‘Gotham’ Season 5 Will Be Its Last, But Prequel Already In The Works

The Fox show “Gotham” will bid goodbye after its fifth season, but adventures in Gotham City will continue as a prequel is now being developed focusing on Alfred Pennyworth, the loyal butler and guardian of billionaire Bruce Wayne.

“Pennyworth” will be a 10-episode, straight-to-series order, according to The Hollywood Reporter. It will be Alfred’s origin story, and “Gotham” showrunner Bruno Heller will be helming the reins.

The new show is not really a spinoff of “Gotham,” since it will be an entirely new story following Alfred’s history as a British SAS soldier who eventually gets employed and befriends Thomas Wayne, Bruce’s father, during 1960s London.

According to reports, Sean Pertwee will not be playing the role. Casting has not yet begun, and the show is slated for release in 2019.

“As genuine fans of these classic DC characters, as well as the incredibly talented Bruno Heller and Danny Cannon, we couldn’t be more excited to make Epix the home of this series,” Epix president Michael Wright said. “We can’t wait to work with Bruno and Danny — along with Peter Roth, Susan Rovner, Brett Paul and the team at Warner Horizon — on this fantastic origin story.”

Meanwhile, the fifth and final season of “Gotham” will only have 13 episodes. Still, it’ll be quite the feat since the show will finally reach its 100-episode milestone.

For now, the characters of the show are in still in a mess. For one thing, a romance is seemingly brewing between Ed Nygma (Cory Michael Smith) and Lee Thompkins (Morena Baccarin).

But Robin Lord Taylor, who plays Oswald Cobblepot, believes the romance is not meant to last.

“I think Oswald thinks that Lee is totally ridiculous,” he told Comic Book. “She’s making an enormous mistake. Oswald learned that, for him and Edward Nymga to coexist in Gotham City, there can be no feelings involved. Like I touched on before, to love is to be used, to be abused. So I think he looks at the whole Thompkins/Nygma situation and he’s just shaking his head being like, ‘Fools.’ They're being foolish.”

Maybe Season 5 will finally bring Oswald together with Nygma. Or maybe Lee will get back together with Jim Gordon (Ben McKenzie). Who knows? Anything can still happen in the show.

“Gotham” Season 4 airs Thursdays on Fox.