Audiences still love worthy comic book stories, and nobody loves audiences more than HBO, which has been examining what makes TV baddies tick for decades now.
HBO’s upcoming The Penguin already has a built-in fan base thanks to the DC fans. And who needs Batman anymore when his enemies are the ones providing all of the entertainment? Colin Farrell first debuted as Oswald Cobblepot in Matt Reeves’ The Batman starring Robert Pattinson, and now he has his very own show to torment the people of Gotham.
Farrell again looks almost unrecognizable in the new series, which is receiving favorable reviews from critics who have compared the gritty drama to The Sopranos. Unfortunately, the Penguin doesn’t go to therapy, so he is a little less in touch with his feelings than Tony Soprano.
Still, the series seems promising thanks to Farrell’s dedication to The Penguin/Oz and the impressive prosthetics, even though he isn’t crazy about that part of the job. The series also stars Cristin Milioti as Sofia Falcone, daughter of deceased crime boss Carmine Falcone, as she paves her own path in Gotham’s criminal underworld. Rhenzy Feliz, Michael Kelly, and Shohreh Aghdashloo also star.
Here’s what the critics are saying about The Penguin:
Glen Weldon, NPR:
The Penguin is the tale of a thug who becomes a boss, and the sacrifices he all-too-willingly makes along the way. That it succeeds as thoroughly as it does may be surprising, given its provenance as yet another Batman-without-Batman nugget of Warner’s IP, but the creators’ refusal to coast on what has gone before, and their willingness to let Farrell and Milioti dig into their characters so we can all sit back and watch them work with what they’ve unearthed is what makes for greatly satisfying TV.
The Penguin may not represent the cure for superhero fatigue, but it delivers a powerful dose of medicine that can treat its symptoms.
Roxana Hadidi, Vulture:
The Penguin is a portrait of a villain, and Farrell’s likability is its trickiest secret weapon. Both Milioti and Farrell are playing characters who veer into cartoon and caricature, but they retain within them the jagged edges of humanity — jealousy and greed, grief and lust, self-loathing and braggadociousness — that make The Penguin simultaneously pulpy and plausible. And, more effectively than either Christopher Nolan’s or Todd Phillips’s films, populist; like any worthwhile story about organized crime, The Penguin is really about what it takes to make it in America. What rules must one break to get ahead? Which alliances, and whose labor, should be protected in a dog-eat-dog world? What is the cost of tapping out of this system or trying to break the wheel?
Milioti and Farrell get parallel speeches about these questions, and The Penguin sometimes becomes repetitive in its treatment of the two of them as bizarro-mirror versions of each other…But that quality is forgivable when The Penguin gives its central pair so much room to grow, and the result is a spinoff that doesn’t need its cinematic precursor to light up the night.
Daniel Feinberg, The Hollywood Reporter:
Oz proves capable of carrying this story, just not in a fresh way. That’s why attentions are likely to shift to Milioti’s Sofia, a character whose presence comes with less baggage from the comics. Sofia is treated more in that Cruella/Maleficent vein as women whose dark path is set in motion by the assumptions and restrictions of the patriarchy. Strutting around in the best examples of the series’ costume design, Milioti makes Sofia more plausible than Oz as a tragic victim and embodiment of everything wrong with Gotham, a figure you can feel sad for and scared of in equal measure. The mano a mano dynamic between the pair yields Milioti and Farrell’s best work, but the interplay viewers will crave peaks far too early.
Eric Goldman, TVLine:
The Penguin isn’t breaking any new ground and, Batman-connections aside, it’s a variation on a story we’ve seen many times before about gangsters with aspirations for more and the in-fighting between them. And yes, plenty about Oz’s demeanor and his complicated relationship with his mother (Deirdre O’Connell) will remind viewers of The Sopranos. But while this isn’t going to join that beloved series or the likes of Goodfellas or The Godfather among the pantheon of Best Mob Stories Ever, it’s an entertaining and well-told tale in its own right.
Ben Travers, IndieWire
The Penguin isn’t just another super-villain origin story, much like The Batman wasn’t just another superhero movie. (Meaning, it’s both and neither at once.) But even if it largely succeeds on its own terms, The Penguin could’ve benefited from a little more romance and variation, rather than a relentless and gloomy dose of reality.
Chase Hutchinson, Collider:
In many ways, the more simple scenes Farrell shares with Milioti (who is also excellent) are where The Penguin feels strongest, as these two characters circle each other with a combination of skepticism and solidarity. They may be the only people in the world who understand each other, but that also makes them uniquely able to destroy one another for their individual benefit. The Penguin drags us into a bleak world that has only been made worse by the acts of all the people the story follows. It’s a series that is still finding its legs and could never surpass The Sopranos, though there are no better acts to attempt to follow. Here’s to a potential second season when Oz goes to therapy. After everything he’s been through and has done to others, as well as what he will continue to do in his sad life, he certainly could use it.
Chris Evangelista, SlashFlim:
Farrell, once again unrecognizable under all that make-up, is consistently good throughout the series. While the majority of the cast around him leans a bit too heavily into their New Yawk-ish wise guy accents, Farrell seems to be flourishing playing such a despicable character. There is virtually nothing redeemable about Oz, and yet Farrell does manage to find a kind of wounded heart lurking inside this bulky monster. If “The Penguin” is worth watching at all, it’s to see the lead performances from Farrell and Milioti, whose Sofia is more or the less the co-lead character. Even when the story they’re stuck in lets them down, these two performers rise to the challenge and do exemplary work. The 8-hour movie approach ultimately fails the series, but you’ll likely find yourself drawn to these extremely flawed characters and all the damage they cause along the way.
The Penguin will premiere on Sunday, September 19th, with new episodes airing from September 29th until the season finale on November 10th.
