Here’s Gotham one-off villain the White Rabbit explained. Gotham is a series that billed itself as an origin tale for Batman, Jim Gordon, and much of the franchise’s famous gallery of villains. The series mostly followed honest cop Gordon as he tried to bring order and justice to a city profoundly lacking in either. While this concept had the makings of a more grounded take on the material, Gotham soon embraced a more over the top, campy tone as it progressed.

Gotham was never afraid of an outlandish twist or plotline, and while it could feature violent and dark sequences, part of the following it built was based around just how crazy it could get. Gotham ended with a blockbuster fifth season which adapted the Escape From New York-inspired “No Man’s Land” comic story, where the city is sealed off from the rest of the country and is overtaken by criminals; it also featured Bruce finally donning the Batman outfit. While a sixth season following a young Batman finding his footing as the Caped Crusader has potential, the show was conceived as an origin story so a return to Gotham looks unlikely.

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Batman has arguably the best line-up of villains of any superhero, from the Joker to Mr. Freeze and Harley Quinn. One of his lesser sung bad guys is the Mad Hatter – AKA Jervis Tetch – who styles himself after the Hatter from Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland. The character has yet to appear in a live-action movie version, though in the past he’s been voiced by Roddy McDowall in Batman: The Animated Series. Tetch made his debut Gotham season 3, played by Benedict Samuel (The Walking Dead), who is looking for his sister Alice.

When Alice later dies, the vengeful Tetch holds Gordon personally responsible and in Gotham’s “Follow The White Rabbit,” he plays a series of games with Jim. This episode also introduced the White Rabbit, who is an albino man that’s been hypnotized by the Mad Hatter into doing his bidding. The White Rabbit first appears to Jim in a diner, relaying a message from Tetch and ordering Jim to follow him. This leads Jim to a payphone where Tetch lays out the rules for a deadly game, where Gordon has to choose between saving a hypnotized boy from being run over or a newlywed couple from jumping off a bridge; with no time to waste, Jim runs to save the boy while the couple leaps to their deaths.

The White Rabbit is later taken into custody by the GCPD while Gordon is led on a wild goose chase, but he has to circle back to the White Rabbit to find out where Tetch is holding Valerie and Leslie hostage; this ends with Gordon being trapped in a particularly unpleasant tea party. “Follow The White Rabbit” is the first and only appearance of the White Rabbit in Gotham and it’s still unknown who he was before the Mad Hatter hypnotized him. He also bears very little resemblance to the White Rabbit from the Batman comics, who is a female escape artist who loves being chased.

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Padraig Cotter
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It’s pronounced Paw-rick, not Pad-raig. Now that’s out of the way, a brief introduction. Padraig has been writing about film online since 2012, when a friend asked if he’d like to contribute the occasional review or feature to their site.

A part-time hobby soon blossomed into a career when he discovered he really loved writing about movies, TV and video games – he even (arguably) had a little bit of talent for it. He has written words for Den of Geek, Collider, The Irish Times and Screen Rant over the years, and can discuss anything from the MCU – where Hawkeye is clearly the best character – to the most obscure cult b-movie gem, and his hot takes often require heat resistant gloves to handle.

He’s super modern too, so his favorite movies include Jaws, Die Hard, The Thing, Ghostbusters and Batman. He can be found as i_Padds on Twitter making bad puns.

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