Will Netflix or Amazon Prime Pick Up Gotham Season 6?

On paper, a Batman-prequel featuring Bruce Wayne as a child just after the murder of his parents shouldn’t work. Before Gotham even premiered, the show had been written off by plenty of naysayers, largely for its take on a child Batman, but when the show finally premiered, it slowly found a fanbase of followers deeming it worthy. Despite the slow start, the show gradually grew from a procedural cop show set in and around the titular city, to something with its own lore, season-long plotlines, and a revisioning of both Batman and many of his villains.

With the fifth season currently airing, Fox has been advertising the show as the final season of the series, with its episode order cut from the usual 22 from seasons one through four to just a measly twelve episodes, leaving fans wondering: will Gotham get picked up by a streaming service like Netflix, Amazon, or Hulu? Let’s take a look at the show and what its plot trajectory means for the future of the series.

Gotham‘s Five Seasons

Created as a series designed to focus solely on the Gotham Police Department, the show opens with a young Selina Kyle watching the murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne, leaving their son Bruce orphaned and in shock as his parents are taken from him. The show then switches focus to Commissioner Gordon, currently working as a detective many years before he rises through the ranks. Teamed with Harvey Bullock, a grizzled detective, Gordon tries to focus his efforts on solving the murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne, while slowly dealing with Bullock’s corruption and trying to stay a clean cop.

It wasn’t until season two of Gotham, subtitled Rise of the Villains and Wrath of the Villains over its two parts, focused on Gordon being fired from the department while Bullock quits. Teamed with local gangster Oswald Cobblepot, Gordon works to bring down Theo Galavan, while new villains like Hugo Strange, Mr. Freeze, and other villains begin to pop up. As the show continued, each season contained two distinct arcs. Throughout season three, viewers were introduced to the Mad City and Heroes Rise arc, which witnessed Gordon becoming a bounty hunter following the Indian Hill fugitives, while Strange, Mr. Freeze, Riddler, and Mad Hatter all continued to cause issues. Season three also put the focus back on Wayne as he began to learn more about the murder of his parents and the infamous criminal organization known as the Court of Owls.

Season four, subtitled A Dark Knight for all twenty-two episodes, finally delivered on everything viewers wanted. Penguin finally took over the city’s crime, issuing licences in the underworld for any burgeoning criminals to begin operating. With Jim approaching Carmine Falcone for help, things continue to grow worse in Gotham. With criminals breaking out of Arkham Asylum and promising to plunge Gotham into anarchy, Bruce Wayne fulfills his destiny and becomes the Dark Knight of Gotham.

All of this sets up the show to become something entirely new, but instead of transitioning Gotham into a Batman television show, the fifth season was announced by Fox to be the final of the show, with twelve episodes instead of 22.

Did Gotham get Cancelled?

Yes and no. While some shows are announced as “ending” rather than cancelled (see Crazy Ex-Girlfriend on the CW, which was pitched as a four season series, or Game of Thrones on HBO), Gotham falls somewhere in the middle. Though the fifth season was announced as the final season well ahead of time, remarks by Gotham‘s showrunner John Stephens suggests that, at the very least, the show having a longer episode count for its final season would’ve been preferred. Gotham was never a ratings mega-giant for Fox, so it makes sense for the show to end around the 100 episode mark.

In fact, Gotham was originally planned to only have ten episodes in its final season, but that order was raised to twelve in order to hit the 100 episode count so valued for syndication. At the very least, those 100 episodes mean that Gotham will be shown on television for a long time to come.

Will Gotham Get Picked Up for a Season Six?

While Fox may no longer be interested in producing Gotham, it’s always possible in the age of streaming media for shows to get picked up by rival networks or streaming services. Unfortunately, that typically happens when a show is cancelled outright without a concluding season. Gotham may have received the axe after its fifth outing, but the show was given time to wrap up its storylines, which it will do with the 100th episode of the show.

So, what are the odds of Gotham getting picked up somewhere new? Unfortunately, pretty low. Gotham is produced by Warner Bros. Television and DC Entertainment, which may be part of why Fox is ending the show. Since Fox doesn’t own the production company behind Gotham, they have less of a reason to continue producing the show. Both Netflix and Amazon have been increasingly focused on only producing their own content as well, making it unlikely for the show to get picked up there. The show could make the jump to the CW, which WarnerMedia has a stake in, but unfortunately, now that AT&T owns Warner Bros., the company has been focused on trying to evolve HBO into its own streaming giant to compare to Netflix.

The other possibility is the DC Universe streaming service, which began in 2018 and is the home of shows like Titans, Doom Patrol, and Swamp Thing. In fact, DC Universe picked up Young Justice for a third season years after being cancelled by Cartoon Network, leaving it as a possible outing for the show. Unfortunately, Titans has actually cast a Bruce Wayne for its second season, portraying him as an older, possibly-retired Batman, making it unlikely that the show is picked up by DC Universe.

Ultimately, we also have to mention that the fifth season of Gotham will likely wrap up the plot, leaving a future pick-up unlikely. The writers behind the show have spoken about bringing the series to a satisfying close, and have gone all out, introducing the Joker with his usual look for the final batch of episodes. Ultimately, having told a full story with a complete end may feel bittersweet to Gotham‘s fanbase, but with more comic book shows than ever before, it may be nice to see a satisfying ending rather than a disappointing burn-out.

What do you think could happen to Gotham? Should it all end here? Tell us your thoughts below!