Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 13 - We Having Fun Yet?

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

Plot

The Bat-Team is left scrambling as Marquis launches an unlikely attack on Gotham City using both Batman and Joker's arsenals. Jada, Ryan, Mary, Luke and Sophie must bring all their respective skills into play, as a final battle between brother and sister looms, while Alice faces an entirely different battle against her own mind.


Influences

The 1989 Batman movie (Joker gassing people during a public spectacle with a balloon), Batman Returns (the Penguin's hypnosis umbrella) and the Batwoman comics. (Alice goes to a Swiss clinic to treat her mental illness.)


Goofs

When trying to move the Bat-Blimp where it will do the least damage, the digital map in the Batcave shows it moving in a north-westernly direction. However, the Bat-Team was trying to get it out to sea, which would be to the east of Gotham City, presuming it is located somewhere in New Jersey, as in the comics. (This would seem to be born out by the 40 degrees N, 73 degrees W coordinates Sophie gives, but conflicts with earlier suggestions that the Arrowverse Earth-Prime Gotham City is located off the shore of Lake Michigan, near Chicago.)

The show unintentionally establishes the disturbing idea that the hypnosis umbrellas caused untold numbers of parents to abandon their small children after Luke finds a lost boy in an alleyway after escaping the blimp.


Performances

Nicole Kang once again shows why she was this season's VIP. A year ago, it would have been unbelievable that Mary could forgive Alice for everything she has done, much less become her advocate. Kang's performance throughout the season has made this development believable and it culminates in her speech here where she calls out the rest of the Bat-Team on their blindspot regarding Alice. It's a shame that nothing comes of this moment due to Marquis' announcement, but it's a powerful speech and the highlight of the episode.


Artistry

The opening montage of Marquis' childhood encounter with the Joker as he breaks into the Joker's hidden armory is suitably spooky.


Bat Trivia

This episode was originally titled "Are We Having Fun Yet?"

Alice claims to have learned of Marquis' plans from a fellow Arkham inmate in the form of a riddle. This suggests that the Riddler might still be alive in the Arrowverse, post-Crisis.

The Weiße Kaninchen Sanatorium Alice goes to at the end of the episode has the same name as the facility that treated Beth Kane in the Batwoman comics.

Weiße Kaninchen Sanatorium translates to White Rabbits Sanatorium in German. This is another nod to Alice in Wonderland.

When listing the weapons in Batman's trophy collection, Ryan mentions the gun of Condiment King. This is the first confirmation that Condiment King exists in the Arrowverse. 

Condiment King was originally created for Batman: The Animated Series as a parody of the cheesy gimmick villains played by comedians who were created for the 1966 Batman television series. This version of Condiment King was a comedian, Buddy Standler, who was brainwashed by The Joker into believing he was a villain using stolen Mad Hatter tech. He was armed with high-power ketchup and mustard guns and made food-based puns.

Condiment King was later introduced into the comics in earnest with the unlikely name of Mitchell Mayo. While the authorities did not take him seriously, he was treated as a threat by the Tim Drake Robin, as his condiment-based weapons could cause anaphylactic shock.

In the final scene, some kind of monster kills reporter Dana DeWitt. A hulking figure is seen wandering off in front of the camera, but a claw is seen attacking the camera earlier. The prevailing theories among fans is that the monster is some variation of the villain Clayface. However, Batwoman showrunner Caroline Dries teased that it was Solomon Grundy in interviews posted after the episode aired.

Coincidentally, the first Batwoman comic based around Ryan Wilder - due out several months after this episode aired - was announced to put Ryan against the Arrowverse version of Clayface.

Technobabble

The Batcave has the technology to hijack every phone, screen and livestream in Gotham City through the Batcave computer and Wayne Enterprises' satellite network.

Luke has never seen the controls of the Bat-Blimp, but speculates they may be vulnerable to hacking by an ISMI catcher.

While the Barcave armory could be accessed by anyone, Luke set the secret vault full of Batman trophies so that only Ryan could open it.

Sophie uses a tech-glove to trick the fingerprint reader on the Bat-Trophy storage room.


Dialogue Triumphs

Luke: Alice killed your mom, Mary.
Mary: Do you think I forgot? You think I don't know how badly Ryan wants her brother back or that the first time Alice ever met Sophie she threw her off a 30-story building? I know. It is not like this is some easy decision for me... or anyone, but I believe Alice is capable of change. She just needs a chance. Come on. Each one of you looked me in the eye a few weeks ago, apologized for sidelining me, and assured me I would have a voice on this team. This is it. This is me using my voice. This is... this is what I want. I need to save Alice's life

Ryan: Tell me why you deserve the Joy Buzzer.
Alice: Shouldn't you be out enjoying your last few hours of superhero anonymity?
Ryan: Yeah, I should. Instead, I'm here doing my best friend a solid while the person who actually needs it is out there threatening to destroy everything I've worked for.
Alice: Oh, you mean the brother you're scared is too good to be true? Face it, Ry-Ry, you can blame Mary all you want, but deep down in that little orphan heart, you need me to have that thing.
Ryan: Oh, wow. Mary was right. You did stop making sense.
Alice: Or... chances are you spent the last few months daydreaming about what it would be like to have a nuclear family. Thanksgiving dinners, family game nights, the comfort of a kidney should a new one become necessary.
Ryan: Your desperation's showing.
Alice: What if you zap Marquis and that good little boy buried beneath that tacky clown suit turns out to be doing just fine without his needy little sister? Do you really want to risk getting your hopes up only to have him leave you like everybody else? I'm your safe bet, Ryan. Psycho or sane, you don't need me to love you back


Continuity

The opening scene shows Marquis breaking into one of the Joker's old hideouts in the fun house of an abandoned amusement park. Apparently Joker told him about its location when he was a kid.

Mary visits Alice in Arkham Asylum and discovers her trying to shock herself with an improvised shock wand made from a socket wrench.

Mary tells Alice that she found a clinic in Switzerland near Geneva, Weisse Kaninchen Sanatorium, which specializes in childhood trauma and abuse victims.

Alice refuses to consider it, saying she is sick of cells and institutions.

When the Bat team assemble to discuss how to deal with Marquis, Alice suggests they use the buzzer on Alice. The rest of the team dismiss this idea, even as Mary points out that Alice honestly wants redemption and is just as much a victim as Marquis.

Marquis uses the Batcave tech to hijack every screen in Gotham City. He delivers a broadcast in which he encourages everyone to be outside in five hours for when he reveals Batwoman's secret identity to the world and that she is not the great hero everyone thinks she is.

Ryan goes to Arkham to confront Alice.

Jada shows up unannounced and asks if the rest of the Bat Team saw the broadcast.

When Luke says he doesn't have the tech to counter the Batcave or trace Marquis' signal, Jada says she can have her tech team pull a carrier-grade router off of Jeturian's server farm and get him whatever he needs.

According to Jada, Lucius Fox repeated himself when he was angry.

Jada gets Luke access to a secure access point to a quantum computer at Gotham University which she financed on his father's advice.

Alice says she doesn't deserve the joy buzzer, but she does have one bit of information Ryan needs. She reveals that she spoke to some of the Arkham lifers on the off chance Joker might have told any of them about his ultimate plan to destroy Gotham City after Batman captured him for the last time.

Alice also guesses that Marquis has a man-crush on Joker and is going to pull off his ultimate plan.

After tracing Marquis' signal to a slow-moving, airborne position, Luke figures out that he stole the Bat-Blimp.

Marquis' plan is to rain the Joker's acid bombs down on Gotham City from Batman's blimp, killing millions of people who are out in the streets waiting to hear Batwoman's secret identity.

Ryan asks Luke to try and steer the Bat-Blimp close to the roof of GCPD HQ, but refuses to tell the rest of the team her plan so they won't try to stop her.

Ryan asks Mary and Sophie to work on getting people back inside.

Sophie only has 300 followers on her social media.

