Gotham – Bitch Flicks

Alright, let’s get this plot stuff out of the way. Kara Zor-El, eventually known as Supergirl, is Superman’s older cousin, who was sent to Earth before the destruction of Krypton, along with Supes, to keep an eye on him. She got pulled into some kind of intergalactic time warp (It’s just a jump to the left, etc) and ended up reaching the earth a couple dozen years younger than him. So Superman gave her to Mr. and Mrs. Danvers (one-time Kryptonians Dean Cain and Helen Slater, for those paying attention) and their daughter Alex (Chyler Lee).

Kara grows up trying to fit in, to be as “normal” as possible, because the world already has Superman, and he doesn’t need her anymore. She grows up and moves to National City, which is basically DC. She gets a mundane job as an assistant to demanding media mogul Cat Grant (Calista Flockhart, clearly having fun). Her nerdy, chisel-jawed co-worker Winn (Jeremy Jordan) has a crush on her, but Kara has the hots for the super-hunky new Black photographer Cat’s hired. You know, Jimmy Olsen (Mehcad Brooks). Only this hunky version insists on being called James. He’s from Metropolis and talks about his relationship with Superman the way someone who’s never actually met Superman would, so I was surprised to learn by the end of the episode that they actually are pretty tight.

Kara is doing a good job of stifling her superpoweredness until Alex (now her roommate) is on a flight to Geneva that loses one of its engines. Kara thinks about it for a moment, then flies off to carry the plane to safety, rescuing everyone on board. It kind of makes you wonder how many planes she let crash before that one, though.

Now that Kara has outed herself as a superhero, it turns out that Alex works for a secret government agency, the Department of Extranormal Operations, or the DEO. Her boss is the alien-hating Hank Henshaw (David Harewood). Naturally, Kara’s a little miffed that Alex has kept this a secret from her for many years. You’d think with the super-hearing and seeing through walls and everything, Kara’s not the type of roommate you could keep that kind of secret from, but well, I guess Kara just trusted Alex.

Kara doesn’t heed Alex’s warnings to keep her head down, and she ends up getting beaten up by Vartox (Owain Yeoman), a misogynistic alien dude. (“On my planet, women kneel before men!” “This isn’t your planet!”)

Oh, that time-warp thing I mis-described above was actually the Phantom Zone, where Krypton sent its prisoners, so when Kara passed through, some prison ship latched onto her escape pod; I am not well-versed in this universe, as you may have noticed. In any case, the prison ship crashed on Earth, too, and so I guess they’ve all been biding their time and waiting for Kara to be old enough to give them a fair fight when they try to murder her. Because it turns out Kara’s mom back on Krypton was some kind of badass judge who sent all these prisoners to the Phantom Zone. This all makes sense, right? Well, maybe just enough sense that the show is kind of fun to watch, in a way I haven’t found with Arrow, or The Flash, or Gotham, though of course that last one’s not supposed to be fun. At least, I hope not.

Melissa Benoist stars as Kara/Supergirl, and she’s terrific. Adorable. She brings the same kind of goofy, naively enthusiastic charm to the role that Christopher Reeve brought to those old Superman movies. She would be the best, most fun thing about the show if it weren’t for this other thing.

You see, my original plan was to write a mostly positive review of the series premiere of Supergirl but with a few caveats. Plotting, for example, is not its strong suit. Some of the expository stuff is clunky. It’s inordinately self-congratulatory about being a feminist show. The CGI effects are cheap-looking and unconvincing.

Wait, what’s up with slipping that one bit there into a list of otherwise mostly innocuous (but still super-insightful) criticisms? The part about it being self-congratulatory. Make no mistake, Supergirl is high on its own supply (of feminism, laced with color-blind casting). But it didn’t take me too long to realize that A) I kind of enjoyed that “in your face” aspect of the show, complete with its questioning both Supergirl’s moniker (“Shouldn’t we call her ‘Superwoman’?) and the comic’s midriff-baring costume (“I wouldn’t wear this to the beach”), its name-slamming Bill O’Reilly and climaxing with Supergirl vanquishing an intergalactic MRA douche-bro, using his own ignorant underestimation of her abilities. And B) Any brief, unwise perusal of “user reviews” or really just comments anywhere the show is being discussed online indicates that it’s kind of a necessary pre-emptive corrective to the kind of vitriol awaiting any kind of mild display of feminism in popular culture. So instead of being a little irritated by the way the show constantly winks at the audience in signaling its mildly feminist and corrective agenda, I begin to see that aspect of it, not as a wink at me and other fair-minded folks, and not as pandering, but as a “nanny-nanny boo-boo” at anyone small-minded and hateful enough to be put out because there’s a superhero show on TV that is actually pro-woman and pro-girl and wears that on its sleeve.

So sure, Supergirl is a bit corny and kind of sloppy, but it’s also considerable fun, especially if you enjoy the silly schadenfreude of it all.

[youtube_sc url=”[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJTjKhxFTXo”]

Written by Jackson Adler.

Mob boss and nightclub owner Fish Mooney is an original character in Fox’s Batman and Jim Gordon origin TV series Gotham. Jada Pinkett Smith understands Fish Mooney, and portrays her with intellectual, emotional, and visceral fervor. However, the writers and directors of Gotham don’t seem to understand the character as well, nor how she makes herself fit into the world of Gotham.

