BATWOMAN 3.9

 

RECAP - BATWOMAN  3.9:  "Meet Your Maker"  

Well...things for the Bat Team have now gotten MUCH worse.  Thanks to Renee Montoya, Poison Ivy is now loose again to reign terror upon Gotham.  On top of that, the team has to also still try and find Mary, who's still on the lam with Alice, looking to escape Gotham and all it's trappings.  And aside from trying to resolve the Mary/Ivy issue....there's still tension between Ryan and Sophie that's making the job even more difficult.  They need to put things aside if they're to save Mary, and with Marcus out of the way, they and focus more on the bigger threat.

Ivy returns by dispatching of two fishermen, but she's weak.  Montoya is there to comfort her, and Pam says that she's weak and needs to gain her strength back.  Montoya knows how she can get her strength back.  Meanwhile, Ryan goes to visit her adopted mother at her grave, and she lets out her frustrations and how she feels.  She can't figure things out, and doesn't know what to do.  Luke is also working out HIS frustrations about letting the team down, about allowing Mary to become what she is.  He's feeling like a liability.  So, he's working out his frustrations with Sophie's help, who still wishes she can work her own issues with Ryan.  Ryan comes in, and she kind of ignores Sophie, but they soon get to work on how to find out just where Ivy and Montoya might be.  Luke admits to why he should not wear the suit...he's not a hero.  But Ryan says he is, and she needs his brains right now to find out what Ivy and Montoya are up to. 

We get back to Jada Jet, whom we've not seen in a little spell, and she's visited by John Diggle.  Apparently, these two have had a past, and Jada mentions what happened to her son Marcus.  She thinks the Joker's joy buzzer would be the key to getting him back to normal, but since Batman's rogues' weapons have been loose on the streets of Gotham, the joy buzzer has yet to be found.  Dig says he'd have ARGUS look into it, but also knows that Renee Montoya was assigned to the Mayor's secret Rogues Task Force.  They both decide to break into Montoya's office to see what information she has.  When they get there, they discover that she's had information on a lot of things.  Diggle also takes the time to discuss with Jada about her daughter Ryan.  Jada remembers when she had nothing when she had Ryan, but sees a lot of herself in Ryan. But they do find the joy buzzer, and they also feel that Montoya and Batwoman owe them an explanation. 

There's a string of environmental crimes the team manages to track to the Gotham Forest, and they head out there, as Ryan and Sophie bicker as they go.  Ivy and Renee have also made it out into the forest.  They've found a way to send out a signal to Mary, who's driving with Alice at the time, and Mary forces her to pull over.  Alice ends up showing Mary that Poison Ivy is back, and that could mean trouble for her.  Alice admits that if Mary goes to her, she could die.  Mary puts the whammy on Alice and immobilizes her, while she goes to meet her maker, in a sense.  Pam and Renee argue about her finishing what she started, and Renee was hoping that she'd just change, but Ivy's not having it.  She plans on killing Batwoman, and then finishing what she had started to begin with, which was destroying the Gotham Dam.  She freezes Renee in place just to keep her out of the way, and she wanders into the forest to grab Batwoman and whomever else is there to stop her.  

In the forest, the trio are attacked by tree branches manipulated by Ivy, and it forces them to try and save some hunters in the forest, but they can't, and Ivy kills them.  They make their way into an abandoned cabin, and lock it down to keep Ivy out.  At this point in time, Mary is out in the forest seeking her maker, and passes out again from the mental pain.  A father and son see her, and she sends the father off by having branches grab him and drag him out into the darkness.  In the cabin, Ryan and Sophie bicker more about Renee and everything else, but Luke warns them that Ivy can sense noise, and won't be long before she attacks again.  He doesn't have enough serum to stop her, and they need to get some ice melt that's in the back of a truck outside.  Ryan suits up, and goes out to get it.  She's almost got the back when the little boy sees her, and calls out to her.  She gets him out of the way, and she dives into the truck, where Ivy attacks.  She orders Sophie to blow the truck up, and Sophie hesitates, but it's also the only way.  Sophie shoots the truck and it explodes.  The boy is safe, but Ivy has taken off.  Sophie rushes outside, worried about Ryan, but she's okay.  Sophie asks her not to do that again, but Ryan feels that with everything that's happened, dying seemed like a good way to go.  Sophie finally kisses her, and goes off to find her car, leaving Ryan speechless.  

We get back to the cemetery, where Luke is talking to his Dad.  He says he knows why he never gave the suit to Luke. But Luke also says that he's kept his father's memory alive long enough, and it's held him back, so it's time to move forward.  Diggle interrupts and says that his father would've been proud of him.  Luke hands the container Diggle had back to him, and said he couldn't open it.  Luke asked him how he opened it before, and Diggle said he didn't...it opened for him.  And Luke figures maybe that's the answer to having it open again.  It's the same container that houses the Green Lantern ring, but John's not been able to open it.  

Ivy and Renee talk, and Renee is ready to stop her.  Renee says she built up a resistance to Ivy's brainwashing toxin.  She was hoping that she'd just give up on her plan, but she won't. At this time, Alice wakes up, and heads into the forest to find Mary, only to see the man she sent off into the forest is impaled on a tree.  She's now worried for her sister, as she's now taken a life.  Mary does find Ivy, and the two meet face to face.  Ivy says she found her, and Mary reiterates that Ivy found HER.  They begin to meld their powers as the episode ends.

This was a good episode.  We see that, despite her weakness, Pamela Isley is just as strong as ever, and with her merging with Mary, that's going to complete her rebirth, so-to-speak, and she'll be hard to take down.  As for Renee, her blind faith in their love allowed Ivy to get loose, and her wishful thinking that Pam would give up on her eco-terrorist crusade was foolish.  Renee is still on the side of law, but she let her love cloud her judgement, and has let another Batman villain loose.  On top of that, she'll also have much to answer for when she's confronted with the fact she had the Joker's joy buzzer in her desk drawer the whole time.  Plus, it's interesting to know that Diggle got around a little bit when he wasn't with Lyla.  Fascinating that it was Jada Jet, but who're we to complain?  And for Luke to be looking into how to open the case that houses the power ring Diggle got back at the end of CRISIS just gives us that desire to see him as Green Lantern all the more.  Enough with the tease...just GIVE IT TO US!  

I loved the one interaction between Mary and Alice as they were driving down the road before Mary's attacks continued.  It seems that they've been able to find the sister they were looking for in each other.  And with Alice worried that Mary's going to die is sweet---but she's also worried now that she's found the dead body that Mary had sent away from her.  Now, whether Mary knows it or not....is a killer. If and when Mary becomes....well...Mary again, how this will weigh on her conscious.  But that's whether or not Mary survives whatever it is Ivy has planned.  

And finally....FINALLY....Sophie manages to show Ryan how she feels.  It took Ryan nearly dying to do it, and Ryan griping about how messed up everything's been, but it's been LONG overdue for these two getting the hatchet buried, and get this relationship in gear.  So...what comes next?  Well....getting Mary back and stopping Ivy would be a start---but I think this will make getting the team back on solid ground a start.  

What did every one of YOU think of the episode?  Are you finally relieved that Ryan and Sophie got a kiss?  Are you hoping Mary survives the Ivy experience?  And what of Alice?  Will she got to Ryan to help her rescue Mary?  And what of Montoya?  She's got A LOT of explaining to do.  

Until next time....the Signal is OFF.