Ryan asks Jada for help in retaking control of Wayne Enterprises.

Jada calls a press conference confessing to the public that she covered up her son murdering her husband. This leads to Ryan being renamed CEO of Wayne Enterprises and causes enough chaos in Wayne Tower that Mary and Sophie are able to sneak into the Batcave undetected.

Mary sets up the computer in the Batcave so that they can send their own broadcast to all the people in Gotham City.

Sophie gets the Penguin's hypnosis umbrella from the Bat-Trophy room.

Marquis figures out that the blimp's autopilot has been hacked and shoots the controls and the pilot before it is low enough for Ryan to jump onto it.

Ryan grapples up onto the underside of the Bat-Blimp.

Sophie knows how to disarm bombs and tries to talk Ryan through disabling Joker's bombs.

Sophie and Mary use the Penguin's umbrella and the Batcave's broadcast facilities to make all the people waiting in the streets of Gotham go inside.

Marquis confronts Ryan and pushes her out the window of the blimp.

Ryan latches onto Marquis and uses some kind of parachute to save them both.

Luke flies into the Blimp in his Batwing suit and uses the Lucius Fox AI to hack the controls to steer the Blimp towards the least populated part of Gotham City. Unfortunately, this requires him to sacrifice the AI.

Alice finds Ryan and helps her fight Marquis, distracting him so she can use the joy buzzer.

A flashback reveals that Ryan told Alice earlier that she was strong enough to change on her own and that she asked Alice for her help.

Sophie tells Luke to program the AI to take the blump to 40 degrees N, 73 degrees W. In the real world, this would be over the ocean just off the shore of New Jersey.

Luke escapes the blimp before it explodes and stumbles across a lost boy looking for his mother in an alley.

Marquis' vitals are stable but he's unconscious after Ryan takes him to Mary's clinic.

Jada says she can't make up for the past but wants Ryan to be part of her future.

Marquis wakes up and says its nice to meet Ryan for real.

Mary finds a note pinned to her desk with Alice's butterfly knife. The note reads "Off to find myself. See you on the flipside."

We briefly see Alice, her hair now brown and dressed in normal clothes, walking away from her sewer hideout, apparently off to the hospital in Switzerland. 

Ryan, Sophie, Mary and Luke take the night to work on cleaning up Ryan's office at Wayne Enterprises and the Batcave.

Reporter Dana DeWitt and her camera crew are killed by some kind of monster. 

The Fridge Factor

Dana DeWitt is killed to set up a cliffhanger for Season 4.


The Killing Jokes

Even by the notorious lacks standards of Arkham Asylum security, it seems odd that Alice could assemble a homemade shock wand in her cell and that she'd have an outlet to plug into.

The show completely glosses over how selfish Ryan is and that her efforts to save the city are born just as much from her seeking the approval of the mother that abandoned her and a desire to hurt Alice as they are any innate heroism.

By a handy coincidence, Luke thought to set the vault full of Batman's trophies so that only Ryan could access it, but didn't apply any of this DNA tech to any of the other Batcave armories. This enables them to get technology Marquis couldn't plan against later.


The Bottom Line

Dreck. Pure dreck, sadly in keeping with the season that led up to it. What little reputation Batwoman had as the most serious and realistic of the Arrowverse series is dead, thanks to a finale built around a hypnotic umbrella and a magic McGuffin. That's less of a sin, however, than the hero being far more selfish than most of the series' villains. This could be taken as a brilliant deconstruction of how the Batman comics are about the upper-class exploiting the mentally ill to their own benefit, but that would be giving it far too much credit. Here's hoping it won't make the cut for Season 4.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 9 - Meet Your Maker

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

Plot

With multiple signs pointing to the original Poison Ivy having awoken, Ryan, Luke and Sophie begin trying to track her down, while Montoya attempts to reach whatever remains of the woman she loved. Meanwhile, Mary's behavior begins to unnerve Alice, as Jada Jet seeks out an old friend's help in saving Marquis.


Influences

Every horror movie where the idiot protagonists are trapped in a cabin in the woods and A Quiet Place (trying to avoid triggering killer plants tracking sounds).


Performances

Again, Nicole Kang and Rachel Skarsten steal the show.


Artistry

The special effects for the killer plants are interesting.


Bat Trivia

The lake where Poison Ivy kills two fishermen is called Loeb Lake. This is likely in honor of legendary Batman writer Jeph Loeb, who wrote Hush and The Long Halloween.


Technobabble

Luke creates special darts for fighting Poison Ivy that combine a paralytic drug and a herbicide. He's certain this will slow her down without killing her until they can recreate Batman's desiccation formula.

All the psychologists Jada Jet consulted with believe a second jolt of the Joker's joy buzzer will reawaken Marquis' sense of empathy.

Natural networking is where plants communicate through acoustics in the ground.

Poison Ivy describes the cutting of her vine that Batman kept as a sporeling, which she created to recharge her, like a battery without a plug. She says that meeting Mary will restore her.

Luke describes Diggle's box as a transmatter cube and guesses it isn't from Earth. Diggle confirms this, but asks him to keep that quiet.


Dialogue Triumphs

Poison Ivy: What were you thinking would happen when you freed me?
Montoya: I wasn't. I got wrapped up in the moment, seeing you, the white tulip, the memories, the guilt.
Poison Ivy: Ah. I'm so sorry that you had to feel guilt, Renee, while I rotted for a decade with no water, no sunlight, no soul mate. Must have been really awful for you.
Montoya: I am sorry, Pam.
Poison Ivy: How am I supposed to believe that? I needed you... more than anything, and you're the one that put me there. 

(Mary is trying to go off on her own because of Ivy's efforts to reach her.)
Alice: Stop! I am supposed to be the crazy one!
Mary: You're not the one with a bitch of a migraine that only seems to stop bitching when I go... this way!
Alice: If you go that way, you'll probably die! The O.G.'s back? She's trying to draw you to her. Why?
Mary: Uh, do I look like the president of the Poison Ivy fan club?
Alice: I don't know, but I do know that a world with two of a kind never ends well. Why don't you ask poor, boring Beth Kane? Oh, that's right. You can't because she's dead! 
Mary: Okay. Then that's why I've been feeling this way? Clearly... w-w-we have some sort of bond, and she's calling out to me. Give me the keys.
Alice: Were you not listening to anything I said?
Mary: I'm going, Alice. This is the woman who unlocked my prowess and the reason why I'm finally happy. The least I can do is go and see what she wants. Please.
Alice: Fine. Let's go meet your maker. 

Mary: Why do we work, Alice? You killed my mom, I replaced you in our family, but... here we are on this crazy adventure together. Hmm? Why?
Alice: Probably because you made me drive out to "deliverance" country.
Mary: It's because despite all of our baggage, we both found the sister we always wanted. I see the girl who... just craves her freedom, and I love that you support me to do what I want... And this is what I want.
Alice: (sighs) Okay. 

Dialogue Disasters

(Sophie watches Luke working out, shirtless, in the middle of their new lair.)
Sophie: Pretty sure in the real world this would be an HR violation of appropriate workplace behavior. Luke: Good thing it's not the real world.


Continuity

In the opening scene, Poison Ivy attacks several fishermen at Loeb Lake, to Montoya's disappointment.

Poison Ivy declares that submerging herself in water is not restoring her strength, like she thought it would.

Ryan visits her adoptive mother's grave, which notes she died in 2015.

Cora Lewis worked three jobs and volunteered at her church while raising Ryan.

Sophie spars with Luke, who seems more determined than ever to get in shape and become a good fighter. She guesses this has something to do with his being man-handled by Marquis Jet in 308.

John Diggle appears for the first time since S612, though it is believed his last chronological appearance in the Arrowverse was in F716. In either case, he has started growing a beard since his last appearance.

John Diggle oversaw Jada Jet's personal security detail at some point when her husband was still alive and they remained friends after.

