Kristen Kringle was a supporting character in Seasons 1 and 2 of Gotham. She was a record keeper at the Gotham City Police Department who had a strained working relationship with Edward Nygma, though would later become Nygma's girlfriend. She was portrayed by Chelsea Spack.
History[]
While working at the GCPD, Kristen would have regular run-ins with Edward Nygma, the department's forensics analyst. Nygma was attracted to Kristen and would often try to get her attention by asking her riddles or telling her bizarre, irrelevant trivia. Nygma would even go so far as to send Kristen strange gifts (such as a cupcake with a bullet sticking out of it) or rearrange her filing system to make her job easier, but Kristen was only ever annoyed by these quirks.
Over time, Edward would try to adjust his behaviour for Kristen's sake, but would find out that Kristen was dating Detective Arnold Flass. Fortunately for Nygma, Flass was later arrested for murder and drug trafficking, and so Nygma continued his efforts to win Kristen over. He would be disappointed again after finding that Kristen had started dating Officer Tom Dougherty who introduced himself to Nygma and appeared to like him and his knack for riddles. Later still, Nygma would find out that Dougherty was actually abusive towards Kristen and had been hitting her. Nygma then confronted Dougherty and demanded he leave Kristen alone, but Dougherty didn't regard Nygma as threatening and ignored him. Two nights later, Nygma confronted Dougherty again outside Kristen's apartment and murdered him, stabbing him repeatedly. He would later dismember Dougherty's corpse and dispose of the evidence by dissolving it with acid.
After Dougherty's murder, Nygma wrote a fake goodbye letter for Kristen in Dougherty's name so as to throw off suspicion. The letter said that Dougherty was leaving town and never coming back, but Kristen pointed out that the first letter of each line of the note spelled out 'NYGMA', a clue as to Nygma's involvement. Nygma dismissed it as coincidence and Kristen appeared to believe him, but from then on Nygma would become increasingly paranoid that Kristen would realise the truth. Over time, this paranoia would develop into schizophrenia and Nygma would manifest a divergent personality that was more confident and ruthless than he was.
Although Nygma was increasingly concerned about being discovered, he was finally able to get closer to Kristen. The working relationship between the two of them became more relaxed and friendly. Also, during the Maniax' attack on the GCPD building, Nygma risked his own life to save Kristen, taking a bullet himself. Afterwards, Kristen grew much closer to Nygma and finally acknowledged his feelings for her.
Death[]
Sadly, Kristen would die shortly after she and Nygma started dating. In the episode "By Fire", the two were enjoying dinner at Nygma's apartment when Nygma decided to confess everything to Kristen, telling her that he killed Tom Dougherty in order to protect her. Regardless of his intentions, Kristen was apalled with Nygma and tried to leave, threatening to tell the police and calling Nygma a "psycho". Nygma tried to stop Kristen from leaving, holding her against the door with one hand to her mouth and the other to her throat. He assured her that he loved her and would never hurt her, but accidentally choked her to death while restraining her. Kristen's tragic demise would serve to drive Nygma over the edge of sanity and push him into his criminal life as The Riddler.