This season has been all-out war on "Gotham," and the latest episodes have only ramped up the action and intrigue. In an effort to rescue a kidnapped Bruce Wayne, Jim Gordon formed an uneasy alliance with the Penguin in order to mount an assault on Theo Galavan and the Order of St. Dumas. However, with such high stakes and so many players involved -- including Alfred, Tabitha, Silver, Selina and Captain Barnes -- it's a guarantee that not everyone will make it out alive.

Fox's "Gotham" Provides Surprise Origin For Classic Batman Ally

Ahead of tonight's winter finale, Executive Producer John Stephens spoke with CBR about Jim Gordon's shades of grey, Penguin's thirst for vengeance, a character's death and Bruce's evolution into Batman. In addition, Stephens talked about Mr. Freeze and Hugo Strange's connection to Gotham City, Nygma's descent into darkness, and a hint that Azrael might make "Gotham" his home before the season is over.

CBR News: Last week, "The Son of Gotham" culminated with Theo Galavan confronting Bruce Wayne. Theo could -- and would love to, it seems -- simply murder Bruce, but we know he's not allowed to. What does the Order of St. Dumas want with the young billionaire?

John Stephens: A lot of this goes back to the Batman lore. The Order of St. Dumas features pretty heavily into it. Anyone who is deeply involved in the Batman world knows the Order of St. Dumas is also the order of monks who created Azrael. That is sort of prefiguring where we're going to be going towards the end of the season, setting up certain ideas like proto-versions of what Batman might become. Bruce can start to see characters that are going to inform the costumed hero that he is going to be in the years to come. The Order of St. Dumas will almost provide a negative example which will guide him on a certain path.

From the start, Jim Gordon has straddled the line between right and wrong. How far over that line is he willing to step in order to save Bruce?

That's where we're going to see Jim make some really dark choices in the coming episodes. A lot of our thinking in creating this season was to put people on that spectrum, and see how far into the darkness they can all go and still come back. Some of our character go into the darkness and never come back. Some of our characters go into the darkness and do come back, but find themselves tainted.

A big part of our storyline stems from the idea that if there had been no Jim Gordon, there would be no Batman, so we're going to see Jim make some really dark choices to save Bruce. That's going to inform Bruce about the man he's going to become. The dark choices Gordon is going to make in the upcoming episode are there, in a sense, so that Batman himself doesn't go to those places. It's all part of that dialogue between those two characters.

Jim and Oswald have once again formed an uneasy alliance. How does that sit with them? Is it a last resort?

It's a last resort for Jim, but not a last resort for the writers. We love seeing the two of them together. When you have such strong actors as Ben [McKenzie] and Robin [Lord Taylor], you want to do everything possible to have them have scenes together. They also enjoy being with one another in scenes, which doesn't happen that often, so you try and make it happen.

It also keys in to the idea of the spectrum of light and dark that everybody in our show works on. Penguin helps to pull Jim towards that dark side. We also like the idea that Penguin actually has true affection towards Jim. Maybe, if push came to shove, he would sacrifice Jim for business. But out of all the people in our world, except for his mother and now Nygma, Penguin actually does consider Jim a friend. That causes him to make some interesting choices going forward, too.

Going into this, how clearly is Penguin thinking? Theo and Tabitha killed his mother. Is he all-consumed by vengeance?

He's pretty all-consumed by vengeance. I'd say he's a vengeance missile, at this point, heading towards Gotham. He's just going to leave destruction in his wake. I wouldn't get in his way.

Oswald and Nygma share more time together in the finale. What are you enjoying about their dynamic and where it's heading?

A lot of it is just seeing them together. When you have two characters who are so strong and are played by such actors, it decreases the need to give them large dramatic things to play. You could have Penguin and Nygma, like in last week's episode, talk about Penguin clogging the toilet and Nygma using up all the relish. Because we know who they are so well, they could almost play anything. The two of them could get together and read the phone book and I feel I would be interested in watching them.

Also, Nygma is not as far along the super-villain trajectory as Penguin is right now. In a sense, Penguin is going to be his godfather going forward, leading him along that journey and setting up what becomes a partnership in the coming seasons.