In her audition, Pinkett Smith walked in to “show” who Fish Mooney is, not to “talk” about her. She did this by walking into the audition in a short wig, a long gown, and a man on a leash. In an interview with Lance Carter on the Daily Actor, Pinkett Smith elaborates on what “room” she is allowed on set in terms of character input and improvised dialogue, since the writers and directors are still finding Fish’ “voice.” However, it seems that while the writers and directors are still figuring out Fish Mooney, Pinkett Smith has a firm grasp At San Diego Comic Con on the character. She pulls from the background and traumatic childhood of mob boss Griselda Blanco, using that for Fish Mooney’s “triggers” and “violence,” and the “classy” and “fabulous” Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard and the actor Joan Crawford for Fish Mooney’s “mask.” This creates what Pinkett Smith rightfully describes as “a scary chick” whom the audience can realistically believe will “go after Gotham” and “just might” succeed in taking it over.

In her interviews, Pinkett Smith uses the words “color” and “shadow” in describing her approach to the character, using a very different vocabulary in describing the character and her “voice” than the show’s creator Bruno Heller. Pinkett Smith states how fun it is for her to delve into “those shadow parts” of herself and not worry about being “politically correct,” like she has to be in her everyday life. What I believe she means to say by talking about “color” and “shadow” and being “politically correct,” is that with Fish Mooney, she can be a powerful Black woman without worrying about coming across as too threatening to a White patriarchal society. Fish Mooney can “hold her own” in the “male dominated Gotham,” and while “these men are no joke,” “Fish can handle” – and sadly, women in such powerful positions are something that we still “don’t see a lot.” She can delve into a fierce side of herself that she normally can’t show in front of the camera. As I’ve written before, as hard as Gotham tries (and fails) to be colorblind, it doesn’t work, because race is a huge part of people’s lives, and to ignore Fish Mooney’s Blackness is to deny much of her lived experiences.

Fish Mooney doesn’t ally herself with White patriarchal characters and organizations under some delusion that doing so will protect her. She rightfully lives on the verge of paranoia, questioning those closest to her to be sure they won’t betray her. She states that head of the “family” mob boss Carmine Falcone has grown “soft” and “old,” even before his true decline because knows that even though she may be Falcone’s “favorite,” it is highly unlikely that he will give the position of head of the “family” to her. The rest of the higher ups in the “family” are White men, and when she asks one of them what they think of the idea of her taking on Falcone’s position, the man responds “sure, why not. Women’s lib and all that,” but that he doubts that Falcone will allow her to take the position, though he does not state why. Fish Mooney decides to take the position by force, but did not count on her underling Oswald Cobblepot/The Penguin to betraying her. She took Cobblepot “under her wing” and treated him “like a son,” but he developed strong resentment toward her. Cobblepot is a skinny and somewhat effeminate character who seems to have romantic feelings for Jim Gordon. (Honestly, when he presented Jim with an invite to his new club, it was like a seven-year-old presenting their crush with a homemade valentine.) A Black woman gave a job to and mentored a queer White boy, giving him an opportunity many of the other mob bosses would most likely have denied. She made him into the resourceful and crafty man he shows himself to be, and he resents her. For what? For verbally reprimanding him when he doesn’t do his job correctly? Perhaps he resents being her umbrella boy and confidant, but if he can’t hold an umbrella steady, why should she promote him? Perhaps Cobblepott has some sexist and racist tendencies, in addition to his apparent mommy issues due to his smothering mother.

Fish Mooney embraces her femininity, as is evident even by her mob boss name. As the only female mob boss we see, her womanhood definitely stands out. She has evidently played on fear and hatred of women to create or adopt her name: “Fish” as in how many refer to the vagina as “smelling fishy,” and “Mooney” as in the menstrual cycle. This way of creating a name, by playing upon fear and hatred, and taking something meant as an insult and reclaiming it for ones own purpose. This is not just a nickname given to her. It is an act of power and defiance. This way of forming an identity is later used by The Penguin, her former protégé, as well as many other characters, including Batman himself. Sadly, character after character, mostly White men, is going to appropriate the actions of a Black woman, of Fish Mooney’s way of finding a new name. The focus of the show is undoubtedly upon the coming of age and the loss of innocence of White men and boys, specifically Jim Gordon, Bruce Wayne, and even Oswald Cobblepot. When Fish Mooney first meets Jim Gordon, a police officer hard on crime, she says “well aren’t you a tall glass of milk,” wary of him from the start. He is the equivalent of a White liberal who wants to “do good” without realizing how intersections of classism, racism, and sexism affect one’s life and career options. He sees her choices as “bad” without taking the time to understand what institutionalized biases lead her to make seemingly “bad” choices in the first place. In Batman lore, “heroes” Jim Gordon Bruce Wayne mostly arrest and lock up people, without noticing what Zach Wein’s comic points out – that crime is not just evil people looking to be evil. Hopefully, like in its somewhat sympathetic depictions Cobblepot and even future Riddler Edward Nygma, Gotham will thoroughly address Fish Mooney’s rough beginnings and her coming of age and loss of innocence, giving her more of the sympathy allotted for the White male leads.

Fish Mooney does all she can for every interaction, every conversation, to be on her terms. She does not want to be used, betrayed, hurt, or killed, and she has no doubt had to fight harder than any of the other characters to be taken seriously. This is a woman who has literally gouged out her own eye and gone down on her own terms rather than be used and hurt by someone else (in this case, another White man). In Gotham, the crime families own the police, the judges, and the politicians, and decide who gets promotions and who ends up dead. These are mostly White men, and yet there is a surprising amount of Black women – perhaps the work of Fish Mooney. While there would no doubt still be violence and criminal activity in a Gotham run by Fish Mooney, all kinds of marginalized groups would be breaking through glass ceilings. A “fisheye” is a kind of camera lens, and the term comes from the way in which a fish sees the world above, looking from the water into the open air. Fish Mooney sees what lies beyond her glass ceiling, and she is going to smash through it or die trying, all played brilliantly by Jada Pinkett Smith. I can only hope that the writers, directors, and producers of Gotham keep giving her more chances to shine.

Tag: Gotham

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