‘The Penguin’ – ‘After Hours’ – Review
Matt Reeves’ The Batman was a colossal cinematic event that brought a dark and noir-tinged shade to the activities of the Dark Knight, who was fighting a losing war on crime, and it was a revolutionary new take on the winged avenger. Stealing scene after scene in a fully transformative performance was Academy Award-nominated actor Colin Farrell in the role of Oswald’ Oz’ Cobb, a street-level hood and middle management for crime lord Carmine Falcone, and who harboured his own grandeur ambitions. After the explosive ending to The Batman, which left Gotham as a wasteland and Falcone dead, everything is now up for grabs, and HBO’s The Penguin tells the story of just how Oz will claw his way to power… by any means necessary.
Emboldened by Carmine Falcone’s death, Oz (Colin Farrell) moves to fill the power vacuum left in Gotham City’s criminal underworld. He finds a potential new recruit in young Victor Aguilar (Rhenzy Feliz).
The debut of HBO’s The Penguin is cause for serious excitement, and audiences who are looking for a gangster series that they can seriously sink their teeth into will be salivating thanks to the arrival of this new series. Episode One, ‘After Hours’ takes audiences into the immediate aftermath of The Riddler’s terrorist attack on Gotham City, and one week on control of the streets of Gotham is up for the taking. It’s here that Oswald ‘Oz’ Cobb (Colin Farrell) decides to make his play, and in the immediate opening moments of the series, we are left with one of the coolest scenes committed to television in recent years. Transformed by the genius of make-up artist Mike Marino, Farrell is the pudgy, disfigured and freakish Oz who has a ‘sit down’ with Carmine Falcone’s degenerate son, Alberto (Michael Zegen), and in this opening 10-minutes, we see a performance of such mad range of emotional depth, that Farrell completely sucks us in. It also says that The Penguin will be as dark as night and that the audience had better not get ahead of themselves with this series.
With the set-up of The Penguin in motion thanks to this explosive crack of gunshots, audiences are thrown into a crazy and schizophrenic first episode that will shake you up and rattle you around. While Farrell was able to share a snapshot of the personality of the ambitious but totally flawed Oz in The Batman, in The Penguin, we get to see a fully realized performance from the actor, and he completely holds the attention of the screen. Viewed by many as a freak with too many aspirations and an inflated sense of his own importance, Farrell brings an incredible range to Oz in ‘After Hours’, and audiences get a deeper dive into his character and motivation. As an almost Richard III type of character, Oz is ambitious, crafty, vicious, pugnacious, snarky, resentful, snivelling and wholey funny all at the same time, and Farrell throws his performance around throughout the entire episode, and you never know where Oz is going to land.
Having found himself in a dangerous position, Oz enlists the help of a teenage delinquent, Victor Aguilar (Rhenzy Feliz), who he takes pity on, and audiences are taken into the seedier side of Gotham City, which has been made worse by The Riddler’s attack. Where The Batman gives us a grand overview of Matt Reeves’s gothic-inspired Gotham City, The Penguin takes us to it on the ground level, and we see an incredible texture and lived-in, roughed-up aesthetic to Oz’s stomping ground. From neon-bathed red light districts to the palatial mansion of the Falcone estate, we get to cover a lot of range here in ‘After Hours’, and the total ambience of what audiences witness in this first episode will bring them deeper into the narrative. Traversing north and south and east and west across Gotham City also leads Oz to stop into his childhood home. It’s here that audiences are introduced to his mother, Francis Cobb (Deirdre O’Connell), who is affected by early onset dementia and who is incredibly disturbed and keenly aware and encouraging of her son’s actions. Deirdre O’Connell has an incredible back-and-forth with Farrell’s Oz, and her performance will leave you off-guard and on edge.
In Episode One of The Penguin, there are plenty of twists, turns, and surprises. One of the biggest arrives in the sudden appearance of Sofia Falcone, the estranged and troubled daughter of Carmine Falcone, who is also a convicted serial killer who has been ‘rehabilitated’ at Arkham Asylum and is now back in Gotham City. Sofia, played by Cristin Milioti, brings a sense of danger, paranoia, and unpredictability to the show. Despite having just been introduced to Sofia, it’s evident from the start that she has a history with Oz and doesn’t trust him at all. Unlike the men in the Falcone ‘family’, she sees through Oz’s facade and is deeply suspicious of his actions in the wake of her brother’s disappearance. With her intense gaze, stylish designer wardrobe, and bold red lips, Milioti exudes an aura of danger and impulsiveness, with her performance showcasing her character’s cruel nature and fiery personality.
‘After Hours’ turns the narrative all the way to up to 11 by the end of its runtime, and this is a piece of television of pure force. Blood is spilt, a cover-up is needed, and a group of very bad people demand answers, and all of it ensnares Oz in a vice of his own making. Moment by moment, you’re on the edge of your seat as Oz scrambles to stay above water, and it all ends in a ferocious third-act moment of torture and revelation. Putting it lightly, you’ll never look at piano wire in the same light again, and Oz and Sofia have a ‘heart to heart’ that will make you shudder. It all ends in a shocking reveal, and audiences are left in no doubt that violence and character will go hand-in-hand with this series.
The Penguin is a series of ambition, power, and a desire to take the American Dream, even if it means travelling down a very dark road to get there. This first episode showcases that we’re watching the next great HBO event series. Colin Farrell is ready to take it all as Oz Cobb, and he’s started to climb that ladder that will lead to another legend of Gotham City.
The Penguin is now streaming on Neon and SKY TV.
Image: SKY TV
