‘The Penguin’ just gave me the gender-flipped Joker and Harley Quinn love story of my dreams
Sofia Gigante (née Falcone) has entered the chat on this week’s episode of HBO’s The Penguin. This time, she’s ready to risk it all—even a shaky alliance with the Maronis—to crush Oz Cobb for good and become Gotham’s baddest crime lord. And from the look of it, she may have a dangerous new ally by her side.
Spoilers ahead for The Penguin episodes 4 and 5.
The Falcones? Never heard of ’em. Well, that’s because they’re all dead, thanks to Sofia (Cristin Milioti), the daughter of the late mobster Carmine Falcone (Mark Strong) best known around town as The Hangman. Whether she’s truly deserving of that moniker remains up for debate, but it doesn’t really matter now that she’s—mostly—gotten revenge for the whole, y’know, being framed for murder and sent to Arkham Asylum by her father and his minions thing. Not exactly “dad of the year” behavior.
Sofia’s decade-long stay at Arkham wasn’t entirely fruitless, however, as this is where she first met Dr. Julian Rush (Theo Rossi). Initially, the well-meaning psychiatrist was assigned to Sofia’s case, where he was meant to determine whether or not she was competent enough to stand trial. Ultimately, Julian resigned because of the corruption taking place within the upper echelon at Arkham, as Sofia was tortured by the prison guards and even fellow inmates on Carmine’s payroll.
Love? Obsession? Guilt? It’s hard to pinpoint Julian’s true feelings for Sofia, but as we’ve come to learn, the two have stayed in touch. In fact, Julian is one of the few people Sofia trusts and he vouches for her innocence long after her release from Arkham. In episode 4, it’s him the Falcone heiress calls when Oz (Colin Farrell) both literally and metaphorically throws her under the bus after their drug operation goes south.
So is this strictly a business partnership, or are sparks flying between what could be Gotham’s new power couple?
The Penguin cleverly subverts everything we love about Joker and Harley’s love story
The Penguin episode 5, “Homecoming,” acts as something of a reset button. Sofia deals with the fallout of her family’s totally not suspicious murder via a gas leak, Oz and Victor Aguilar (Rhenzy Feliz) set up a new base of operations in Crown Point, and Salvatore Maroni (Clancy Brown) breaks out of prison. To make matters more interesting, Dr. Rush also switches sides, approaching Sofia with a proposal of his own: “I’d like to be a part of whatever’s next, if you’ll have me.”
If former Arkham psychiatrist-turned-obsessive love interest sounds familiar, that’s because it is. This is almost a verbatim reimagining of Harley Quinn’s origin story as she fell deeply in love with her patient, Joker, went mad, and joined him on his “dark crusade.” According to Cristin Milioti, this nod to DC’s most infamous couple is fully intentional. I, for one, would love to see the mild-mannered Julian being corrupted to the dark side and becoming Sofia’s guard dog.
“I think when we started, I’d only read the first four [scripts] and then we got the last four as we were shooting, so I was also learning about their relationship in real-time,” Milioti told Decider. “But I’m so glad to hear you say that, because I do [see it]. I was intrigued by it, even just reading the scripts.”
The Penguin showrunner Lauren LeFranc also weighed in on the “twisted and weird” romance between Julian and Sofia, which subverts typical gangster film tropes, in which women often take the back seat. She also set the record straight regarding the power dynamics at play here, as Sofia is very much the one who wears the proverbial pants in their relationship.
“We’ve seen so many gangster films where the way men treat women is very like, in a diminished way, I guess. And to me, it was interesting that Julian Rush could be somebody who admires Sofia and is in awe of her, but is the beta in this relationship, and Sofia knows it. I just don’t think you’ve gotten to see that type of dynamic that often.”
What is Dr. Julian Rush hiding?
For now, it’s hard to tell whether or not Dr. Rush will be a worthy sidekick to Sofia and her new crime empire, or if he’ll just get in the way of her ambitions. After all, Julian will have to do a lot of mental gymnastics to come to terms with her … questionable methods (i.e. shooting Johnny Viti at point-blank range). He’ll have to match Sofia’s freak, so to speak, if he ever hopes to keep up and set aside whatever moral compass guided him to help his former patient in the first place.
It’s worth noting that some have speculated that Julian is either the DC Universe’s take on The Scarecrow or Dr. Hugo Strange, a popular villain from the Batman comics who, yes, just so happens to be Arkham’s in-house psychiatrist. But for now, we’ll just have to wait until the next episode of The Penguin rolls out this Sunday on HBO and Max to find out.
Have a tip we should know? tips@themarysue.com
