Gotham, Season 2, Episode 22: Transference
Wow, that was messy. It wasn't the worst finale out there, granted, but it still leaves a pretty bad taste in my mouth.
Mostly due to Fish Mooney, who randomly decides to break out and just take over, complete with horrible acting and horrible lines and ill-defined story-breaking superpowers, turning Hugo Strange into a crying mess... which he proceeds to have as he completely freaks out when he realizes things spins out of his control. It's such a shame, really, considering how fun Hugo Strange has been throughout this season. He ends up getting caught up between the crossfire of Firefly and Mr. Freeze, somehow surviving that no problem, and then just blubbering because the big scary Court of Owls is coming.
It really feels more like a mid-season finale, because half of the episode is spent on Nygma and Hugo interrogating Bruce, Lucius and Gordon about what they know about who really runs the city... which really is a crappy series of scenes. What was the point of the poison gas when you're only going to drop Lucius and Bruce next to Gordon... unsupervised... for no reason? Why move them at all, if you want them to die and disappear? What was the point of using Nygma's scare tactics if Hugo has truth serum? That whole sequence was just dumb, and really even in-universe all it serves to do is probably instill suspicion within the minds of our heroes.
And for Hugo Strange's people to just allow Selina to waltz around because she's Firefly's disciple or some shit? That's also dumb.
And for everyone in the GCPD, including Bullock and Alfred, to not question Clayface's utterly disgracefully horrible acting? That was also dumb. Hilarious, of course, to see the eternally-winking-and-grinning Clayface Gordon, but still.
Oh, and Jim Gordon decides to abandon his city, upon which Hugo Strange's army of monsters has been unleashed, to go off and find Lee. Because that's what you do. Granted, the whole Arkham crisis was averted, but surely at least confirming just what kind of monsters Hugo Strange has unleashed takes precedence? Bah.
Other than the stupid ways that the plot runs over its head to move characters into place -- including bringing in Barbara Kean quite randomly to unmask Clayface -- it's a serviceable finale, with the main plot centering on Team Gordon just surviving the big bomb that Hugo Strange has in the basement, while Strange just wants to escape the wrath of the Court of Owls. Fish is the wildcard that Strange didn't expect, mind-controlling poor Ms. Peabody, and eventually escaping with a full retinue of monsters. The execution is just shit, though, with Hugo Strange being a blubbering mess, Fish reminding me why I despise her character, and the ending just being inconclusive. What happened to Firefly and Mr Freeze? Why didn't Fish kill the Penguin? Where did Fish go?
That shot of blurred monsters being unleashed (was that Jerome-Joker among them?) ending with a cloned Bruce Wayne is creepy and cool, but the rest of the episode was just a big mess, meant more to build up the Court of Owls, the army of monsters and *sigh* Fish fucking Mooney, which really was the one character that should've stayed dead. Seeing Hugo Strange's character arc utterly derailed like this by both the Court and Fish just pisses me off a lot, and to do that in an inconsistently paced episode like this is just inexcusable.
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