IN REVIEW: PENNYWORTH: THE ORIGIN OF BATMAN’S BUTLER (S1 – EP6) – Hedgehunter

Synopsis: In Hedgehunter, A past mission in Morocco comes back to haunt Alfred. Meanwhile, Thomas Wayne arrives in Gotham City.

The Story

Having been assigned to Zahra Khin as her protection detail in last week’s show. Alfred has learned about Zahra’s mission to find out what happened to her father but has now realized that her father was a person of interest that he and Dave Boy abducted for the UK Government while on a mission in Morocco that took place ten years earlier. Having slept with Zahra. Alfred tries to use that as an excuse to resign as her protection. When his real reason is that it was he who took her father. While all of this is going on Dave Boy is slowly coming out of a pretty major acid trip. 

Elsewhere, Bet Sykes has been captured by John Salt and the remnants of the Raven Society. She learns that Salt plans to resurrect the society by building an army of cyborgs to take back control of the UK.

In Gotham City Thomas Wayne prepares to do the unthinkable.

The Acting

We get some really strong acting performances this week. The chemistry between Jack Bannon and Jing Lusi gets turned up a notch or two as we see Alfred fall for Zahra, which makes things so much worse for him when she learns the truth about his involvement in kidnapping her father. The scene where Alfred is pretty much forced to reveal his role in Zahra’s father’s abduction is brilliantly played out.

We also get a great performance from Paloma Faith as we see Bet have one last battle with the former head of The Raven Society John Salt (Edward Hogg). The scene where Salt orders his new Blue Soldier to seemingly murder Bet’s baby is really effective. Especially when he reveals that the Baby was safe all along. The final battle between the two enemies is nicely played out. It is seemingly a satisfying end to some of the unfinished business that the series had left over from season two.

Overall

Hedgehunter proved to be a pretty solid episode. I loved the tragic aspect of Alfred’s relationship such as it was or is with Zahra. Its made to seem pretty real for Alfred as he truly opens up to Zahra even telling her about his past relationship with Esme, which ended in tragedy.

I also enjoyed the last gasps of The Raven Society and seeing Bet Sykes get a satisfying conclusion to her arc.