Cancelled characters and storylines

The supervillain Harley Quinn was considered to appear in the show on several occasions. In one instance, Barbara Kean was discussed for the mantle.

A promotional still for the series finale, depicting an event that didn't occur in the actual episode.

This page details the planned or considered characters, scrapped ideas, and storylines that ultimately didn't make it into Gotham.

Season 1

• Originally The Joker's origin story wasn't going to be touched upon until later in the series, but showrunner Bruno Heller later decided to "scratch the surface" in Season 1 because "this is America — nobody wants to wait."
• Season 1 was originally going to be 13 episodes long, but it was then extended to 16 episodes. As Kevin Reilly of FOX explained "We were only contractually obligated to order 13, and we ordered 16, because we think that's the way that show, at least in its first iteration, will be very strong to arc to. That show is going to have a very strong, serialized element." It was later extended into a full season order of 22 episodes, with Reilly stating that "This is the Batman franchise."
• While Gotham was always set in its own continuity, according to Reilly in 2014, it was initially planned to be in the tonal vain of the Christopher Nolan films.
• During a scene in "Everyone Has a Cobblepot", Harvey Dent suggestively mentions to Jim Gordon about "knowing all about cops and their partners". When Gordon asks him what he means, Dent angrily storms out. This cliffhanger was never addressed in any future episodes.

Season 2

• Showrunner John Stephens has expressed a strong interest in using Calendar Man, stating that he nearly made it into Season 3. Calendar Man had been previously announced by Heller to appear in Season 2, but this never took place. Before Season 2 aired, the official Gotham Twitter account also foreshadowed Calendar Man's planned appearance in the upcoming season, saying "Call the Calendar Man, we've got a date for #Gotham Season 2!".
  • Danny Cannon stated that they would eventually get to Calendar Man, claiming he has no origin story in the comics.
• The Mad Hatter was originally going to be introduced at some point in the season, but was later reserved for season 3.
• Harvey Dent was promoted to series regular, but was barely used. According to actor Nicholas D'Agosto, "Gotham has so many established stars on it already, it frankly doesn't need Harvey Dent right now. I think it serves Harvey Dent to become Two-Face as old as Bruce can get. I think there was kind of a realization that it wasn't the right time for this storyline. My hope is that it will happen — though there is no plan at the moment." The character never returned.
  • In April 2019, John Stephens revealed that they found difficult to find their unique take on Two-Face as he typically doesn't show up until after Bruce Wayne becomes Batman. They also did consider introducing a prototype Two-Face character, but this also never came about.
• It is briefly established that Thomas Wayne possessed a Kevlar vest with a bullet hole in it. However, this is never elaborated on.

Season 3

• Harley Quinn and Killer Croc were considered to appear in "Heroes Rise: Heavydirtysoul", with Stephens stating "the Harley Quinn of it all is a bit more of a sticky wicket but it's one we've already thought about for the character. We don't want to give too much away but it will definitely be someone connected to the Joker cult world that we have set up." David Mazouz mistakenly "confirmed" that she would definitely be appearing at one point, and Ken Woodruff suggested that she might be a character previously seen on the show.
• Barbara Kean was considered by the showrunners to transform into Harley Quinn and Magpie, at separate points, neither of which took place. John Stephens retroactively referred to Barbara becoming Magpie as "a terrible idea", adding that he doesn't know why they thought of that.
• According to actor Cameron Monaghan, Jerome Valeska was supposed to die in "Mad City: The Gentle Art of Making Enemies": "He was going to be beheaded and that was going to be it for him. Ultimately they decided that instead, we’ll go the opposite way and really embrace the idea of the character being involved in the Joker mythos."
• Ben McKenzie had hinted that Jim Gordon may have taken on the identity of an iconic DC character at some point in season 3, however this idea didn't come about and it is unknown who he was referring to.
• On "Heroes Rise: How the Riddler Got His Name", there was a scene was most likely deleted very late during post-production, since three still images from it were released as promotional photos to promote "Heroes Rise: How the Riddler Got His Name". Even though the scene was removed from the final cut of the episode, a few glimpses of it still remain intact in the released episode (a close-up of Nygma holding the newspaper and one of him opening the tin with pills), meaning this deleted scene takes place in between the scene in which Ed takes a pill and is haunted by a vision of Penguin for the first time. This extended scene was eventually included as a bonus feature on the DVD and Bluray box set Gotham: The Complete Third Season.

