And here…we…go…again!
Yes, just when you thought that things were turning around for Batwoman (and mainly Ryan Wilder) things just…went right out the window with “Initiate Self-Destruct” because with just two scenes the quality of the episode dropped immensely. Yep, that’s the impact that bad storytelling can have.
I’ll start with the positive though. As revealed in last episode’s stinger, the Crows have a blood sample of Batwoman and Sophie knows personally that it’s Ryan because of what she found. So the rush is on to get the sample erased or compromised so they can’t find out who it is. Meanwhile, Ocean is found and Black Mask is having him and Angelique perform one last cook before they’re killed, so the race to get to them is on as well.
That right there is plenty of plot for an episode and they handled it really well up until a certain point. Luke, Mary and Sophie had to try and get things erased, and meanwhile, Batwoman found herself working with Alice to get Ocean and Angelique back. It was good!
What really sold it though was the banter between Batwoman and Alice. Alice naturally shined, but Ryan added a lot to it herself, especially when she realized how Alice felt about Ocean. It was a nice twist on things and I appreciated it…until it was ruined…but no…not just yet, one more thing to talk about…
Wallis Day made her more-or-less “official” debut in Batwoman as Kate Kane. They explained the various elements of her new look and sound (which was a surprisingly similar thing to how they handled the change of Leo’s voice in the 2012 TMNT cartoon but I digress). And Enigma’s role wasn’t just making her think she wasn’t Kate Kane anymore, but that she was actually…Circe Sionis. Black Mask’s daughter. That certain was a twist and one that played out well as she was dispatched to go and deal with Batwoman and Alice herself, and she did just that…and this is where the bad things roll in.
Because while Ryan handcuffing Alice to that spot was fine, her pulling the “can’t save them all” move was just dumb. Because if you recall, not even a few episodes ago she had the chance to kill Alice herself and she didn’t because “she wasn’t worth it” or some such, but now that someone else was doing it…that was fine? And some might say, “Well she’s doing a Batman Begins!” but that doesn’t hold up. Batman let the train kill Ra’s and Ra’s technically had some leeway to get out of that situation, and Ra’s wanted Batman to kill him in a way. Here, Alice was at knifepoint, she was actually asking for help, and Batwoman just…walked away. It was an insult, contradictory, and dumb.
Oh, and many people agree that the Batman Begins moment? Was dumb as well.
“Ok, so that was one scene, what was the other?”
Glad you asked. The other major faux pas of this episode was the CW-classic trope of the hero (Ryan) saving the love of their life (Angelique) and not MINUTES after being reunited…they split up. This isn’t a Batwoman thing solo, we’ve seen it in Flash, Arrow, Legends of Tomorrow, Supernatural, Supergirl and more and it’s DUMB!!!!!!!!!!!….!!!!! And seriously, they couldn’t let them have ONE NIGHT or two together before splitting them up for good? Seriously? Lame.
Again, this episode was on an upward path, especially with Sophie finding out about Snakebite and Jacob and getting Sophie to confront him about it eventually. That’s good progression right there. But just when I was thinking this would turn out great…those two scenes just kill it. So if you don’t mind, I’m going to go and…”Initiate Self-Destruct”.
Todd Black
Todd Black is reader of comics, a watch of TV (a LOT of TV), and a writer of many different mediums. He's written teleplays, fan-fictions, and currently writes a comic book called Guardians (guardians-comic.com). He dreams of working at Nintendo, writing a SHAZAM! TV series, and working on Guardians for a very long time!
Nerd Comments