Gotham Recap With Spoilers: Rise of the Villains: The Last Laugh

The episode opens, and Gordon and Bullock are roughing up a suspect, looking for information on [...]

By Russ Burlingame

(Photo: Fox)

The episode opens, and Gordon and Bullock are roughing up a suspect, looking for information on the Maniax in the wake of their attack on police headuarters. He says he doesn't know anything but offers to help them spread the word. Gordon tells him to spread the word that Jerome killed a friend of theirs, so anyone who helps him is dead.

At Galavan's, Tabitha is packing up to go out when Barbara comes to see her, kissing her goodbye before her brother comes in with a snack cart. Jerome is on his way in. Barbara and Tabitha kiss passionately and Tabitha leaves. Galavan talks to Barbara, revealing that his family "built this city" and that he's happy she got Gordon out safe. His family was betrayed, their legacy erased, and he's here to reclaim the city. He offers to help her destroy Jim when he's no longer useful.

Bullock thinks Penguin is the one who will know how to find the Maniax. Gordon sends Alvarez to check on Jerome's prison. He starts to take a command role in the police department, delivering a rousing speech. Shortly thereafter, Lee comes to bring him to a hospital gala she helped organize, and he won't go at first but eventually she talks him into taking a few hours away from the chaos.

Tabitha and Jerome go to see Jerome's father, roughing him up. Jerome tells a story about when his mother used to get drunk with men and beat him up, and his father used to try to help him. They tie him up, rant about their plans, and stage the area to make it look like he helped organize the escape. After the old man rants a little about how Jerome is a curse upon Gotham, and his legacy will be death and madness. Jerome laughs and then readies to kill him, but Gordon and Bullock arrive. Jerome stabs him in the eye and he and Tabitha escape through a window, but Bullock and Gordon can't follow, as Bullock is incapacitated by a gas attack. Jerome almost shoots Gordon, but Tabitha stops him, whipping the men as unconsciousness starts to take them from the gas.

At the gala, Bruce and Alfred met up with Lee, asking about Gordon. Selina is there, too, and catches up with Bruce a little before getting distant and leaving.

At his apartment, Galavan tells Barbara that what Gotham wants is a hero, and he's going to give them one. Jerome and Tammy have gone ahead, with Jerome taking the place of a magician who is set to perform at the gala. While there, Alfred asks Lee out; he seems to be softening her heart a little when Bruce comes and insists he wants to leave. Alfred convinces him to stay instead, and he's there when Jerome comes to entertain the guests. Bruce is selected to be part of the show, and reluctantly agrees.

Jerome wants to cut him in half, making a big show of it as magicians are wont to do.

Back at the police department, Gordon and Bullock both decide they aren't going home until they find something...but when he sits up and the effects of the gas hit him again, he deciddes to go sleep it off.

At the party, Jerome "restores" Bruce, joking that he has a split personality.

Next, he calls up the deputy mayor for the trick. the "lovely assistant" pulls her mask down and winks at Lee; it's Barabara. Lee calls Gordon for help but is kidnapped mid-call.

As Jerome tries a trick with the deputy mayor, gunmen storm the place, devolving everything into chaos.

Gordon gets a call from Jerome: They've got Lee hostage. Galavan "arrives" and stands up to Jerome, appealing to Jerome's decency to let people go home and take him as a hostage instead. As the police get ready to invade, Bruce has a moment with Selina. She slips out as Gordon heads in. Jerome terrorizes the hostages under the guise of a "show," with squirt guns, William Tell plays and the like. Barbara and Lee snipe at each other.

Jerome decides he's going to make Bruce Wayne his first "official victim," but Bruce doesn't come out. Barbara suggests they kill Alfred instead, and they grab him. Just before they shoot him, Bruce comes out to stop them. Gordon has handed a gun off to him, which he smuggles to Alfred before they take Bruce.

Before Jerome can kill Bruce, though, Galavan stabs him in the neck and kills him, Jerome telling Galavan this isn't what they rehearsed. But all along, Galvan wanted to be the hero. From Penguin to everyday people, everyone spends the rest of the episode watching footage from the event.

Bullock goes to see Penguin, antagonizing him. He asks about the rumors that Gordon killed someone for Penguin. Penguin won't confirm or deny, but eventually says Jim shouldn't worry about it. Bullock tells him to leave Jim alone, and that he still owes him for Fish.

As they cart Jerome away, Gordon is proud of Bruce, but Alfred is upset that he put himself in danger. Bruce says he and Gordon were a good team. Barbara had escaped through a trapdoor in the stage, so she's gone. Galvan gets credit for saving Bruce and by extension everyone else, but he downplays his accomplishment. He tells Gordon to call if they need anything. As they leave, Alfred flirts with Lee a little again.

After they leave, Gordon asks Lee if she's okay and for a kiss; she gives him one, disappointing Alfred. Selina sees it and seems happy.

At the police department, Gordon takes the crime scene tape off Essen's door and assumes her office.

During a news report on the event, there are a number of shots of the city responding to either Jerome or Galavan as their "hero." Tabitha looks on, jealous, as Barbara and Theo kiss.

In the streets of Gotham, a man watching Jerome's performance on a TV in a window kills a homeless man, laughing the whole time.

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