Spoilers ahead of The Penguin episode 7
One of the moments we've been waiting for happened in The Penguin episode 7, "Top Hat." We finally learned how Oz's brothers--Jack and Benny--died. This wasn't via a monologue or some off-hand comment he made to Vic in the present. No, the crime drama let us in on the event and how it unfolded in a flashback sequences that took us back to Gotham in the '80s.
At this time in the boys' lives, their mother Francis was doing the books for Rex Calebrese, the gangster who ran their neighborhood who Oz still admires to this day. It was a typical afternoon for him and his brothers, he wanted to spend time with their mom while they horsed around. Francis, loving as ever, was playful with Jack and Benny even when they disrupted her work. But she did instruct her oldest, Jack, to take his brothers out so she could finish what she was doing. She also passed along Rex's ledger.
Before they could do anything, Jack had to give the ledger to Rex. He'd warned his brothers off the man, but it was clear that Oz idolized the gangster even then. Kids being kids, they ran off to play and, as Oz told Vic in episode 5, they did so in the abandoned tunnels underground. What none of the Cobb boys knew was that only Oz would make it back home to their mother.
How did Jack and Benny die on The Penguin?
One of Benny's favorite games was playing flashlight tag. Oz ended up being the first of the three of them to be "It." He didn't count all the way to 10 like he was supposed to but it didn't matter because his brothers decided to change up the game anyway. The rules were you hid in the station but they chose to hide further in the tunnels and down what looked like a part of the sewer system for the city.
Oz tried to get down there with them but he couldn't with his leg brace. It's hard for him to go down the ladder to the part of the tunnels they were in on a good day, but that day it was raining. Frustrated and mad at his siblings, he decided he wasn't going to play anymore. And, as payback, he closed the door to the shaft they'd gone down. What he didn't know is that his brothers wouldn't be able to open it. Oz went back home and got time with their mom by himself like he'd wanted not realizing the severe consequences of his actions.
A storm had hit Gotham. One with heavy rains. The tunnel Jack and Benny were in was already filling with water when Oz had closed the door. It wasn't anything to be concerned about at the time but the unrelenting downpour meant that more and more water was being pushed into the tunnels. The brothers tried to get out, they yelled for help but no one would have been able to hear them. Eventually, the water rose high enough for them to drown.
Francis may not know how her sons died which is the advantage Sofia needs
There was an implication in "Top Hat" that Oz never told Francis what really happened to his brothers. The night of their deaths, he said that they went on to the movies and he came back to be with her. It seems unlikely that he would have come clean about his part in their deaths. His guilt over their traumatizing loss would explain the dynamic he has with his mother and his need to do anything in order to become a man she'd be proud of.
However, if Francis doesn't know, that leaves her open to Sofia's plotting. The head of the Gigante family was inspired by her to play "new games" since the world she'd been born into was stacked in the favor of men. She seemed to have tasked Julian the psychiatrist with delving into Francis' memory to uncover what happened to Jack and Benny.
By the end of "Top Hat" she's brought the woman to Monroe's, the jazz club Oz told Sofia his mother took him when she decided she wasn't going to stay confined to her bed anymore after the demise of her boys. In the finale, The Penguin is set to dive into the promise Oz made Francis that night but it also could contextualize it for her.
Sofia said she wanted her nemesis to know real pain. His mother learning he's responsible for his brothers' deaths and that their lives changed in a night because of decision he made could do just that in the blink of an eye. Especially if it sets Francis off and all the pride she had in him is washed away and replaced with horror and hatred.
Oz thought he could trick Sofia into believing he would hand the keys to the underworld to her, but it's clear she intends to take them herself and destroy him in the process. Who will win? That's a question the finale may answer.
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