Gotham: Pilot

(spoilers for s01e01)

Batman before he became Batman. No, that's not really what Gotham is going to be about, and somehow that's a good thing. We have James Gordon (Ben McKenzie) - a rookie Detective who's been partnered up with the cynical and dodgy Harvey Bullock (Donal Logue). It does sound like a typical cop-show, though it certainly doesn't feel like your stereotypical 'everything's going to be alright in the end'. The episode begins with the story of course - Bruce Wayne's (David Mazouz) parents getting shot and killed by an unknown perpetrator. 

It's a classic scene that we all recognize - dark alley - pearls - gun shots - which is a good start, but also a bad one. Of all moments one should 'save', it's this one, as it's a very classic scene, a scene everyone knows all-too well. The scene has been done a lot of times, and perhaps they intend to get it over with, because they've got other stories to uncover. I hope it's the latter, because the fact that so many familiar characters have been introduced in the pilot is a bit worrying. 

Already in just this episode we've met Bruce Wayne, Cat-'girl', the penguin, the riddler and even Ivy. You'd think they'd saved them for later, though, thankfully they've saved the one pendulum character for now, which is a good thing, but they've still showed their hand too quickly in terms of the others. 

However, the concept of Gordon who's a good cop pretending to be a bad cop in a really poisoned city is a good thing. And it'll certainly keep the show interesting in terms of character development. There's very few shows out there about good men if you think about it, truly good ones that is, without them having a side-effect of being a gigantic a-hole. I'll keep my fingers crossed for interesting future episodes at least, and hopefully this episode was just really a taste on what they can offer, more than just throwing out the characters every single episode.