Season 4

• As mentioned before, the showrunners had plans to turn Barbara into Magpie. Barbara's appearance during early season 4 (white hair, similar hairstyle, black clothes) seems to be a remnant of this abandoned story arc.
• At the beginning of Season 4, actor Cameron Monaghan pitched a storyline that was ultimately turned down by the producers. However, they took ideas from it that influenced the Joker lineage arc throughout the backhalf of the season.
• In line with Bruno Heller's original concept for the Joker's ancestry, Jeremiah Valeska was conceived to be a second precursor to the Joker like his brother Jerome. As John Stephens explained in April 2018, "Jeremiah is not the Joker. Joker is somewhere out there, anonymous and unformed, he's watching the actions of Jeremiah and Jerome and possibly even another one, and he's adopting them as inspirations as the person he'll one day become." The show was later cancelled, renewed only for one last shortened season to wrap things up. Although a final transformation into the Joker doesn't take place in Season 5, Jeremiah did undergo a transformation and go on to fight Batman, with the series leaving it ambiguous as to whether or not he becomes the Joker later on.
• Danny Cannon originally confirmed that Ivy Pepper would eventually join the Gotham Sirens along with Barbara, Tabitha and Selina. However, this never happened during the fourth season and was entirely discarded when the show had to end after the shortened season 5.
• The Ventriloquist was originally already meant to be a villain during season 4. According to Danny Cannon, there was going to be an episode called "The Ventriloquist", which he would have written.
• Danny Cannon mentioned in an interview discussing the fourth season, that the show "still got Clayface to do". However, the Clayface arc was not included during season 4 and entirely abandoned when the show had to end after the shortened season 5.
• According to Andrew Sellon, Vanessa Harper was originally going to die on multiple occasions during season 4. However, these plans were discarded each time.
• On two separate occasions during season 4, the writers also considered killing Arthur Penn off.
• In the episode "A Dark Knight: Queen Takes Knight", there was originally going to be a scene in which Penn escapes from the Iceberg Lounge after being tortured by Tabitha, revealing that he was only wearing his underwear after the interrogation.
• The original script for "A Dark Knight: No Man's Land" featured the debut of Lady Shiva during a montage at the end of the episode. However, this was cut.
• In "A Dark Knight: No Man's Land" during the villain montage, a bat winged humanoid is seen, however unlike Mother and Orphan, the story behind this individual is never elaborated upon in season 5.

Season 5

• Had the show continued beyond the shortened season 5, Tabitha Galavan would have fully embraced her super-villain identity as the Tigress during No Man's Land, on whom she is based on.
• John Stephens repeatedly pushed to have Condiment King on the show, but all of his pitches were rejected.
• The Riddler's iconic question mark cane was originally set to appear in "The Beginning...". The Riddler was announced to be reintroduced with amnesia while naked, mumbling to himself, and covered in tattooed riddles. This never took place. His arc would have been influenced by Batman: Zero Year as well, and Lee Thompkins was set to undergo a drastic change.
• Arthur Penn's transformation into the Ventriloquist and Scarface would have been explored more. He was originally meant to be one of the recurring villains during No Man's Land in season 5, but when the episode count was shortened, his arc had to be abandoned.
• For the episode "Nothing's Shocking", Andrew Sellon and Seth Boston briefly discussed the idea that Scarface wouldn't be able to pronounce the letter "B". In the Batman comics, Scarface is usually unable to pronounce the letter "B" and is known to call his nemesis "Gatman" instead.

The mysterious winged humanoid from the season 4 finale went unresolved during season 5.

