Where Does The Penguin's Oz Cobb Rank Amongst The Great Antiheroes?
Antihero is a term that most of us first learned for the first time when Tony Soprano first came around, and we all started throwing it around like we were literary geniuses once Breaking Bad came into our lives. "Antihero" and "Penultimate" - 2 words that made you sound smart like you read books but all you were doing was watching television and probably reading reddit threads after each episode. The last decade or so we've been throwing those terms around more than your girlfriend who calls you a "narcissist" who is "gaslighting" her. Because between Tony, Walter White, Al Swearengen, Vic Mackey, Don Draper, Dexter Morgan, Omar Little, Marty & Wendy Byrd, potentially a handful of characters from Thrones depending on how you view that series, and plenty others, television has been chock full of guys we all rooted for who were questionable at best.
What term I dont think a lot of us learned, is "villain protagonist." Which is probably a better way to characterize some of these guys. The difference between a good guy who's doing some bad shit and a bad guy doing some bad ass entertaining shit is enormous. One you can still level with on some moral level, the other one is just good old fashioned rooting for the bad guy. The best characters are where you dont know which one it is. Thanos is a good example. Definitively a villain. Matter of fact, the ultimate villain. But also I kinda understand theres just too many goddamn people and not enough STUFF, so lets get rid of half these jamokes and let the other half ball out. I feel you, Thanos. I do. Im right in the middle, perfectly balanced as all things should be. Walter White is another all time great because you watch him devolve from one to the other. Watched him as he started as the former and finished as the latter. Walt was a dying dorky dad, hellbent on the the idea of providing for his family the best and fastest way he knew while still trying to limit the damage he created…where as Heisenberg finished off as an egomaniac devoted to nothing more than his legacy and reputation willing to poison little kids and watch innocent people die. And in between those two were moments where the two blended together perfectly and despite all that…somehow, someway… we all just fuckin hated Skylar White. Boy were we way off on that one.
I know thats not a rare take any more, everyone has had that epiphany. But I havent blogged much in recent years since we all looked back on Breaking Bad and realized it, so I gotta say it here: Skylar was actually a down ass bitch who rode for her drug kingpin husband to pretty extreme goddam lengths and only once he became a murderous psychopath did she do what she had to do to protect her kids. And at the time we were like "what a fucking bitch, man!" It was a different time! We were still all publicly hating women with no backlash!
But anyway, Walter was an Antihero and Heisenberg was a Villain Protagonist. Vic Mackey was a piece of shit corrupt cop, doing 100% bad things and putting people in extremely compromising positions = Villain Protagonist. Jax Teller killed a bunch of people - FORTY SIX to be exact - but almost every time it was defending himself or protecting the club or the family. Perhaps some satisfying revenge kills in there but for the most part he really didnt want to kill unless he had to = antihero. Dexter Morgan killed 149 total people, with only 12 of them not fitting Harry's Code. Serial killer with an 80% hit rate for justified kills? I thought it would be higher, but I still give him Antihero. Don Draper is just an absolutely detestable guy with a reprehensible track record but hes handsome as hell, dresses sharper than a motherfucker, and says cool shit so he's the main character - villain protagonist. In my humble opinion.
Enter Oz Cobb. One of the best characters on television the last few years. An absolute lock for all sorts of awards and praise for Colin Farrell in one of the most transformative roles we've ever seen. The voice, the limp, the suit, all of that has to fucking SUCK as an actor and he nails all of it. And while he nails it with the acting, the writing of his character is top shelf stuff. Right up there with the Walters and the Thanoses, if you ask me. So where does he rank, and where does he fall on the Antihero-Villain Protagonist scale?
The Penguin, in general, is very obviously a villain. When you say, who are the villains in Batman? The answer is Tier 1: the Joker, the Riddler and, the Penguin. Tier 2: Two Face, Bane, Scarecrow and then Tier 3 are your guys like Mr. Freeze. But very definitively the Penguin, as a character, is a villain. Danny Devito's half human version of the Penguin eating fish with his flipper hands with black shit oozing from his mouth has zero redeeming qualities. Nothing heroic or protagonist-ic about him. (Sidenote: i like to believe theres a television multiverse where Frank Reynolds, host of the Little Beauties pageant is in the same timeline as the penguin. Frank hangs out with Pondy and the Cricket and Charlie and the Gang enough that he devolves into Oswald Cobblepot:
But Oz Cobb is very different from Oswald Cobblepot. Devito's Penguin is this disgusting deformed half human half animal lascivious freak. Nobody has EVER, for one single second, liked or rooted for that version of the Penguin. Where as Colin Farrell's Oz Cobb is a super ugly fat guy with a bum leg. A sympathetic figure surrounded by worse assholes than he initially appears. Whether its a spoiled douchebag imbecile Alberto Falcone, or the smug and condescending Johnny Viti, or a super creepy and unsettling Dr. Julien Rush (Who's going to become Scarecrow, right?) played by Theo Rossi, shout out to Juice! SAMCRO!… all of these assholes are less likable than Oz Cobb. As the series starts Oz is more affable than almost all the other characters on screen. He comes across as the guy who had to hustle harder than all these other rich pricks. The Underdog. The crippled guy who has to use his wits and his brains and is always one step ahead. And if he's not hes got a Plan B and the gift of gab to get him out of a jam. And despite being ugly as sin and waddling around like a gross greasball rolling around town in a purple Maserati, theres something oddly charming about him, Early episodes, extremely Antihero vibes.
