James Gordon

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* 2016
* 2022

**James “Jim” Worthington Gordon Sr.** is an American police officer and Gotham City Police Commissioner appointed in 2019.

Police Commissioner Gordon has dedicated his career to cleaning up the corruption in Gotham City Police Department, a goal he has come a long way towards accomplishing. He has been equally tough on crime, and in the pursuit of making Gotham City safe for all it’s citizens, Gordon has forged an uneasy alliance with Gotham’s other top crime fighter, the mysterious vigilante known as Batman.

## History

### Background Information

Raised in Chicago, James’ father, Peter, was an alcoholic lawyer, thief and criminal who took out drunken frustrations on his son and especially his wife, Barbara. When Jim was nine years old, Peter’s destructive behaviour continued until he struck an innocent bystander whilst drunk driving; Peter was subsequently sentenced to 11 years in Montgomery Federal Prison Camp in Montgomery, Alabama. This left the Gordon family broke, but seizing the opportunity, Barbara divorced Peter and, fearing his release or escape from prison, she took James and left Chicago with whatever little money they had left. At first, they stayed with Peter’s brother, Frank, a cop in Gotham city.

Jim was sheltered within the Gotham suburbs, which seems to have given him an opposite perspective of the city as a child to the one he would later be exposed to during his career as a police detective. When the time came, Barbara and Jim left for Little Rock, Arkansas. While Gordon grew up moving from household to household, he had become a noteworthy troublemaker and rebel.

When Gordon was fourteen, he broke his femur while jumping a fence to escape a truant officer; Gordon later said this was a turning point for him, as after skipping school and shoplifting only led to trouble and a broken bone, he determined that he got better results from working with established rules rather than rebelling against them.

### Divergence

#### Military Service

Following his accident, Gordon turned his bad attendance record and his failing academic status around, eventually graduating high school with perfect grades. Gordon volunteered into the United States Army in November 1993 with consent from his mother, two months before his 18th birthday; he quickly passed basic training and in January 1994 he was assigned as a replacement marine. Gordon likely later joined the special forces as a result of his war-hero reputation. During his time in combat, Gordon narrowly escaped death several times.

Upon his mother’s death back home, Gordon was granted discharge from the Army and returned to the States in 2005 where, after his mother’s funeral in Little Rock, he relocated back to Illinois, began studying criminology with university professors and joined the Chicago police academy.

#### Chicago

Gordon graduated from the police academy and became frustrated with his fellow officers' laxness. On patrol, he once confronted three men assaulting a woman and managed to apprehend one of the assailants. When the suspect was beaten during interrogation, Gordon declined to participate. He later persuaded the suspect to give up the others.

Gordon was still taking university night classes in criminology when he began dating Barbara Kean, a waitress and fellow student. After being assigned to the Bureau of Criminal Investigation, he moved to Chicago's Logan Square and married Kean in 2008.

In later years Gordon began to witness brutality among other Chicago officers when corruption, bribery and violence within the force grew. After Gordon uncovered evidence of fraudulent results in the mayoral election and brought down two more of his fellow officers, his Commissioner assigned him to the case against the Viti crime family, which Gordon later figured was a move to “keep your enemies closer”. With a select group of ‘clean’ cops, Gordon tried to gather evidence against the family to little avail, seemingly being sabotaged every step of the way.

It became clear to Gordon that the mob had him on a lead, and that his life in general was not in his control, paired with his failing and one-sided marriage. Gordon's extensive, unpredictable hours on the job were putting a strain on his marriage to Barbara Kean, with whom he was struggling to conceive their first child. Gordon began to feel powerless and depressed and he would commit himself further to his work to the point of obsessiveness, and he would find it difficult to sleep. Shortly afterwards, Gordon was involved in an incident which caused the death of several innocents including a child, when Gordon inadvertently caused a two-train collision during a bomb plot. After acting as a private detective to make ends meet; Gordon was cleared of all charges and offered his job with the police force.

Once Gordon rejoined the CPD it became clear to his commissioner that Gordon had developed an alcohol addiction as a result of the traumatic train incident, and continued to be obsessive in his work. His Commissioner subsequently suggested Gordon relocate for both his own safety and the safety of the other officers, to which he agreed.

### Turning Points

Arriving in Gotham in January 2016, Gordon aimed to rid the city of it’s reputation as "the most dangerous city in America", and immediately discovered corruption among his fellow officers. In March, after refusing a bribe Gordon was beaten by a masked gang of corrupt cops, who threatened a now-pregnant Barbara. After privately dealing with vengeance against his corrupt partner, Arnold Flass, whom Gordon recognised from the attack; Gordon began turning a blind eye to the corruption, but subsequently began another battle with the obsessive detail in his work and found it difficult to sleep.

