This episode of Gotham  provides a fantastic closure to a handful of distinct storylines while opening others. Gotham has easily been one of the best comic related properties on television and if “Into The Woods†is anything to go by, Gotham doesn’t look to be slowing down anytime soon.
Gotham has always done well expressing the dread and gruesomeness of its characters and Gotham itself, but wow was this one an eye-opener. Oswald Cobblepot has essentially turned into the whipping boy, and after his newlyfound father’s death, his step family attempted to exile him from the house. Oswald, however, convinces them to let him stay as their maid, essentially. Of course Charles and Sasha Van Dahl taunt him and make his life a living hell; all the while Grace simply dismisses him and hopes that he will eventually get fed up and leave. Boy was she wrong.
Penguin has been quite neutered in his abilities after the whole Hugo Strange ordeal, but he has still been quite an interesting character. It was obvious that he wouldn’t be like this forever, and you could argue that Strange knew that this would be so and even that Penguin would be more brutal after his dormant phase. Brutal is putting it lightly. He does indeed find the vile of poison because Grace is too stubborn to waste the rest. He exacts his revenge ten-fold. We don’t see him kill Charles and Sasha, but he certainly does as the next scene is terrifying. A few scenes prior, Grace is demeaning him for his poor cooking skills, so now he made her a special dish. He says he cooked two different varieties and feeds both to her one at a time… two different varieties, two kids… yep. He fed them to her and then proceeded to kill her. It’s certainly safe to say that Penguin is back and Gotham is in for a world of hurt.
The scene was absolutely chilling, not necessarily what happened but how they slowly laid it out to you. They let you get to that conclusion as she was taking her first bite. It is probably one of my favorite scenes in the show.
The other huge story point that wrapped up, somewhat anyway, was the Nygma sequence which was tied directly to Jim’s fate. Nygma has been becoming bolder and bolder as the episodes have gone by and that climaxed when he was able to get Jim arrested for the murder of another officer. Nygma’s crass-ness doesn’t last all that long because, as mentioned by Bullock, the GCPD keeps a recording of every single call that comes in. He gets the recording and goes to Nygma for “help,†even though it appears that he does believe it was Nygma all along.
The scene where Jim confronts Nygma is absolutely perfect. The episode leads you to believe that Nygma doesn’t realize that Jim is onto him, but of course he is. When Jim calls him out on it, Nygma quips that he knew that Jim knew. That’s why he put a device to electrocute Jim underneath the seat. Typical Nygma fashion and it was quite funny how he thought that he was so sneaky. Jim gets away and actually runs into Bruce and Selina. Bruce takes him back to Wayne Manor to rest up, and Jim comes up with a brilliant idea of going to the grave site of Ms. Kringle.
The moment Nygma gets caught is hilarious because he tries to  convince the entire GCPD that Jim is the criminal, and when he goes to run he falls flat on his face. The desperate look on his face is absolutely ridiculous. Although Nygma is not officially incarcerated, it certainly isn’t the last that we have seen of him. Of course, Ngyam didn’t go to Blackgate; he is going to Arkham Asylum. Surely Strange will have some interesting experiments for him, but it will be interesting to see if Nygma is able to turn this situation to his advantage as he usually does. Speaking of Arkham, good old Barbara Gordon is back and visits Jim at the end of the episode. After seeing Penguin’s regression, surely it is only time before the same happens to her.
The other sequence worth mentioning is when Alfred forces Bruce to make a decision; it’s either pursue what his father was working on with his computer or live his life of crime with Selina Kyle. Naturally, he chooses the work his father was working on in the “batcave†and will become further consumed by finding his parents’ killers.