John Diggle is also implied to be an old flame of Jada Jet, as he tells her he got back together with his wife and had kids and she seems disappointed.

Sunlight is also not restoring Poison Ivy's strength.

Ryan is still angry at Sophie for sleeping with Montoya and refuses to talk to her directly.

Team Bat presume Poison Ivy is active again based on reports of the two dead fishermen at Loeb Lake, an unnatural hornet attack at a pesticide factory and an oil rig being tipped over. All of these attacks were within a two mile radius of a national park outside Gotham City.

Jada offers Diggle a job as head of her security detail. He turns it down, saying that he only agreed to meet with her because he just happened to be in Gotham City attending to other business. 

Diggle agrees to help Jada find Joker's joy buzzer, which she believes might be able to cure Marquis. He suggests, given all the other Batman villain weapons on the street, that all of them were part of a collection, which means the joy buzzer might be out on the street as well.

Diggle says his sources at ARGUS thought Renee Montoya, who works for the Mayor's Offices' Rogue Unit, would be worth consulting about the possibility of a Bat-villain weapons cache.

Poison Ivy reaches out through the plants to send a message to Mary, bringing them together.

Alice tries to talk Mary into leaving Gotham with her to go to Santorini.

Mary describes the sensation of being summoned by Ivy as feeling like brain-freeze when you eat something cold too quickly.

Ryan, Sophie and Luke's van is attacked by vines shortly after they get to the national park.

A random hunter dies after trying to warn Ryan, Sophie and Luke away. They hide in a cabin.

Luke blames himself for the team's current predicament and says it's clear his father didn't give him the Batwing suit because he isn't meant to be a hero.

Ryan says that real heroes screw up all the time and keep going, pointing out that Sophie allowed Alice and Poison Ivy to escape on her watch. Sophie sarcastically agrees, pointing out that for all of Ryan's alleged detective skills, she didn't realize Mary was possessed by Poison Ivy until it was too late.

Poison Ivy confronts Montoya on how Batwoman and her allies seemed to know how to find her. Montoya admits to working with them, but says Ryan is different from Batman. Ivy refuses to believe her and goes off to kill Batwoman.

Jada Jet knows how to pick locks and apparently learned the skill while living on the street in her youth.

Diggle and Jada find Montoya's list of the missing Bat Villain weapons.

Alice makes reference to the Beth Kane doppelganger from 112.

Alice agrees to help Mary find Poison Ivy, but Mary knocks her out so she can go on her own.

Sophie and Ryan continue to argue, but Ryan does thank Sophie for grabbing the Batsuit out of their van before it was destroyed.

Sophie asks Ryan why she's always held a grudge against her and says it goes beyond her treating Ryan badly when she was a convict.

Luke is able to kill the vines that come into the cabin with a mixture of salt and vinegar.

Ryan puts on her Batsuit and makes for a truck they saw earlier that had a bag of salt in the bed.

Diggle and Jada steal he booze out of Montoya's mini-fridge.

Jada has no idea how Ryan tracked her down.

Jada finds Joker's joy buzzer in Montoya's desk.

Montoya tries to kill Mary.

Luke saves a boy, whose father was the hunter killed by Ivy earlier in the episode.

Luke visits his father's grave. He also died in 2015.

Luke tells his father that he thinks he is ready to be a hero now.

John Diggle meets Luke as his father's grave and says he is sure his dad is proud of him.

Luke returns a box to Diggle and says he couldn't get it open. This is the box Diggle found in a smoking crater in A810.

Diggle says ARGUS couldn't get the box open either, but it opened for him once before.

Luke guesses that whatever makes the box open isn't based on science.

Diggle asks Luke for one more favor - passing on a message to Batwoman from Jada Jet, that she found her fix.

Alice finds Mary's phone and a man's corpse impaled on a tree.

Montoya built up an immunity to Poison Ivy's pheromones by poisoning herself a little each day.

Mary finds Ivy. The two hug and Ivy is rejuvenated.

Sophie kisses Ryan.


Location

A national park outside Gotham City.


The Killing Jokes

Granting that they're somewhat desperate, Team Bat going into a national park hunting a villain who manipulates nature with an untested weapon seems incredibly stupid, even for these heroes.


The Bottom Line

Painfully bad. The "heroes" continue to be as unsympathetic as they are idiotic and the only thing marking the villains as villains is random, unmotivated murders. Not even John Diggle and the promise of his Green Lantern storyline being resolved can make this episode worth watching more than once.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 6 - How Does Your Garden Grow?

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

Plot

A frightening discovery in a Robinson Park garden shed sends Montoya rushing to Ryan to place the city on high alert, as she theorizes that Poison Ivy has returned in a new form. Meanwhile, Alice is suspiciously eager to help the Bat Team, as Sophie seeks vengeance for her sister's near death at the hands of the Black Glove society.

Influences

The Batman comics of Grant Morrison (Black Glove Society)


Goofs

The newspaper article with the headline "Batman Scratches The Poison Ivy Itch" is dated as having been published one month ago. However, Batman's last battle with Poison Ivy would have had to have taken place at least six years earlier, given when Bruce Wayne disappeared from Gotham City.


Performances

Rachel Skarsten steals the show.

That being said, Nicole Kang does a masterful job switching between Mary and Ivy and is pitch-perfect vamping it up as Ivy.


Artistry

The horror elements are well played, particularly the make-up for Chris Hayner, the living beehive.

The special effects for the killer vines are good.


Bat Trivia

The episode title comes from an old English nursey rhyme, "Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary." Alice quotes it to Mary near the end of the episode. The title is also a foreshadowing of the revelation that Mary has become a host to Poison Ivy's mind.

Mary's hairdo in this episode mimics the horned-hairdo worn by Uma Thurman during her final fight with Batgirl in the movie Batman and Robin.

Alice makes reference to Montoya having a "wall of weird." This is a reference to Smallville and the mural/database started by Chloe Sullivan of strange things happening around Smallville.

At one point, it is noted that the Arrowverse version of Renee Montoya was on track to become the next Police Commissioner. At the time this episode aired, Rene Montoya was the GCPD Commissioner in the monthly Batman comics.

Alice makes a reference to Harley Quinn when it is discovered Mary violated medical privacy laws while under Ivy's influence. This is the first mention of Harley Quinn existing in the Post-Crisis Arrowverse.


Technobabble

Luke checks Mary's credit card records and finds out she bought a flowering pot, fertilizer and a watering can that morning.  Her phone's geo data says that then she went to a vacant lot in the Burnside district.

Mary theorizes that Poison Ivy's pheromones allow her to communicate with nature while heightening the things she is passionate about.  This is why she overreacted to a rejection and bent the rules to see justice done to a Black Glove operative that couldn't be touched legally. 

Sunlight is the trigger for changing Mary into Poison Ivy. Her eyes turn green when Ivy has control.

Luke detects an abnormally high thermal presence in the plants Poison Ivy controls.


Dialogue Triumphs

Ryan: How did you get Poison Ivy's vine?
Alice: While you were slurping caviar off of Mummy's fine china, some of us were in the field protecting this city.
Ryan: Mm-hmm. You just so happened to stumble across a Batman trophy while you were taking a stroll through the park? 

Alice: (mock-earnest) The cherry blossoms are so gorgeous this time of year.

Alice: Ahem. I'm gonna go check on the vic's progress.
Ryan: (Because you care about a stranger's life all of a sudden?
Alice: You're right. I don't. Let's you and I go sit in the Batcave together and watch the computer tediously cycle through all the anti-encryption ciphers.
Ryan: (deadpan) Have fun with Mary.
Alice: Will do. 

(Ryan and Luke are slow in believing Mary's theory that she is Poison Ivy's host.)
Alice: I thought watching Kate come out was torture.

