Season two of Gotham is all about the “Rise of the Villains,” and it has now been confirmed that more of the Caped Crusader’s greatest enemies will be making their presence felt in the series later this year. Last night’s premiere (a review of which can be found by clicking here) introduced us to Theo and Tabitha Galavan, and while their motivations aren’t quite clear just yet, one popular fan theory is that they may be part of the Court of Owls.
In the comics, The Court are a secret society who rule over Gotham City, dealing in corruption and murder to intimidate their way into wealth and power. They employ a breed of highly trained undead assassins known as Talons, wearing owl masks on their faces to disguise their true identities.
[zergpaid]When showrunner Bruno Heller was asked about the chances of the siblings being part of that group, he would neither confirm nor deny the theory, but had this to say about possibly introducing the characters in Gotham.
“Yeah, absolutely, [I’m interested]. I won’t say that it’s part of – I don’t even want to say that, because I don’t want to spoil part of the story. The Court of Owls is deep, deep, deep Gotham mythology. The comic book fans know about it, but I would suspect the larger audience is not so familiar. We sometimes have to make a distinction between the ‘Nolan-era Batman movie fans’ and the comic book fans. It’s not that they’re two separate audiences, just that there are two levels of engagement. Court of Owls is very much deep DC mythology.
We are absolutely going to explore that world down the line. Looking at the longevity of the show, we have to hold some cards back, we can’t just throw all of the elements, all of the story at once. The long arc of the show is Bruce Wayne’s journey of discovery down into the depths of the physical and meta-physical world of Gotham. The Court of Owls is a brilliant conceit that will absolutely be part of our storytelling. I just won’t tell you when.”
So, they’re definitely on the way then, but we’re going to just have to wait and see when that’s going to be.
The Court has a long history in Gotham City (it took years for Batman to discover their existence), so unlike some of the show’s other villains, Gotham is going to have a lot of freedom to do whatever they choose with them. It would certainly be interesting for the to be revealed as being responsible for the murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne though, don’t you think?
