Will The Penguin Season 2 Happen? Everything We Know

Warning: This article contains SPOILERS for The Penguin

Now that The Penguin season 1 has come to an end, attention must turn to the future of Colin Farrell’s iconic DC villain. So, what do we know about the chances of a second season of the DC spin-off? The Penguin is a DC Elseworlds series that focuses on the eponymous Batman villain’s rise to power in Gotham’s sprawling underworld. It was an exceptional expansion of Matt Reeves’ acclaimed Batman universe, and it’s inevitable that there will be clamor for more.

The Penguin retains the dark themes established in The Batman, delivering a particularly bleak take on one of the most iconic and recognizable characters in Batman’s rogues’ gallery. Colin Farrell’s Oz Cobb is a stark departure from the most recent live-action cinematic adaptation of Oswald Cobblepot in 1992’s Batman Returns, portraying him instead as a shrewd and seedy mob boss. Oz’s crucial role in Gotham means that a second season is always possible – so here’s what we know.

The Penguin Season 2 Has Not Been Confirmed

Colin Farrell Has Also Expressed His Doubts About Returning With More

The Penguin season 2 has not yet been confirmed, but it certainly isn’t off the table. This is actually fairly typical for Matt Reeves’ Batman productions, as confirmation for a sequel to The Batman did not come until several weeks after the first of the trilogy was released. Showrunner Lauren LeFranc has, however, spoken about the chances of a second season of The Penguin to The Direct at NYCC:

“I mean, we put it all out on the table. I think that in order to do a second season, we have to feel like we can top ourselves. We have to feel like there’s something more there to really dig into. I mean, I really care about all these characters, even if they’re terrible people… I t’s been a joy to write them, even though they’re twisted and complicated and weird and darkly funny. So look, I think Gotham City is just such a fun sandbox to play, and I’d love to keep playing in it, but I think it just has to be the right thing. We should never do anything just to do it.”

The Penguin has been very well reviewed (including by ScreenRant), and that success will surely also influence whether The Batman spin-off will return for a second season. The first episode has amassed more than 16 million people in total, with 1.9 million tuning into the penultimate episode during its Sunday night release window.

Colin Farrell’s comments feel like a barrier to any potential second season, as he’s been very vocal about how difficult the filming process was. When asked by TotalFilm about whether he believes season 2 is possible, Farrell replied:

I don’t know, man. Don’t get me wrong – I loved it – but it got in on me a little bit. By the end of it, I was bitching and moaning to anyone who would listen to me that I f—–g wanted it to be finished. I tried to remind them that I had ‘grumpy gratitude.’ I was still grateful, and still honored – I grew up watching Burgess Meredith [who played the role in the ’60s TV series], and then Danny DeVito [in Tim Burton’s 1992 film Batman Returns] was my Penguin – so being a part of the lineage of that storytelling, I really did feel privileged. But by the end of it…It’s not like I didn’t know who I was and I was going out and burning cars and s–t, but… if you take what Matt Reeves created and then what Lauren [LeFranc, showrunner] did and what Mike [Marino, prosthetics and make-up designer] did and put them all together, it was a really powerful experience.

This “powerful experience” is likely referencing how labor-intensive the role became after donning such a significant amount of prosthetics on such a regular basis.

What We Know About Penguin’s Future In The Batman Universe

The Batman director Matt Reeves has long called The Penguin the “entry point” for the upcoming sequel, saying it will “absolutely connected to where we leave things in the series. There are details that actually connect right into the way the next movie begins, and the way that Oz enters that world as we hand the baton back to Batman.” He also told Deadline that “Colin [Farrell] will be part of the movie. We’ve shared [the script] as we’ve been going along with DC and the studio, and they’re super excited.”

More recently, Farrell himself spoke with Collider about his potential future in The Batman Part II, which will head into production in 2025, and wasn’t exactly concrete in his confirmation:

“No, no, but I’d say Dylan will probably let me know very soon. I could call up Dylan today and ask him, I suppose, what we’re looking at, when we’re going to start shooting and all that thing, but I’ve kind of had enough of it all for now. I need to step away and just be at home and chill and watch movies and go on hikes.”

The Penguin Season 2 Cast: Who Could Return?

The Penguin’s Cast Shrunk Considerably After The Spin-Off’s Bloody Kill List

The survivors list after the finale is remarkably small considering the size of The Penguin‘s cast. Oz Cobb would be able to reprise his starring role, but the violence inherent within The Batman franchise and Oz’s thirst for absolute power meant even his closest allies ended up severely depleted. The most likely returning character alongside him would be Deidre O’Connell’s Francis Cobb, though she remains in a persistent vegetative state after her stroke in the finale. Given Oz refused to fulfill her request for him to kill her if that happened, she’d likely return without much active participation.

Rhenzy Feliz clearly can’t return after his character – Victor Aguilar – was killed in the finale, but Cristin Milioti’s Sofia Gigante is still a possibility given she ends up in Arkham again, while her partner in crime Dr Julian Rush (Theo Rossi) is somehow working there again. That could suggest he plans to help her escape, setting up another round of conflict with Oz.

Oz’s girlfriend Eve Karlo (Carmen Ejogo) remains in play (with a troubling new Oedipal element thrown in), and the new breed of Gotham’s gangland bosses (including Robert Lee Leng’s Link Tsai) are set up for more prominent roles. So too is Rhys Coiro’s Gotham Councillor Sebastian Hady, who Oz uses in the final episode as his clever means to clear his name. Pretty much everyone else is dead, so barring some ghostly returns, the show would probably need to bring in some new talent.

The Penguin Season 2 Story: What It Could Be About

How Another Season Could Expand On Penguin’s Story

The Penguin season 2 would likely depict its titular villain at the height of his power. Given the creative license that Matt Reeves’ and other writers have demonstrated with their interpretation of the Batman mythos, it is difficult to draw from specific DC Comics storylines that the next season might look to adapt. With Penguin set to reappear in The Batman – Part II, however, there is a chance that Penguin and Batman’s long history in the aftermath of that movie might even see them cooperating out of convenience against a greater threat.

Oz Cobb’s fondness for exploiting poltical corruption would put him at odds with The Riddler (Paul Dano), whose army of followers remains active in the background of The Penguin. Their agenda is clearing up corruption in Gotham, and Oz has effectively put a target on his back if they discover his association with Councilman Hady.

Intriguingly, we don’t yet know if Robert Pattinson’s Batman remains fully active in Gotham, after The Batman‘s ending, but the final shot of The Penguin does at least offer a major hint that Jim Gordon believes he is. Whether a potential second season would see him more prominently involved remains to be seen: the reality is that the show worked so well without him that it would be almost a shame to include him again. But there would have to be a very big reason to justify it, like there was here.

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