Between finding his dad's secret lair and masterfully manipulating Silver St. Clair, Bruce continues to take steps towards becoming Batman. How will this ordeal with Theo further push him in that direction?

He's going to have to trust himself in a different way. The minute he can trust himself that he can handle being in these morally perilous situations and know how he's going to react, he's going to be more and more likely to put himself in that situation. In the pilot, you watched Bruce basically say, "I was so scared, I couldn't do anything." What we're going to see in the next episode is Bruce confront that very fear of being so scared, and how he's going to get beyond fear and conqueror his own fears.

Through all of this, Selina is continuing to keep tabs on Bruce. In what ways might she prove to be a wild card in rescuing him?

She's always kind of a wild card. You're never sure what she's going to do in those situations. She desires that connection with Bruce, but she never wants to be seen as deserving a connection with another human being. She wants to be like a cat, completely self-sufficient, even though she wants to be around him. It's going to start to set up a bigger storyline in their developing relationship that we're going to play heavily in the back-half of the season.

We also saw Alfred go toe-to-toe with Tabitha in a truly violent fight. Alfred no longer seems comfortable remaining on the sidelines, so what can we expect from him in the latter half of the season?

The Alfred we saw in last week's episode is much more the vision of the Alfred we're going to see moving forward. His S.A.S. training is going to be more and more evident, especially as Bruce pushes harder to find what's been going on inside his company and inside Indian Hill. As those things come to the fore and Bruce is putting himself in more perilous situations, Alfred is going to be at his side.

Where is Tabitha while all this is going down?

She's in the thick of it. We're going to see the culmination and the climax of the tensions that have been arising between Tabitha and her brother Theo. The two of them will also come to blows in the finale. She's in the heart of the action.

The synopsis promises not everyone will make it out alive. How does this death -- or deaths -- affect the characters?

In an absolutely seismic way. The death that occurs will shape the second half of the season, both in the immediate way that affects everybody, and in an ongoing way in the later part of the season. It's really the starting pistol for the second half of the season.

What other big tease can you give about the winter finale?

Besides everything else that happens, we will also see the introduction of one of the big Batman rogues on the show that we have not seen yet: Mr. Freeze.

How long will viewers have to wait to see Hugo Strange? What can you share about "Gotham's" take on him and Mr. Freeze?

You won't have to wait long at all to see Hugo Strange. In fact, we'll be seeing him as soon as we come back in the New Year. We're going to see those two end up working together as we go forward. Both of them will be at the heart of this mystery that our characters have been investigating since last year, about what is happening inside Wayne Enterprises and how that is connected to the death of the Waynes. We'll be tying those two characters into the core mystery of the show.

After he debuted with a major story last season, we haven't seen much of Harvey Dent. What kind of plans do you have for him?

He's still a part of the world of "Gotham." We still use him, and we still always ask ourselves, "Is there a way we can bring Harvey into the show?" We spent so much time on this track of following the Galavans throughout the first half of the season, that we haven't been able to use him as much as we wanted to. Right now, we have him plugged in for a bunch of episodes going forward, but we don't have any big arc for him. We still continue to think about him all the time.

It's that case of, when we're dealing with the Batman world, of having an abundance of riches. Whenever you feel like you using one character, or developing a following character, you know you are always short-changing someone else. You just have to hope you are on the air long enough that you give everyone their due.

Barbara Kean took a well-received walk on the dark side earlier this season. Have we seen the last of her?

We have absolutely not see the last of Barbara. She'll be coming back in the middle of the second half of the season. We will continue to take her along a more dangerous path. Erin [Richards] was so wonderful in that version of crazy Barbara that we wanted to have as much of her as we possibly could. We are developing a storyline for her in the second half of the season that will be leading into next season as well.

What other characters should audiences keep an eye on in the future?

I'm really excited for everyone to see the real emergence of Nygma. He's the villain we've been putting on the slowest build. Now, we're going to see him take a couple more huge steps forward to becoming the Riddler. He's going to do it in a way that really impacts our main characters in a dramatic way.

I think the developing Bruce/Selina relationship can be very emotional and heart-wrenching. We will watch these kids develop and make the choices about who they are going to be as they grow closer together and then farther apart.