Gotham Season 3: Who is the Aged-Up Ivy Pepper?

Fox just released the first official photo of Ivy Pepper — aka Poison Ivy — from Gothamseason 3. As we learned last month, Gothamwill be aging Ivy up in the upcoming season, with 28-year-old Maggie Geha taking over the role from 14-year-old Clare Foley. The official season 3 synopsis teases:

The series also will catch up with the future POISON IVY (Maggie Geha), who, after an encounter with a monster from Indian Hill, finds herself reborn as a young woman who’s harnessed the full power of her charms.

Den of Geek talked with Gothamexecutive producer John Stephens last month at San Diego Comic Con, and asked him about the decision to age Ivy up. He said they thought “it might be interesting to do,” adding:

There were storylines we wanted to play with Ivy that we were just not able to play with the actress being [so young] — and [Clare Foley] did a wonderful job for the two years we had her, but we couldn’t play the storylines we wanted to play with the age of the actress at the time.

Stephens also divulged some more details about what the aged-up Ivy will be like in season 3, as well as comparing the Poison Ivy character to canon, saying:

The mentality of the Ivy we have in our world is not the same as the Ivy who exists in the canon. She’s a bit more of a loose cannon. And so she goes and creates a great deal of havoc in our world. And because she is still a 14-year-old, 15-year-old street teenager in the body of a 25-year-old woman, she doesn’t know how to act in the world yet, and so she has to fumble her way about.

Gotham‘s decision to age Ivy up is no doubt an interesting one, but one that could be awkward and uncomfortable when it comes to its execution. The superhero show is not known for its deft, complex handling of female characters. That being said, it will be nice to have another female villain on the show — and hopefully one who sticks around.

We’ll have to wait and see how Ivy’s transformation and havoc-raising affects Selina in particular, who has been shown to be friends with Ivy in the past. And we can’t forget the time that Ivy Pepper spent with Barbara back in season 1 when she and Selina were crashing at Babs’ apartment. Could Ivy and Barbara join forces now that they are both in the loose cannon game? We’ll see. In the mean time, here’s that aformentioned photo of Ivy Pepper all grown up…