In April 2016, Gordon became a local hero after single-handedly saving a group of children from a hostage situation.

After the ‘Bat-Man’ made a threat towards the wealthy elite of Gotham city and especially crime boss Carmine Falcone; Commissioner Loeb assigned the still not-entirely-trustworthy Gordon the task of the leading the anti-Batman Taskforce, and promoted him to lead detective on the case of the vigilante.

Initially hating the Batman, it became clear to Gordon over time that Batman could be a force for good in Gotham. By June, it had become clear to Gordon that Eileen had become scared and wary of Gotham and wanted to leave. After subsequently encountering Batman, it became clear to Gordon that he couldn’t tell Eileen about anything at the darker sides of his work anymore, and this lack of communication quickly resulted in his affair with co-worker and partner, Sarah. When asked by Sarah why he’d moved to Gotham, “The most dangerous city in America”; Gordon stated it’s because he idolised Gotham as a child, and he wished to restore it to it’s former glory.

In conversation with Harvey Bullock, and later his uncle Frank; Gordon accepted that Gotham had always been corrupt and unlawful even when he was a child. With his heroic facade proving to be ineffective due to Jefferson Skeevers’ poisoning, and with little anymore to fight towards; Gordon quit the police force and subsequently became a guard at Arkham Hospital.

On the morning November 3, 2016, Mobster Johnny Viti targeted Gordon’s family and captured Gordon's infant son, James Jr. Gordon chased after him on a stolen motorcycle and they fought on a bridge until James Jr fell. Batman caught up in time and leapt over the bridge's railing, saving James Jr. Gordon let Batman go, and after a conversation, Gordon decided to return to the police force and confess his affair to Eileen; holding onto the newfound belief that a true hero would continue to fight despite the impossibility of his success.

Subsequently, Gordon confessed his affair to Eileen while Sarah agreed to leave Gotham. While Gordon confessed he didn’t feel like he could communicate with Eileen, she told him that she knew Gotham was an awful place, and that she’d stressed she’d wanted to leave repeatedly but Gordon was always too focused on his work to listen to her. In an effort to make up for it all despite Eileen’s reluctant forgiveness, Gordon got them into marriage counselling and brought flowers and chocolates repeatedly.

Flass subsequently supplied Assistant District Attorney Harvey Dent enough evidence and testimony needed to implicate Loeb, who resigned in disgrace. Gordon was shortly thereafter promoted to captain, and entered a secret partnership with Batman.

## Chronology

* 1976 - James Worthington Gordon is born to Peter and Barbara Gordon in Chicago, Illinois.
* 1977 - Roger Gordon is born.
* 1985 - Peter is jailed for 11 years following a drunk-driving and manslaughter conviction. Barbara Gordon divorces Peter and moves to Gotham with young James.
* 1989 - Barbara and James leave Gotham, turning James rebellious. James begins truanting and shoplifting.
* 1990 - James breaks his femur whilst running from a truant officer, and decides to turn his life around.
* 1993 - James volunteers into the US Army.
* 1994 - James is assigned as a replacement marine.
* 1997 - Whilst in America, James visits Uncle Frank in Gotham and volunteers for the police. Whilst there, he meets a young Bruce Wayne and gives him hope at a time when he is hopeless. Roger and Thelma Gordon marry and relocate to Ohio.
* 1997-2005 - James fights in the US Army as a Marine, eventually joining the special forces and becoming a decorated war hero.
* 2005 - Barbara passes away, while James is honourably discharged from the Army and moves back to Chicago. James begins studying criminology and joins the police academy.
* 2008 - James becomes a detective for Chicago Police Department and marries Barbara Kean.
* 2014 - James causes a train accident and is temporarily suspended from the police force.
* 2015 - James rejoins the Chicago Police Department, but is soon transferred to Gotham.
* 2016 - James relocates to Gotham with a pregnant Barbara. In October, James Gordon, Jr. is born.
* 2017 - James and Barbara adopt fifteen-year-old Barbara Gordon after Thelma’s death.
* 2019 - James is promoted to police commissioner.
* 2020 - James begins to build a stronger police force now that the last traces of Falcone corruption have been weeded out.
* 2022 - James and Barbara divorce after James Junior is sent away to a home for troubled boys. James enters a brief relationship with doctor Leslie Thompkins, but they split up amicably after Sarah Essen returns to Gotham and the pair begin dating.

