Episode Seven: “Top Hat”

In its seventh episode, “The Penguin» (2024) focuses on Oz’s (Colin Farrell) bond with his mother, Francis Cobb (Deirdre O’Connell), an important relationship that hasn’t been detailed much until now.

Viewers are treated to an extended flashback sequence showing Oz and Francis when they were much younger. Viewers also discover Oz’s two brothers, Jack and Benny. By the end of the flashback, viewers know how and why Oz is the way he is.

In the present, Oz discovers that Sofia Gigante (Cristin Milioti) has kidnapped his mother. Before he can confront him face to face, he is ambushed and attacked by Salvatore Maroni (Clancy Brown) and his henchmen. Oz manages to free himself from Salvatore and escapes.

Meanwhile, Sofia visits her niece Gia (Kenzie Grey) after discovering that Gia may be cooperating with the police regarding the deaths of the entire Falcone family. Sofia realizes the pain she has caused Gia and she has become what she hates most: her father, the late Carmine Falcone.

The episode welcomes new insight into Oz’s origin and includes several great, well-executed moments of tension, particularly at the end of the episode where Oz’s Bliss production headquarters is destroyed.

The acting of all artists, no matter their time on screen, big or small, is always memorable. Viewers see Oz in a state of distress, unsure of what to do. This is the first time his enemies have obtained something he values ​​most.

This is the first time since episode 4 (“Cent’Anni”) that viewers also see Sofia in distress. After realizing that she is essentially her father, she hates herself for putting Gia in the same situation as Carmine a few years ago.

Of the three major main characters, Brown’s Salvatore is the one who gets the least time to shine. However, he remains a big enough player to make his presence known. He has a pretty good fight scene with Oz where he unleashes all his hatred towards him for making his life miserable by murdering his wife and son.

In the end, Sofia wants to make Oz suffer just like he made her suffer. Instead of trading Francis for Oz’s Bliss supply, she sends him a special gift that ultimately results in Oz being captured by one of Sofia’s men.

Episode Eight: “A Big Thing or a Small Thing”

The finale of “The Penguin” is what most season finales aspire to, but most fail to achieve. Oz is taken to Sofia where she also holds Francis hostage. Sofia tortures Francis to make Oz confess, but he doesn’t say a word about what he did.

Francis comes to his senses and reveals to Oz that she always knew what he did to Jack and Benny. Francis also told Oz that she planned to let him get killed by a notable gangster, Rex Calabrese (Louis Cancelmi), whom Oz admired. However, he couldn’t go through with it.

Oz frees himself from his constraints, takes his mother and flees. At the scene of Oz’s destroyed headquarters, Victor (Rhenzy Feliz) berates the other crime families for not engaging in the war against Sofia and running away.

Sofia orders existing crime families to hunt down and capture Oz as she prepares to leave Gotham City for good. Victor manages to have the crime bosses’ deputies killed instead, and Oz is freed while Sofia is kidnapped.

In her final moment with Oz, she is sent back to Arkham Asylum – a fate even worse than being killed. She receives a letter from a woman named Selina Kyle (Zoë Kravitz) and smiles as she reads it. By the end of the season, Oz got what he always wanted: to be Gotham City’s most respected and feared crime boss.

In a penthouse, he dances with Eve Karlo (Carmen Ejogo) while she dresses in a similar dress that Francis once wore when she and Oz were young. They dance slowly together as the camera zooms out to the outside of the penthouse where the Bat signal is lit in the distance.

“The Penguin” turned out to be excellent in its acting, writing and music. Where it excels most is how it separated itself from being its own thing and didn’t include any sequences or cameo appearances from Robert Pattinson’s Batman.

It provided an enjoyable and original story with characters that many DC Comics fans haven’t seen fleshed out on the big screen. It also cemented Colin Farrell as one of the best actors today to play a comic book character. If you have a Max subscription, do yourself a favor and watch this series.

Rating: 4/5

@judethedudehannahs