The Penguin Episode 8 Review: Pick Your Jaw Up, The Brutal Finale Of DC's Best Show Really Was That Good

If you’re looking for a quick assessment of The Penguin’s final episode, know this: it’s the very definition of a perfect episode of TV. Not just DC TV, not just comic book TV… it’s so good that it might feel impossible from the outside. And this is a show that already had an episode I proclaimed the best DC episode of all time. At times, The Penguin has been a difficult show to watch; as challenging and provocative as it has been excellent. With episode 8, that sentiment has very much grown.

Set in the immediate aftermath of The Penguin episode 7's explosive cliffhanger ending, with Gotham once more in ruins and Oz's empire falling around him, the finale sees Sofia and Cobb's conflict come to a head. To recap, Oz was taken by Sofia’s men and a harrowing showdown planned between the Penguin and his mother over the deaths of his brothers. From there, it’s all about how we get from Oz at his lowest to him being in a position to rival Batman in the upcoming The Batman Part II - a rollercoaster we’ve now been shaken about by multiple times this season.

Directed by Jennifer Getzinger (who has a quite incredible CV), the finale promised to wrap up the stories of every major character, as well as handing the reins on Oz back to Matt Reeves, and let’s just say it’s a success. A towering, formidable, shocking, provocative success that even manages to pull focus back out to Batman’s story, in fact.

We Need To Talk About That One Scene

The Penguin Finale Has One Of The Most Memorable Scenes Of All Time

I won’t get into specific spoilers here, but the final scene featuring Oz and Rhenzy Feliz's Vic is easily one of the most profoundly affecting things I’ve ever seen in live-action TV. It's the kind of scene that sucks the air out of the room, thanks both to exceptional performances and where the story takes things.

Their dynamic was also beautifully crafted throughout the episode after the 7 previous brought them together. Vic had been groomed as Oz’s underboss, and a stand-in for Gotham’s people - he’s always been key to Oz realizing both his endgame and the key to his power. And throughout the finale, there are subtle exchanges of real affection from Vic to his boss that make how this story has developed all the more impressive.

The Penguin Reclaims & Reframes Oz For The Future

Now That's How You Remind Everyone That Oz Is Not A Good Guy

The Penguin needed a reclamation of Oz, because, let’s be honest, he was a little too likable. No matter what he did, Colin Farrell’s performance is so darkly charming - by design I might add - that you end up rooting for the guy. That much was choreographed beautifully throughout the entire show, because we had to be invested in his victory.

In the finale, though, everything is flipped by the one scene that literally everyone is going to talk about for a long time. It’s such an efficient reclamation of the idea that Oz is despicable that I almost have to stand and applaud. I’ve now watched this episode twice, and trust me, it gets infinitely more affecting the second time as you spot the tricks that lulled you into feeling good about things. The storytelling artistry at work here is genuinely top tier.

How The Penguin Avoided A Huge MCU Issue

Even When You Know The Ending, It Doesn't Take Anything Away

The MCU’s Disney+ shows were hamstrung by an issue in their genetics: they had to be watchable without impacting the mainline movies, while also expanding on them. That’s why you get entire bottle series that won’t really impact when and if those characters appear in a movie. And crucially, it’s also why so many of them start and end in the exact same position, narratively speaking. They’re burdened by glorious expectation, as it were.

The Penguin could have fallen into the same trap, given it’s a supporting story for The Batman movies. We already knew Oz’s play for Gotham at the end of The Batman, and him being in power by the sequel would still make sense even without these 8 excellent episodes because of the final shot. That’s simple, logical self-preservation by Matt Reeves’ team to make sure anyone who skipped the show isn’t lost by the time the sequel comes out.

But The Penguin is still essential viewing all the same: not only is its quality a huge selling factor, but the journey back to Oz’s power play is immaculately told without any sense that you’ve just been cheated by the ending essentially directly following on from The Batman. I can’t say the same for some MCU shows, even if I liked them: The Penguin just feels more substantial all round.

The Penguin's Finale Has Some Of Its Strongest Individual Performances

It's Impossible Not To Shower The Cast With Superlatives

It would be easy to let all the episode’s specifics evaporate in the face of the monumental effect of its most prominent scene, but there’s a lot more to it than what happens on the river banks. And all the successes come back to one thingThe Penguinhas done incredibly well throughout: pulling exceptional performances out of adeeply talented cast.

Colin Farrell once more is towering: particularly when he’s dealing with horrifying emotional stress. Watching him during the interrogation scene that crowns the episode as its real highest point is spellbinding. The fact that he manages such nuance under that amount of prosthetic makeup is astonishing. He then does it again, in Oz’s most frenzied moment and it’s not just the results of what he does but the brutal way the camera allows an unflinching view of what it takes from him that sets it apart as such great work.

Cristin Milioti is great again (mark that off your bingo card), and in the same interrogation scene, she does her best work with viscerally affecting material. Too many of Batman’s villains are classified by their mental instability, but Milioti’s laser-guided attack on Oz’s most important relationship is a case study in vengeance. The emotional cracks that appear are just as important, and it’s often in Milioti’s flashes of crushed humanity that Sofia is the best. I want more of her.

Deidre O’Connell, meanwhile, does what she always does well in The Penguin, playing both sides of Francis Cobb - both cruel and calculating (for good reason, of course), and lost to her illness. Through Julian Rush’s flashback device and Sofia’s interrogation, O’Connell’s performance offers the cap on one of the most claustrophobic, intense scenes I’ve seen in a long time.

And then there’s Rhenzy Feliz, the underdog of The Penguin whose performance has never been given the luxury of grandeur. Victor is more subtle, but no less artfully crafted: a street kid archetype with depth, and the way he sets up his dynamic with Oz is good that I worry it will be overlooked. Without his work, the episode’s ending simply wouldn’t land how it does. He may not get the Emmy nomination I almost guarantee the other three will, but that would be a disappointing oversight.

Final Thoughts On The Penguin’s Finale

It's Settled: This Is The Best DC TV Has Ever Been

If you invest eight or so hours into a premium TV event show, you want it to stick the ending: The Penguin does so by offering one of the best TV finales of all time. It’s so clever that once you go back over this wonderful show, you’ll notice where it told us what was going to happen, and the trick loses none of its magic for that.

Matt Reeves can be very happy that Lauren LeFranc is the one who expanded The Batman universe even before he did: this show has been a revelation that probably shouldn’t have come as a surprise, but comic book projects have gaslit too many people, and it’s just great to have such a colossal talent (along with each individual writer and director) making this quality of entertainment. I’m honestly just sad it’s over now. The Penguin is dead; long live the Penguin.

Created by Lauren LeFranc, The Penguin is a crime-drama spin-off television series of 2022's film The Batman. Set shortly after the events of The Batman, Oz Cobb, A.K.A. the Penguin, begins his rise in the underworld of Gotham City as he contends with the daughter of his late boss, Carmine Falcone, for control of the crime family's empire.

Pros

• Oz & Vic's final scene is one of the most memorable of all time.
• The set-up for The Batman Part II is very good.
• The main performances all hit season highs.
• The storytelling and resolutions here are top tier.
• Some of the most brutal live-action TV scenes ever made.

All 8 episodes of The Penguin are available to stream on Max.