When Gotham kicked off last year, the show began with a number of proto-versions of Batman’s Rogues gallery such as The Riddler, Catwoman, Poison Ivy, and of course The Penguin (who, played by Robin Lord Taylor, has sort of worked his way into MVP status on the show according to its fans, along with Jada Pinkett Smith’s Fish Mooney).
Just a few episodes into its run, and rumors were already flying around regarding the Joker possibly appearing, either through red herrings in every episode, or even the wild theory that Oswald Cobblepot was actually the Joker.
Today, Executive Producer Bruno Heller has revealed that The Red Hood is coming to Gotham, and as we know, where that hood usually goes…the Joker is soon to follow.
From an interview via CBR:
There’s going to be an episode that involves the Red Hood…which picks up that strand, the costume strand, and sort of gives a kind of philosophical base, if that’s not too pretentious a word. Why costumes? What’s the power of costumes? What’s the power of a mask? All of that groundwork will be laid sort of culturally for that side of the DC Universe before we start rolling into the more spectacular spandex type of deal.
With Bruce at his current pre-teen state, who is going to drive The Red Hood into that infamous vat of chemicals? Perhaps this will be the first of the Red Hood gang and the eventual “Joker-to-be” comes later. Or maybe I’m putting more thought into this than Gotham‘s producers probably have. I’d love to be wrong.
The New52 teased that Gotham had numerous masked gangs before Batman showed up.
In the comics, it seems that Joker has been spliced with Hush, becoming a master tactician and master of disguise. (How did he know so much during “Death of the Family”?)
Snyder’s Batman work seems to use masks as an underlying theme.
I get the impression that someone working on this series has a checklist of every recurring character connected to Batman (superheroes excepted), and is working their way thru it.