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Released by: Warner Brothers
Released on: September 8th, 2015.
Director: Various
Cast: Ben McKenzie, Jada Pinkett Smith, Donal Logue
Year: 2014/2015
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The Movie:
Created by Bruno Heller, the same guy who gave us Rome and The Mentalist, Gotham takes place in the titular city and covers James Gordon's years in the police department before the arrival of Batman. It's an interesting idea for a TV series and it does occasionally do a pretty neat job of blending superhero stuff and cop show stuff with a gorgeous film-noir inspired sense of style - but it also makes a few questionable missteps along the way.
In the first episode we meet James Gordon (Ben McKenzie) and his partner Harvey Bullock (Donal Logue), two cops that are requested to investigate the murder of wealthy Thomas Wayne (Grayson McCouch) and his wife Martha (Brette Taylor). There was only one witness to the murder, a young woman named Selina Kyle (Camren Bicondova) and the killing left behind their son, the now orphaned Bruce (David Mazouz). We're only half way through the first episode and we're already playing the 'HEY I KNOW WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN TO THAT CHARACTER' game, and hence, that's part of the problem with the series.
Gordon gives young Bruce Wayne, who has been entrusted to the care of family butler Alfred Pennyworth (Sean Pertwee - son of a certain Doctor Who actor!), his word that he'll solve the case, and to his credit he gives it his all. As things play out and the investigation moves around the city, we meet a bunch of people who may or may not be connected to the case - a mobster named Fish Mooney (Jada Pinkett Smith), a low level crook named Oswald Cobblepot (Robin Lord Taylor) and a few more investigators in the form of Renee Montoya (Victoria Cartagena) and Crispus Allen (Andrew Stewart-Jones).
Later episodes see the cops chasing down a variety of crooks - The Dollman (Colm Feore), a vigilante named The Balloonman, a maniac who calls himself The Spirit Of The Goat - and sees them interact with District Attorney Harvey Dent (Nicholas D'Agosto) in addition to introducing the Arkham Plan that will have long reaching consequences in the future. As all of this plays out, Bruce learns to cope with the death of his parents, the character arcs that shape Cobblepot and Mooney take on greater importance and the inmates of Arkham Asylum escape and lay siege to the city. Along the way we'll also meet The Scarecrow, a guy named The Red Hood, a man named Lucius Fox (Chris Chalk) with ties to Bruce, a dude named Edward Nygma (Cory Michael Smith), a woman named Barbara Kean (Erin Richards) and about a zillion and one lowlifes and crooks.
The episodes that make up the first season of Gotham are:
Pilot / Selina Kyle / The Balloonman / Arkham / Viper / Spirit of the Goat / Penguin's Umbrella / The Mask / Harvey Dent / Lovecraft / Rogues' Gallery / What the Little Bird Told Him / Welcome Back, Jim Gordon / The Fearsome Dr. Crane / The Scarecrow / The Blind Fortune Teller / Red Hood / Everyone Has A Cobblepot / Beasts of Prey / Under the Knife / The Anvil or the Hammer / All Happy Families Are Alike
This series really is all over the place. Let's get the negativity out of the way with first, right? As mentioned earlier, in all caps for dramatic effect, the series seems to want to use the 'look who this is - remember them?' angle of the history behind the shows as a selling point but it instead comes off as a distraction. If everyone in the series is a somebody, then by default are they not all nobodies? It takes away from the suspense because it makes it hard to care about something when you know where it's going. So there's that problem, which when you think about it, would be pretty hard to get around when dealing with a universe as storied and popular as the Batman universe. There are more issues here than just that, however. The scripting jumps around in tone a lot… sometimes so dramatically that you wonder if this dark, serious drama is supposed to be funny? It shouldn't be, at least not overly, but these jarring shifts make you wonder. Consistency is important, that's not to say that the storytelling shouldn't take chances now and then or that the series should repeat itself, but rather that it should build on what came before rather than run slapdash in multiple directions throughout individual episodes. There are also a few too many members of the supporting cast that chew through the scenery like crazy, which doesn't help things either.
The first season does get a good bit of stuff right, however, which will probably make giving at least the first few episodes of the soon to debut second season a shot. Ben McKenzie and Robin Lord Taylor are both great here. You'd think, given that Taylor is playing The Penguin and that it's very hard to take The Penguin seriously that his arc would crash and burn but nope, the guy is really, really good in the role and he makes it his own while still staying true to form. McKenzie's Gordon is a seriously dedicated man but, like all humans, prone to making mistakes. He creates a believable character here and is the right guy to base all of the ensuing nuttiness around simply because he is as believable as he is in the lead. Jada Pinkett Smith is alright here (though she has a tendency to really ham it up it somehow suits her character) and Pertwee and Mazouz have an interesting relationship as butler and ward, even if Alfred's persona here is considerably less graceful than it's been in past depictions.
