One of the things I notice with the current DC Entertainment live-action shows is their different approaches to storyline progression. The Flash (2014) and Arrow are flashback-heavy; The Flash (2014) doesn’t rely on backstory as much as Arrow, but Greg Berlanti shows use the flashbacks to cram in as much of the DC universe as they can. Constantine is the most straightforward show so far, sticking to whatever evil John Constantine needs to fight that week, and adapting Hellblazer stories to NBC Standards and Practices’ guidelines. Where else would characters like Dr. Fate and The Spectre logically appear?

Gotham, for its part, loves juggling its many plot threads. The whole point of the show isn’t that Bruce Wayne becomes Batman. This is not fucking Smallville, where everything leads up to Clark Kent becoming Superman; Gotham is about a city with shaky moral grounding. To that end, I wish Gotham would rely on two or three plot threads each week – “The Mask” has Fish Mooney, Oswald Cobblepot, young Bruce Wayne, Barbara Kean, and Edward Nygma’s threads competing against the nominal A plot introducing Black Mask. The loopy Carol Kane cameo has evolved into the loopy Carol Kane recurring character. Jada Pinkett-Smith’s Fish Mooney, in particular, gets a lot of screentime…which has me thinking she dies before Gotham’s first season is over.

Gotham is a consistent performer for Fox. Granted, it’s a Batman-related series; DC relies on the Bat and his associates to spackle its walls and clean its gutters. That typed, I’m amazed how often DC Entertainment goes to the Bat-well and still manages to succeed, in spite of Batman’s current overexposure. This has me worried that Scooby-Doo will get a gritty, hour-long live-action drama in a few years. Fox is threatening something similar with Riverdale, so it’s not that farfetched.