‘Batwoman’ Boss on Kate’s Heartbreak, Alice’s Big Moves & That Final Scene
Spoiler Alert
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for the Season 1 finale of Batwoman, “O, Mouse!”]
Can you believe that this wasn’t the original plan for the Batwoman Season 1 finale considering the last scene?
In “O, Mouse,” Jacob (Dougray Scott) reluctantly aligns himself with the titular hero to take down the latest threat to Gotham. But once that problem’s taken care of, he and his Crows turn their weapons on her, forcing her to retreat and leaving Kate (Ruby Rose) to wonder if she can ever tell him the truth.
Meanwhile, Alice (Rachel Skarsten) continues her search for the weapon that can take down Batwoman — kryptonite! — only to discover the only piece is safe inside Wayne Enterprises. Luke finds a way to destroy it, using, in Mary’s terms, a really big hammer, but Kate still has a piece she’s keeping for Kara and she won’t destroy it without talking to her.
But Alice kills two birds with one stone — after saying goodbye to her past and killing Mouse (Sam Littlefield) — to accomplish her goal. Tommy (Gabriel Mann), a.k.a. the villain Hush, has been itching for a new face he likes to replace those bandages, and she gives him one: Bruce Wayne’s (Warren Christie).
Here, showrunner Caroline Dries discusses that major reveal, Kate and Alice’s relationships with their father, Alice’s big moves, and more.
(Courtesy of The CW)
That’s one way to get Bruce Wayne on Batwoman.
Caroline Dries: We found a loophole!
How is introducing a Bruce Wayne, even an imposter, going to upend the worlds of Kate, Gotham, and the show?
In a huge way. It’s going to tap into everyone’s hopefulness and then complete and utter disappointment ultimately. He’s very, very dangerous because he’s trusted and people are craving him, so it’s going to be pretty dramatic.
Can you talk about casting Bruce Wayne’s face because yes, you’re casting Bruce, but he’s Tommy.
That was obviously a huge undertaking in terms of making sure we get it right. We weren’t really trying to cast Tommy Elliot 2.0. We were just casting in our minds Bruce Wayne, and so we needed to find an actor who looked like he could be Bruce Wayne and also was talented enough to fluctuate between stoic, charming Bruce and crazy, irrational Tommy.
When I saw Warren Christie’s name on our list of actors, I was like, “Uh, am I seeing this right? Is this a joke? Yeah, we definitely want him.” So we convinced him to join the family. We have a lot of fun left to have with him.
How much are we going to see him next season? Series regular? Recurring?
I don’t think he’s going to be a series regular. The way we were asked to tell the story by DC is that we were on the A side of the drama, meaning we were aware this was Tommy and it wasn’t a surprise when Bruce Wayne shows up for the audience. We didn’t want to have a sequence where Bruce Wayne was showing up and then we’re like, “Oh my God, awesome, Bruce Wayne is here,” and then it be Tommy. The audience is in on it, and so it’s only a matter of time before our heroes are in on it. Once they’re in on it, the jig is up.
(Dean Buscher/The CW)
Alice made Tommy’s dreams come true, but what can you say about whether he’ll be able to do the same for her when it comes to the kryptonite?
Alice decided to ally herself with a really irrational, mercurial man, who has his own agenda. It’s not going to be easy to get exactly what she wants, but she’s also Alice, so anything she wants, she ends up getting. They’re a good match for one another.
Kate had hoped she’d be able to come clean to her father about who she is. It doesn’t look like that’ll happen any time soon. Are we going to see that start to affect her relationship with him when she’s around him just as Kate?
Yeah. That was a really heartbreaking moment for Kate because there’s a metaphor. She came out to him as gay when she was younger, and there wasn’t any hiccup in their relationship. This is the heightened version of that. The way she compared herself to Alice having used to be Beth and how he used to love Beth, but he can’t see past Alice now, she’s shaking in her boots. That relationship really has a long way to go, and honestly, if I were Kate, I wouldn’t come out to him at this point either. He needs to cool down a little bit.
And they’d had that great moment on the train at the beginning of the episode!
Exactly! That was intentional to show them working together and there is this fluidity between them and they would make a great team. That’s the tragedy here.
Jacob has this single-minded focus about stopping Batwoman. What will it take for him to listen to everyone telling him to stop?
It will take a big, huge crisis or a giant paradigm shift for him to take off his blinders and put his rage away.
(Dean Buscher/The CW)
Alice destroyed her past, burning the book, killing Mouse. How is killing Mouse going to affect her? He said he wasn’t worried about him surviving without her, but her, on the other hand …
Exactly. He’s incredibly wise. He knows Alice better than anyone. But Alice wants what Alice wants, and nothing is going to stand in her way, even if it’s her dear brother Mouse. Her rage, her adrenaline, her obsession, these things are all really blinding her judgement but they’re also a defense mechanism that she leans on because if they weren’t there, she would have to actually look in a mirror and realize that her sister allowed Beth to live and Alice to die, then locked Alice in Arkham. Those feelings are so tumultuous for Alice that she can’t even maturely dare feel them, so she would rather engage in this sense of purpose, which is revenge.
Alice’s aim is to “start new” and “be full and complete and happy,” and while for her, that means killing Batwoman, how will we see her realize that won’t be enough to accomplish that goal? How is that going to affect Gotham?
That’s the drama that we’re teeing up. It will be a drawn out, dramatic ending for her. Alice isn’t stupid, so at some point she’s going to get in touch with her real emotions and it’s going to be cataclysmic.
In terms of the kryptonite, Alice and Jacob are actually on the same side when it comes to how they want to deal with Batwoman since he’s after something that will penetrate the suit. Could we see that change their relationship?
Yeah, they’re after the exact same thing and they both want Batwoman dead. It will definitely change their dynamic and could possibly bring them together or push them farther apart. Time will tell.
The scenes between those two this season were so great and so emotional.
They’re so good. To me, actually, those scenes added so many layers to Jacob, who has such a harsh exterior, and then his ability to show his layers when he’s around his daughter that he essentially lost, it was really moving.
(Shane Harvey/The CW)
Is there anything you had really wanted to accomplish in the first season that you were happy you did or anything you didn’t get the chance to because production shut down early?
It’s something we’re planning on taking into Season 2, so I won’t ruin it, but there’s a really big cool Alice move that happens in the comics that we, since day one, always knew we wanted to do.
Batwoman, Season 2, January 2021, The CW
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