Selina Kyle (Gotham)

Selina Kyle, sometimes called "Cat", is a savvy, independent, young street thief that roams the alleyways and rooftops of Gotham. After witnessing the murder of his parents, she became associated with Bruce Wayne and Detective James Gordon. Selina's alignment often switched between helping them or the criminals of Gotham City, including Barbara Kean, Fish Mooney and Tabitha Galavan.

Biography

Season One

Selina Kyle is introduced as a 13-year-old street orphan and skilled thief. In the pilot episode, she personally witnesses the murders of Thomas and Martha Wayne. She forms a tenuous alliance with GCPD Detective Jim Gordon after he saves her from kidnappers working for the Dollmaker. She promises to help him solve the Wayne murders if he helps her get out of trouble with the law. Gordon has her temporarily housed at Wayne Manor, which leads to her befriending the Waynes' son, Bruce. She saves him from a gang of hired killers and gives him his first kiss. She also helps Bruce find Reggie Payne, the man who stabbed Bruce's butler Alfred Pennyworth, pushing Payne out of a window to his death to prevent him from telling the people who hired him that she and Bruce are onto them. Selina also has connections with Ivy Pepper and later befriends Barbara Kean, Gordon's ex-fiance. During the gang war between Carmine Falcone and Sal Maroni, Selina is among the street children recruited into Fish Mooney's gang. When a gang war erupts between Oswald Cobblepot and Mooney for the control of Gotham's underworld, Selina declines to pick a side and slips away during the conflict.

Season Two

Selina later re-emerges working for Cobblepot's gang and tries to protect Bruce from corrupt billionaire Theo Galavan and his niece, Silver St. Cloud, who competes with Selina for Bruce's affections. Later, Bruce and Selina stage a kidnapping to find out what Silver knows about the Wayne murders. She teams up with Gordon and Cobblepot to save Bruce when he is kidnapped by the Sacred Order of Saint Dumas. She allows Bruce to live on the streets with her for a while and tries to teach him how to fight. When Bruce decides to go back home, Selina angrily spurns his friendship. Selina later volunteers to infiltrate Arkham Asylum to find Hugo Strange's experiments. She also meets Bridgit Pike, the alter ego of the vigilante Firefly, and becomes her ally in fighting human traffickers. In the season finale, Selina helps Bruce and Lucius Fox infiltrate Arkham and save Gordon from Edward Nygma.

Season Three

When Strange uses experimental technology to revive Fish Mooney, Selina once again goes to work for her. When one of Mooney's minions catches Ivy stealing from her, Selina tries to save her, but is helpless to stop Mooney's thugs from pushing Ivy into a vat of toxic waste.

Later on, Selina encounters Subject 514A, a clone of Bruce created by Strange. After 514A saves Selina during a robbery gone wrong, she sees his scars and realizes he isn't Bruce. 514A explains the situation, and Selina tells him he is more normal than Bruce. With that, 514A kisses Selina and the two part ways. Later, while Selina is stealing wallets at the Cobblepot's party, she encounters Ivy, who reveals that Marv, one of Mooney's minions, aged her and gave her the power to make plants do her bidding.

After Bruce confesses his feelings for her, Selina kisses him. She tries to help Bruce and Alfred break into a building owned by the Court of Owls, assisted by Selina's long-lost mother, Maria. Although Maria seems to want to reconnect with her daughter, Selina later discovers that she only returned to extort money from Bruce. Selina then tearfully tells her mother to leave Gotham and never return. Selina gets angry at Bruce once she finds out he kept the truth about her mother from her, and breaks up with him.

514A attempts to get Selina to leave Gotham with him, but she says that he will never be the man Bruce is and that she doesn't care about him. She attempts to warn Alfred, but 514A pushes her out a window. However, a herd of cats revive her, and she is taken to the hospital, where Ivy helps heal her. She comes back to Wayne Manor to kill 514A, but Alfred stops her and throws her out. She allies herself with Ivy and Cobblepot, but is captured by Barbara, Nygma and Tabitha Galavan. She negotiates her way out by betraying Cobblepot, protecting Ivy, and getting money to leave Gotham. After her relationship with Bruce is further strained during the chaos caused by Jervis Tetch's "Alice" virus, Selina meets up with Tabitha looking for employment, which Tabitha gives her after testing her talents with a whip. Selina tells Tabitha that she is "done just surviving".

