‘Gotham’ Season 2 spoilers: Erin Richards talks about Barbara’s motives

That’s sort of the ideal way to explain it. Jerome really did get the last laugh, especially after making such an impact in the first three episodes.

Valeska may have messed things up by targeting the GCPD that got Gordon all hot headed.

It was the Blind Man with All the Evidence in the…?

Suddenly those theories that Barbara might actually be the Joker-in-training don’t seem as insane as they once were. An assistant leads Bruce up to the stage where he’s put in a box to be cut in two.

Throughout the first 20 minutes, folks say there’s going to be a magician at the gala. What’s not part of the plan, or at least the plan according to everyone except Theo, is killing Jerome.

Jerome’s father has a knife in his eye. “Better to realize that now”.

The biggest improvement from Season One for Gotham has been the increased focus in each episode. Children will wake from their sleep screaming at the thought of you. Cicero tells Jerome that he will be a “curse upon Gotham” and that his only legacy will be “death and madness”.

Undeterred, Jerome crashed the Gotham Children’s Hospital Gala as The Great Rudolfo.

Gordon drags Bullock out into the hallway, but the gas gets to him too. As the episodes go on, the two’s relationship has become one of my favorite things, as they really share fantastic chemistry. With several suitors and a collection of chips on her shoulder, I’m genuinely interested to see where the writers take her going forward.

Bullock pays Penguin a visit. Word of the debt Gordon collected for Penguin has hit the street, but Oswald insists that Gordon has no need to worry. We’ve seen the obsession she’s had with Jim in the past two episodes, but her flatout telling Leslie she’s doing all this to get with Bruce ruins the character. If you are a fan of the Batman movies, you will know that this scene is reminiscent of something that was seen in The Dark Knight. A guilt-ridden father who wanted to rescue his poor son sounds good enough, right? This is around the time Alfred remembers he’s a guardian and not just there to try to make a date and begins to protest, but the trick goes off without a hitch and Bruce soon rejoins him in the audience. While Jim and his newly reinstated partner Harvey Bullock are still reeling from the bloody attack Jerome perpetrated on police headquarters last week, and they deal with their loss by throwing a bunch of random thugs out a window. Beyond that, it was just reading every major run in the comics involving the character that I could get my hands on, looking at his face, how h’s drawn, and taking what I could from that.

Although the non-magician-act scenes were fairly impressive in of themselves (Jerome killing his dad, a few sweet Leigh/Jim material, the burgeoning love triangle between Barbara and the Galavans, Harvey threatening Penguin), The Last Laugh will undoubtedly be remembered for Jerome’s on-stage performance as The Great Rudolpho and, essentially, Gotham’s first incarnation of The Joker.

Indeed, Jerome’s psychotic and chaotic behavior – and death – inspires a number of Gothamites, as seen during the episode’s conclusion. One of the tricks that you have to learn, with episodic TV, is you don’t know how many years you’re going to be blessed with, so, we have an arc worked out that is multi-year, and we kind of have to keep on our toes to tell it completely. The Maniax seize control of the gala and Alfred tries to protect Bruce.

Just before he kills his own father, Jerome wonders if he has a fortune to tell him before he goes. Galavan has now positioned himself as the hero that Gotham deserves along with the respect of both Gordon and Bruce Wayne. After presenting himself as a hero during the gala, Theo Galavan betrays and fatally stabs Jerome to add legitimacy to his new image. If that’s all he ever does, Gotham will have paid sufficient homage to this iconic character.

If there’s hope here though, it’s in the episode’s implication that Gordon will eventually have to compromise his ethics to truly clean up Gotham and take down Galavan, even if Gordon doesn’t know Theo is the bad guy yet. Someone who may not be terribly pleased with him, however, is his sister, who watches as he and Barbara get close later that night. Through his death, Jerome has inspired countless others to pick up the villany torch where he dropped it. Perhaps one of them will become the “true” Joker. Earlier on in the episode, Galavan finally opens up about his aspirations.

Don’t miss learning the origin story of the Joker when Gotham airs at 8 p.m. EDT on Monday on Fox.