Everyone converges on Coryana as the hunt for both Kate Kane and the cure for Ryan’s Kryptonite poisoning continues.

How do you solve a problem like your lead walking away from the maiden season of the show that was so successful that it’s already been renewed? Well, you re-cast. For the showrunners of Batwoman though, rather than re-casting the lead character, they replaced her instead, which felt like a bold move when it was announced but has been one to which they have rather… unevenly committed ever since.

I’m sorry to have to say that yes, it’s another episode of this second season of Batwoman where we spend an awful lot of time on where exactly its departed main character is. Worse, it’s a little bit dull, too.

Through a series of convoluted plot events that themselves don’t really need to have happened, we end up with everyone converging on the secret island that’s definitely unfindable. Alice is brought there with the corpse posing as Ocean, of course, there to collect her sister from Safiyah and finally exact her revenge. But can she maintain the deception with her former mentor for long enough to get what she wants? And when she gets it, being Alice, will it be what she actually wanted all along?

Batwoman is there in the form of Ryan Wilder, hopped up on a mad cocktail of drugs that will give her a boost but also conveniently provide a ticking clock for her to be up against, because this episode feels like it needs to inject some tension somewhere in amongst all the incessant talking. Will she be able to locate Kate in time, and get the Desert Rose so that she can be cured and live happily ever after? Who can tell…

Jacob Kane and Sophie are also there because… well why not, they seem to need to turn up everywhere. Kidnapped for the umpteenth time this season, in this universe where concussion or indeed any sort of lasting effect to injury don’t exist unless the plot specifically requires them to, the worst head of a private security force and his right hand woman are sterling contenders for the Being There While Doing Nothing Important awards, but, you know, Jacob might be able to hotwire a jet and Sophie can make sympathy noises.

Back in Gotham, Luke and Mary get a surprise visit of their own, followed by another, more convenient one who’s there to bring them news which the show then kind of immediately undercuts with its pre-credits tease. The internet has been alight with the news since approximately five seconds after the show finished airing, so it’s not exactly a spoiler to say that I ended the episode with another heavy sigh at the show’s continued refusal to let go.

Honestly though, the real frustration here (apart from the sheer inconsistency in the way certain characters suddenly behave) is the absolute crawl the pace is at as everyone just stands around having long conversations with each other about life, love and everything. There’s no showing, an awful lot of telling and very little action. At one point my wife, who hasn’t been keeping up with the show walked in and watched for five minutes before asking me ‘what is this?’ When I told her, she just shrugged and said ‘It doesn’t seem like Batwoman’. Indeed.

Verdict: Characters acting against all we know about them, long dull conversations and an ending and pre credits tease which actively undercut the entirety of the episode itself. Yikes. 4/10

Greg D. Smith