Season Four

Eventually, Selina and Tabitha work for a revived Barbara Kean, even when Barbara aligns herself with Sofia Falcone. The Falcone family's hitman, Victor Zsasz, offers Selina and Tabitha the opportunity to enter Cobblepot's licensed crime system. After Tabitha refuses, Selina goes in alone. At Cobblepot's club, the relationship between Bruce and Selina rekindles, as Bruce apologizes for his previous behavior. They later encounter each other anonymously, both dressed as their vigilante personas. Selina is working for Barbara and Tabitha; she has to steal an ancient, mystical knife from Cobblepot's cargo, while Bruce is trying to make sure the knife doesn't fall into Ra's al Ghul's hands. When Bruce is spotted by Cobblepot's goons, they open fire and he has to fight his way out while Selina goes back to the Siren's club empty-handed. Bruce later buys the knife at auction and Selina asks him to give it to her, but he refuses and tells her to leave. When Barbara wants to shut the Sirens down, Selina proves her worth to them by going on her own to steal from the bikers' gang. The Sirens later oppose Cobblepot after being tasked to capture Nygma for him. The Sirens then capture Sofia as an asset against Cobblepot, then end up working for her to bring him down, sending him to Arkham and taking over his empire.

Bruce and Selina meet again later in the season at the Siren's Club, where Bruce is drinking and partying to numb his guilt over killing Ra's. Eventually, Bruce asks Selina for help, but she is on her way to stop Ivy from murdering innocent people and tells him to atone for his actions, especially regarding his behavior towards Alfred. During the second half of the season, Selina is torn between her loyalty to the Sirens and her feelings for Bruce, which causes friction between the three parties. Eventually, Selina helps Bruce fight other villains like Jerome Valeska, a resurrected Ra's Al Ghul, and Jonathan Crane. Bruce is sprayed by Crane's fear toxin, but Selina is able to reach him. They share a kiss back at Wayne Manor seconds before she is shot and paralyzed by Jerome's brother Jeremiah. After Jeremiah and Ra's destroy Gotham City's bridges to the outside world, turning the city into a no man's land, Bruce tells Alfred to take Selina to Gotham's last remaining hospital and oversee her recovery.

Season Five

Months later, Selina has undergone an operation to keep her spine from collapsing, but she remains paralyzed. She tries to commit suicide, but her doctors stop her. Bruce takes the advice of a nurse to seek out "the witch" as he asks where to find her. The witch turns out to be Ivy, who reluctantly gives Bruce a strange boil to cure Selina. Once the boil is administered, Selina regains the ability to walk, as well as new, quasi-feline powers. Suffering from PTSD episodes, Selina decides to get revenge on Jeremiah by stabbing him in the chest. Later, Cobblepot comes to her for help in defeating jewel thief Magpie, and the two of them plan to leave Gotham forever.

Bruce and Selina share a surprise date where he expresses his intention to leave Gotham, which saddens her. Ivy walks in, hypnotizing Bruce and leaves Selina in the middle of a fight. Selina gets out and finds Bruce and they both violently fight each other. She manages to snap him out of it by hitting him and tearfully admitting that she doesn't want him to leave. Bruce takes Selina as his date to Gordon and Leslie Thompkins' wedding, and kisses her. However, Bruce eventually decides to leave Gotham in order to train himself to fight crime, leaving a heartbroken Selina a note wishing her well and promising to one day return.

