“Mad as Hatter” is episode one of season three of Batwoman.
In the season two finale, “Power”, various items from Batman’s rogue’s gallery were floating off down the river. Someone finds the Mad Hatter’s hat and puts it up for sale as the news says that Alice has been sentenced to Arkham for life. The hat is sold and the purchaser removes it. Inside it looks to have circuitry. He may know what he’s bought. And he’s an Alice superfan.
Ryan and Luke, the latter in the powered armour his dad made, are taking down some marijuana growers. Luke doesn’t like being called sidekick. ‘Number two dude’ is no better. Alice is in Arkham, reading a postcard from her father that says he isn’t going to give up on her this time. She’s told she has a visitor.
Luke asks Ryan for name ideas. She doesn’t think ‘Black Batman’ is a good one. How about ‘Dork Knight’? They are opening up crates, looking for poison ivy. It’s not a big seller so Luke looked for people with an interest in the benefits of a fast-growing vine. Hence marijuana growers. Ryan thinks the vine is bigger when they find it. Because it is. Gunmen burst in and Luke freezes.
Mary has gone to see Alice. It’s her graduation and her father asked her to check up on Alice, so she’s pretending she cares so she doesn’t have to lie to him. Alice says her daddy is going to get her out. And she isn’t unhappy. Mary is leaving when Alice gets her to return. She has a question for Ryan.
Luke and Ryan return the ivy to storage; she asks why he froze. He claims he didn’t; the suit did. It sometimes glitches. Mary arrives with tickets to her graduation and strict instructions as to when they have to be there. Then starts going off on one about her father, because she’s barely heard from him since he was locked up yet he’s writing to Alice. Oh, and Alice wanted her to ask Ryan about her birth mother. Ryan denies knowing what this means; Alice had told Ryan her mother didn’t die in childbirth.
The man with the hat is in the subway, recording himself about Alice when two people confront him. They think she’s where she belongs. The man says to pay some respect to her. The other does. The new Mad Hatter realises he can control them – perhaps he didn’t fully realise the powers of the hat – and gets one to slit the throat of the other.
A woman is in a basement office when the custodian knocks on her door. He shows her a story about the Mad Hatter. She decides it important and leaves. She’s Renee Montoya, which is a familiar name (and played by the same person who played the role in Gotham), and she heads to the crime scene where the forced killer is being interviewed.
In the Batcave, Luke tells Mary and Ryan that this is a Mad Hatter imposter. Which means he has the hat. He shows the video of one being forced to kill the other. Mary asks how the hat works. Luke explains that the original Mad Hatter was a neuroscientist who felt the world wasn’t listening to him. So, he developed mind control technology to make them listen. Luke’s father figured out how to disrupt the mind control, but they need to get the hat off the new Hatter’s head. Mary thinks there’s someone who will have a clue as to the Hatter’s intentions.
And Ryan heads to see Alice. Alice doesn’t know anything about her superfan. She assumes that Ryan is there regarding her birth mother. If it was Alice, though, she’d be planning a tea party.
Mary wishes supervillains would say what they mean. Sophie doesn’t want to be a downer, but at the last tea party, Alice poisoned Mary’s mother. Ryan wants to change the subject. Mary does, to Sophie’s love life. Ryan asks about Kate. Mary gives reasons as to why that’s not more than friends until Sophie tells her to stop. But agrees with her.
There’s one obvious thing for the Mad Hatter to crash; Mary’s graduation ceremony. Ryan admits to Sophie what Alice told her about her mother; Sophie offers to dig into it on the quiet. You just know that is going to be significant, no matter what Ryan decides. And Alice appears to be losing the plot, even for her.