THE PENGUIN EPISODE 2 FULL Breakdown, Batman Easter Eggs & Things You Missed
THE PENGUIN EPISODE 2 FULL Breakdown, Batman Easter Eggs & Things You Missed
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00:00What do you say Oz, you in?
00:05Let's dance.
00:07Welcome back everyone, it's Charlie. This will be my full Penguin episode 2 video.
00:11There are a bunch of Batman easter eggs and references, so we'll break it all down.
00:14If you're brand new to the channel, be sure to subscribe to get all the episodes.
00:18Careful for spoilers if you have not seen the episode yet.
00:21We'll start at the beginning and work our way through shot by shot talking about easter eggs and WTF moments.
00:25The episode title was inside man a reference to Penguin because in this episode he starts actually playing the Falcons against the Maronis.
00:33Like he's spinning all these plates in the air trying to play everybody against each other.
00:37Making plans, the plans failing, and continually having to make contingency plans on the fly.
00:42Which he then advises to Victor at the end of the episode.
00:45Always have a contingency plan, always think on your feet.
00:48Originally he bargained with Sal Maroni to become their inside man inside Falcons organization.
00:54While making the Falcons believe that it was Maroni who killed Alberto.
00:58But also he's not just playing the Falcons against the Maronis.
01:01He's also within the Falcons sided with Sophia becoming her inside man inside the Falcons.
01:08Gonna help her take over the family eventually.
01:10But he's also still at odds with her because the whole idea is that he's trying to become the comic book Penguin.
01:16Eventually causing both of these families to go war with each other.
01:19Hoping that they destroy each other and he can slide in to make another Penguin reference and create his own empire.
01:25Becoming more like comic book Penguin.
01:27So it's a little good the bad and the ugly where everybody is sort of playing against each other in this situation.
01:33And Penguin has plans within plans within plans.
01:36He's not meant to be a criminal genius to make another Batman reference to the comics.
01:40But he is meant to be very quick on his feet.
01:43A very very good improviser.
01:45There's been no plan that he has made this season so far that is actually gone according to the way he originally wanted it.
01:52He's continually had to make contingency plans always thinking on his feet.
01:57Clearly that will continue to happen through the rest of the episodes like things will only get crazier.
02:02The actual opening scene starts with Sophia having a flashback inside Arkham Asylum.
02:07It looks like she just gotten there in her vision like she's been there for just a little while.
02:11She seems super surprised to see her brother Alberto.
02:14Remember she told Penguin that he came to visit her regularly.
02:18Then revealing that it is a vision when she sees that his finger has been cut off and she starts to remember things from present day.
02:24Notice we also find out that she calls him Berto.
02:26She keeps referring to him as Berto during the episode.
02:29The reason why she only sees the shadowy hand reach out to shoot him is because she's suspicious of who actually killed him.
02:35Like she doesn't actually know.
02:36She's heard people blame others.
02:38But the idea is that she's meant to be very suspicious of everyone including Penguin.
02:43Even though they formed the alliance at the end of the episode against Luca within the Falcons.
02:48Even though Penguin was successfully able to frame her man for Alberto's murder and pretty much everything else that's happened.
02:54She still does not trust Penguin.
02:56So the idea is that that suspicion will continue through the rest of the series.
03:00Like he's not completely scot-free from Alberto's death.
03:03You also notice that the visitation area here is the same one that we saw in the Batman movie with Robert Pattinson's Batman visiting Riddler in Joker in that deleted scene.
03:11Because it's meant to be the same universe.
03:13Notice the red flashing lights.
03:15Seems like some sort of psychological treatment that she was given that her psychiatrist here is using.
03:19And if it seems like they have some kind of weird sexual relationship.
03:22That's because it is like the way they talked about at least online the articles about the character.
03:27Is that there is some kind of relationship between the two of them.
03:29Always very healthy for patients to have sexual relationships with their psychiatrist.
03:35I am sure that will end well.
03:37The actual red flashing lights and just his general demeanor give a lot of Hugo strange vibes.
03:42They're calling his character Julian Rush who is not a character from the Batman comics.
03:46They created him for the purposes of the Batman universe here.
03:49Most of you will remember him as Shades from the Luke Cage series in the Marvel universe.
03:55That's a cheap broom.
03:57Old.
03:59Notice he tells her to start looking around the room.
04:01And the picture that she looks at looks suspiciously like the outline of a chubby comic book penguin.
04:07Like maybe some foreshadowing there.
04:09Like in her mind subconsciously she's suspecting the penguin was involved in Alberto's death still.