The series also looks great. Gotham is portrayed as shadowy and mysterious city and the production design team really runs with this concept. There's a lot of great looking art deco stuff going on in the architecture and the costumes and wardrobe creations on display also look fantastic. There are moments in the series where overacting and terrible dialogue might make you reach for the remote, but the visuals… they won't let you do that. We'll see if things get better next go round and if the series has the longevity it'll need to stick around or not. The first season gets a pass, but only barely. When it's good, it's great, but when it's not good, it's pretty hokey.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Each and every episode of Gotham arrives on Blu-ray framed at 1.78.1 widescreen in AVC encoded 1080p high definition and each and every episode of Gotham looks fantastic. The show is pretty dark more often than not but colors are still really nicely produced here, resulting in some moments of fantastic visual contrast that the discs present pretty much perfectly. Black levels are nice and deep while shadow detail remains consistently impressive. There are no obvious compression artifacts, the picture is always sharp and clean and detail is strong throughout. Eagle eyed viewers with larger sets might spot a little bit of crush in some of the darkest of the dark scenes but otherwise, things shape up very, very nicely here.
Audio options are provided in English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and in Spanish and Portuguese Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo with optional subtitles in English SDH, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Norwegian and Swedish. The DTS-HD tracks for the different episodes that comprise the first season of the show are also very good. Surround activity is not only very well placed but it's also pretty frequent. Lots of impressive discrete channel separation is present throughout the entire run while the dialogue remains crisp, clean and clear. Great depth and range is noticeable throughout and balance is pretty much spot on.
There are no extras on the first disc unless you count the menus and the episode/chapter selection options (which are included on each one of the discs in the set) but disc two contains a few deleted scenes for the following episodes: Penguin's Umbrella, Lovecraft, Rogues' Gallery and What The Little Bird Told Him. The sole extra on disc three is another deleted scene, this time for the episode Welcome Back, Jim Gordon.
On disc four, there's a deleted scene for the Beasts Of Prey episode, but more interesting is Gotham Invented, which is a three part documentary that explores how the series came to be, its connection to Batman and the related comics and spin-offs, the different storylines that work their way through all of this material and last but not least, the villains that are such a big part of this show's appeal. Combined this thing runs about thirty-two minutes and it's a reasonably concise breakdown of the concept presented alongside some interesting insight from those who made it happen. Moving right along, Gotham: Designing The Fiction is a twenty-minute long piece that explores the production design employed in the series. Given how stylish and interesting looking the series is, this is a pretty interesting watch and one of the more detailed, relevant supplements here. The Game Of Cobblepot is a twenty-six minute examination of the role that The Penguin plays in this first story arc that takes a look at how his character is created and then turns and shifts throughout the season run. The twenty-one minute Gotham: The Legend Reborn is a behind the scenes piece that explores what went into getting the pilot made and what it leads to in later episodes. It's a bit too promotional in nature but it's well put together and worth checking out.
Rounding out the extras is a five minute gag reel and a DC Comics Night At Comic-Con 2014, a panel in which the presenters discuss not only Gotham but also The Flash, Constantine and Arrow. It runs about half an hour and it basically lets the presenters preview and then discuss some of the material that would wind up being key to each one of the show mentioned. Last but not least we get quick character profiles for Bruce Wayne and Alfred J. Pennyworth, Harvey Bullock, James Gordon, Fish Mooney, Oswald Cobblepot, Dr. Leslie Thompkins and a selection of Killer Characters. The Blu-ray case containing each disc fits inside a slick, sturdy cardboard slip cover. Inside the case along with the discs is an insert leaflet containing a digital HD download code.
The Final Word:
The first season of Gotham takes a little while to get going, hitting some very obvious bumps along the way, but once it gets into the swing of things, the last few episodes get pretty interesting indicating that the upcoming second season should be one more rewarding and worth paying attention to. We'll see how it goes. As to the Blu-ray release itself, Warner Brothers has done an excellent job bringing the show to Blu-ray. The transfers are great, the audio is very strong and there's a lot of supplemental material here that fans should appreciate.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