## Personality and Traits

### Overview

A loyal, level-headed and pragmatic cop, Gordon seems to abide completely “by the book”; but makes exceptions when things are taken deeply personally to him, in which case he will willingly bend the rules to get what he might attain to be a 'personal justice'. Respectful and caring, and a highly perceptive individual, Gordon finds it easy to read people with a high level of accuracy and is able to work primarily based off his own instinct, making him an exceptional yet controversial detective. However, it seems that he can also sometimes be too confident and stubborn in his decisions or make judgments too quickly.

### Childhood, Upbringing and Early Adulthood

Gordon’s childhood relationship with his parents has made a tremendous impact on the man he is today; his relationship with his mother was difficult as a result of the tough working environment in which she had to raise her two sons, and Gordon seems to have joined the army simply to show her that he had recovered from and was trying to make up for his troublemaker past and his early teenage years of insulting his mother and pinning the blame for his childhood hardship solely on her, rather than his father and the environment he was raised in. This display of straightening out and joining strictly rule-following groups such as the army and the police force are early examples of Gordon’s guilty conscience shining through, and Gordon’s attempt to appeal to his mother and make her love him. This is probably due to his mother always having to work as a result of the lack of a responsible father figure, and likely gave Gordon an anxious and needy attachment style as a young man, always wanting and desiring approval from his mother.

Gordon’s absent father contributed to his early teenage years of acting out, as well as his one-sided viewpoint of his mother’s responsibility for his childhood unhappiness. Whilst in Chicago, Peter Gordon was an abusive alcoholic who made the lives of his wife and child a living Hell; upon his arrest, Barbara divorced Peter and left Gordon’s father as well as Chicago behind, making a new life within Gotham under the protection of Peter’s seemingly trustworthy brother, Frank. The period following this Gordon himself has began to lead a happy childhood, although to Peter’s insistence he and his brother were both sheltered from the world outside as a result of Gotham City’s unsafe environment and high crime rate. This was unbeknownst to Gordon at the time, and so when his mother eventually took the family away, Gordon began to attend school once again but became isolated and began to display more reckless and avoidant behaviour as a sole loner troublemaker, hesitant and extremely unwilling to take friends. Determined to make his mother upset for ruining his ideal placement, Gordon took his frustrations around his absent father, uncle and mother out on his mother and tried to make her feel responsible, which greatly impacted her mental health at the time. Following a physical trauma in the form of a broken femur, Gordon began to respect his mother when she began to attend him and he began to feel like working within established rules would work out better for himself and others - leading him to straighten out his own life and strive to appeal to his subsequently absent mother, called back to work heavy hours once again.

During this time, whenever Gordon would slow down or stop busying himself he would begin blaming himself for hurting his mother, who was now even more distant from him, which would lead to feelings of self-loathing and frustration which he would in turn avoid via studying harder for his education or training physically to one day join the army or the police force.

Barbara passed away in 2005 when Gordon was abroad with the Special Forces, and he returned home for her funeral and requested an honourable discharge after the best part of a decade working under the United States Army, which he was granted; his new ambition was to return to his native city and join the Chicago Police Department. Seemingly, once his mother passed away and he had no longer a desire to please her with military service and recognition, Gordon no longer had anything tying him back to the army and so he aimed to be who he genuinely wanted to be - a crime fighter. It is possible that Gordon was so harshly against troublemakers and rule-breakers partly due to his desire to please the spirit of his mother, but primarily due to his hatred and distaste for his father and what he did to him and his family.

### Chicago Police Department and Train Crash

Whilst enrolled in University of Chicago, Gordon primarily took night classes in criminology alongside working in the daytime firstly as a student in the Chicago Police Academy, in a course which was to last a few months and Gordon proceeded to speed through and graduate top of his class due to his seemingly endless energy and never ending devotion to the cause of law enforcement, and he would quickly become enrolled as a police officer later that year in 2005. The criminology course would go on to last three years, during which Gordon aimed to become a detective in Chicago specialising in homicides and would dedicate himself fully to the cause whilst also balancing his police work and his fledgling relationship with art student, businesswoman and part-time waitress, Barbara Kean.

Despite this considerable workload, Gordon was able to make everything work, even balancing his and Kean’s attachment styles. Both Gordon and Kean were more avoidant in relationships as a result of their estranged and distant relationships with their parents and family members, and would subsequently spend a lot of time apart whilst also reassuring one another they were around and had each other, and would visit and spend time together wherever and whenever possible.

