Batwoman Episode 114: Smile, Darn Ya, Smile!

“Batwoman” has finally found its footing and delivered two great episodes in a row! It’s very clear what the solution was: More “villain-of-the-week” stories. Don’t get me wrong, I actually like Alice, but her and Kate’s endless back-and-forth was dragging a little. Allowing her to “die” and be reborn seems to have symbolically injected new life into the show as well.

This week’s villain is Duela Dent, a name familiar to comic readers, though here she’s simply a disturbed young woman. Equipped with nothing more than an ordinary box cutter, she’s quite possibly the weakest Arrowverse antagonist ever, but she proves you don’t need to shoot lasers to leave your mark.

(Well, I guess she’s still more impressive than the Rabbits.)

As the B-plot of the episode shows, the true antagonist of the show is the city of Gotham. Everyone, from the Gotham City PD to the justice system to even the Commander’s beloved Crows, is a combination of incompetent and corrupt. Batwoman is just one person and she has a long way to go before she can save her city like Oliver Queen. This is why a villain she could take down in two seconds is still a threat, it represents the fact that she can’t be everywhere at once. She needs allies, which is a message that Kate seems to be very reluctant to accept – though to be fair, she’s still doing well by Bat family standards.

Two such alliances are teased this episode: Batwoman both works with and also makes out with Sophie, even though she still doesn’t know who’s under the mask. A heart-to-heart makes them both realize that neither side of that relationship can work while Sophie wears her own mask, prompting her to realize she doesn’t want to live a lie anymore. She comes out to her mother. It…doesn’t go well. On the flipside, Mary -who’s already figured the Bat out- keeps dropping hints that Kate can totally trust her with anything, which fall on deaf ears. She finally has enough and outright states that she trusted Kate with her clinic and hopes to receive the same trust one day.

Our little villain also ties into Alice! Turns out when she was younger, she snapped from the pressure to “look perfect” and cut up her own face, and our resident psycho plastic surgeon fixed her against her wishes. Alice asks for her help to take him down, and she’s happy to land a hand – or a face. With her new disguise Alice is able to kidnap Cartwright and make him tell her where Mouse is: Currently strapped to a chair, being forced to breathe fear toxin. Is it a Cartwright original, or does he have ties to Scarecrow, who’s been hinted at several times but never shown?

(Speaking of never shown, the episode also name drops Duela’s UNCLE Harvey Dent, who’s still a good little ADA and doesn’t play with any coins.)