(Ryan and Luke finally believe Alice and Mary's story.)
Alice: And we're all on the same page. Well, that was an excruciating process.
Ryan: You knew Mary was infected by the vine. That's why you were being so coy in Montoya's office.
Alice: I just figured the last thing anyone needed was for Mary to end up on Renee's wall of weird.
(Ryan's cell phone vibrating. It's Montoya. She dismisses the call.)
Alice: (sarcastic) Oh. Muting the boss. I'm sure that's gonna end really well.
Ryan: Montoya doesn't need to know anything about this.
Alice: Okay. I see. It's fine when we throw Alice in Arkham, but, oh, poor, sweet, innocent Mary, yeah, we should protect her at all costs.
(Mary handcuffs herself to the rail.)
Ryan: What are you doing? 

Mary: What one does when they realize they can control mother freaking earth! I nearly killed someone, and I don't know why or when this infection is gonna make me transform again, and until we figure it out, I am a threat to everyone...
Alice: (mouths words) Not me. 

Ryan: Why didn't you say anything about Mary?
Alice: I was wondering how this would end up my fault.
Ryan: You obviously knew something was up. How'd you figure it out?
Alice: Uh, the question isn't how I figured it out. It's how the hell you didn't. You're her roommate, you have a billion dollars of Battech at your disposal, and your number two is a certifiable genius. One of you should have noticed. 

Mary: So... maybe the chemical pheromones from the Poison Ivy allow me to communicate with nature while heightening the things that I'm passionate about like justice?
Alice: Well, seeing as that M.O. tracks and, uh... ahem... I killed your mother, I'm really not looking forward to being turned into a cabbage. So we should find out exactly what turns Dr. Jekyll into Mrs. Hide my victims under a pot.

(Ivy, in Mary's body, knocks out Luke. She stretches in the sunbeam leaking into the Batcave.)
Alice: Good morning, sunshine. I was wondering when you'd come out to play.
Ivy: You figured out sunlight was my trigger. 

Alice: (starts undoing the handcuffs on Mary) Well, they don't call me a supervillain for nothing, but Batty will be home soon, so I hope you know what you're doing.
Ivy: Why are you helping me?
Alice: Well, why does anyone help anyone? To accrue favors owed. But until I redeem this one, I need you to be careful. Once you slither out of this Batcave, Renee Montoya's gonna be hunting you down like a gardener with a weed whacker.

Montoya: Where did you get infected? The park, the river? Where was the vine, Mary?
Ivy: It's not a homing pigeon for the brokenhearted, Ray-Ray. You don't whisper, "Pamela Isley", into the leaves and follow as it slithers its way to her secret burial site.
Montoya: You know about Pam?
Ivy: Enough to know that she doesn't want you to find her.
Montoya: Look. You need to come with me so I can get you help.
Ivy: Is that what I need? Did you use that soft, gentle tone to lure Poison Pam into captivity?
Montoya: No. She was out of control. You're not there yet. Let's keep it that way.
Ivy: What do you think she thinks about down there? I mean... besides freedom and water and how her veins scrape together like sandpaper? 

Montoya: Easy. Let's not make this ugly.
Ivy: She thinks about how much she hates you, Renee. 

(Ivy drowns Batwoman in vines.)
Ivy: You've been so wrapped up in your own drama, Ryan. It's time you got wrapped up in mine for once.

Alice: "Mary, Mary quite contrary, how does your garden grow?" Quite well it seems from all the sirens I've been hearing around town. (gesturing to the car) It's fully electric, steppy.
Mary: Is that supposed to impress me?
Alice: Uh, yeah. Considering it was 10 times harder to hotwire. So you gonna tell me what you did to everyone's favorite cellar dweller at the Mayor's office or what? 

Mary: On the road. 

Alice: Aw. There's that patented Dr. Hamilton bedside manner... all warm and chatty.
Mary: (impatient) Get in. 


Dialogue Disasters

Cop: (To Montoya) Your ambiguous yet far-reaching power supersedes ours.


Continuity

A group of teenagers playing basketball in Robinson Park come across a man who seems to have been built into a bee-hive, who has bees come out of his mouth as he begs for help.

Montoya takes charge of the crime scene, to the annoyance of the GCPD officers on the scene.

Montoya has the man sent to Mary Hamilton's clinic on Bennett Street.

The man is identified as Chris Hayner, a Tricorner resident.

Monotya theorizes that Ivy has a new host, based on the dead vine Alice found in 305.

Montoya gives Hayner's phone to Ryan.

Alice goes to Mary's clinic to check on Hayner's progress.

Ryan finds Sophie in the Batcave, using the computer to find footage of her sister's attacker using the CCTV system. She says Alice spilled a cherry soda on her laptop.

Sophie is convinced Jada Jet is working with the Black Glove Society.

Ryan says that Jada had no idea people were going to get hurt and that she only contracted them for one job.

Sophie makes reference to her sister being frozen and three of her friends dying in 304.

Alice notes that Mary has even more plants in her clinic than she did in 305.

Alice confronts Mary with the idea that she is Poison Ivy's new host.

Chris Hayner wakes up and screams when he sees Mary, saying that she's the one who did this to him.

Mary tells Ryan and Luke that she thinks Alice is right about her being Poison Ivy's host. She says she can't remember where she was earlier in the day.

Ryan and Luke don't believe Mary or Alice until it is pointed out that the last three texts on Chris Hayner's phone were sent to Mary.

Alice says she didn't come forward with what she had figured out because she figured the Bat-Team wouldn't want Mary getting busted by Montoya.

At one time, Detective Montoya was on track to be the next GCPD commissioner.

Sophie confronts Montoya and asks for a favor, given that she agreed to take custody of Alice. She asks for all her data on Victor Fries and his preservation serum. Montoya says she doesn't have half of what Batwoman does. Sophie then asks for all the information Montoya has on the Black Glove Society. She says she knows nothing beyond the fact that people who know anything about the Black Glove Society end up dead.

Luke discovers that Mary had a profile on a dating website called Twinge and that was where she apparently met Chris Hayner. 

The Bat-Team's best guess is that Mary buried Chris Hayner in honey after he said she seemed sweet but rejected her

Alice and Batwoman go to the vacant lot and find a man buried up to his neck, The man is a Black Glove operative named Virgil Getty.

Mary was apparently able to track Virgil through the PO Box he was using to buy the cryogenic medical supplies he used on the Freeze Serum victims. She was able to do this by using her ability to access medical records to bypass the normal privacy laws.

Alice suggests they tell Sophie they have a Black Glove operative held under the Batcave, but Ryan says they have enough problems without Sophie looking for more.

Alice tells Luke and Mary that Renee Montoya and Pamela Isley dated in college and that is why Montoya is so obsessed with Poison Ivy. 

Alice makes reference to the new Mad Hatter from 301, the new Killer Croc from 302 and Nora Fries in 303.

Ryan meets with Montoya in her office at Wayne Enterprises and tells her that she knows they found a second Poison Ivy victim. She demands to talk to the victim, but Ryan says she will let her know once he's awake after she questions him.

Renee tells Ryan about her involvement with Poison Ivy.

Alice admits to telling Sophie about the Black Glove operative in their custody after Ryan told her not to.

Sophie questions Virgil and learns that the Black Glove Society had been employed to take care of various screwed up rich kids in secret since Marla Elliot hired them to try and treat her son, Tommy Elliot, before he became Hush. Before that, she formed a group of other rich parents with bad seed kids that swapped horror stories, discussed treatments and medications. This led to them spending millions on R&R to fix their kids brains.

Virgil is able to kill himself while Sophie's back is turned, as she confronts Ryan over Alice being more honest with her than she is.

Alice tells Luke and Mary that Ryan is rushing to stop Sophie from talking to Virgil because she's more concerned about Jada Jet's secrets than saving Mary and she wouldn't be surprised if Ryan handed Mary over to Montoya.

Ivy takes over Mary. Alice helps her to escape the Batcave.

Ivy calls in a tip to Rene Montoya's office, reporting an Ivy sighting at the Gotham Botanical Gardens.

Luke tracks Mary's phone to the Botanical Gardens and suits up to join Ryan as Batwing.

