My Review of Gotham's 2x18: "Pinewood"

Written by Robert Hull And Megan Mostyn-Brown
Directed by John Stephens

Gordon: "Why are you doing this?"
Barbara: "I was there, remember. When you first got the Wayne case. I know what this means to you."

It's fair to say that since tapping into her villainous side that Barbara has mostly improved for the better as a character but there are still some shaky bits with her from time to time. Having spent most of the second half of this season in a coma and now newly released from Arkham, Barbara seems to be on a mission to make things right .... or was she?

I genuinely don't know to be honest. Maybe if Gordon hadn't rejected her at the end of their little adventure with the Lady together perhaps she might have stepped back into the light but things did end with her going back to Butch and Tabitha (whom the show is struggling to do anything decent with), so perhaps not.

I did like that for the first time though, Barbara felt genuinely unpredictable as a character. One minute she seemed eager to help Gordon with tracking the Lady down and helping him with the Wayne case. The next moment he's tied to a chair and it looked like that Barbara was back to her old tricks. Gordon is absolutely right in not wanting to forgive her but without a doubt was Barbara the highlight of the episode.

As for the Lady, it's always fun seeing Michelle Gomez on the show (and I hope she appears again) but two episodes in and I still don't know much about the Lady as a character. She did seem to like Barbara's flattery towards her though, so that was something but maybe next time, give the character a little scope.

Of course, the one thing we took away from this episode was learning about the Philosopher who turned out to be Hugo Strange. This happened around the same time that Bruce, Alfred and Lucius did their own diggings into Pinewood, met up with the unfortunate but likeable Karen and also encountered Victor in full Mr Freeze form along with Gordon. And that wasn't the only insane thing connected to Strange that happened this week.

The episode spent a lot of time talking about Strange trying to raise someone from the dead and by the end of this episode, Patient 44 turned out to be a success story for Strange and the sceptical Peabody. Patient 44 also turned out to be Theo Galavan and keeping with this show's love of playing around with continuity, Galavan is now going by the name of Azrael. This is going to be an interesting one to see play out.

Also in "Pinewood"

Bullock's reaction to seeing Barbara coming out of the apartment is the funniest thing the show has ever done.

Barbara: "I'm telling the truth. That's what I do now."
Gordon: "It's hard to believe."

Karen's claw arm was pretty interesting. It's a shame that the character didn't survive the episode though. I liked her.

Alfred: "That's far enough, drop the knife."
Karen: "It's not a knife."

Barbara: "I'm kind of famous."
The Lady: "Oh, the notorious Barbara Kean."

Is Hugo really going to be the one responsible for the Wayne murders? I really don't know how I feel about that to be honest.

Barbara: "Don't be mad."
Gordon: "I was tied to a chair and nearly killed again. What should I be feeling?"
Barbara: "Gratitude."

Oswald, Nygma and Selina were all absent in this episode and Barnes was back to be fairly ineffectual as well.

Hugo: "Oh, Peabody we did it. We brought someone back. We actually did it."

Chronology: From where the end of Into The Woods left off.

Pinewood certainly had it's moments. With a smaller cast, it does feel like the show can flow a little better as the Gordon/Barbara and Bruce/Alfred/Karen team up all worked well seperately and then managed to merge together pretty well too.

Rating: 8 out of 10