

Enigma makes her escape by doing the one thing she promised Safiyah she would never do - restore Ocean and Alice's memories of each other. She does this by saying the words "Mockingbird anew." This paralyzes Alice and Ocean for a few minutes as their memories return.

Black Mask reveals that he has eyes inside of Crows HQ, so he knows that Sophie came after him alone and nobody is coming to rescue her.

Batwoman shows up to rescue Sophie.

Black Mask gets away after he reveals he has Angelique being held elsewhere and his men will kill her if he doesn't escape.

Angelique tells Black Mask that she doesn't know the full technique for making Snakebite, but claims to know how to find Ocean.

Ocean says that Safiyah gave him Enigma's contact information and that he called her a day earlier. Enigma told him that someone was tracking her and that her identity might have been compromised.

Ocean's mission is to find the one last Desert Rose plant he had taken with him, as Alice has destroyed every other sample on Earth.

Alice confirms that Batwoman probably has it, since she isn't dead from Kryptonite poisoning.

Ocean and Alice start making out after Ocean once again asks Alice if she regrets killing him.

Agent Tavaroff finds security footage in Black Mask's base of Batwoman fighting Black Mask while Sophie was there. Based on that, he searches the scene and finds a sample of Ryan's blood.

Sophie finds the Batmobile AI remote in Mary's car and, hacking it, overhears a conversation between Luke and Ryan where Ryan reveals she's the new Batwoman.


The Killing Jokes

Granting that Sophie's purpose on the show is to be a bad cop who gets captured by the villains in 90% of the episodes she's been in,  the decision to go after the False Face Society on her own is stupid even by her standards.

The one thing stupider than that decision? Ryan leaving the Batwoman AI in Mary's car for Sophie to find later. (It also seems really out of character for Luke not to have nagged Ryan about returning that to him ASAP.)


The Bottom Line

A decent filler episode with some amazing action sequences, let down only by the final five minutes requiring our main heroes by idiots for the sake of advancing the plot.