Yellow roses are left where Batwoman and batwing will find them. These are a symbol of friendship.

Ivy removed the fail-safe/Lucius Fox AI from the Batwing suit.

Ivy builds on Mary's resentment of Luke and Ryan neglecting her or ignoring her advice to turn her against the Bat-Team.

Luke tears his radiator cuff in the fight.

Montoya saves Ryan and Luke, but she is not happy that they didn't tell her about Mary being Ivy's new host.

Sophie is drinking at the Hold Up and is joined by Monotya. The two are later seen furiously making out.

Ryan calls Jada Jet and says that she needs a favor.

Alice meets with Ivy with a stolen electric car.


The Killing Jokes

Ryan and Luke are dumbed down considerably in their efforts to dismiss Mary's claims that she's the Poison Ivy host, purely because they don't want to believe Alice would be honest about something.


The Bottom Line

The strongest episode of the season so far.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 5 - A Lesson From Professor Pyg

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

Plot

Ryan asks Sophie to accompany her to a dinner at Jada's to determine just what her mother knows about Wayne Enterprises and their finances. The evening takes a turn for the worse, however, when an uninvited guest shows up, revealing a new side to Marquis and his mother. 

Influences

The comics of Grant Morrison (characters of Jada Jet, The Whip, The Flamingo and Professor Pyg)


Goofs

Why doesn't Luke go to DEFCON 1 the minute he loses touch with Sophie?


Performances

Nicole Kang has a great performance here playing the obviously off-kilter Mary.


Artistry

The costume for Professor Pyg is a high quality piece of make-up and costuming.

The horror movie style direction is solid.


Bat Trivia

Created by writer Grant Morrison and artist Andy Kubert, Professor Pyg first appeared in Batman #666 in July 2007. Born Lazlo Valentin, the man who became known as Professor Pyg was a brilliant scientist and surgeon employed by the secret United Nations organization Spyral, who was driven insane by a product he was testing. The formula made Lazlo paranoid and obsessed with perfection, performing surgery on himself to become the horrific pig-faced Professor Pyg. He continued to practice his depraved medicine to "make people better" fitting them with horrible new faces and drugging them into becoming his depraved servants.

The Arrowverse version of Professor Pyg is also named Lazlo Valentin, but was apparently a hitman for several years before going straight and becoming a gourmet chef. (His hitman past was mentioned in 213.) Unfortunately, he was fired by Jada Jet, who used her name to ruin his reputation and leave him unable to find work. This resulted in his wife leaving him, taking their children with her, pushing Lazlo to seek revenge on Jada Jet. 

Alice lists several Batman villains while going through Montoya's files, some of whom have previously appeared in Batwoman and in other Arrowverse series. These include Magpie (last seen in 120) and Talia Al Ghul (last seen at Oliver Queen's funeral in A810).

One of the villains on Montoya's list is said to be a woman named Shelley Gaynor, who is known as The Whip. She is said to be an animal rights advocate whose whip was made of faux leather. 

In the comics, Shelley Gaynor was a hero called The Whip, who was part of the Seven Soldiers of Victory. She was the granddaughter of a Golden Age hero, also called The Whip, who is primarily remembered for making his first appearance in Flash Comics #1 in January 1940 along with the Jay Garrick Flash and Hawkman. 

The background given for the Arrowverse Poison Ivy draws off of the origin Pamela Isley recived during the Bronze Age of Comics and her appearance in World's Finest #241 in July 1978. In this origin, Pamela was seduced by a man named Marc LeGrande into helping him steal an Egyptian artifact containing ancient herbs. He tried to poison her with the herbs, which were so rare as to be untraceable, but she survived the attempt and developed an immunity to all toxins and diseases. It was not until the post-Crisis era that Ivy's background was changed so that she became the victim of experiments by Jason Woodrue (aka The Floronic Man) which left her with an immunity to toxins, a toxic kiss and plant-control powers.

The Arrowverse version of Poison Ivy was said to have a rival in the PhD program named Marc LeGrande, who abducted her and used her as his guinea pig. He injected her with oleander, nightshade, water hemlock and other poisonous plants that changed her physiology and her mind, changing her from a compassionate and loving woman to a reckless maniac overnight.

Alice eventually determines that the murderer with the whip was a villain called The Flamingo, whom she describes as a "flamboyant, pink, Harley-straddling psycho."

In the comics, The Flamingo was a villain created by Grant Morrison and Andy Kubert for Batman #666. Once an ordinary man named Eduardo Flamingo, he was brainwashed by the Gotham mob into becoming a contract killer and serial killer for hire, who ate the faces of his victims. He did wield a whip as a weapon and had a dandyish dress sense, with a pink leather jacket and matching Harley-Davidson motorcycle

Technobabble

Catwoman reportedly stole some of Batman's nanotechnlogy and wove it into her whip, making it indestructible.

Zoey's dissertation is on modern family dynamics particularly as it relates to Bowen's family theory paradigm as it relates to triangulation and the roles of rescuer, victim and persecutor.

Mary determines the murder victim had motorcycle grease under his fingernails and she found a similar, but not exactly the same viscous synthetic on the bullwhip.

Mary saved Jordan Moore's life by mimicking the antifreeze synthesis plants use to survive subzero temperatures.

The show introduces a new wrinkle that Poison Ivy can take control of other people and use them as host bodies. This is apparently what has happened to Mary Hamilton. 


Dialogue Triumphs

Alice: So you're Ryan's date? So saw that coming.

Sophie: It's not a date. It's recon.
Alice: But you're wearing a push-up bra, so it's a date.
Sophie: You know this is your fault, right? 

Alice: Ugh. Don't blame me for this repulsive love affair.
Sophie: If you'd never told Ryan that her biological mother was still alive, we wouldn't be in this mess!
Alice: (mock sincerity) Soph, the guilt I think I'm supposed to be feeling is seriously killing my hallucination-free vibes.


Continuity

As the movie opens, Alice and Sophie are seen watching a horror movie together, confirming that Alice is now Sophie's roommate. 

Both women hear a noise, which turns out to be Batwoman on the balcony.

Ryan came to retrieve Alice because of a murder victim Montoya thinks was killed with one of the Batman trophies, i.e. Catwoman's whip.

According to Luke, Catwoman and Batman had a romantic relationship. 

Alice determines that the whip the murder victim was bound with cut with a pocket knife, making it impossible for it to be Catwoman's whip.

Wayne Enterprises stock is down 53% in the three days since 304.

The entire Crisis Management team for Wayne Enterprises quit because of the stress from the accusations Ryan is facing.

Ryan was delivered a couriered letter inviting her to dinner at Jada Jet's house.

Mary points out that the only evidence they have tying Jeturian Technologies to the Black Glove Society came from Alice, who is hallucinating so badly they had to pull her out of an asylum.

Alice says she has not hallucinated since leaving Arkham Asylum. 

Sophie poses as Ryan's girlfriend at the dinner, to help her bug Jada Jet's home office.

Jada Jet's chef is revealed to be Professor Pyg.

Ryan and Sophie lie and say they met through friends on a Tuesday. They remember because it was taco night.

Jada tells Ryan that she knows something is going on between Ryan and Marquis.

Marquis shows up with a date - a woman named Zoey.

Sophie plants a bug and searches Jada's desk while pretending to go to the bathroom.

Sophie finds a picture on Jada's desk of herself with a man and a young Marquis, but the photo is folded so the man is no longer there.

The feed to the Batcave suddenly cuts out while Luke and Sophie are talking.

Jada tells Marquis that Jada knows something is up after she leaves the room.

Jada finds Sophie in her office. She lies badly and says she got lost.

Montoya asks Alice to figure out who besides Catwoman might tie a guy up with a bullwhip.

Alice dismisses Magpie, The Whip and Talia al Ghul as suspects.

Alice determines that Montoya is obsessed with Poison Ivy for some reason, based on the fact that her files on Ivy are very detailed but the other files are rather thin.

