Spoiler alert! This story includes important plot points (and the ending) of the “The Penguin” Season 1 finale (now streaming on Max), so beware if you haven’t seen it yet.

The season finale of HBO’s “The Penguin” boasts an emotional gut punch but a rousing sense of hope, as Colin Farrell’s scarred gangster finally becomes the Gotham City supervillain he’s fated to be and the town’s Dark Knight makes his presence known. (Well, sort of.)

Lauren LeFranc, creatoundefined of “The Batman” spinoff drama, says she always knew it was a “rise-to-power story” for the criminally underestimated Oz Cobb, “but he couldn't do that without losing so much at the same time. It had to come at a cost ― an emotional cost ― most of which he chose," and Oz sacrifices "himself, people around him and things in order to achieve that level of power.”

And by the end of the episode, Oz “really does lose his own humanity at the same time,” LeFranc adds. “He feels that that's a weakness and that's really what makes him so villainous. I knew that was essential.”

Let’s break down what happens in the finale with Oz and Co.:

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Colin Farrell’s ‘The Penguin’ gangster makes a fateful decision

The series follows Oz’s maneuvering to take over the Gotham drug trade (and thereby the town’s underworld), and he sparks a revolution in which young, underestimated criminals take out their gang leaders. But he faces hardships as well: His mother, Francis (Deidre O’Connell), suffers a stroke after a showdown with Oz’s rival Sofia Falcone (Cristin Milioti). His young right-hand man Victor (Rhenzy Feliz) comforts Oz in a tender moment that turns deadly when the gangster brutally chokes him to death. “You’re a good man, Vic. You’ve got a good heart. It wasn’t for nothing,” Oz says as his companion slumps to the ground.

“I wanted to make sure that Oz makes a choice like that and he doesn't have to,” LeFranc says. “There's no justification for what he does. That felt really, really important.”

Farrell believes “any semblance of decency that Oz had up until that point is gone. I mean, that's kind of the final blowing out of even the pilot light. This is a bad, bad, dark, dark human being.”

Cristin Milioti’s Sofia Falcone earns an unhappy yet bittersweet ending

After detonating a car bomb to demolish Oz’s underground drug lab – which causes massive city destruction ― Sofia aims to get out of the city and ditch her family's criminal empire. She gets the chance to take out Oz for the last time but is double-crossed, giving Oz his own chance for revenge. “You’re going to hell, sweetheart,” Oz says, wielding a gun and telling her to turn around. “I’ll save you a seat,” she responds, ready to take a bullet to the head. Instead, the cops show up, arrest her and put her back in Arkham Asylum.

For Sofia, that's “a fate worse than death,” Milioti says. “He found the one thing that was actually the worst thing possible for her.” However, it isn’t all bad: Sofia receives a letter in a black envelope from her half-sister Selina Kyle (aka Catwoman, played by Zoë Kravitz in “The Batman”) and while you don’t see what's written, the depressed Sofia smiles when reading it.

“It’s like a glimmer of hope,” Milioti says of the scene. “And selfishly, I would love to see them team up and wreak havoc, obviously. Just absolutely decked out to the nines, kicking ass and taking names.”

The Penguin finally takes his perch – but the Batman is watching

In the final scenes of the finale, Oz (with his familiar top hat and tux from the comic books) arrives at his penthouse and visits his mother, who's now in a vegetative state. (As a child, Oz promised her a “top floor” view, but the tear on her face hints this isn’t what she wanted.) Because his mom can’t communicate, it’s Oz’s girlfriend Eve who maternally (and creepily) tells him how proud she is of him.

“Gotham’s yours, sweetheart. There’s nothing standing in your way now,” Eve says.

Oz agrees: “You’re goddamn right.” They share a little dance as the camera pans out to show the Bat symbol lighting up Gotham’s cloudy sky.

Robert Pattinson’s Caped Crusader from “The Batman” doesn't play a role in “The Penguin,” even with all sorts of criminal chicanery. But because the show is a bridge between director Matt Reeves’ first movie and the upcoming “The Batman Part II” (in theaters Oct. 2, 2026), this final moment is “an elegant way to hand off to the second film, to say Batman does exist in Gotham,” LeFranc says. “We haven't seen him for a while, but you're definitely now going to see him in the next film.

“Oz has achieved a level of power that has given him more notice. In the first movie, Batman doesn't think twice about Oz, he doesn't mean anything to him, but now he’s a threat.”