After months of delays with covid-19, a new season of the CWs Bat is at the helm here with a brand new vigilance. I would like to confirm this Javicia Leslie is absolutely fantastic as Ryan Wilder, the new Batwoman. If you have skipped this program due to Ruby Rose, or just because you have too much TV on your plate, it’s time to look back for a second look, because with Leslie at the helm, this program finally feels like the Bat-verse CW you want.
Or I want to at least. I’m not here for a deadly serious Batman. The arrogance is inherently wild and stupid and I want my Bat-related shows to be inherently wild and stupid. Season one of Bat tried it and had absolutely ridiculous things like heads in freezers, training in the middle of brightly lit stadiums, and Rachel Skarsten’s villain Alice.
But Rose was terribly unequal as a lead role, and despite what some (I assume especially producers of entertainment) think, you need a good actor to star in a TV show. Leslie is so good that she makes everyone around her better. There’s a real energy in the scenes she shares with actors from the first season, and during the two episodes I watched, I could see the cast really coming together and clicking.
However, the biggest improvement for the superhero series could be by having Ryan as the leader instead of Kate Kane. While Kate had a powerful reason to put on the hood in Greg Rucka and JH Williams III Bat restarted at DC Comics, the same cannot be said for the show. She almost seems to fall into the role; she took on the hood and lid because the show needed her, rather than for any real character-driven reason.
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Ryan is different.
This new hero’s The story is also perhaps surprisingly completely intertwined with Kate’s. But we’ll get back to that. First, we need to discuss the most triumphant moment of the episode. Ryan het a bunch of very understandable and believable rage that finally manifests in the premiere of the second season (“What Happened to Kate Kane?” when Hush tried to kill her with a kryptonite bullet. She takes the shot like a champion, jumps up and then pushes BRUCE WAYNE’s face off HUSH’s body.
Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Did you think the show was going to confuse Hush for half a season as if he were Bruce Wayne? Because no! Batwoman put the story to rest in 40-plus minute. But let’s go back to how we beat off a man’s face at Batwoman.
At the top of the premiere, Kate’s plane streaks across the sky before crashing near Ryan where he is sleeping in a van. She immediately rushes over to survivors because she is a good person and not to find a green ring, she finds Batwoman’s suit – and no sign of Kate herself. The program makes it clear that there is no trace of Kate’s body, and this means that she may absolutely return at a later date (perhaps with a bit of surgery for the reconstruction of the face that soaps would like to use as reconstitute their actors). But the story also treats it as if Kate is dead.
Her family and friends mourn her. Sophie withdraws from a relationship with Alfred’s daughter, Julia, because of her sadness. Kate se pa, Jacob and her sister Alice both become more vicious. Step-sister Mary and good friend Luke Fox are both crying in the Batcave as they realize what the plane crash means. And then … Ryan suddenly puts on the hood and takes out bad guys and enjoys it very much.
The Batsuit on Bat is almost more similar to Iron Man’s suit than Batsuits from the comics. Instead of Kevlar en sy, this is Kevlar and a few million dollars in flashy technology that Ryan has to stumble upon understanding when she uses it to get bad guys out. In the course of the premiere we get Ryan backstory too; she was a be who found a loving adoptive mother, and when the two tried to move into the apartment she had paid for with her new job, they saw Alice’s gang squatting there. Her mother was killed, Ryan almost died, and all the great upward momentum she gained in life disappeared. Sophie and the rest of Jacob’s paramilitary police force, the Crows, can not stand her because she’s had some attacks on the law before, but even then – one situation concerns an ex-girlfriend – it seems a bit overzealous when still running over Gotham.
But it works for Ryan. Kate, and indeed any billionaire who decides to fight crime with a suit instead of their considerable wealth and influence, has always felt as stupid as a thorn in the side. The first season wanted to show how absolutely horrible it was that Gotham outsourced its policing to a private company without supervision, but it rarely worked when everyone who cares about Kate worked there and she had no desire to encourage them to to get a job.
Ryan is well aware of the crows and how bad they are, and has no personal attachments that stop her from tackling them. She also has a leg up to pick from Alice that deserves to be earned – and hard to overcome. Plus she is not loaded! And looks pretty smart! Kate often felt like a stupid jock who decided to tackle the world, because why not. Ryan feels like a smart woman who really wants to help make the world a better place, and not just for herself. She has that sense of duty that makes the comic version of Kate so damningly captivating. After a year of wondering where Kate Kane is, Bat finally found her, and her name is Ryan Wilder.
Different musings:
- Oh yes! Do you remember how Hush adopted Bruce Wayne’s face so he could steal kryptonite and do other bad things? Julia Pennyworth IMMEDIATELY looks at him like a fake and Ryan then gets his real face stuck in the climax of the episode. They wasted no time in letting the storyline rest. I’m still shocked. Unbelievable.
- Also Hush shoots Ryan with the kryptonite and she is largely OK despite the program repeatedly saying it would be a fatal shot. So … is there a chance she’s a human?
- Seriously, Leslie has so much fun as Ryan that her joy is contagious. You will absolutely grin as she takes on her first bad guys.
- The Batmobile is finally making its appearance. It sucks.
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