Batwoman (Season 1, Episode 3): “Down, Down, Down”
Welcome back to Gotham City, where everyone is “horny for Batman” (as Alice puts it) now that Kate has donned the suit publicly once and been MIA since then. This week’s episode focuses on Kate dealing with the fallout from her dipping her toes in the Batman mantle without really committing to taking it up. Early on, Luke tries to talk Kate into embracing the mantle and the responsibilities that come with it, but she is quick to point out that she isn’t Batman and shouldn’t pretend to be something she’s not. Of course, there is plenty of queer subtext that one could play with in this episode-long grappling with identity and the way that one’s personal identity clashes with society’s expectations along with what you owe yourself vs what you owe your community as a leader and a person with some degree of privilege and access to a platform of sorts.
Holly Henderson and Don Whitehead, who co-wrote the episode, chose to let all of that rich thematic subtext lay there untouched. Instead, they told a much less rich story about Kate being confronted by an old nemesis of Batman and friend of Bruce named Tommy Elliot. In the comics, Tommy plays the mysterious villain Hush who torments Batman while knowing his secret identity. Here too, Tommy knows Bruce is the Batman and he’s out for revenge.
He tries to force Bruce to come forward, which eventually forces Kate to get involved. She first tried to handle things as herself, but once Tommy takes hostages, including her father and his family (which Kate somehow never learns despite that seeming to have rich story potential), Kate caves. However, she can’t just pretend to be Batman anymore, so she has Luke add some red to the costume while attaching a gaudy red wig, birthing Batwoman in the process.
In the B-plot, Alice, whose childhood flashback starts the episode, breaks into her dads place, killing his guard in the process, and rages over the fact he gave up looking for her and got a whole new family instead. It all works to further flesh out their father/daughter dynamic and remind the audience what a threat she is. It also makes it doubling surprising when she appears on the roof to save Kate from Tommy Elliot. Kate and Tommy’s fight scene is clunky, and the resolution was a bit of a mess. I’m unsure if that was because the show is still trying to figure out how fight scenes in the suit should work or if we are meant to see Kate as inexperienced and unsure of herself now that she’s beginning to embrace the Bat mantle. I’d like to say it’s the latter, but I’m just not very confident that is the case.
Alice saves Kate because she apparently has plans for her, but Kate thinks it’s more than that. She think Beth, Alice’s alter-ego, is still in there, and Kate is going to do everything she can to prove she’s right…unless Alice kills again at which point she says she’s swearing her off forever? I guess Kate is probably bluffing to try to force her sister to redeem herself, but, as far as Alice sees it, she is giving Alice further incentive to kill again. This scene and the scene by the batlight at the start of the episode were the two best parts of the episode.
I still believe that there is something worthwhile whenever these two get extended dialogue scenes together, but I can’t say there’s much worth defending beyond that. This felt like the first glimpse at what the formula for a typical episode of Batwoman might look like, and I can’t say it’s really done much to improve my opinion about this series or it’s potential.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFuYqEbZBo4