Ten Years Later

Ten years later, Selina has become a jewel thief and is being shadowed by a mysterious masked vigilante resembling a bat. Selina attends the opening of the new Wayne Tower and joins Barbara, Thompkins and Gordon in stopping Nygma and Jeremiah from destroying it. The vigilante – who she recognizes as Bruce – later tells her that he left Gotham City in order to protect her. She replies that she wanted him, not his protection. The two reconcile, but before leaving, Bruce tells Selina to return a diamond she had stolen; in response, she mutters "like hell".

Appearances

Gotham

Season One

"Pilot"
"Selina Kyle"
"The Balloonman"
"Viper"
"Spirit of the Goat"
"The Mask"
"Harvey Dent"
"Lovecraft"
"Rogues' Gallery"
"Welcome Back, Jim Gordon"
"The Fearsome Dr. Crane"
"The Blind Fortune Teller"
"Red Hood"
"Everyone Has a Cobblepot"
"Beasts of Prey"
"Under the Knife"
"All Happy Families Are Alike"

Season Two

"Rise of the Villains: Damned If You Do..."
"Rise of the Villains: The Last Laugh"
"Rise of the Villains: Strike Force"
"Rise of the Villains: Scarification"
"Rise of the Villains: By Fire"
"Rise of the Villains: Mommy's Little Monster"
"Rise of the Villains: A Bitter Pill to Swallow"
"Rise of the Villains: The Son of Gotham"
"Rise of the Villains: Worse Than A Crime"
"Wrath of the Villains: Mr. Freeze"
"Wrath of the Villains: A Dead Man Feels No Cold"
"Wrath of the Villains: This Ball of Mud and Meanness"
"Wrath of the Villains: Mad Grey Dawn"
"Wrath of the Villains: Into the Woods"
"Wrath of the Villains: Unleashed"
"Wrath of the Villains: A Legion of Horribles"
"Wrath of the Villains: Transference"

Season Three

"Mad City: Better to Reign in Hell..."
"Mad City: Look Into My Eyes"
"Mad City: New Day Rising"
"Mad City: Anything for You"
"Mad City: Red Queen"
"Mad City: The Executioner"
"Mad City: Time Bomb"
"Mad City: Beware the Green-Eyed Monster"
"Mad City: Ghosts"
"Mad City: Smile Like You Mean It"
"Heroes Rise: How the Riddler Got His Name"
"Heroes Rise: The Primal Riddle"
"Heroes Rise: Light The Wick"
"Heroes Rise: All Will Be Judged"
"Heroes Rise: Pretty Hate Machine"
"Heroes Rise: Heavydirtysoul"

Season Four

"A Dark Knight: Pax Penguina"
"A Dark Knight: The Fear Reaper"
"A Dark Knight: They Who Hide Behind Masks"
"A Dark Knight: A Day in the Narrows"
"A Dark Knight: Stop Hitting Yourself"
"A Dark Knight: Things That Go Boom"
"A Dark Knight: Queen Takes Knight"
"A Dark Knight: Pieces of a Broken Mirror"
"A Dark Knight: A Beautiful Darkness"
"A Dark Knight: Reunion"
"A Dark Knight: The Sinking Ship, The Grand Applause"
"A Dark Knight: One of My Three Soups"
"A Dark Knight: That's Entertainment"
"A Dark Knight: To Our Deaths and Beyond"
"A Dark Knight: One Bad Day"
"A Dark Knight: No Man's Land"

Season Five

"Legend of the Dark Knight: Year Zero"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: Trespassers"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: Penguin, Our Hero"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: Ruin"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: Pena Dura"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: 13 Stitches"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: Ace Chemicals"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: The Trial of Jim Gordon"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: I Am Bane"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: They Did What?"
"Legend of the Dark Knight: The Beginning..."

Tie-In Media

Novels

Gotham: Dawn of Darkness
Gotham: City of Monsters

Motion Comic

Gotham Stories

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Selina Kyle (Gotham)

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Trivia

The season 5 storyline in which Selina is temporarily rendered paraplegic by Jeremiah Valeska, could have been inspired by a very similar plot point in The Killing Joke, where Barbara Gordon is paralyzed in the same way by the Joker (via a gunshot to the spine).