How is Batman's famous Rogues' Gallery of supervillains holding up on Gotham without Batman? Pretty well, actually.

Gotham: "Pax Penguina" Photos 20 IMAGES

Gotham's Best Batman Villains 9 IMAGES

Gotham returns to FOX on (new night) Thursday, September 21st for a Season 4 premiere, "Pax Penguina," that finds fear-mongering Batman villain Scarecrow (Charlie Tahan) making his in-costume debut in the midst of the city's most peaceful, crime-free era ever.Of course, we've already met young Jonathan Crane on the show, back in Season 1 during a two-episode arc focused on his father, Dr. Gerald Crane (Julian Sands) - a story that left Jonathan incapacitated and mentally tormented by his dad's own fear toxin. So how will Gotham's full version of Scarecrow hold up to his comic book counterpart? Or even other representations of Crane from films like Batman Begins or games like Arkham Asylum and Arkham Knight? One thing we do know is that Gotham has been at its best, since the very beginning, when spotlighting the city's crooked and cracked evil-doers.Check out some images from "Pax Penguina"...Sure, Jim Gordon, Harvey Bullock, and young Bruce Wayne are called upon each week for huge acts of heroics in the name of justice, but the show found its calling right away, back during its first year, when it brought out Cameron Monaghan's Jerome as a Joker-surrogate because creator Bruno Heller essentially saw no point in waiting to give the fans what they wanted. Since then -- as Gotham leaned further into the idea of having every Batman villain exist years before the caped crusader could ever debut -- the buzz surrounding each season became about which notable bad guys were joining the story.Here's a quick look at the best villains on Gotham. No, not every Batman foe is "killing it" on the show (Ivy's basically Kimmy Schmidt, Mr. Freeze and Captain Barnes are a bit silly, Tigress is way under-utilized) and the jury's still out on some (we just found out Butch is somehow Solomon Grundy, Ra's al Ghul is still new to the show, etc), but that doesn't mean that some great actors aren't doing some awesome things with other famous comic book criminals. Flip through the slideshow below for Gotham's Best Villains...Once Gotham became devoted to developing its own canon, free from the constrains of Batman (which the show doesn't even need at this point given all Jim Gordon's been through), it found its own bizarre and demented niche. One warped enough to allow - say - someone like Professor Pyg to join its ranks (oh, he's coming in Season 4 at some point). Even those who were heroes on the show got absorbed into the dominating villainous tapestry. Characters like Barbara Kean, Nathanial Barnes, and even Leslie Thompkins eventually found themselves driven insane (either by tainted blood or trauma), joining the ranks of the Gotham's expanding criminal world.Being separate from the comics, previous movies, the current DCEU, and the Arkham game series -- but also borrowing elements here and there from all of them in certain ways -- Gotham is its own island and is doing some great work with Batman's iconic Rogues' Gallery.Who are some of your favorite Batman villain on Gotham?

Matt Fowler is a writer for IGN and a member of the Television Critics Association (TCA). Follow him on Twitter at @TheMattFowler and Facebook at Facebook.com/MattBFowler