The following article contains spoilers for The Penguin Season 1 on HBO Max
Summary
Now thatThe Penguin’s entire seriesis available for watchability by anyone with a subscription to HBO Max, there are plenty of big moments to see.The Penguinoffers several moments that are more than a little newsworthy, all leading up to Oz Cobb’s riseas the kingpin of Gotham. In order to make an omelet, Oz knew he had to break some eggs. He had to go very, very dark after spending most of the series being a kind of protagonist. It even seemed like the show was going to have some problems reminding people that he was a bad guy.
However, it took no time at all to make people realize that actually,Oz really was a bad guy. He went from likable to psychopath pretty quickly. And he had some really dark moments. It wasn’t just when he was an adult, either. The part where a young Oz killed his brothers so that only he could get his mother’s love was a striking scene in the HBO Max show. It started to show that the man was never really a good person. He always had something wrong. And then, the finale especially showed just how bad he was in the head. However, the moment that most people see as the darkest moment of the show was, in fact, not the darkest moment in the show.
Oz Reaches New Evil In The Penguin Finale
When talking about the darkest, most heart wrenching scene inThe Penguin, most people are going to arrive at the momentwhen Oz strangles Vic. That’s not a surprise, especially because of what led up to that moment.
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Vic and Oz are sitting alone having just won the mob war and become a realBatman & Robin of crime. They are a mirror image of Bruce Wayne and any of his three wards that came and went over the years. Their plan was almost perfect and allowed Oz to escape any number of dangers as the plan was executed in order to be the victor.
Not only that but Vic had just finished talking about how he felt like Oz was his family. How they could be together and rise to the top of the crime world. Vic thought theirs was a partnership that’s could last. And then Oz decided he had to kill him precisely because he also thought of his young protege as a family member. That was what made the moment really dark. It wasn’t that Vic was wrong about their relationship it was that he was right and Oz couldn’t have that. It was essentially a repeat of what he did to his brothers when he was younger. He needed to be at the top all by himself. He couldn’t have anyone taking up room. Andso he killed the kidwho had been his most loyal ally throughout the show.
Thescene was sufficiently darkand foreboding. It did the job it set out to do. But it wasn’t the darkest scene in The Penguin. That scene belonged to Oz’s final scene with Sofia Falcone. That might surprise some because he left her live. But that was the point.
Sometimes Death Is A Mercy
Sometimes in ashow likeThe Penguin, fans realize that being killed isn’t the worst thing that can happen to a character. When Sofia and Oz see their relationship come to a head and the two are talking like they’re saying goodbye forever, it’s assumed that Oz is going to kill the woman who was the only person who was really in his way in his climb to the top.
The scene is set up to look like so many othermob movies and mob televisionshows where the mob boss is leading out a victim to the middle of nowhere to kill them. Sofia certainly thinks that’s what’s about to go down. Instead, Oz has set her up to be the fallguy. She’s the person the police are looking for to pin the Hangman murders on. And with the fact that she really did kill her entire family and was suspected of that crime, it’s not hard for Gotham’s finest to make that case stick.
So,instead of Oz killing Sofia, he effectively sends her back to the place she hates more than anything the place that brings back so much trauma that she appears to be catatonic when we see her back in Arkham. She is effectively in hell. It’s a safe bet that she would have preferred to be killed than sent back to the place that transformed her into the person who was capable of killing her entire family.
That’s why the scene showing thefinal exchange between Oz and Sofiais really the darkest scene inThe Penguin. Because he knows how damaging that is to her. She told him several different times during the series just how much of a nightmare being stuck in Arkham was. He knew that, and he went out of his way to do it to her, when he could have just killed her. There was no need to pin the Hangman murders on her at this point in the story. She was dealt with. And he once again, took the most evil avenue possible.
The Penguin
Cast
Created by Lauren LeFranc and starring Colin Farrell, The Penguin builds on 2022’s The Batman. The Max series chronicles the eponymous villain’s attempt to reach Gotham’s criminal peak, rising through the underworld in the middle of a power struggle.