• Lady Shiva was announced to appear, but was ultimately absent.
  • Incidentally, John Stephens stated in 2015 that Man-Bat wouldn't be part of the show for quite a while, joking that he wouldn't appear until he becomes the main antagonist in Season 13.
• Setting up season 5, the ending of season 4 saw Mr. Freeze and Firefly among the villains who claimed territory in the abandoned city. However, Fries and Bridgit were absent during the entirety of the fifth season. In the episode "Year Zero", it is mentioned that Firefly and Freeze were in a turf war for territory, giving a hint as to what their planned storyline would have been like.
• There were also alternate plans for Mr. Penn's death in "Penguin, Our Hero". The writers originally considered that Penguin would kill Penn for betraying him and running away to Haven. However, Robin Lord Taylor and Andrew Sellon agreed that this would not fit the relationship between their characters that was developed over the run of season 4 and 5, causing the writers to abandon that idea.
• Sharing a common goal, Bruce Wayne, Lucius Fox, and Alfred Pennyworth were set to become the "strongest team" of the season, with Alfred physically training Bruce and Lucius providing him with gadgets. This would've propelled Bruce's transformation into Batman. Bruce Wayne would have infiltrated the No Man's Land gangs sector-by-sector, adopting different disguises and even taking over a gang.
  • David Mazouz later explained "The training of Batman takes a back seat a lot this season because there is so much going on, so much action – we really do fit 22 episodes' worth of action and story into these last episodes."
• Before David Mazouz tried on the Batman costume, John Stephens stated that there were no plans to recast any characters in "The Beginning...". Actress Camren Bicondova also suggested that she planned to return in the episode. Ultimately, Bicondova was replaced by Lili Simmons with Batman co-played by a stuntman wearing the costume.
• While the series finale remains mostly unchanged from how it was planned during the first season, the extent that Batman is used was changed. In July 2014, Bruno Heller stated that there were no plans to use Batman at all, stating "[It's a story of] how do you deal with crime of this level when there are no superheroes? It's about men and women and not about superheroes and that's the more interesting story." In 2015, Ben McKenzie stated that Batman would only put on the cape in the final frame of the final scene of the episode.
  • In February 2019, it was claimed by Stephens that Batman would be featured all throughout the episode and not just in the final scene, "The last episode is one scene in the timeline of the rest of the season, and then the rest of the episode is in the future. It almost feels in a weird way like another pilot." Batman uses David Mazouz's face and voice, but he is physically played by a larger stuntman. However, this turned out to be blatantly false, as Batman only appeared briefly and was only shown in the final shot (as originally planned).
  • According to Stephens, it was planned to not show Batman until the final frame since Season 1 because the series is told from the eyes of Jim Gordon.
• A pre-release still image from the finale showed the Riddler and Penguin facing down a man in a hat. This shot is not in the actual episode. - This turns out to be the man Riddler and Penguin get there cane and Bowler hat from in there final shot.
• In August 2018, David Mazouz claimed that the word "Batman" would be spoken on the show.
• The batcave was reportedly set to appear in Season 5.

Future Seasons

• The show was originally meant to have at least two more seasons, as the writers already had story plans for seasons 6 and 7.
• Had Gotham continued beyond season 5, the Ventriloquist and Scarface would have appeared as recurring villains during seasons 6 and 7. Andrew Sellon compared what his role would have been like with that of characters like Poison Ivy, who appeared in multiple episodes per season and had their own story arcs every year.

Trivia

• Originally Arthur Penn's role as the show's version of the Ventriloquist was going to be scrapped from season 5 due to the limited episode count, but FOX later extended the season by two episodes. This allowed the producers to revive his character one last time and turn him into something resembling the Ventriloquist in the episode "Nothing's Shocking", where the Scarface puppet was incorporated. It is unclear how much of that depiction differed from their original plan, as Penn is never actually referred as the Ventriloquist in the episode.  

See also

• Deleted scenes
• Allusions to the DC Universe
• Allusions to other Batman media
• Metropolis (cancelled series)
• Pennyworth (series)