04:14The reason why she tells him that she's not safe even though she's at home.
04:18Is because the entire family is against her.
04:20As we see through the rest of the episode.
04:22They basically want to get rid of her as fast as possible.
04:24If not straight up kill her.
04:26Also there's outside forces that she'll have to worry about soon too if not already.
04:30Like the Maronis are going to try and kill the Falcons eventually.
04:33Love the title transition too the way they do this episode.
04:36They've kind of been doing this in all the episodes so far.
04:38So I'm expecting this to continue in future episodes with different scenes.
04:41But when she says she's not safe at home.
04:43It literally transitions right to the penguins face inside his car.
04:47Implying that maybe he will be faced with the decision to actually have to kill her.
04:51We find him outside Blackgate Penitentiary ready to meet Maroni again.
04:55We learn that he's already been informed by his people on the outside.
04:58That Penguin pinned Alberto's death on him.
05:01Shoray Agladashu is meant to be his wife and this is meant to be his son.
05:05The way they explain their characters is that he fell in love with the Persian woman.
05:09This woman here and eventually replaced his entire Italian mafia with the Persian mafia.
05:15So that's why in the Batman universe most the Maronis will look Persian.
05:19Penguin scrambles quickly trying to save the situation.
05:22Like I said thinking on his feet playing it off like he was doing Sal a favor by pinning the murder on him.
05:27To make Gotham afraid of him again.
05:29Make the Falcons afraid of him again.
05:31Who then threatens to out penguins treachery to the Falcons.
05:35But the way they played he manages to talk himself out of the situation like he did in episode one.
05:40Revealing that the new head of the Falcone family is Carmine's brother Luca.
05:44Love the little detail about his wife talking to him in Farsi so that the penguin doesn't understand.
05:49It's also meant to foreshadow the idea that she's very involved in his day-to-day running of the actual family on the outside while he's in prison.
05:56Like she's meant to be just as cunning as he is.
05:59What penguin means when he says that Maroni will have to do his part in all this.
06:03It's taking credit for Alberto and letting the war play out between families.
06:07While penguin tries to dance in between them spinning all these plates in the air playing everybody against each other.
06:12He agrees to do that in exchange for all of Falcone's drops business because are going to hit the truck.
06:17The idea is that Carmine Falcone actually stole the drops business from Maroni in the first place by outing him to the feds and getting him thrown in prison.
06:25Then basically absorbing his drops operation making it the Falcone's operation.
06:29That's one of the reasons penguin was trying to play on his desire for revenge against the Falcone's.
06:35We meet one of their capos Irvad who will help him steal everything he needs from Robbinsville where the Falcone's ordered him to take the drops business.
06:42If you didn't watch Sopranos or you don't watch a lot of mob based television shows capos are like captains inside the mob families.
06:50The reason why they're using the FEMA trucks to move this stuff around is because remember this is just right after the events of the first Batman movie.
06:56So Gotham is still a disaster site FEMA is still there trying to help everyone in the city.
07:01Penguin sets everything up so that he can take down all of his enemies when they hit the convoy.
07:06But then VD shows up and he has to call an audible being thrown onto the truck having to survive the actual hit.
07:12Notice how they're making VD seem like such a butthole in all these episodes so far.
07:17Like they really want you to hate that character.
07:19They want all the other characters to also hate him to like penguin hates him and Sophia hates him.
07:24Pretty soon when Luca finds out that he's been banging his wife.
07:27He'll also hate him too.
07:28But one of the key things here is that he calls him penguin to his face and in the Batman universe.
07:33The way that Matt Reeves explained it is that penguin is meant to be a derogatory term that people call him who don't like him.
07:39All because of his deformity in the way that it makes him walk like it looks like he's waddling around like a penguin.
07:45So the idea is that they really want to make it seem like VD hates penguin and penguin really hates VD.
07:50Penguin winds up surviving the hit by having to kill all the different members of the truck eventually himself.
07:55Like the driver almost dies but survives to see him killing the other two men.
07:59While that Bobby Darin song call me irresponsible is playing.
08:03Very apropos choice for the song itself because penguin is being very irresponsible in the situation.
08:09We spent a lot more time in this episode with the Sophia character to like she comes back to the mansion while they're talking about the hit in the background.
08:15She hears penguin getting credit for saving Castillo's life.
08:18Penguin yelling at John VD trying to save face playing it like the disaster wasn't his fault.
08:23It was VD's fault.
08:24Remember this is him basically trying to maneuver things to make everybody think that VD was the mole on the family.