Ryan is once again confirmed to be a Vegan.

Zoey is said to be a graduate student who is writing her dissertation on modern family dynamics. 

Jada confronts Ryan about Sophie snooping around in her office.

Zoey goes to the bathroom and suddenly finds herself losing all sensation in her hands.

Jada, Marquis, Ryan and Sophie begin suffering the same symptoms. 

Professor Pyg reveals himself and explains that he drugged the wine. He discusses how he was fired by Jada years earlier and how his wife left him and took the kids when he couldn't find work.

Ryan goes to get Zoey but finds her dead in the bathroom.

After finding that their phones are dead and the front door is locked from the outside, Jada escorts everyone to a panic room on the top floor.

Jada does not own any guns.

Marquis starts spasming once they are in the panic room.

Montoya tells Alice that she knew Pamela Isley before she became Poison Ivy and that the two dated while they were students at Gotham University, where Pamela studied botany and she studied criminal law. 

Alice confirms that Poison Ivy was not in Arkham anymore, despite having a cell there with her name on it.

Montoya doesn't know what Batman did with Poison Ivy, but she guesses that he buried her somewhere away from water and sunlight.

Montoya helped Batman to lure Ivy into a trap.

Alice has another hallucination of a letter from her father.

Sophie says that without an adrenaline shot, Marquis is going to die because he drank far more of the wine than anyone else and is having a more extreme reaction to the paralytic. 

Jada says there are several EpiPens among the camping gear in her basement and that her husband carried them all the time because of his allergies.

They are able to see Professof Pyg building a bomb through the security monitors in the panic room.

Sophie tells Jada that she is Jordan Moore's sister and accuses her directly of being connected to Black Glove.

Professor Pyg gets to Ryan as she passes out while making a break for the basement.

Alice notices that Mary has a lot more plants in her clinic and that Mary has begin going on rants about plants being awesome.

Alice tells Mary her delusions are back.

Mary has developed a constant itch ever since being exposed to a certain vine. Alice identifies the vine as Poison Ivy.

Jada shows herself to Professor Pyg to save Ryan. This allows Ryan, who was playing possom, to inject herself with adrenaline and fight Professor Pyg.

Sophie saves Marquis' life, only for Marquis to go berserk and kills Professor Pyg.

Alice eventually identifies the killer as the Flamingo and the victim as a member of a rival gang.

Alice gives Montoya a cutting from the dead vine sample Mary took.

Montoya says that Ivy's vines don't die unless she's infected someone else.

Sophie once again tells Ryan that she's sure Jada is hiding something.

Ryan confronts Jada alone.

Jada found the bug Sophie left behind. She also found out who Sophie is and that she was a former member of Crow's Security.

Jada tells Ryan that Marquis is sick in the head and had been since he was a child. 

Marquis was one of the students on the bus full of children Joker had taken hostage in the flashback of the Batwoman pilot. The Joker shocked Marquis' head with his buzzer and the voltage made Marquis different and dark.

As a child, Marquis poisoned his dad with peanuts and laughed while he died.

Jada says she has spent millions trying to fix Marquis behind his back, seeing multiple specialists and psychologists. Her latest effort involved hiring the Black Glove Society to help her build a working treatment to safely freeze Marquis until she could find a cure and then revive him. She says she had no idea they were going to test the treatment on innocent people like Jordan Moore.

Jada claims she was pushing Ryan away because she was trying to protect her from Marquis.


The Bottom Line

A waste of a good villain, though the horror elements are competently executed. Unfortunately, everything involving Jada and the set-up of Marquis as a new Joker is nowhere near as interesting as everything involving Alice investigating Poison Ivy's connection to Montoya and the idea that Ivy is now taking over host bodies. While it seems oddly par for the course that Alice has become the best detective in the show, it is weird that she's the one doing most of the heroic work in this episode.

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 1, Episode 20 - O, Mouse!

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


Plot

Jacob Kane forms an uneasy alliance with Batwoman to catch an Arkham Asylum escapee on a rampage. Meanwhile, things come to a head between Alice, Mouse and Hush, as Alice attempts to put her house in order while plotting how to best bring Batwoman down. 

Influences

Batwoman: Elegy by Greg Rucka & J.H. Williams and the Heart of Hush storyline.

Goofs

It beggars belief that a big guy like Tim "The Titan" Teslow can walk around Gotham City in an orange jumpsuit wielding twin machetes and go unnoticed, particularly since he's making no attempt to stay hidden.

Perhaps the most ludicrous conceit of the episode is that he manages to get into Gotham University's stadium undetected, despite it being surrounded by The Crows, and that he shuts down the power before taking down several men in body armor.

Why don't The Crows shoot at Teslow while he is charging Batwoman on the field? Why do they wait until after Batwoman spends a minute talking him down, apart from it making it clear just how evil The Crows are? Most annoyingly, why don't they try shooting her uncovered face rather than her well-armored chest?

Performances

Rachel Skarsten absolutely nails Alice's monologue as Mouse dies.

Artistry

The opening action sequence on the train is one of the best in the show's history.

Bat Trivia

It is confirmed in this episode that Batman was given a piece of Kryptonite by Superman in case it was ever necessary to end his life. Superman also did this in the comics.

The episode ends with Alice having given Hush the face of Bruce Wayne. The same thing happened in the comics, in the storyline Heart of Hush.

Technobabble

The Crows release an app to the general public that can be used to summon them in the event of an emergency relating to Alice or the other Arkham escapees. 

Kryptonite is described as a mineral with a natural green luminescence and strong covalent bonds.

Kryptonite is nonreactive to acetic, hydrochloric and sulfuric acid. 

Mary says that Tim Teslow's Dorsal Posterior Insular (the part of the brain that regulates pain) shriveled down to next to nothing after years of traumatic head injuries. This explains why he felt nothing when he fought Kate.

A trauma-bond exercise is a psychological event where you destroy something that connects you to your pain as a way of moving on. In this case, Alice suggests destroying her copy of Alice in Wonderland with Mouse so they can move on to a new life.

Luke was finally able to destroy the Kryptonite using a hydraulic press generating 40,000 pounds of compressive force.

Dialogue Triumphs

Mary: You told me that The Crows wanted to make over their image. Why not start by allying yourself with someone the city actually roots for?

Jacob: You did this?
Mary: I knew I'm one of the only people who could get through to you! (sighs) I believe in her Dad!

Jacob: Mary - I said anyone affiliated with her will be brought to justice.
Mary: Then arrest me! Arrest me for believing in someone who saves lives and who stops criminals and who inspires hope without charging a penny for it! I'm your daughter and if I don't believe in what you're doing , how can you expect a city of strangers to?!

(Alice and Mouse are burning their copy of Alice In Wonderland.)

Mouse: What happened to us should never happen to anyone. But there's no one in the world I would rather have gone through it with than you.
Alice: (sniffling) Nor I without you. And I mean this - with all of my heart. (pauses) I still want to join you in the beautiful garden, and smell the seasons in bright flower beds, and make a wish in cool fountains. I want to meet a man with many hats and smile back at the Cheshire Cat. And run... with you forever.... through our Wonderland.

(Mouse reaches up to his nose. Blood has begun to run from it.)

Mouse: Alice? 

(Alice shakes her head, holding back the sobs and trying to avoid Mouse's gaze.)

Mouse: What did you do?!
Alice: (suddenly bitter, intense) You made me choose. 

Mouse: You poisoned me?!  Why did you do that?!
Alice: (softly, stammering) Be-Because I couldn't let you leave me! Not you too!

Mouse: This...this wasn't even real?

(Mouse moans and pitches forward. Alice takes his head into her lap and begins stroking his hair. She begins crying freely.)
Alice: If only pain could turn to ash, with the strike of a match. (intensely, hissing the words) But my pain is a part of me, the way my family is a part of me.And you could never understand why I need to enact my revenge. Because you have never experienced true betrayal. (sadly) At least not until now.

