Batwoman 1x14 : Grinning from Ear to Ear review

Be warned there will be *SPOILERS* involved in this review. With that being said let's get into it. 

Batwoman returns from it's week hiatus and starts off with quite the interesting introduction to the villain of the week. We see a young woman looking into her bathroom mirror. She looks perfectly normal except for when the mirror shifts and we see her real face which is almost falling to one side. She breaks the mirror into pieces but it doesn't end there as she picks up a piece of the broken mirror and proceeds to cut her own face (A Joker tribute?) as we hear her mom call out to her. When she doesn't answer her mom walks into the bathroom and is shocked what she sees..the episode then picks up right where it ended 2 weeks ago as we see Kate and Sophie grinning from ear to ear. Sophie meets Mary and seems incredibly happy. More so than normal according to Mary and the same can be said for Kate who gets questioned by Luke. Both having shared a passionate kiss the last time we saw them and perhaps having slept together also seem over the edge with excitement. Sophie especially seems smitten with Batwoman when she and Mary talk. Luke tells Kate that getting close to Sophie is a bad idea as Bruce found that out the hard way as Batman. He always pushed people away to protect them as if his secret ever got out everyone close to him would be targeted. This is similar to Kates situation as Luke tells her to end things with Sophie before they get even more serious. 

And that is exactly what Kate goes to do as she texts Sophie as Batwoman asking to meet at her place. We see Sophie getting dressed up as she thinks it's another hook up but it's far from it. Batwoman shows up outside her apartment and just as it looks like she is about to end it they kiss again but this time get interrupted by Sophie's mom who shows up announced to see her daughter after hearing of her separation from her husband. Batwoman retreats as reports of people being killed erupts in Gotham. This of course is the same woman from the beginning of the episode whose face is completely scar ridden. This slasher killer is targeting various social media higher ups which leads to Kate thinking that Mary is a possible target even though she no longer is a part of social media or at least it's higher up scene thanks to Alice. Earlier in the episode Kate went to see Mary about something but declined her offer for help. Mary is aware that Kate is indeed Batwoman and as it turns out Batwoman pays Mary a visit a bit later into the episode as she asks her to help with identifying the slash killer. The killer turns out to be Evelyn Dent the niece of Harvey Dent according to Luke Fox. An interesting way to tie Harvey into this universe which I like. Batwoman eventually hunts her down but gets cut off by Alice who learns that Evelyn was worked on by a plastic surgeon who turns out to be August Cartwright. Alice's childhood captor and who last time we saw kill Beth thinking it was actually Alice. Alice ends up cutting off Evelyn's face and dons it herself to get to August who is still hiding under his professor mask. The image of a faceless Evelyn was rather creepy to say the least. 

The episode draws to a close as Sophie and her mom have a real heart to heart moment. But before that Sophie's day only gets worse again as Batwoman does end up calling off their relationship / fling. Devastated by this Sophie's emotions are only further hit when her mom doesn't react well at all to her coming out to her as gay. Her mom actually is really upset by her daughter's confession in a scene that is extremely impactful and easy to relate to for many people I'm sure. Sophie's left in her apartment sitting on the couch weeping as her mom leaves. The character development for Sophie was really, really good here and I can't wait to see what happens next. But the episode ends with Alice who we see talking to August with her Wonderland gang backing her up. Moments before Alice revealed herself to him in a shocking twist that he did not see coming at all. She was supposed to be dead but he got the wrong girl as this leads to Alice knocking him out before dragging him back to her new lair. There the two talk in what is really just a bargaining chip for Mouse. Speaking of Mouse the episode ends on him as August tells Alice that he is someplace..safe. Well that someplace safe is far from the word safe as we see him strapped to a chair with a mask on him. The camera pans to reveal that something is being pumped into him and it's none other than an entire canister of Fear Toxin complete with a Scarecrow design on it. Fear Toxin is being pumped into Mouse which is in turn exposing his greatest fears. Quite the harrowing experience..overall this episode was quite good. I think the week break really did hurt this show's momentum as beforehand it was on a serious roll. Now that it's back it felt a little flat at times. Not enough to derail the entire thing though as to be honest it wasn't all that bad. Sophie coming out to her mom and her reaction was like an emotional punch to the gut. The Fear Toxin reveal at the end was a nice surprise and in general this episode was solid as a rock. Things are heating up nicely as we head into the final 7 episodes or so of Batwoman's first season. 

★★★