Puttin' on "The Penguin"

Spoilers ahead.

I seriously wonder if I'm one of the only people who wasn't into "The Penguin" and actually didn't mind that "Joker: Folie à Deux" was a depressing anti-musical.  Then again, the recent "Joker" movie was over after 138 minutes while "The Penguin" is a prestige crime series that runs for eight hour-long episodes.  They're not really comparable and have little in common, except that they're both new takes on very old "Batman" villains, and were both released roughly at the same time.  

The Penguin, aka Oswald Cobblepot, has been reimagined as Oz Cobb, a Gotham mob boss who appeared in Matt Reeves' "The Batman" back in 2022.  Played by Colin Farrell under layers of prosthetics and makeup, he's a monstrous, ugly man who displays enough signs of humanity that we can be temporarily convinced to root for him instead of his enemies.  Functioning as a quasi-sequel to "The Batman," "The Penguin" charts Oz's rise to power in Gotham after the death of his former boss, Carmine Falcone (Mark Strong, replacing John Tuturro).  Standing in his way are Falcone's children, Alberto (Michael Zegen) and Sofia (Cristin Milioti), rival crime boss Sal Maroni (Clancy Brown) and his wife Nadia (Shohreh Aghdashloo), and plenty of others trying to fill the void left by Falcone.  Oz's only allies are his illness-addled, disapproving mother, Frances (Deirdre O'Connell), and a stuttering street kid he's taken under his wing, Vic Aguilar (Rhenzy Feliz).      

The approach that showrunner Lauren LeFranc has taken here is to essentially make the Penguin into Tony Soprano with a disfigured mug and more cartoonish accent.  He's a blustering, buffoonish villain who can be incredibly genial, but is utterly immoral and unscrupulous.   Time and time again people trust him when they should know better, sometimes thinking they can control or manipulate him.  I can find no fault with Farrell's performance except that I don't find the character to be at all sympathetic or entertaining.  Keep in mind, however, that I watched all of "The Sopranos" feeling pretty much the same way about Tony Soprano.  I was only ever on his side because I cared about the people who were on his side.  And in Oz's case it's far more obvious that he's going to turn on everyone in the end.  

Fortunately, "The Penguin" features other figures of interest.  Chief among these is Sofia Falcone, with whom Oz has a long history.  His initial job in the Falcone organization was as her driver, and his actions contributed to her ending up in Arkham Asylum for an extended period of time.  When Sofia re-emerges as a candidate to take over from Carmine, deeply damaged and full of rage, Oz is squarely in her crosshairs.  The episode that goes into her history is the high point of the series, and an excellent showcase for Cristin Milioti.  Kudos should also be extended to Deirdre O'Connell and Rhenzy Feliz, who acquit themselves well in the episodes featuring their characters' POVs.

The performances were enough to get me through the entire series, but I knew from fairly early on that the show wasn't working for me.  Its comic book approach to organized crime dealings just never sat right with me throughout.  The characters were too broadly drawn, and their clashes too outlandish, even if the creators had taken pains to stay gritty and grounded.  I could tolerate these kinds of two-dimensional underworld figures in other circumstances, usually with the promise of a goofy action scene right around the corner, but in a show with more dramatic aspirations, I couldn't bring myself to take any of it seriously.  

Frankly, the Penguin was never a character that held any interest for me - he simply boils down to a very unpleasant, brutish career criminal.  This version of him tries to add some depth and some tragedy, which is admirable, but it's nothing that changes his fundamental nature or his function as a baddie.  I was never curious about his origins or how his mind worked, the way I was with the Joker or the Riddler.  In fact, I'd much rather see Sofia Falcone return as a villain in this universe than the Penguin.

The series is well made, and I don't begrudge the fans who enjoy it.  However, this corner of Gotham is not one I'm likely to revisit any time soon.  

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