(Alice bursts out crying again.)

Alice: Goodbye, my sweet Mouse. My brother. My everything.  I'll see you again in Wonderland.

Continuity

Kate saves Jacob from a psychotic man on the subway, in her civilian identity. The man beheads another man before making his escape.

Vesper Fairchild identifies the psychotic man as former college football star Tim "The Titan" Teslow.

Tim Teslow was a Tight-End for the Gotham Goliaths before he was committed. He was the best in the team's history, scoring at least one touchdown in every game he played, making 100 catches and rushing 1000 yards each season.

Mouse wants to leave Gotham and start a new life with Alice somewhere else.

Alice is insistent she needs to kill Kate before she can leave Gotham, which means finding the Kryptonite mentioned in Lucius Fox's journal.

Hush insists that Alice keep up her end of the bargain and get him a new face, which she promised in exchange for Lucius Fox's journal and help translating it.

Luke says that the shard of Kryptonite Superman left in Bruce Wayne's possession is the only Kryptonite left on Earth. We know this isn't true, however, as Kate acquired a piece of it from the Bruce Wayne of Earth-99 during 109.

.

Luke sets about trying to figure out how to destroy the Kryptonite.

Kate does not follow sports at all.

Mary knows a shocking amount about football and the career of Tim Teslow, largely because Tim Teslow's brother Apollo was dating her friend Selu Corova.

Apollo Teslow is the Goliaths' Running Back. 

Tim Teslow used to be the kind of man who would walk the neighborhood kids to school to make sure they felt save.

Tim Teslow was committed after he killed a referee on the field after a referee made a call against him. After that, it came out that he was abusing steroids.

Mary warns Kate against getting involved as Batwoman, but Kate insists she knows how to work around her father.  

Mary recalls that Kate, as a teenager, stole a Crow's SUV and was arrested for joy-riding in it.

Mary also recalls that Kate threw a party in Jacob's penthouse without asking and Jacob let the police land a helicopter on the roof to arrest Kate.

Kate wants to come clean to her father about being Batwoman.

Alice approaches Professor Darby, the head of the geology department at Gotham University, regarding Kryptonite, as his name was mentioned in Lucius Fox's journal.

Alice kills Professor Darby after learning that he sent the Kryptonite sample he was given to analyze back to Wayne Enterprises.

Apollo Teslow testified against his brother at his trial.

Apollo blames years of untreated head injuries coupled with steroid abuse for turning his brother into a psychotic maniac. 

Tim Teslow shows up at the stadium where Apollo is training and gets past Batwoman to stab him in the back, paralyzing him permanently. 

Kate suffers a couple of cracked ribs and a dislocated shoulder during her fight with Tim Teslow.

Luke determines that the man Tim Teslow killed on the subway was an administrator at Gotham University, who was fired from the college's neuro clinic for falsifying the brains scans of student athletes. This caused the players to keep playing even when it wasn't safe and likely aggravated Tim Teslow's condition. 

Wayne Tower is 45 stories high.

Mouse asks why Alice is making Hush a face whens he promised him they would kill him, before he threatens to leave Gotham without Alice. 

Mouse is still bitter that Alice didn't visit him for the 5 years he was trapped in Arkham Asylum.

Alice finally agrees to leave Gotham City with Mouse, but says they have to throw a party first.

Coach Kurt Donahue of GU's football team took early retirement just before the scandal with the college manipulating the players' brain scan records broke. While nothing could be proven legally, there was no way he could be ignorant of what was being done to keep his players on the field.

Mary lights the Bat-Signal and is taken into custody by The Crows. This leads her to approach Jacob with an offer to work with Batwoman to bring in Tim Teslow. 

Jacob agrees to the truce.

Coach Donahue gives a press conference, asking to meet Tim Teslow on the field at Gotham University's stadium so he can apologize to him in person for putting the game before his health.

Alice poisons Mouse to prevent him from leaving her.

Sophie and Julia are not informed about the partnership between The Crows and Batwoman. This leads them to conclude that Jacob is setting a trap for Batwoman, since Jacob knew they had contact with her before.

The Crows gun down Tim Teslow after Batwoman has talked him down.

Batwoman escapes after The Crows try to shoot her.

Sophie criticizes Jacob for putting her in charge of managing the Crows App, suggesting he did so to keep her out of the way while he went after Batwoman. 

Julia confesses to Sophie that she was involved with a woman named Safiyah who put a price on her head. She shows Sophie pictures of them together, which were left at her hotel room - a sign that the are being watched and that Sophie is now a target as well.

Kate admits that Mary was right about her not being able to come out as Batwoman to Jacob.

Luke successfully destroys the Kryptonite Bruce had.

Kate reveals the existence of the Kryptonite she got during Crisis on Infinite Earths to Luke and Mary.

Kate declares there should be no more secrets between the three of them. 

The Crows recover some of the expended bullets that failed to penetrate the Bat-Suit. This leads Jacob to declare they need to find something stronger than a Desert Eagle.

Alice is revealed to have given Hush the face of Bruce Wayne. He asks him to walk into Wayne Enterprises and get the Kryptonite from Kate.

The Killing Jokes

The Crows and Batwoman look horribly incompetent in this episode, given they have trouble taking down a single psychotic ex-athlete with brain damage. 

The Bottom Line

Had this been a regular episode, it might have been okay. As a season finale, it's a bitter disappointment, due to a villain who has to be made into something far bigger than he should be to justify the conflict with The Crows and Batwoman. As per usual, the best bits of the episode involve Alice and even with her killing Mouse its increasingly difficult not to see her as the least of all evils out of all the characters in this show. Still, the cliffhanger is an awesome one and a great lead into Season 2.

Batwoman Episode Guide: Season 1, Episode 19 - A Secret Kept From All the Rest

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


Plot

With Lucius Fox's journal recovered, yet utterly unreadable thanks to a unique code, Alice and Tommy Elliot (dubbed Hush by Gotham's media) begin kidnapping code-breakers from all around Gotham City, eventually grabbing Luke Fox and Julia Pennyworth. Yet as Kate goes into a battle to save half of her allies, she finds herself wondering who she can really trust in the faet of a stunning revelation..

Influences

Batman: Hush by Jeph Loeb & Jim Lee and Batwoman: Elegy by Greg Rucka & J.H. Williams.

Artistry

The chase scene where Batwoman moves to save Parker Torres from Hush is amazing.

The fight scene with Kate taking on the inmates in Arkham is a good one.

Bat Trivia

This episode gives the Arrowverse version of Tommy Elliot his supervillain codename; Hush. In the episode, this is because of the one word he is heard to say while abducting a professor from a library. In the original comics, Hush's codename was a reference to the nursery rhyme, "Hush, Little Baby" about a baby that is promised various gifts if it will stop crying but is never satisfied.

Batwoman saves Parker Torres near the Williams Viaduct. This is likely a nod to artist J.H. Williams, who co-created the modern version of Kate Kane.

The translated page of Lucius Fox's journal we briefly see when Alice is viewing it through the translator glasses contains a number of references to the 2007-2008 "Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul" storyline. Apart from confirming that Batman had dealings with Ra's Al Ghul and Talia Al Ghul in the Post-Crisis Arrowverse timeline, the blurb also makes mention of the vigilante Azrael and the Order of St. Dumas and Order of the Pure that created him.

The journal also makes reference to the Suit of Sorrows - an armored costume which was created for Azrael and apparently briefly worn by Batman before he fell victim to a curse on the suit that caused whoever wore it who was impure of heart to go berserk.

Technobabble

Hush uses two .45 caliber pistols.

The code Lucius Fox used to write his journal is a poly-alphabetic cipher, using hundreds of characters in multiple languages and alphabets. 

A corresponds with Heth, which is the first letter of the Aramaic alphabet, which is the first alphabet alphabetically out of all the languages Luke recognizes in his father's journal.

