| “ | Edward: My actions seem... mad to you? Lucius: To anyone. Edward: I... I just killed the best friend that I ever had. And my search for a teacher or an enemy, that was just me trying to hold on to him for a little bit longer. But now I know who I am without him. Lucius: So, who are you now? Edward: Oh, come on, Foxy. I'm the Riddler! |
„ |
| ~ Edward Nygma to Lucius as he adopts the persona of the Riddler. |
| “ | Don't you dare call me "Ed". I'm the Riddler. And I became him when I killed you. | „ |
| ~ Nygma to Oswald Cobblepot. |
| “ | I've shown this city who I truly am once before, and I will do it again. They will bow to the Riddler, and they won't get up until I permit them to! | „ |
| ~ Nygma to Oswald Cobblepot, and his most famous quote. |
Edward "Ed" Nygma, also known as the Riddler, is the secondary antagonist of the 2014 TV series Gotham.
Initially a socially awkward forensic scientist working for the Gotham City Police Department with a penchant for speaking in riddles, he would descend into a path of crime after accidentally killing his crush's abusive boyfriend and later her, embracing his supressed darker urges and becoming a brilliant, yet deranged and narcissistic criminal mastermind seeking to become Gotham City's greatest villain. He is the best friend of Oswald Cobblepot and the arch-nemesis of Lucius Fox and second arch-nemesis of Bruce Wayne aka the Batman.
He was portrayed by Cory Michael Smith.
Personality[]
Edward is normally cheerful, vivacious, effervescent, and friendly; however, he came off as weird and outright irritating towards his work colleagues. They specifically found him as such for his love of riddles, and his continued use of them while explaining what he had discovered during his work. Edward is also very knowledgeable and intellectual about factual trivia which he thinks is a helpful matter, however it is actually another source of why his colleagues find him annoying. He has shown to be a genius-level intellect although his unorthodox methods of finding clues has led to him being questioned by his superiors. However, he still remains loyal and a very necessary element for the police service.
Edward appears desperate for a friend or even the slightest hint of companionship, possibly due to his childhood of neglect and insecurities, which was shown as he took an instant shine to the new cop, Jim Gordon, simply because he solved his riddle while meeting him for the first time as most of his colleagues don't even let him finish, let alone answer one of his "brain-teasers".
However, Edward does have a reputation among the G.C.P.D. for mishandling equipment. Cases of this are pretending to be a coroner while "dissecting" a watermelon for Kringle and using the same room to "surgically remove onions from (his) takeout". Once the actual coroner, Doctor Guerra, discovered him examining a murder victims body without clearance, he had him suspended. Edward appears to suffer from O.C.D. such as organizing Kringle's Evidence Room in the way he wanted after being left in charge. An example of Edward's most immoral rule-breaking deed was when he framed Doctor Guerra for hoarding body parts out of revenge for getting him suspended.
However, Edward does express a more altruistic and unselfish side. When he had discovered that his crush, Kristin Kringle, was being abused by her boyfriend, Officer Tom Dougherty, he went over to defend her despite Kringle's objections and ignoring the fact that Dougherty exceeded him physically. Another example was when he saved Kringle from being shot when the Maniacs invaded the G.C.P.D. and when he nursed an injured Penguin back to health.
His attempts at romance are feeble at best. Although Edward does constantly try to impress Kringle, it never pans his way, such as writing a love letter for her which is discovered by her then-boyfriend Arnold Flass, which was used to humiliate him and planting a bullet inside a cupcake which was an attempt at a romantic metaphor. Edward was eternally optimistic; he had hope that he and Kringle would still be a couple despite her outright rejecting him multiple times, ironically this determination was a factor of why Kringle found him unlikable.
However, as the series continued, something began to affect Edward's psyche. Because of the humiliation and abuse he has suffered all of his life and in his work place, he slowly suffers from a breakdown until he actually had a mental collapse when confronting Dougherty at Kringle's home and ends up stabbing him multiple times which resulted in a magnitude of emotions: shock at what he had done and hysterical laughter while muttering to himself "Oh, dear" at the sight of Dougherty's corpse.
After murdering Dougherty, Edward tries to resist his new persona but was seen arguing with himself and his "dark side" in the evidence room when he had discovered that the letter he had forged told Dougherty leaving Gotham left a clue that he was the one who actually killed him. Edward's schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder became all too clear; he had no capacity for remorse or mercy, even taking some joy in murdering people, developing a much darker and sadistic personality and becoming a shameless serial killer and psychopath.
