Colin Farrell is an undeniably handsome man, so when he was first announced to be playing Oswald Cobblepot in The Batman, a lot of fans were under the impression that we’d be getting a much more charming and roguish version of the villain than we’d become accustomed to.
Of course, that definitely wasn’t the case, with the makeup team doing an incredible job to bury the Golden Globe-winning actor a mountain of prosthetics to turn him into the future Penguin. Farrell is totally unrecognizable in both appearance and accent, and he’s set to become a recurring thorn in the side of Robert Pattinson’s Caped Crusader after he admitted he’s only got a handful of scenes in the DC reboot.
Most of those scenes must have factored into the trailer, then, because fans were overjoyed at Farrell’s contributions to the footage and his transformation in general, as you can see from the reactions below.
Reeves confirmed that Penguin, Riddler and Catwoman are all getting their origin stories told, so Oswald might not have reached the upper echelons of the Gotham City criminal underworld when The Batman kicks off. That means his ascension could play out in tandem with Bruce Wayne growing into his role as his hometown’s nocturnal protector, giving the franchise a legacy storyline that can play out over a number of sequels.