08:30We meet Luca the new head of the family Carmine's brother.
08:33The way they play the dynamics in the situation here penguin notices that they hate Sophia being there.
08:39They don't have anything to do with her and that Sophia also hates them to so penguin tries to use that to his advantage.
08:45Immediately clocking the VD is the fall guy that he needs to go for pin it all on VD.
08:50Everybody hates VD Sophia starts have a bit of a standoff with Luca and they sort of set up this fight between the two of them that will play out over the rest of the season.
08:58However, many episodes he doesn't really care that much about her and she's going to eventually try and take over the family herself.
09:05The couple quick references here to like when he says what he doing running a marathon because she knows that he has the deformity and can't walk that well.
09:12So she walks even faster just to mess with him early on in the episode.
09:16She still really hates him and even though at the end of the episode when she does form the alliance with them.
09:21She still doesn't like him that much, but he's currently the only person in the family that seems like he's supporting her.
09:27So it's more of an enemy of my enemy is my friend situation with the two of them.
09:31His big pitch here to her is to use that mystery drug shipment which he also references later in the episode to the fact that it's such a big mystery feels like there's going to be some big payoff from the comics
09:42or to be some big twist and were not expecting like is not an actual drug is something completely different lot of people wondering if it's venom because venom is a big drug in Gotham city during the comics relative to the Bane character
09:53DC just announced that they're actually doing a deathstroke in Bane team up movie.
09:57But I think it's meant to be connected to the DCU universe not to Matt Reeves Batman universe like it's completely separate thing.
10:04This is a coincidence when you see penguin and Victor walking down the street and he stops and looks at the missing persons poster.
10:10I think the idea is that he's thinking of somebody that's close to him.
10:13There's a couple text he gets later in the episode.
10:16I think it's meant to be a girlfriend of his that will be the next week's episode.
10:19There's only teasing more of his back story to like we don't know that much about his character yet.
10:24When we see Sophia's car the D71 license plate is a Batman detective comics reference volume one number 70 Sophia listens to the news on the radio.
10:34They mention all the problems still caused by Riddler's attack like all the stuff that FEMA's trying to help with all the flooding the mayor elect that they mention is the brand-new mayor Bella Ray all who just got the job towards the end of the Batman movie when all this craziness was going down.
10:48They reference psychos being let out of Arkham asylum. You remember that Joker and Riddler are currently in Arkham.
10:54Probably a bunch of other Batman villains to that we don't know about, but it's mostly meant to be a reference to Sophia Falcone being let out and being acquitted of the murder of seven different women.
11:04They make a bunch of references here and later in the episode to her hangman identity from the Batman dark victory comics, which is meant to be a sequel to Batman the long Halloween during that storyline.
11:14She took the hangman identity and killed a whole bunch of people, but the way the showrunner talked about her character in this traumatic past.
11:21These mystery seven killings that got pinned on her is that everything that everyone believes in present day, especially the family believing that she did this isn't totally correct.
11:30So I think the idea is either someone else was involved and she was framed for or she's only partially responsible for those seven deaths will probably get some more flashbacks to explain what really happened like how those seven women all died.
11:43Penguin tells the story of how he came to work for Carmine Falcone to Victor basically likening it to the way that Victor came to work for Penguin like he's just like him.
11:52Like he got an unexpected promotion just like Penguin did when he was younger.
11:56When he mentions the blue heron club that's also the club that his mother took him to as a child that he talks to Sophia about later in the episode where they went dancing after his brothers died.
12:06As we hear from him at some point he became a bar back at that same club that eventually one of the other mobsters that was working for Falcone hired him as a driver and then that driver wound up getting caught talking to the feds and then killed.
12:19He calls it popped, which is also meant to be a parallel for him commenting on the current situation that they're in because Penguin if he is caught will get popped.
12:27But the idea is that when he was younger Carmine Falcone kept him on seeing something in him giving him a chance.
12:32So he's doing that with Victor now.
12:34Even though it might not seem like it. This is actually Penguin's way of showing Victor how much he believes in him like you actually have a shot kid you're just like me.
12:41You can make it if you work on it you learn to think on your feet, which he also admonishes him for at the end of the episode like don't screw up when you screw up always find a way to save the moment.
12:51Really big Easter egg here to when Penguin talks about learning how to drive and stealing the car and crashing it into the spring river.
12:58That's actually Easter egg for Dick spring who was a famous Batman artist back in the day on the classic comics.
