Gotham Season 3 Episode 10: Time Bomb Review

This Gotham review contains spoilers.

Gotham Season 3 Episode 10

“Time Bomb” was a particularly bloody episode of Gotham,but it balanced the gore by tying together multiple plotlines in satisfying ways. Though, in many ways, “Time Bomb” felt like a transitionary ep — Mario and Lee race closer to the altar, Bruce and Selina discuss their relationship, the noose tightens on Oswald’s secret — it was elegantly told. Something Gothamcan’t often boast. Here’s everything that went down in “Time Bomb”…

Ed kidnaps Butch and Tabitha.

Ed has gone from lovebird mode to depressed lump to heartbroken vengeance mode in zero seconds flat. Again, I would be a bit more invested in this storyline if Isabella wasn’t a plot device and she and Ed had anything resembling dynamic development, but Cory Michael Smith does gleeful psychotic well.

Operating under the false assumption that Butch was the one who cut Isabella’s break lines, Ed kidnaps Butch and Tabitha and sets about torturing them. This is bad news for Tabitha, especially, as she is the counterpoint to Isabella in Butch’s world. Ed creates a harsh ultimatum: Tabitha can either let her hand be chopped off or press a button that will electrocute Butch… to death. Typical Riddler stuff. 

As the clock ticks down, Tabitha explains to Butch how it is: She likes him and everything, but she doesn’t love him. Not enough to lose a hand. Butch is surprisingly understanding, telling Tabitha that it was enough to love her even if she didn’t love him in return. It’s kind of pathetic, but also sweet. Tabitha agrees, letting the mini-guillotine chop off her hand to save Butch’s life.

Moments before the blade drops, Butch tries to anger Ed by confessing that he killed Isabella by shooting her in the head, assuming that’s the way she went. It makes Ed realize that Butch is telling the truth when he said he didn’t kill her, which most likely brings Ed one step closer to finding out that it was his best bud Oswald who really did it.

Barbara hatches a plan.

Barbara finally gets a real plot line in this episode, and it’s great. She spends the episode on the hunt for lady love Tabitha (and, as a consequence, Butch, too). As we have come to expect from the villainess, she is good at getting what she wants, quickly tracking down her kidnapped friends and figuring out who really killed Isabella. Seriously, the GCPD should hire her. She is a better investigator than anyone they currently have on staff. After rescuing Butch and Tabitha from a disheartened Ed, she hatches a plan: start a war between Ed and Oswald. Then, she can take Gotham for herself. Something tells me the Court of Owls might have something to say about that…

Team Bruce meets the Whisper Gang.

It turns out those guys who tried to kill Bruce, Selina, and Ivy in the last episode aren’t actually that bad. (#Misunderstood) They’re the Whisper Gang and they were betrayed by the Court of Owls. Now, they’re trying to Take. Them. Down. (Using two keys with owl faces on them. Because that’s how Gothamrolls.) This changes everything for Bruce, who only made a truce with the Court because he didn’t think they had any vulnerabilities.

The Whisper Gang’s clandestine plan does not go well, however. By the end of the episode, two of the Whisper Gang’s number have fallen silent forever, taken out by Talon, the Court of Owl’s very own assassin. Guess it’s up to two teenagers in teenaged bodies, one teenager in an adult body, and Alfred to save Gotham from the clutches of the nefarious Owls. 

Mario reveals his angry depths.

We all knew that it was only a matter of time before Gothamreveals Mario to be a hidden psycho, right? How else will it be able to convince the viewer that Lee and Jim make a good couple? (For the record, I’m still not convinced.) When it becomes clear that someone is trying to kill Mario, Jim tries to get the truth of his past out of him. But neither Mario, nor his father, Carmine Falcone, is talking.

Though Jim might not have the clues to figure out what Mario is hiding, we viewers do. First, we see Carmine pull a tooth with an owl on it out of the mouth of the assassin who tried to kill Mario. We see Carmine meet with Kathryn, one of the leaders of the Court. They are on good terms, for now, but the same can’t be said for Mario. Carmine makes it clear that, if anything happens to his son, then the Court of Owls will have a new enemy.

At the end of the episode, Mario sees Lee coming out of Jim’s apartment (she went to give him a kiss goodbye before her wedding) and he Hulks out (courtesy of the Alice Tetch virus, it seems), taking out the two men who start harrassing him. Sure, the virus is giving Mario some extra strength, but he also seems to be extremely well-trained, some might even say Talon-like. But if Mario is Talon, then wouldn’t he be on the Court of Owl’s side? Could he be part of the Whisper Gang? Or is there another explanation for his furor and training? Whatever the explanation, Lee needs to find better men to date/marry.