In 2008, Kean was involved in a car accident which nearly took her life, after which the couple began to struggle with their feelings apart and rely on each other heavily for emotional and physical support, and they began to grow closer than ever before. After graduating and being assigned to the Bureau of Criminal Investigation, Gordon moved to Chicago's Logan Square and proposed to Kean, and the couple were married soon afterward.

From the beginning of his law enforcement career Gordon was a stickler for the rules, and would disapprove heavily of police misconduct and unwarranted violence and abuse of power, often finding a way to attain results from suspects through more respectful, patient and meticulous methods. On top of this, Gordon would often be found investigating his fellow officers on the side out of compulsion and would sometimes turn them in on charges of corruption, misconduct or abuse. Especially in later years as the city continued to grow more seedy, the environment began to take a toll on the by-the-book Gordon, and he would continue to witness corruption and betrayal increase.

Through the years of relative stability following Kean’s accident, Gordon would often spend time at work and then come home at night to his loving wife with their renewed spark and passion; however, sometimes Gordon would spend extra hours catching fellow officers partaking in unethical practices. On one occasion, Gordon turned in two fellow officers who he did not realise were connected to the Viti Crime Family, and himself wound up helpless as part of a plot to keep him on a leash as the leader of the anti-crime family investigation force. Once Gordon came to this realisation that he was being used, Gordon became outwardly more of a naive coward as a front to his peers but threw himself more into his work and his investigations into the mob, police corruption and reasons for higher crime rates on the side, out of view of those suspicious and wary of him. Gordon’s marriage grew increasingly strained as a result of his seemingly increasing emotional unavailability, displaying that he began to become more concerned with his professional life than that of his personal; or, more likely that to some level his work had become more personal - now that he had been personally betrayed he was more hellbent on catching out those who have been corrupted and were dragging him along.

The exact reason for Gordon’s intolerance for corruption could be pinned down to his own childhood and the fact that his father was a criminal who would often associate with payed-off police officers who he’d allow into their house and talk to for hours, despite his wife’s protest. Once Gordon’s marriage began to strain Barbara became equally more needy of her husband to be around, especially whilst trying to conceive a child; but also more distanced as a result of her blaming him for his specific reasoning as to why he was around less. Subsequently, Gordon began to commit himself more to his work rather than face the possibility or the anxiety of being at home thinking purely about his work. Gordon subsequently found it difficult to sleep, thinking about ways to undermine and outplay the mafia and their grip on the city. All of this appears to indicate that once Gordon feels powerless in either his professional or personal life, his drive to investigate grows uncontrollably as a form of control, so much so that he may begin to lose sleep over an obsessive need to investigate a particular case, irregardless of the case actually being involved in the initial trigger.

Shortly afterwards, Gordon was involved in an incident which caused the death of several innocents including a child, after which Gordon was willing to accept any responsibility for his actions during the time the footage and the case were being investigated and he was placed behind bars and temporarily suspended from the police force. Despite on one hand his guilt and mounting stress being a sign of good character and an ability to accept responsibility for his own mistakes, it was also a catalyst for a battle with alcoholism and his subsequent (yet brief) separation from Barbara, as well as his most morally degrading time whilst acting as a private detective in the slums of Chicago.

Once Gordon rejoined the CPD it became clear to his commissioner that Gordon had developed an alcohol addiction as a result of the traumatic train incident, and continued to be obsessive in his work. His Commissioner subsequently suggested Gordon relocate for both his own safety and the promise of a new environment, to which he agreed. Following this, Gordon reignited his relationship with Barbara in the intervening weeks before his move to Gotham City, and Barbara became pregnant as Gordon finally had time to spend with his wife as a result of his promised new future and no current cases to be working on aside from a handful of leftover Private Detective clients.

## Deaths

### Murders committed by Jim Gordon

* Kidnapper - A man who kidnapped several children and held them a gut point. Shot and killed by Gordon in order to save and release the children.

### Deaths connected to Jim Gordon

* Unnamed young boy - Died as a result of a two-train collision caused by James Gordon’s hot temper and hot-headedness following his despair at the state of Chicago.

## Appearances

* **Main Role**
	+ Turning Points

* **Supporting Role**
	+ The Long Halloween
	+ Dark Victory

## Trivia

* Gordon’s vehicles include:
	+ Brown 1970 BMW 6 series E24