13:03We see his girlfriend Eve Carlo come with her friends and they all just celebrate with some of the Falcone's and Penguin using the opportunity to try and stoke the fires against the Maronis.
13:13There are a couple funny moments with Penguin trying to set Victor up with the cam girl and he just has no idea what to do.
13:18They're really just using this moment to show you that Victor has another girl that he's actually going out with that he cares about like oh yeah you're nice this is cool.
13:25But he starts stuttering just because he's so nervous and because she starts asking him a whole bunch of questions that he doesn't want to answer.
13:31Eve then correctly guesses what Penguin did he killed Alberto Falcone and is now sort of roped her in on it with her girls.
13:38He explains his plan to her about using the pictures against John Beatty to frame everything on him in the club that he's going to create that she will work out with her girls after this.
13:47Now in the comics the iceberg lounge was his big place.
13:51But in the Matt Reeves Batman universe the iceberg lounge was owned by Carmine Falcone and Penguin just ran it for him which is now defunct.
13:58So I don't know if this new club that he plans to create will be like another version of the iceberg lounge or something that's totally different.
14:05They use the opportunity to remind you that he sleeps basically in a converted bank vault and he keeps the files with the dirt on everyone.
14:12Really important files in a lockbox which does seem prudent.
14:15Sophia winds up going to one of her father's former dirty detectives to find out who the mole is inside the family.
14:22They don't actually name him like he never speaks his name.
14:24So it's not meant to be Bullock or like a famous comic book character.
14:27I think it's just someone they created for the purposes of the show.
14:30But he also mentions that half the Gotham City Police Department is dirty and was working for Falcone which will probably come back in the next Batman movie too.
14:38Part of the idea in the first movie is that Batman was fighting the police as much as he was fighting the Riddler.
14:43But this detective seems like he's going to become Sophia's detective from here on out like you're helping me from now on.
14:49Later we find out that she's actually been sleeping inside her closet like notice she walks out of her closet in the beginning of the morning.
14:56Probably because she doesn't feel safe.
14:58Something about her PTSD from Arkham like she's used to sleeping in small enclosed spaces because she's been in Arkham for so long.
15:04All these fresh scratches on her neck seem like something that she did to herself.
15:09Maybe it was her clawing around the chains that used to be around her neck.
15:12Like that's why she was scratching like she was metaphorically scratching because she still felt like it was around her neck.
15:17Penguin's mother has another episode that he tries to deal with.
15:20They basically want to set up the complicated relationship that he has with her.
15:23Kind of like Tony Soprano and his mother on that series The Sopranos because the Penguin series is aping The Sopranos a lot.
15:29Sort of like The Sopranos but with Batman characters.
15:32Revealing that he won't send her to a home or get her special help which she critically needs.
15:37Implying that maybe she'll wind up having some kind of accident in the future and will wind up dying that way.
15:43But notice later in the episode he actually lies to Sophia Falcone claiming that his mother also is dead.
15:49Probably as a way to both protect her and also keep people from using her against him.
15:54They have Alberto's funeral. The protesters calling for him to send Sophia back to Arkham.
15:58We see the woman in the pictures with Vidi is actually Luca's wife.
16:01They leave before he's able to show him the pictures.
16:04So he has to call another audible like he will have to do pretty much in every single episode.
16:08We'll probably see him do that several times in each episode.
16:11There are a couple Easter eggs on the signs here too.
16:13The red question mark if you don't remember is meant to be the Riddler's symbol from the first Batman movie.
16:18Remember there was one of his followers on the subway trying to get him to scan the QR code.
16:22Because the Rata Alata website is active again.
16:25You can actually scan that in real life.
16:27It'll take you with a bunch of articles about stuff that's happening currently in the Batman universe.
16:31So some of these people are meant to be more of the Riddler's followers.
16:35Remember the way they position the Riddler inside the Batman universe here is more of like a QAnon kind of vibe.
16:40Trying to out conspiracy theories.
16:42So part of the idea is that people think there's some kind of mystery behind the deaths of all these women.
16:47All because Sophia was supposedly acquitted of their deaths.
16:50But nobody believes her and everyone just thinks that she did it.
16:53As I said earlier, the showman revealed that that's not meant to be completely true.
16:57Like we'll learn the truth of that history eventually.
17:00You can let me know in the comments if she wasn't completely responsible for all those seven deaths.
17:04Who do you think was responsible?
17:06Like was it her mother or was it someone else?
17:09Penguin tells her story about his dead brothers confirming they died when he was young.
17:13There were some theories about that after episode one.
17:15Saying that they didn't have a funeral service for them because his mother didn't want the pity.