What is shown from this "Evil Ed" persona (a name given by many fans) is that he was reckless and arrogant, he had hidden clues in his forged Dougherty letter by spelling out his name NYGMA at the beginning of every sentence and nearly admitting to Kringle that he had killed Dougherty during their dinner. Eventually, after accidentally murdering Kringle while trying to subdue her, then later hiding her body in G.C.P.D., he discovered that he enjoyed getting away with murder and embraced his darkness, which was proven when he remorselessly killed a hunter while he was discarding Kringle's body in the forest.
Edward's serial killer identity has shown to be short-tempered, aggressive, forward, and downright arrogant - an example was when he slammed a drawer, angry at himself for leaving a clue about his involvement in Dougherty's demise and telling Penguin that his mother dying was because of his own weakness. However, he was also able to project a calmness and confidence in his movements and words, something which surprised Gordon, for as long as he had known Edward he had always appeared shy and insecure. Edward still kept his powerful intelligence, able to cleverly hide the remains of his victims and could recognize it would be beneficial for him if he struck a partnership with Penguin after he had saved his life.
In spite of Edward's intelligence, he is shown to be quite paranoid and unreasonable, especially when he thinks someone is on to him, like when he believed Jim was close to the sudden disappearance of Kristen or when he fell for Gordon's trap when he thought the latter was going to find Kristen.
Powers and Abilities[]
- Eidetic memory: Nygma has claimed that he is incapable of forgetting anything.
- Explosives expert: Nygma is skilled at creating bombs, such as the ones he put in the museum and the train station.
- Encyclopedic knowledge: Edward possesses a profound knowledge of anatomy and displays a wide-ranging command of esoterica from numerous fields.
- Forensic expert: Nygma was the forensic specialist for the GCPD prior to his arrest. He was able to use his skills of forensics to frame Gordon for Pinkey's murder. He also noticed how the brake lines to Isabella's car had been cut, something the GCPD forensics team failed to see.
- Skilled lockpick user: Edward has at least rudimentary lock picking skills, as shown when he successfully broke into the Medical Examiner's locker and accessed Hugo Strange's elevator to Indian Hill.
- Logical Reasoning: Edward is able to calculate the likelihood of certain events. He also has the remarkable ability to view people and situations as puzzles to be solved. As such, Edward managed to successfully solve an advanced puzzle box within several seconds, an item of which has been passed down throughout generations due to its complexity, with even Oswald claiming that the most skilled mathematician could not crack it.
- Master manipulator/Master of deception: Nygma is skilled at manipulating others, such as the inmates at Arkham. He was able to trick Kristen into thinking Dougherty left Gotham by writing a letter with his name in it.
- Master tactician: Nygma is able to flawlessly execute the crimes he commits through careful and methodical planning, such as when he had Gordon incarcerated for murder. In his escape from Arkham, he knew when the guards and the guarding forces were walking around the floors of the asylum to scan the place, and knew how to act as he planted the bombs in the museum and the train station.
- Medical knowledge: Nygma has some medical knowledge, having managed to save Oswald from dying from his gunshot wound and nurse him back to health.
Weakness[]
- Obsessive Disorder: Oswald stated that his true weakness is a desperate compulsive need to complete what he has started in exacting fashion. This makes him far more predictable than emotions. His need to prove his intellectual superiority as well as make the death of Oswald more dramatic made him weak and gave Oswald an opening to beat Edward Nygma at his own game. After months of being frozen on ice, his mind suffered severe damage and made this trait even more noticeable. He spent six hours devising two overcomplicated riddles (in rap form), that Oswald misinterprets and when he storms into the Iceberg Lounge, he is so frustrated that he does not realize he walked into the same trap as last time. After what Oswald said, he questions his own identity; Ed Nygma, The Riddler, someone else or nobody.
- Split Personalities: Whenever Nygma is struggling with something internally or emotionally, he subconsciously creates a mental projection of his issue. After murdering Tom Dougherty, he began to hallucinate a darker, stronger version of himself which kept him in line. Initially the hallucination was only a reflection, but soon it appeared side by side with Nygma until it could hijack Nygma's own body. This hallucination would plague him until he accepted his life as a serial killer. The second hallucination was a brief image formed from his fear and guilt. Because Nygma was afraid that he would kill Isabella, he created a hallucination of Kringle who only said how it was a matter of time until Nygma kills Isabella as well. Unlike the Nygma hallucination, Kringle never evolved past the reflection stage. A third hallucination was the Penguin personality. Unlike the Nygma or Kringle hallucinations, Penguin was triggered by Edward taking pills. After thawing out, Nygma began experiencing his first hallucination once again as Dark Nygma, but in the form of his persona, The Riddler.
