The first season of Gotham was, in a lot of ways, relatively down-to-earth. While there were more than a few recognizable faces from Batman's extremely rich history, the show leaned more toward organized crime than anything else. The show's first season was essentially a mob story, with Jim Gordon and a few other Batman characters thrown in for good measure.
Now, for the show's second season, the characters are becoming a bit more recognizable: while Gotham's skewed timeline is getting further and further away from canon with every episode, it's also opened up quite a few new possibilities. Instead of focusing on a number of different crime families, Gotham can focus on what the people want to see: supervillains.
And this week's supervillain is a doozy: as one of Batman's greatest adversaries, Mr. Freeze has been tormenting Gotham City since the Golden Age of comics. In the past, the GCPD has been completely and totally outgunned by Freeze and his ice tech - and, judging from the show's latest teaser, that definitely holds true in Gotham:
As with many of the show's characters, Gotham's take on Mr. Freeze is quite a bit younger than most fans are probably used to. In the comics, TV shows and movies, Mr. Freeze is a middle-aged man - here, it looks like he could still be in college. He's also sporting a much different look: whereas the 'classic' Mr. Freeze typically wears a large suit of sub-zero armor, the character in Gotham is apparently fine with a hoodie and some googles. In fact, he actually bears a striking resemblance to another DC Comics villain on TV right now - Legends of Tomorrow's Captain Cold.
As for who exactly is wielding the ice gun, there's no telling just yet. Gotham has routinely altered the origins of its characters to fit in with the story, so this version of Mr. Freeze could be just about anyone - considering how young he appears in the teaser, it's easy to assume that Gotham's Mr. Freeze isn't worried about a cryogenically frozen wife.
It'll be interesting to see what Fox does with a character like Mr. Freeze - if Batman and Robin taught us anything, it's that the character doesn't always translate well to the screen.
Mr. Freeze is set to make his Gotham debut on Feb. 29.
