The Gotham panel at this weekend’s New York Comic-Con gave us a lot of exciting teases for the FOX prequel series’ upcoming fifth and final season. Showrunner John Stephens was surprisingly forthcoming at the Q&A, too, as he confirmed that Shane West is playing Bane, just as fans suspected. Plus, he unveiled that Alfred will be the one who gets his back broken in this version rather than his master.
The juiciest revelation from the panel, however, has to be the fact that the season 5 finale will be set ten years in the future, which will allow Gotham to finally unveil Batman in all his glory. David Mazouz has done a terrific job of portraying the teenage Bruce Wayne for the past five years but his young age has always been a barrier between getting the character in the iconic cape and cowl. However, it seems like the time jump in the finale will be the perfect way for the show to have its cake and eat it, too.
As ComicBookMovie.com says, it’ll be interesting to see whether the man under the mask will be Mazouz or a recast Bruce to reflect the jump in the character’s age. If Batman’s big entrance is more of an action scene, then it’s perfectly possible that a suitably movie star-looking stunt double gets to play the part. If the role requires the hero to say the classic “I am Batman” line, though, then it should really go to Mazouz, as he’s earned the right to say it.
And it looks like that line will likely be coming, too, as Mazouz has teased that season 5 will go ahead and feature the word “Batman” in some context. It seems like Gotham isn’t going the Smallville route of stopping short of giving the fans what they want, then, which makes the arrival of season 5 in early 2019 all the more exciting.