List of Victims[]
Season One[]
- Officer Tom Dougherty - Stabbed repeatedly in the chest.
- Total - 1
Season Two[]
- Kristen Kringle - Accidentally choked to death.
- Unnamed Hunter - Hit in the head with a shovel.
- Leonard - Killed with Oswald Cobblepot off-screen.
- Carl Pinkney - Bludgeoned with a crowbar.
- Total - 4
Season Three[]
- Two of Oswald Cobblepot's Henchmen - Both shot in the head.
- Five Unnamed People - Killed after they failed his test.
- Professor Dyson - Blown up with a bomb.
- Three Unknown People - Electrocuted to death.
- Teddy Thirio - Killed for a part of his riddle.
- Two Unnamed Theater Actors - Stabbed to death with a sword.
- Total - 14
Season Four[]
- Two of Sofia Falcone's Thugs - Blown up with a grenade launcher
- Arkham Guard - Murdered off-screen by either Edward or Oswald, body shown
- Lee Thompkins - Stabbed to death (later brought back to life)
- Total - 4
Season Five[]
- Three Street Demonz Members - Killed off-screen, bodies shown
- Emmanuel Vasquez - Killed off-screen, body shown
- Unnamed Old Woman - Thrown out of window
- Delta Force Member - Stabbed in the head with a thrown knife
- Arthur Penn - Shot in the head
- Two of Nyssa al Ghul's Henchmen - Blown up with a bomb
- Two Unnamed Soldiers - Shot repeatedly
- Four Unnamed Gangsters - Shot off-screen, bodies shown
- Total - 15
Overall[]
- Total - 38
- 37 People
- 1 Dog
Episode appearances[]
Trivia[]
- Edward working for the Gotham City Police Department is probably taken from the Arkham video game series Riddler, who was shown working for the G.C.P.D in the prequel game Batman: Arkham Origins.
- Also, when Edward's "dark side" speaks to him, it distorts, similar to how Riddler's voice does when he speaks to Batman in the Arkham games.
- The device he built to torture Tabitha and Butch might be another reference to the games, as the Riddler builds multiple elaborate death traps in the game Batman: Arkham City.
- After being thawed out, Riddler couldn't think complexly, as his brain was damaged from being frozen. (As his fan explained, he couldn't figure out "What's red and green and goes round and round?: a frog in a blender.")
- Edward's relationship with his alternate personality is similar to the relationship between the unnamed Narrator and Tyler Durden in the 1999 film Fight Club.
- In some versions of the character he has the surname "Nashton", where he ends up taking the name Nigma (sometimes spelled Nygma depending on the writers).
- Like most of his DC incarnations, Nygma always has an inability to tell a permanent lie. Even if he manages to get away with a lie like how he murdered Tom, he always leaves a clue about what actually happened, similar to how he made sure in each left margin, it spelled out "NYGMA".
- He may also tell half truths. One instance is how he told Leslie Thompkins about his fight with Kristen, but leaves out the part where he killed her. Another occurrence is when he admits that Kristen "left" Gotham to be with Tom Dougherty (via afterlife).
- Another example is his description of Tom Dougherty as "rotten". Naturally, Gordon assumed that Nygma was talking about Dougherty's personality, but Nygma was secretly referring to the fact that Dougherty is dead and decomposing.
- His license plate is "RIDL LVR".
- He is the most ruthless and violent version of the Riddler, being behind that of the "Batman: Earth One" incarnation.
- This incarnation begins to craft his Riddler persona and gimmick years prior to Bruce Wayne becoming Batman.
- This idea would later be used for the backstory of Riddler from the Batman: The Enemy Within video game, in which he operated in Gotham City as a costumed villain prior to Bruce Wayne becoming Batman.
- Nygma's struggle with his darker side and having a split personality makes him similar to another Batman rogue Harvey Dent/Two-Face.
- He has the highest bodycount in Gotham after he blew up Haven.
- Edward Nygma could be considered the occasional main anti-hero/villain of the series, as he mostly appears somewhat a protagonist and even shows good intentions in the overall plot. He shares that quality with Penguin, who is an occasional anti-hero/villain with less good qualities but more storyline and appearance.
- Edward Nygma was killed twice in Gotham : the first time frozen by Victor Fries on Penguin's orders in Season 3 and the second time by Lee Thompkins in Season 4. He was resurrected every time, first by his former classmate Myrtle Jenkins, (who will be killed by Victor Zsasz on Penguin's orders) and Hugo Strange.
- In Season 5, Riddler becomes the sole personality as Hugo Strange placing a control chip in his brain damaged the part with the Edward personality and erased him.
See also[]
- For his Heroes Wiki article, see here.