17:19And even though he does tell her a couple lies here during their conversation.
17:22When he talks about dealing with the pain, he is being truthful though.
17:25Like some of the things he tells to her are truthful.
17:28We find out that his brothers were named Jack and Benny.
17:30I'm sure we'll also get a flashback to explain what happened with them and what happened with his father.
17:35Then he gets a text from the Maronis because of what happened with Ervod being captured by Sophia's detective.
17:41He winds up saving his own life by telling them about the dirt that he has in all the files on everyone they're going to use for the rest of the season.
17:48He also tells them that he's going to save Ervod's life.
17:51During Alberto's wake, Sophia also gets Ervod down in her basement ready to interrogate him.
17:57Theoretically, he would give up all the secrets on Penguin and what's really going on too.
18:02When Penguin gives Victor his mantra here, the only way out of this is through.
18:06That'll probably be a recurring theme throughout the rest of his meteoric rise to power in like future Batman movies where he appears to.
18:12When in doubt, when things get crazy, the only way out of this is through.
18:16He creates another elaborate plan, which of course does not go according to the way he wants it.
18:22Victor tries to plant the jewels on Beatty's car unsuccessfully.
18:26So he winds up having to kill Ervod so that Luca will be convinced that there is a mole inside the family and that winds up working successfully.
18:33So R.I.P. Castillo, like he starts the fight with Beatty so that he can plant the knife on Castillo.
18:38Also, he found a way to plant the jewels in Castillo's apartment too.
18:42So now Sophia believes that it was Castillo that killed Alberto, but that doesn't mean that Penguin is off scot-free.
18:48She's still suspicious of Penguin, like she doesn't trust him.
18:51They also use this to set up more of the fight between Sophia and Luca trying to push her out again.
18:56Like there are a couple moments at the wake here where it's clear that the rest of the family,
18:59like even the regular family members, like the other women, do not like her and do not trust her.
19:04So she feels like everybody is against her, which is why she's so willing to team up with the Penguin, who she still does not like.
19:11The enemy of my enemies is my friend, and right now her real enemies are her family.
19:16So pretty easy to guess that in some future episode she will wind up killing Luca herself.
19:21Penguin then admonishes Victor for his failure and not thinking quickly enough on his feet.
19:25Lay down with the body, like he actually has to hug the bodies down there in the grave.
19:29This is like a recurring theme between him and Victor.
19:31Like every single episode, there's always a moment where Victor thinks that that's it.
19:35Like, oh, Penguin's gonna kill me now.
19:37Why else would he make me lie down in the grave next to these dead bodies?
19:40But when he reminds him to always be quick on your feet,
19:43I think the idea is they'll pay this off later this season when Victor will do that.
19:46Like some plan will go awry and he'll wind up saving Penguin's life by thinking quick on his feet.
19:52A lot of people also asking if his name is Victor, will he wind up becoming Victor Zsasz from the comics?
19:57I'm not expecting that, but because all the different Batman characters and Batman villains
20:01have a more real-world spin than say like the more fantastical Batman movies, it's always possible.
20:07If that winds up happening, hopefully he doesn't get little cuts all over himself.
20:11Like that would be pretty nuts.
20:13Sofia calls to make the alliance with Penguin and they meet at their graves.
20:16Basically, these are the tombs of all the different Falcons.
20:18Carmine, who died during the events of the Batman movie recently,
20:21his wife, Sofia's mother, who died in 1994,
20:24they lay her with the camera on her for a little while,
20:26so I feel like we'll see what happened to her in a flashback.
20:29We briefly heard her voice during the home movie that they watched at the wake.
20:33And when the camera pans down to Alberto's tombstone,
20:36they actually remind you what time it is inside the Batman universe.
20:39It's November.
20:40The way that Matt Reeves explained it is that the events of the Batman 2 movie
20:43pick up right after the Penguin series,
20:46meaning that the Batman 2 might wind up being another Christmas movie,
20:49just like Batman Returns.
20:51But there's a bunch of Easter eggs and references throughout the episode.
20:54If there's anything you spotted that I didn't talk about during the video,
20:57write down below in the comments.
20:58My full episode 3 video will post next week after they release it.
21:01So big reminder that new episodes are on Sundays now.
21:04It's a Sunday night show.
21:06There's a bunch of big stuff coming up.
21:08Everyone click here for all my Penguin episodes
21:10and click here to learn about the new Batman Deathstroke in Bane movie that they're working on.
21:14Thank you so much for watching and I'll see you guys in the next one!