Fourth Season of Gotham Darkest Yet

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Gotham Season 4

When we ended the third season of GOTHAM, it looked as though we were going to see Bruce Wayne (DAVID MAZOUZ) take up his night-stalking ways that will lead to his eventual identity as The Batman. Alas, as the season progresses, we find Bruce Wayne choosing to be more of a jerk, burying himself from his future by going full-bore into the playboy mode, spending nights on the town with drinking buddies and getting sloshed. He even ends up fighting with Alfred (SEAN PERTWEE) and ultimately firing him.

But there's a lot going on with Gotham's villains while Bruce is busy losing himself. Penguin (ROBIN LORD TAYLOR), in an attempt to prove the Gotham Police are powerless, begins to issue licenses for crimes -- licenses that most of the police force actually respect! It's all part of his "Pax Penguina" plan to bring peace to Gotham -- or at least its underworld. Jim Gordon (BEN MCKENZIE) is determined to prove Penguin wrong, but even his own friend, acting Captain Harvey Bullock (DONAL LOGUE), puts the pressure on to recognize the licenses as valid.

As this transpires, both sides of the conflict are given a target in the form of Professor Pyg, an erudite serial killer who terrorizes the city. Both Gordon and Penguin want to be the ones to capture him, to prove that their way of doing things is the correct way. But Pyg has secrets of his own, tying back to mafiosa would-be Queen of Gotham, Sofia Falcone (CRYSTAL REED), who has come to Gotham to try to take over her father's crime organization.

This season also sees the return of The Riddler (CORY MICHAEL SMITH), thawed from a block of ice by a mixed-up fangirl. But his mental acuity seems to have been mushed a bit due to his having been frozen. To get help getting his faculties returned, he seeks out "The Doc" who is running things in The Narrows, to find out that this mysterious benefactor is none other than Lee Thompkins (MORENA BACCARIN). A reluctant partnership is formed, and enforced by the recently resurrected (and amnesiac) Butch Gilzean (DREW POWELL), who has been himself transformed into the shambling swamp man, Solomon Grundy.

Barbara Kean (ERIN RICHARDS) has her world upended when she is gifted with the Demon's Head from Ra's al Ghul, putting her suddenly in charge of a cult of assassins who await her further instructions. But learning what she needs to do is a challenge, especially when al Ghul is brought back from the dead seeking to reclaim his power.

The latter portion of the season really puts things into high gear, when we see the return of Jerome Valeska (CAMERON MONAGHAN), the prototype Joker. He has his sights set on revenge against a new character we haven't seen until this point -- Jeremiah Valeska, his twin brother. By the time Season Four wraps up, Jeremiah is tragically driven insane and into a new form of The Joker, and his partnership with Ra's al Ghul leaves Gotham City a literal No Man's Land! Fortunately, Bruce Wayne has come to his senses and is ready to face his future -- if he has one left.

This Blu-ray set includes all the episodes from Season Four, as well as the trailer for the series and a featurette focused on the DC television shows taken at San Diego Comic-Con 2018.

 

GOTHAM
The Complete Fourth Season

01. Pax Penguina
02. The Fear Reaper
03. They Who Hide Behind Masks
04. The Demon's Head
05. The Blade's Path
06. Hog Day Afternoon
07. A Day in the Narrows
08. Stop Hitting Yourself
09. Let Them Eat Pie
10. Things That Go Boom
11. Queen Takes Knight
12. Pieces of a Broken Mirror
13. A Beautiful Darkness
14. Reunion
15. The Sinking Ship The Grand Applause
16. One of My Three Soups
17. Mandatory Brunch Meeting
18. That's Entertainment
19. To Our Deaths and Beyond
20. That Old Corpse
21. One Bad Day
22. No Man's Land

Also included:
Season 4 Trailer
Best of 2017 DC TV Comic-Con Panels

Grade: 
4.5 / 5.0