We shouldn't like Oz Cobb (Colin Farrell). The Penguin's protagonist is a menace to society, someone so motivated by his ambition that he doesn't care what effects the drugs he's selling have on Gotham City so long as they give him money and power. We also know, thanks to his comic book origins, that he's a character with legitimate supervillain potential. He could end up hurting Gotham City even more than his predecessor, Carmine Falcone.
And yet, we do like Oz. Two episodes into The Penguin's eight-chapter run, the series has made it all but impossible not to root for him. Part of that is due to Farrell's inherent charisma and likability, which shines through his multiple layers of prosthetics. But The Penguin has also given him two important qualities that make him the kind of character viewers want to see succeed, regardless of whether it'll actually be "good" if he does. Cobb was a bit of a bumbler in The Batman, as the movie didn’t have the bandwidth to flesh the character out. The series, however, has made Oz a street-smart underdog, qualities that are on full display in the HBO drama's second episode.
In The Penguin Episode 2, Oz finds himself trapped like a rat. While attending Alberto Falcone's funeral, he discovers that Sofia (Cristin Milioti) and her bodyguard have apprehended the sole survivor of a failed heist that Oz helped set up with the Maroni family. Should this man wake up from his anesthesia-induced slumber and speak to Sofia, Oz’s involvement in Alberto's demise would be discovered. So Oz plays on the infighting in the Falcone family, casually revealing the existence of Sofia's prisoner to her proud, misogynistic uncles.
This gives Oz just enough time to sneak into the basement where the man is being held and murder him before any of the Falcones can actually get any information. When the Falcones discover this, they demand that every member of the family's criminal organization be kept together and searched for the knife that was used. Oz, once again, finds a way out of this by thinking on his feet. He starts a fight with Sofia's biggest rival, Johnny Vitti (Michael Kelly), but rather than planting his knife on him, he uses the confusion of the ensuing scuffle to stuff it in the coat pocket of Sofia's bodyguard.
It is a brilliant move, and one that comes as a total surprise to the audience. Not only does it divert the Falcones' suspicions away from Oz, but it further isolates Sofia too. Believing there’s no one close to her she can really trust anymore, Sofia turns to Oz and offers him a chance to supplant her uncles with the supposedly new drug her brother was bragging about just before Oz shot him in The Penguin's premiere. It's a simple sleight of hand that accomplishes multiple goals and elevates Oz in the viewers’ eyes. And after seeing him get overmatched by Bruce Wayne in The Batman, it’s fun to be reminded of just what a sinister schemer the character can be.
The Penguin isn't the first show to use a character's intelligence and coming-from-nothing origins to paint him as an entertaining and endearing figure to viewers. Classic TV shows like Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, and The Sopranos all tend to trap their characters in dangerous corners and then let the audience watch as they puzzle a way out. This cycle makes rooting for morally dubious characters like Oz a uniquely rewarding experience. We like to watch them work, so we end up wanting them to survive as long as possible so we can keep watching them. That was the case with Walter White and Tony Soprano, and so far it’s proving true for Oz Cobb.
New episodes of The Penguin premiere Sunday nights on HBO and Max.
