From Max The Penguin It’s not the first TV series to emerge from Hollywood’s fascination with Gotham’s seedy side, but it might be the one most committed to staying clear of any trace of Batman or the rogues gallery at the aptly named Arkham Asylum. Case in point: Even its sole Arkham patient, Sofia Falcone, aka the Executioner, seems lifted straight from the great Batman era of mobster fiction.
[Ed. note: This piece contains spoilers for The Penguin’s premiere episode, “After Hours.”]
Photo: Warner Bros. Discovery
The Penguin features Sofia Falcone, daughter of the Falcone crime family played by actor Cristin Milioti, as perhaps the most terrifying player fighting for the Falcone crown. Sofia could be a shoo-in to follow her father’s death in 2022. The Batman and the death of his brother in The Penguin's premiere, but her path is hampered by the general sexism of the mob and also by the perception that she is not mentally ready to be a boss.
Sofia, Penguin She tells us that she has just left Arkham Asylum and that, in a past life, she committed a series of murders. But who did she kill and why did she earn the nom de guerre “The Executioner”? The Penguin has yet to present its own answers to this question, but the DC Comics stories in which Sofia originated have.
A little about Sofia Falcone in DC Comics
Sofia first appeared in Batman: The Long Halloweena 1996 miniseries by writer Jeph Loeb and artist Tim Sale that is one of the best Batman mystery stories to grace the page and arguably one of the most influential modern Batman comics on film. Long Halloween It followed Batman and other characters on their quest to find the true identity of serial killer Holiday, who was preying on members of Gotham's mob elite. Sofia appears about halfway through the story, just after her release from prison.
Regular prison, that is, not Arkham Asylum. Instead of the family outcast, Long HalloweenSofia is Carmine Falcone's love child and his best enforcer. She's also a complete piece of trash nicknamed “Sofia the Giant.”
Image: Jeph Loeb, Tim Sale/DC Comics
Sofia wouldn't get her serial killer credential until… Long HalloweenThe sequel to, Batman: Dark Victorywhere he turned out to be the mysterious serial killer The Executioner. That's a enormous spoiler for Dark Victorybut, well, the fault The Penguinnot us.
Who did the Executioner kill?
As the Executioner, Sofia preyed on police and other law enforcement figures (mostly corrupt, because this is Gotham City). She would surprise her victims with a rope and leave them hanging in plain sight, with her business card pinned to their chests: half-finished Executioner games, scribbled on papers taken from Harvey Dent's office desk before he became a villain.
The goal of it all was revenge: at the climax of The Long HalloweenHarvey (as Two-Face) had executed his father, Carmine Falcone, and all of Hangman's victims were people who had helped Harvey build his career. Sofia, who had survived a fall from Carmine's rooftop penthouse at the end of Long HalloweenShe escaped suspicion for most of the story by pretending that the fall had paralyzed her from the neck down.
The Penguin This isn't the first “down-to-earth” Batman TV series to cast Sofia as the lead — Crystal Reed (Teen Wolf) played it for several seasons of Gotham CityShe fits perfectly into a series that looks to play with the succession in the Falcone family and delve into a more traditional type of true crime supervillain. Sofia dies at the hands of Two-Face at the end of Dark Victoryso his presence in the comic has been contained in it and The Long Halloween.
In addition to being mystery stories and serving as origin stories for Two-Face and Robin, Long Halloween and Dark Victory He asked, “But how, exactly, did Gotham City go from the mob-dominated underworld to the era of civil war?” Batman: Year One “To the chaotic, theatrical crime waves of a loose community of costumed killers?” Part of that transition, Loeb and Sale posited, was the scions of Gotham’s major crime families turning to serial murder and calling cards.
But it is The Penguin Will he also be interested in following that particular transition, or will he maintain his commitment to staying away from the villains nicknamed Batman? That will be demonstrated in the other episodes of the miniseries.