SPOILERS AHEAD
But as we get to the middle and end of season 1, that villain vibe comes back pretty heavy. We learn that he just straight up fucking murders his 2 brothers in HORRENDOUS fashion all over a very trivial dispute over Flashlight Tag. On the one hand, I dont really think Oz hit them with the flashlight. He did find them. But, they kept hiding in that tunnel. They never actually got hit by the light Rules are rules, until the light actually hits them, you're still "it." On the other hand, playing a game of tag with your crippled brother and going down like 30 feet on a ladder is kind of a dickhead move. And also its very relatable when you're stuck being "it." The only thing more mortifying than being It and not being able to tag anybody is being Marco in Marco Polo and not finding anybody in the pool. Thrashing around like an asshole, yelling Fish out of Water at the wrong times, just like, soaking wet and half drowning because you're gassed. You start cheating by opening your eyes and people are yelling at you. Legit I have PTSD flashbacks thinking of times I was stuck as Marco thinking, "I may never get out of this pool. I may just die Marco." True story when I was a little kid, like 6 - my older brother was 10 and we had 2 neighbor family friends Victoria and Jason that were like 8 and 12. So I was the youngest of the bunch and we always used to watch scary horror movies like Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th. And so we had a Jason Vorhees mask and a toy machete and we basically used to play a version of tag that was Jason Vorhees vs the Camp Counselors. But whenever we played this, I had to be Jason and chase them - and because in the movie you never see Jason run and you only watch him ominously walk, the rule of the game was that I wasnt allowed to run. Imagine that. A SIX YEAR OLD WALKING, vs an 8, 10, and 12 year old RUNNING. How the fuck was I ever supposed to catch them??? Were they even having fun???? What was the point of this game???? Why would anyone want to do that???? Other than, of course, to point and laugh at me.
SPOILERS AHEAD
So, I tell that anecdote to say, I can sympathize with Oz when you're the kid in the group who is getting bullied around. Now, the difference is, I just said "fuck you guys! I'm going inside!" and I didnt trap them in the sewer during a flood until they met their demise screaming for their lives while they slowly drowned in rainwater. Thats a pretty key difference, right there. Pretty big distinction. And that, my friends, is where you really start to feel the villain side of Oz. Up until that point you know theres a lot of murder and violence. Theres a lot of manipulative, hollow words where he's blatantly using people, making them think they are a team or a family but they're really just means to an end for him. Theres a lot of backstabbing and double crossing and going back on his word. But in all those cases they are expendable trash bag henchman or other crime bosses and scumbags. So you dont really care that his actually behaving like a shitbag.
But locking your brothers in a sewer, and then having hours upon hours of time to still save them and intentionally choosing not to just so you can watch jazz numbers with your mom? Fucking deplorable.That fat piece of shit. What an absolute asshole. Lookin like Pugsley Addams mixed with Corey Feldman
Cara Robbins. Getty Images.
Its not the locking them in there, its the letting them stay in there, that I first felt like I didnt want to root for Oz anymore. And then he sets the Maroni wife and son on fire and I start thinking, you know this Penguin guy might not be too nice! Now, I'm not saying he was Damon Pope setting Tig's daughter on fire and making him watch in Sons of Anarchy (truly the most unsettling, disturbing scene of television I've ever watched)…because at the end of the day those characters were gangsters and thieves and they were try to murder Oz so its kinda like, all's fair in love and war. But nonetheless pouring gasoline on a guy and sending him over to his mom only to throw a lighter on them is still some depraved shit.
And yet, despite all that, heading into the finale, you're still kinda rooting for him to win. He's the focus. You've gone on this ride with him. The ups and the downs. The wins and the losses. Every time you think he's cooked he finds a way to wiggle out. Whenever hes about to take an L hes smart enough to turn it into a W. Through it all, you're still Team Oz. Or at least I was.
But then…Vic happens. And that changes everything. That erases everything. There is no grey area on that one. Theres no explaining that one away. Theres not hero. Just all villain. You can't even really still say you're "rooting for the bad guy" after that one. Thats one of the single most despicable, unconscionable moves in television history. The kid that gave you his everything. The stuttering gem of a kid who lost his whole family and turned to you as the only thing in his life that he cared for. Did everything he could to make Oz proud of him. Came back to save Oz's ass time and time again. Coming back with the car when he could have ridden off to California with his hot ass girlfriend and lived a nice life with her. Came up with the Link scheme to outwit Sofia. Protected his mother. Protected Oz. And for no good reason other than not wanting to have any weak spots, he literally chokes the life out of Vic. Dont get me wrong, a ruthless and probably correct assessment of the situation - you can't have any vulnerable spots when you're fighitng a gutter war in Gotham and thats what Vic was. But that was the nail in the coffin for me. From Antihero to Villain Protagonist once he killed Vic. A real piece of shit move that really left my jaw on the ground. Once it was pretty apparent where that scene was going I was actually literally speaking to my television going "No…no way…theyre not gonna…they cant do tha…oh my god they're gonna do it. They're doing it. They DID IT." Great twist. Great writing. Threw a real wrench into everyone's feelings about Oz, and reminded all of us who got lulled into a false sense of security throughout those first 7 hours - the Penguin always has been, and always will be, a piece of shit villain.