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He’s got an underground lair, a network of tunnels, a sci-fi designer drug, and an alliance of all of Gotham’s gangs behind him. I think it’s official: The Penguin is a proper supervillain. This week’s episode of the bad guy’s eponymous show depicts Oz Cobb at the height of his powers to date — but its final scene indicates his time at the top of the world will be short-lived.

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The action picks up some time after the events of the previous episode. By now, Oz’s subterranean headquarters is a virtual factory and nerve center for a city-wide Bliss distribution network. The Penguin and his troops, drawn from the impoverished people of Crown Point, are able to evade the combined forces of Sofia Gigante and Sal Maroni by using Gotham’s network of abandoned underground trolley tunnels to move around the city undetected.

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Mostly undetected, anyway. Victor’s subplot this episode centers on Squid (Jared Abrahamson), the local tough guy who once bossed Vic around and now wants a piece of Oz’s action. When he won’t listen to reason, Vic shoots him — his first kill. Oz is proud of him for handling his business on behalf of the people he’s close to, which is nice. As for killing? “It gets easier,” he adds, which is…less nice.

Sofia and Sal are on the hunt for the Penguin too, and the hunt is very personal. After all, he burned Sal’s wife and son alive, helped frame Sofia for murder, and killed her brother, the only person who cared about her while she was wrongfully incarcerated. Of course it’s personal. The problem is that as far as they know, Oz has no family to speak of, and isn’t close to anyone.

But a telltale drawer of ladies’ undergarments in his apartment directs Sofia to Eve (Carmen Ejogo), the sex worker whom Oz pays to be his girlfriend. But it’s more complicated than that, she insists to Sofia, whom she derides as a rich girl who can afford to see things in black and white. Sure, she fluffs his ego, as women do for powerful men all the time, but she knows who he is.

Or does she? Sofia — whom Eve welcomes into her house fully expecting to become the next victim of the infamous Hangman — reveals that her father committed the murders and covered it all up with Oz’s help. This means he continued to work for a man he knew had killed two of Eve’s friends. When Sofia spares Eve because she respects the woman’s loyalty to her girls, whose safety she was ready to pay for with her own life, Eve directs the mob boss to Oz’s hidden location in Crown Point. The episode ends with an armed and dangerous Sofia eyeing Oz’s buddy Vic and mom Frances with bad intent.

For his part, Oz has been keeping very busy. Desperate to provide better living conditions for his mother and for everyone else in Crown Point — the area’s energy needs aren’t being met because resources are being diverted to rich areas — the Penguin strongarms a councilman into getting the lights back on within hours.

But that was just his opening act. Piecemeal alliances with Irish, Ukrainian, Latina, and Black gangs have given his Bliss operation street-level dealers for distribution, but the Gigante-Maroni alliance’s retribution has scared them off. So Oz gathers all their leaders together, along with the top dogs from the Triads, whose international connections and superior manpower are vital to making the whole thing work.

Tossing out cans of beer, the Penguin declares this meeting “the Gold Summit” with characteristic grandiosity. Together, he says, they can steal the city away from the fat cats who look down on them, politicians and mafiosi alike. One by one, the gangsters crack open their brewskis and drink to their newfound union.

Shifting alliances, governmentally abandoned no-man’s-lands, attempts to unify all of Gotham’s gangs: Add it all up, throw in a dingy long winter coat Oz has begun wearing as a little costumery, and you’ve got a storyline straight out of one of the Arkham games. (I don’t think it’s a bad thing for a show about a Batman villain to feel like Batman’s going to show up any second and say “THIS ENDS NOW, PENGUIN.”)

With a fun script by Nick Towne, and a distinct lack of the orange that has often overwhelmed the image on this show — kudos to director Kevin Bray and cinematographer David Franco for making the night scenes look like they were shot in the night air of a big cold city, just for starters — this episode makes it seem like The Penguin has truly gotten its sea legs. I’m still crossing my fingers it get its (bat-)wings eventually too, that’s all.

Sean T. Collins ( @theseantcollins ) writes about TV for Rolling Stone , Vulture , The New York Times , and anyplace that will have him , really. He and his family live on Long Island.

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