Show: Gotham
Character Status: Regular
Current Season: Left Show
Endgame: None
Orientation: Lesbian
Show Status: Still Airing
Tropes: But not too gay, Hide Your Lesbians
Introduced in: 2014-2015 / Final season: 2014-2015
Appeared in seasons: 2014-2015
Renee Montoya was a detective with the Major Crimes Unit of the Gotham City Police Department. During season 1 Renee was a main character and credited for all 22 episodes, although she only appeared in 7 of them. She was investigating protagonist James Gordon who was dating Renee’s ex-girlfriend Barbara Kean.
Renee was seen several times trying to convince Barbara that Gordon wasn’t a good cop. Eventually Renee came to the conclusion that she was wrong about Gordon and she dropped her investigation. After that Renee and Barbara rekindled their romance and Barbara left Gordon for reasons unrelated to Renee.
By the end of Season 1, Barbara had relapsed into abusing drugs and turned into a psychotic murderer, and Renee, one of the only regular latina lesbians on network TV, and a popular lesbian character in DC’s universe, was written off the show.
Gotham executive producer John Stephens said it was “one of those things where these shows do evolve at a certain point”. “The show began as a police-centric show with a lot of cops, and became more of a Gotham supervillain-centric show.”. Source: AfterEllen
Relationship story arc with a woman: No
Relationship story arc with a man: No
Male love interest after being identified as a lesbian? No
Storyline during sweeps? No
[1] A relationship story arc is defined as explicit, developed on screen, and lasting more than 3 episodes. It is listed as questionable or subtext if romance is only implied, mentioned instead of shown on screen, part of a dream sequence, or otherwise not explicit for the viewer.
[2] Sweeps episodes air in February, May, July and November, the periods when advertising rates are set. A character is marked as "sweeps" when there is a very limited number of episodes that address their sexuality, all air during sweeps period, and the storyline is otherwise ignore/dropped.
She is so consumed with this need for power, and I really feel like somewhere right in the heart of that is the idea that Jim is the only thing that can save her. And not because it’s a man saving a woman, but because Jim is the only thing that is vaguely good in Gotham… I think that they’re kind of forever bonded. There’s something there that can never fully be diminished.
— Bustle, Erin Richards (Barbara), before Season 3.
Erin Richards
April 24, 2017
They just love to have a good time. They’re both out of their minds, so it’s sexual but it’s also—there’s like a sadistic element to it as well. And I love their relationship. Like [Barbara] is kind of a kooky crazy out there one, and Tabitha’s much more quietly dominating, more of a planner. It’s a great push-pull relationship.
— AfterEllen, Jessica Lucas (Tabitha), before Season 3.
Jessica Lucas
September 16, 2016
Butch is actually a part of a love triangle between the three of us. He’s still very much in love with Tabitha and I don’t know if she has feelings for him—she has fond feelings for him but she’s also using him as a tool to have in her back pocket to help her get out of some sticky situations with Penguin.
— AfterEllen, Jessica Lucas (Tabitha), before Season 3.
Jessica Lucas
September 16, 2016
She’s in a little difficult romantic situation. A romantic triangle with basically two main villains this year—one of whom is a man, one of whom is a woman. So she’s caught in the middle between the two. So it’s a triumvirate of romantic villainy. By episode two you’ll know.
— AfterEllen, Executive Producer John Stephens regarding Barbara/Tabitha/Butch (Evil bisexual trope).
John Stephens
August 7, 2015
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