When Batwoman made its Arrowverse debut, the character didn't have any experience as a vigilante. With two different characters having taken on the mantle, both had different levels of fight skills to bring to the table, creating some very different fight scenes for the show.
Kate Kane and Ryan Wilder aren't the only characters who know how to throw a punch though. They have friends, teammates, and even enemies who rival their skills, leading to some very interesting fight scenes over the course of the show.
10 Batwing Goes After Alice
Though Luke Fox has done plenty of solo training with a punching bag, he doesn't take on a superheroic identity until Batwoman's Season 3. When he does, there's a lot of debate as to whether or not he's actually ready to be in the middle of the fight.
When he decides to go after Alice in the episode "Loose Teeth," he proves that he can hold his own in the field. Alice is a great hand-to-hand combatant with an affinity for knives. Luke isn't out to capture or disable her, and he manages to hold his own in their brief altercation with a few blocks. What's great about the fight is that he actually gets the better of her, able to inject her with nanotech during the fight to enable the team to track their reluctant ally.
9 Ryan Tries To Save Sophie From Black Mask
When Ryan Wilder becomes Batwoman in the second season, she wants to do some good in the world, but has a hard time adjusting to the vigilante life. Some of her better fights actually showcase her inexperience against powerful villains.
In the episode "Arrive Alive," Ryan tracks down Sophie, who is being held by Black Mask. She battles Black Mask while Sophie manages to free herself from her restraints. When the villain has the better of the brand new Batwoman though, it's Sophie who comes up behind Black Mask to save the person there to save her. It's a reminder that the vigilante can't do everything herself and that even heroes need a little help.
8 Kate First Takes On The Wonderland Gang
Though a lot of villains come and go in the series, the first villain remains the show's strongest. Alice initially is in the Wonderland Gang's command when Kate Kane first returns to Gotham to begin Batwoman's origin story.
When she first finds out that Alice has gone after her ex Sophie, Kate decides to take the criminal on herself—before she ever dons the cowl. Kate makes her way into the Wonderland Gang's hideout to cut down the members on her way to Alice. It's a great display of her skills that gives the audience faith in her taking on the vigilante role even though she doesn't win the fight. Kate uses a fire extinguisher, a skillet, and a refrigerator door as weapons in her fight.
7 Alice & Kate Break Into Arkham
The Season 1 episode "Through The Looking Glass" sees Kate team up with a surprising partner: Alice. She and Alice don't just team up, but they break into Arkham Asylum together. It's that break-in that makes for a great fight sequence in the series.
Kate makes sure that Alice agrees not to kill any of the security guards as they break in, but Alice and Kate waste no time incapacitating everyone they come into contact with. It's a great sequence to show how much Kate's fighting has grown in such a short time as she's able to use her surroundings, like the hallway walls, to take on opponents much larger than her instead of relying solely on found objects to use as weapons.
6 Batwoman Takes On Titan
In the first season, a lot of Kate's one-on-one fights leave a lot to be desired for the audience. By the season finale, however, Kate's become as exciting to watch in a one-on-one fight as much as she is against a group.
That's the case when she goes up against the villain known as "Titan." Kate, as Batwoman, tries to take Arkham Asylum escapee Tim Teslow back into custody while also being pursued by the Crows. Taking on Teslow alone forces Kate to use her skills in an open area without found objects, doors, or walls to aid in her fight.
5 Alice Unleashes Arkham On Kate
While Alice and Kate working together to break into Arkham is a fun watch for fans, so is Alice turning on Kate a few episodes later when Kate's trying to get out of Arkham. It's Alice who decides to release all of the prisoners as a distraction from her, leaving Kate to have to battle her way past them to get out of the building.
This is the first season's best fight sequence as it looks like pure chaos, but is certainly carefully choreographed behind the scenes. It's impossible for Kate to take on everyone in her path, but she does manage to battle several prisoners on her way out and save the lives of a few of the guards, getting out without any serious injuries.
4 Kate Goes Up Against Batwoman & Alice
In the series' second season, the audience was in for a surprise in the form of a very different Kate Kane than they were used to. Manipulated by the villain Black Mask, Kate was tricked into believing she was Circe Sionis, and she was willing to do anything for his criminal empire. That put her in direct opposition to Ryan's Batwoman when the latter rescued her ex, Angelique.
While Ryan fights a masked "Circe," she uses her batons and works her way through the abandoned factory Roman Sionis has been using to manufacture his latest drug. Kate's Circe gets the better of Ryan, and Ryan ends up being saved by Alice.
3 Ryan, Sophie, & The Jets Take On The New Professor Pyg
Batwoman's third season introduces the Jet family—Ryan's birth family—to the show. With a dinner party at their home that Ryan and Sophie attend comes the villain Professor Pyg as their "chef." The episode itself plays out like a horror movie thriller as Marquis' girlfriend is killed before the dinner party members discover their drinks have been spiked with a paralytic.
The fight against Professor Pyg is less of a single fight scene than it is a long string of fight sequences as both Sophie and Ryan try to fight off the effects of the drug enough to protect Jada and Marquis. Ultimately, it's Marquis that saves everyone, though Sophie and Ryan get to team up for a great fight.
2 Alice & Ocean Come To Blows In A Subway Car
Alice's backstory involving Ocean goes a long way in humanizing her just as much as the reveal of her captivity as a child does. Meeting Ocean slowly unlocks a part of Alice that has long been dormant, and the fight between the two in an abandoned subway car is where that really starts.
As they trade blows in the car, Alice's hand-to-hand skills are put on great display, but the fight is also interspersed with flashbacks to Ocean training her years earlier. It's an intense fight and a good way to introduce the audience to more backstory.
1 Poison Mary Defeats Batwoman & Batwing
With Batwoman's third season come new villains inspired by legacy Batman characters who find "trophies" from the old villains. Poison Ivy's trophy is a vine that is left to run loose in the wild. When Mary ends up infected by the vine, she ends up with all of Poison Ivy's abilities.
Even before she comes into all of her powers and completely transforms, Mary makes for a formidable opponent when she realizes she doesn't want Ryan to have to turn her over to the police. Mary manages to take on both Ryan's Batwoman and Luke's Batwing almost without lifting a finger. The heroes are trapped and incapacitated by Mary's control over plant life as she slips away.