EDWARD: Gotham, Gotham, Gotham. Enough already. If it gives you any pleasure, I will address this once and for all. I had previously ignored it in the vain hope that it would go away - but alas, here we are. Let us begin with the program itself. Visually, it appears encased in vintage amber. Allegedly it takes place in the late 1970s to the early 1980s, but the milieu resembled the 1950s. Let me assure you, the true Gotham is not stuck in a time capsule. For better or worse, fashion moves forward like everything else. I could forgive the 'retro' feel if the language went with it. However, when one hears such unsavoury modern phrases as 'asshats', 'dude', and 'ho' - ugh - one abandons all hope of civilised discourse entirely. Frankly, the plots leave me mystified - what is supposed to be going on? It appears to be a tangled mess of plot threads that lead nowhere. I saw my namesake almost every week doing virtually nothing, popping up like an overpaid cameo actor, making sure he gets his riddle in. Edward Nygma, indeed. His parents must have known he would later become a dastardly villain, and named him accordingly. He speaks in riddles instead of plain speech and his name is Mr. E. Nygma. It is not exactly what one might call subtle.

I acknowledge my own eccentricities here, obviously - but I contest that I am an organic evolution, not a dyed-in-the-wool oddball with nowhere to evolve but to extremes. I have no problem with how he looks. Certainly they made him the prototypical nerd because these things need to be spelled out, but fortunately my vanity does not extend to my looks so I take no offense. Besides, unless you happen to be Bruce Wayne, you do not get to be intelligent AND pretty in your portrayals. Speaking of Wayne, he appears to be a child in this, which is an irritating disparity. The Nygma character is well into adulthood and Wayne is but a child? He is older than I am! But enough of that, back to Nygma.

I have no objection to his choice of profession, as forensic science is fascinating enough to keep one such as me interested. That he works for the police does chafe my anti-authoritarian streak, but perhaps this person learned more patience than I. His manner, however - I do not find myself there. He is awkward, overeager for any scrap of validation, and frankly disconcerting around women. I personally have as much use for women as I do for anyone else; what they keep in their heads is their only selling point. I do not begrudge him his interest in women whatsoever. If he wants to be reduced to a spluttering schoolboy at the twirl of a skirt, that is his lookout. However, he needs to learn social grace in his courting. He actually sniffed that woman when she had to move past him? Was he raised in a cage? Oh, right, I get it. He is intelligent and wears glasses, so he has to be weird. Therein lies a problem, however: he is not weird enough. He is too weird for normal, but he is not normal enough to pass. Is that why they split his personality? Because there was nowhere else for him to go? Which I find ridiculous, by the way. That is Harvey Dent's affliction, not mine. I cannot say that I have had a 'second self' push me into being more confident, but then I have never felt it necessary to answer every question with a question, either. So people find me annoying? They should try this guy on for size. And this dark side of his - who does not NEED glasses because he is SO evil - takes that awkward romantic ineptitude and shoves it right into the realm of the sex offender. Here's a newsflash: no woman owes you anything, impostor Nygma, whatever you may say or do. You DESERVE precisely nothing. He claims that his weakness is love. LOVE. How pitiful. Must we go over this again?

My pride is my weakness, and I readily admit that while maintaining no attempts to remedy it, because I like me that way. It has thus far kept me from blundering my way into several murders, certainly. For someone who appears so precise, he is sloppy, clumsy, and hangs around in plain sight for anyone to see when he should be long gone. He's the blushing, paranoid ingenue of small crime, fancying himself a psychotic genius and palling up with that faux Penguin. I wonder how much Cobblepot paid to be represented by a good looking man? I doubt that he'd love being played up as such a wet little mama's boy, though. I suppose their graceless alliance is fitting - a penguin and a cuckoo, birds of a feather. Overall, I cannot say that I am impressed with any of this bilge that you made me watch. I cannot pass judgment without sound knowledge of the facts, and now I desire to carve the facts out of my brain with an ice pick. You call this pretender a Riddler? You would call his piffling puzzles riddles? HA! I have heard better riddles come from the centre of a Christmas cracker.

Oh and here's a tip for you writers - to convincingly write an intelligent character, you need a modicum of intelligence yourself. You need more than a penny paperback full of platitudinal riddles that a child would find elementary. There are certain things in this life that you cannot bluff your way through, and one of those is Edward Nygma. This is a sorry excuse for a Nygma, and such a wasted opportunity. Once again, we get the portrait of a geek who only wants to possess a pretty girl and beat down all his bullies. Is that what one such as I can be reduced to? Truly, I despair.