SERIELAND RECO / CONSEIL - "Gotham", located in the world of Batman, takes the side of a classic format of a detective series to dissect the sometimes obscure codes of the world of superheroes.
A work that takes a human perspective on "monsters" marginalized from society.
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This week, SERIELAND's algorithm, Clément Lesaffre, advises
Gotham
.
Like
The Boys
, whose season 2 is currently broadcast on Amazon Prime Video, this American series, broadcast on Fox between 2014 and 2019 and available today on Netflix, offers an offbeat look
at the very rich universe. superheroes.
There too, the viewer contemplates a world populated by supermen and villains with extraordinary powers.
But, where
The Boys
demonizes these beings apart by bathing in cynicism,
Gotham
humanizes them.
A city plagued by crime
Gotham is the city of Batman.
A Gothic metropolis, plagued by inequalities, where billionaires rub shoulders with the worst breed in dark streets.
Each day brings its share of sordid crimes and the police, overwhelmed, are therefore assisted by the Black Knight.
Except
Gotham
is not a Batman series.
Quite simply because here, Bruce Wayne is still a teenager.
The story begins with the famous murder of his parents, Thomas and Martha Wayne, shot in cold blood when leaving the cinema by a thief, in front of their helpless son.
Orphaned, Bruce Wayne grew up under the benevolent wing of the family butler, Alfred Pennyworth, until he used billions of his heritage to build a high-tech arsenal and become Batman, the protector of Gotham.
All the films on the superhero skip this transition in a few minutes, or even content themselves with a flashback as its origin is known.
The original idea of
Gotham
is, on the contrary, to tell the birth of the character by dwelling on the adolescence of Bruce Wayne, obsessed with the murder of his parents.
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A police series doped with super-villains
But, another originality, Bruce Wayne is not even the main character of the series.
The hero - not always great - is James Gordon.
In the comics, he is an upright police commissioner, Batman's staunchest ally.
But in
Gotham
, he's still just a newbie and hothead inspector.
We are therefore dealing with a detective series like there are so many others on American television.
It is the classic "one episode = one investigation" format, with several red threads in the background.
The format of the
Mentalist
, for example, and it is no coincidence: it is the same showrunner who created the two series, Bruno Heller.
An astonishing format for the super-heroic genre, which certainly results in creating lengths after two seasons, but which works well because it sticks to the universe of the Dark Knight.
Recall: Batman is himself a detective.
And it works all the more since the gallery of villains is fantastic: the Sphinx, the Joker, Catwoman, the Mad Hatter… They are all there, would-be criminals all more frosty than the others, with the conductor, the Penguin, perfectly embodied by Robin Lord Taylor.
A human look at a universe of "monsters"
These antagonists spice up the investigations of a Gordon often overwhelmed by the madness that surrounds him.
Like
The Boys
,
Gotham
takes the point of view of a somewhat naive idealist (Hughie / Gordon) to dissect the elements of fantasy that inhabit the Batman universe.
An outside look that associates these deviant beings, some really crazy, with "monsters".
Rejected, they marginalize themselves and turn to crime.
But, far from caricaturing them,
Gotham
humanizes them.
The Penguin thus becomes a cruel but endearing anti-hero.
And behind its very classic form, the series is ultimately progressive in the themes addressed.
Moreover, like
The Boys
,
Gotham's
strength
lies in its cast of "faces".
All in all, we meet a Jada Pinkett-Smith who makes crates, just brilliant;
Michael Chiklis, the massive Vic Mackey of
The Shield
or Donal Logue, alias Harvey Bullock, corrupt but terribly endearing inspector.
It is these recurring faces that gradually add depth to Gotham.
For connoisseurs, the series becomes a sort of "Who is this?"
cheering.
And for others, it's a guided tour of the Batman universe, a bit crazy but full of love.
Gotham
2014-2019
5 seasons, 100x42 minutes
Streamed on Netflix