One of the more controversial elements of Zero Year is the early appearance of Lieutenant Jim Gordon. We can freely admit to our initial reaction being "Tread carefully here, Snyder..." We should have known to trust the man from the start though, because of course Jim Gordon, always the sole good cop in a sea of corruption and the man who would be Commissioner, obviously isn't crooked. It just looked that way for a moment. Oh Snyder, you crafty rascal! It all boils down to an incident when rookie cop Gordon has a young Bruce in his car one day, after catching him playing truant from school to go and see The Mark Of Zorro (nice touch). Bruce sees Gordon and his partner Corrigan make plenty of stops before they drop him off, and Jim is given a snazzy trenchcoat at one stop-off. The young Wayne realises when he is older that this was obviously a bribe, so Gordon must be a bent cop. We find out later that Gordon, who had only just moved to Gotham, was simply lying to himself and not wanting to believe that he had transferred into the most corrupt police department ever. He ends up uncovering a dog fighting ring, run by the GCPD and gets in an almighty scuffle with his partner Corrigan. Basically, this was all a very roundabout way of introducing a little bit of mystery and potential danger into the character of Gordon, who has always been such a straight arrow. Which we love him for. We're super happy he didn't turn out to be corrupt, to be honest. Phew.
