Okay, So How Big of a Deal Is This Sofia Gigante Rebrand?
Searching for a definitive indication that The Penguin is charting its own course in the long history of Batman stories? Well, look no further than episode 5, when Sofia Falcone (Cristin Milioti) took over her crime family under a new name: Sofia Gigante. Spurned by her father’s betrayal, Sofia takes on her late mother’s name and plans to create a new legacy. Sofia’s decision cemented her as the Penguin’s main antagonist for the second half of the season. Her character also marked an entirely new direction for Sofia Falcone in Matt Reeves’s Bat-verse.
In both The Batman and The Penguin, Carmine Falcone is not a great father—or even a mafia don. He sends his daughter to Arkham Asylum when she learns that he killed his own wife and set the scene up to look like a suicide. He also murders several women who work at his club in Gotham. After investigating the incident in The Batman, Batman is unable to stop the Riddler from murdering Falcone. Alberto is set to take up the family business at the beginning of The Penguin, but the Penguin kills him as well. Then, in episode 4, Sofia murders the rest of her family by triggering a gas leak at the Falcone mansion. Now, the crime business—or whatever’s left of it—is all hers.
What Is Sofia's Story?
Sofia's arc in The Penguin is incredibly different from what Batman comic readers know of the Falcone family. Appearing in two series by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale titled Batman: The Long Halloween (1996) and Batman: Dark Victory (1999), the Falcone clan's war with the Maronis plays out on a much larger scale.
Without spoiling the ending, Sofia is roughly the opposite character as her reimagining in The Penguin. She’s a full-fledged member of the Falcone crime family in The Long Halloween, and she even looks up to her father with reverence. Following a dispute between Harvey Dent and the Maronis, Carmine Falcone is killed and Dent's face is burned with acid.
In the sequel, Dark Victory, Sofia takes over the family in her father's stead. She becomes “the Hangman,” killing cops in Gotham who had anything to do with District Attorney Harvey Dent. In the comics, her mother’s maiden name wasn’t even Gigante. She took on the name only after marrying mobster Rocco Gigante—who doesn’t make an appearance in The Penguin. In Dark Victory, she even kills her brother, Alberto, herself.
As we head into The Penguin’s final episodes, it seems that Sofia’s more ruthless personality is beginning to show itself. She’s created the Gigante family—and now, she’s coming for Oz Cobb.
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