Of the many villains that Gotham has thus far fully realized or explored in depth, one A-lister that has relatively remained untouched up until now is that of the Scarecrow. Sure, we did meet a teenage version of him, and his father, back in season 1, but other super criminals such as Penguin, Riddler and Mr. Freeze have seen their origins be fleshed out instead.
So, if you’re a fan of whom many would refer to as “fear incarnate,” you have a lot to look forward to when season 4 picks up this fall. Actually, we knew to anticipate this when David Mazouz, the young Bruce Wayne himself, said we should expect a “full blast” Scarecrow earlier this month. And despite heeding his words, we were still taken aback when the first footage featuring Jonathan Crane fully suited up premiered at San Diego Comic-Con this past weekend.
To date, this character hasn’t been explored all that much in the live-action realm. Yes, I’ll fully admit that Christopher Nolan’s take on the Scarecrow in The Dark Knight Trilogy was great, but it was a bit more “real world,” if you will. Thankfully, executive producer John Stephens has said that he and his colleagues are ready to go whole hog:
“At the very beginning of the season, Penguin has solidified his control upon Gotham like never before. Where he’s kind of unionized crime. And Scarecrow comes in to basically reintroduce fear into Gotham and to remind people that the dark is still scary out there. And we’re really going to fashion, especially Episode 2, almost a horror movie episode where we really get to see Scarecrow. I think he’s like purely terrifying. Imagine, rather than the other versions of Scarecrow out there — because there are a lot of different versions — what if you just really tell Scarecrow as a horror movie? Because he could be scary as hell.”
That actually does sound quite interesting. The more well-versed Batfans out there have probably noticed that some inspiration here and there has been culled from the Arkham series of video games, so we’ll have to wait and see if any of the memorable Scarecrow moments from those will have any influence on this arc. I guess it matters how much they want to push the boundaries of surrealism.
Gotham returns for its fourth season on Thursday, September 28 on Fox.