B corresponds with the Babylonian alphabet, but it isn't the second letter. 

There's an interval variance each time the code changes alphabets. Luke eventually figures out that it is based on his social security number.

Parker asks if Mary can bypass the data throttle on the Bat Computer.

Mary discovers a pair of Lucius Fox's old glasses in a drawer in the Batcave. These turn out to be a pair of smart glasses that are programmed to auto-translate Lucius Fox's journals when the person wearing the glasses looks at his code.

The Bat-Suit is equipped with a sonic scanner that, in addition to picking up radio signals like the police band, allows Kate to find the distinctive sound of an electrical current running in a large building.

Dialogue Triumphs

(Kate grills Julia on why she secretly went after Reagan without telling her.)
Kate: Why didn't you just use your name? Tell her you're with The Crows?

Julia: I see. Reagan can't be trusted and now no one can be trusted.
Kate: Not no one. Just people who have lied to me in the past and last time I checked that included you. 

(Luke says he doesn't think Julia is hiding anything from them, despite Kate's suspicions.)

Kate: Do you believe her over me?
Luke: Am I not allowed to disagree with you now?
Kate: Not when we're both being lied to.

Luke: I trust her, Kate!
Kate: Then I can't trust your judgement.

Luke: Says the girl who went home with the bartender and left the key to destroying Gotham on the nightstand.
Mary: Damn!
Kate: If you don't like how I do things, no one is forcing you to be here. 
Luke: You know what? You are absolutely right. 

(As Alice kills the second code-breaker in as many days.)

Hush: They need more than 90 minutes to figure it out! Alice, you keep killing them!

Alice: Well, they keep disappointing me!

(Kate and Mary have just hit on the idea of trying to track Hush by using Professor Carr's pacemaker.)

Mary: So we trace it back to where it transmitted its last signal. And then we'll know where he died and then we'll find Hush. That's genius!
Kate: Mmm-hmm.
Mary: Right.

Kate:  Let's do it.
Mary: Ok. 

Kate: Yeah.
Mary: Yeah.
Kate: Right.
(There is a long pause as they both look at each other expectantly.)
Mary: Sooo.... trace it!
Kate: Uh... How?
Mary: You don't know?!

Kate: (quietly) Kind of a Luke thing.

(Kate and Parker exit the elevator down to the Batcave.)
Parker: OMG! Full disclosure; I thought Batcave was a metaphor. Are there, like- AAH!
(Parker screams as a swarm of bats fly past her on the walkway. Kate doesn't even blink.)
Kate: Yep. Not a metaphor. 

Continuity

Tommy Elliot, his face still bandaged, kills 3 people with silenced pistols before abducting a professor from Gotham University Library. He is dubbed "Hush" after the one word he was heard to say by any witnesses.

Kate tracks down Reagan and learns of her relationship to Magpie.

Reagan tells Kate that Magpie's real name is Margot.

Reagan tells Kate that she told all this to a blonde woman with a British accent who knew Kate. Kate realizes immediately this is a reference to Julia Pennyworth. 

The professor Hush abducted is identified as Professor Carr.

Carr identifies characters in Lucius Fox's journal that are Aramaic, Babylonian and Mayan.

Mouse asks why Alice doesn't simply kill Kate when she's not in her bat costume. Alice insists there must be a reckoning and Kate must know it was her who arranged her death, which is also why she doesn't just have Hush kill her.

Professor Carr's area of expertise is numerical analysis rather than linguistics. 

Alice electrocutes Professor Carr to death.

Alice wants to abduct Luke Fox. Mouse is against this, as that will surely get Batwoman's attention.

Alice agrees to let Mouse and Hush try and kidnap two more experts before she goes after Luke Fox.

Kate confronts Julia over her going after Reagan in secret.

Tony Kim, a Crow's client, was abducted. He is 45, works undercover for the NSA as a code-breaker. 

Professor Carr's body was dumped in the same vicinity as where Tony Kim was abducted.

Luke has know Julia since they were kids and he considers her trustworthy.

Mary knows who Professor Carr was, saying he taught Cryptography I and II at Gotham University. This, coupled with the news Hush just kidnapped an NSA agent, leads her and Kate to conclude that Hush must have the journal and is trying to get someone to translate it.

Alice kills Tony Kim; again by electrocution using a shock therapy device.

Alice sends Hush to kidnap Parker "Terrier" Torres from 110.

Mary remembers that Professor Carr had heart troubles. This leads Kate to wonder if he has a pacemaker that can be tracked. Unfortunately, neither she nor Mary have any idea how to track a pacemaker on-line.

Parker has a girlfriend named Gina now.

Gina calls Kate's landline for Gotham Pride Real Estate and tells her the last place Parker was on FindMyFriends.com was in Somerset and that someone grabbed her while they were chatting on FaceTime.

Batwoman is able to save Parker from Hush, though he is able to escape.

After failing to catch Parker, Alice insists that now they go after Luke Fox, like she wanted to in the first place.

Luke did some digging on Julia and confirmed that the SRR let her go for freelancing. He confronts her on this fact at Crow's Headquarters.

Crow's HQ is based in Wilson Plaza.

Kate brings Parker to the Batcave.

Julia says there are things about Kate Luke doesn't know and can't know, which relate to who she is freelancing for.

Mouse mimics Kate's voice in a phone call to find out where Luke is so they can kidnap him. 

Alice threatens to kill Julia if Luke can't crack the code on his father's journal. 

Luke says that his father was a Mensa member with a 163 IQ.

Sophie shows up at Kate's office to ask her if she had seen Julia.

Sophie offers to break things off with Julia if that's a problem for Kate. Kate says she can do whatever makes her happy.

Sophie tells Kate that Luke was with Julia before she went radio silent.

Alice plans to kill Hush once he stops being useful and tells Mouse this in private.

Luke is able to crack the sequence his father created for his journal. 

Luke's social security number starts with 535.

Parker is able to use the Bat Computer to track Professor Car's pacemaker. This leads her to discover he died in Arkham Asylum. Kate then makes the leap, based on the burn marks on Carr's body, that Alice is electrocuting her victims.

Mary discovers a power of Lucius Fox's old glasses is a pair of smart-glasses coded to auto-translate his journals. 

Luke translates part of his father's journal, but refuses to tell Alice what it says, saying his father died for this secret and so will he.

The journal Alice has doesn't contain weapon designs: it describes how to break the Bat-Suit.

Kate offers to trade the glasses for Luke and Julia's lives. Alice agrees.

Alice arranges a mass jail-break at Arkham Asylum to cover her escape and distract the Crows, who show up to arrest Batwoman.

Jacob Kane blames Batwoman for the break-out after the fact.

Luke tells Kate that she screwed up trying to trade his life for information that could hurt her.

Kate tells Luke that there is no Batwoman without him.

Parker tells Kate she should fight harder for Sophie.

Julia is confirmed to have nerve damage in her arm and a numbness in her left hand.

Sophie and Julia kiss after Julia is looked over by the medic.

Julia tells Kate that she tracked down The Rifle after he tried to kill her in 107 and she made a deal with his boss to save her life. Julia was going to exchange the journal for Batwoman's life. Julia made the deal before she knew the journal explained how to kill Batwoman and, knowing that, the deal is now off.

Julia says the woman she was working for is Safiyah Sohail - the woman who was first mentioned in 107 as having a grudge against Alice.

Kate claims to have never heard of Safiyah Sohail.

Jacob Kane lights the Bat-Signal to tell Batwoman that if he sees her again it will mean war.

Alice finishes reading the journal and determines that the element needed to destroy the Bat-Suit is Kryptonite.

The Bottom Line

A solid episode which does more to make Hush seem threatening than 90% of his comic book stories, even as an underling of Alice, even as it lays the groundwork for Season 2 and Safiyah Sohail's arrival in Gotham. This episode doesn't really feel like the penultimate episode of the season, however, so it will be interesting to see how everything is tied up in a week.