Recap / Batman: The Animated Series E47 "Birds of a Feather"

The Penguin, two days after he Just Got Out of Jail, ransacks a millionaire's home and is stopped by the Batman. After he does his time, he is released from prison and decides to turn over a new leaf. Veronica Vreeland, a wealthy socialite, and her Upper-Class Twit friend Pierce Chapman, invite him to a party as a joke, but as Veronica spends time with Oswald, she starts to like him. But everything goes downhill when the Penguin finds out the truth.

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Tropes in this episode include:

• Affably Evil: At the beginning, the Penguin apologizes to the man he's robbing and subtly compliments his taste in art, claiming he's only robbing him because he has good taste. He also spends most of the episode genuinely trying to reform.
• Attention Whore: Veronica expects that bringing The Penguin to a party will attract more attention to herself.
• Book Ends: The episode begins with the Penguin throwing a tantrum after being captured by the Batman, and ends in the exact same way, showing Oswald has not changed nor learned anything.
• Deadpan Snarker: The Penguin is The Snark Knight when he deals with the lower classes (prison guards, bus drivers, Batman). When he at last deals with the upper classes, he becomes a Stepford Snarker.
• Didn't See That Coming: Batman's reaction to Penguin trying to protect Veronica from the thugs instead of leading them.
  • Later, Bruce is surprised that Penguin has genuine affection for Veronica and is planning to gift her jewelry instead of stealing it.
• Downer Ending: The Penguin's revenge is thwarted and the day is saved, but it's treated as a rather sad testament of Cobblepot Redemption Failure. Veronica expresses rather sadly that despite the deception that set off the Penguin's return to crime, she did value their friendship. To this, Penguin bitterly states how "(High) Society is to blame" before he's carted off to prison.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Penguin bristles at Batman believing he was in league with the alley gang, saying he had always surrounded himself with better underlings than those thugs.
• Exact Eavesdropping: Penguin learns Veronica's true motive to get involved with him when he listens to a conversation between her and Pierce.
• Eye Take: After forcing herself to laugh at Penguin's Orphaned Punchline, Veronica is rather bewildered by the former's lack of table manners.
• Face Palm: Vreeland does this when Penguin tries to sing along with the opera in an awful singing voice.
• Falling Chandelier of Doom: The story starts with Penguin being caught when a chandelier falls on him. When he later abducts Veronica, he ties her to a chandelier inside his hideout and shackles Pierce under it.
• Heel–Face Door-Slam:
  • Penguin really wanted to leave his life of crime, and he only got back to it because of his anger at Veronica's treason.
  • The very last lines are one for Veronica, the only one that showed Character Development, but was too little and too late:
    Veronica Vreeland: Oswald, I really was growing fond of you...
    The Penguin: I suppose what they say is true: society is to blame. High society.
• Hidden Depths: The true genius of the writing is that none of the Sad Clowns are as shallow as they appear at first glance:
  • Oswald can truly be The Charmer under all his Small Name, Big Ego personality.
  • Veronica is not the heartless Rich Bitch she herself believes to be.
  • Pierce doesn't care about the lower classes, but he is willing to risk his life to save his only friend, Veronica.
• I Warned You: Upon learning that Veronica invited Penguin to her lavish party for the entertainment value, Bruce tries to caution her of how this could go very wrong.
• Ineffectual Loner: Oswald, Veronica, Pierce, and Bruce are cases of different degrees of No Social Skills. They cannot really connect with each other.
• Inspector Javert: Batman/Bruce Wayne never buys that Cobblepot may actually want to redeem himself this time until right before he pulls a Heel–Face Door-Slam. If he had realized it earlier, maybe he could have helped him to leave his life of crime.
• Ironic Echo: When Veronica tries to list off all the (false) reasons she fell in love with Penguin, she mentions that she's attracted to his distinct Roman nose. Later, when Penguin overhears Pierce and Veronica mention how he's being used and the features that make it impossible to befriend him, Penguin icily mentions "Don't forget my fine Roman nose".
• Laughing at Your Own Jokes: Penguin is clearly more impressed with his own sense of humor than Veronica, who awkwardly smiles and then gives a pouty expression that oozes "How long does this have to go on?" before forcing herself to laugh.
• Meaningful Name: The episode title is "Birds of a Feather," but the whole saying is: "Birds of a feather flock together." However, this is not the case: Oswald Cobblepot, Veronica Vreeland, Pierce Chapman, and Bruce Wayne all are Ineffectual Loners with a touch of the Sad Clown. Even when united by his petty delusions (Veronica, Pierce and Bruce are in the same circle, but they cannot communicate well with each other), these birds of a feather flock alone.
• Mugging the Monster: Three muggers try to rob Veronica Vreeland while she's dating Penguin and he shows them why it takes Batman to defeat him. justified because they thought he was some guy wearing an ugly mask.
• Noodle Incident:
  • Penguin has been to the restaurant "for a quick carry-out" more than once. At the party, he also has a talk with the President of Gotham First Federal and talks about how easy it was to rob the place.
  • Apparently, Veronica and Pierce once were in a party who was crashed by the Joker, who stole all the valuables. They thought it was Actually Pretty Funny.
• Not Me This Time: Batman sees Penguin with a woman's gold necklace along with some thugs and immediately assumes Penguin was robbing them per usual. Only after he's subdued all of them does the woman tell Batman that Penguin was actually retrieving the necklace from the robbers.
• Oh, Crap!: Pierce apathetically states how easy it will be to get the ransom money Penguin wants, but his confidence is quickly vanished when Gordon tells him that he is going to make the drop.
• Orphaned Punchline: Penguin has one: "—and I said, 'But, warden—those aren't my pants!'"
• Prank Date: Veronica sets one up with The Penguin.
• Properly Paranoid: Penguin admits during dinner that he can't shake the feeling there's more to all this than Veronica simply showing him kindness. Veronica has to do some sweet talking to dissuade him of this.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: When Pierce comes to deliver the ransom to Penguin, Veronica tries to plea that instead of going through with his revenge, they can still be friends. Penguin lets them both have it and points out that all he wanted was a genuine friendship which would've cost her nothing. But at seeing they deceived him into being a novelty at her party, he's going to make certain he makes them pay dearly for making a fool of him.
  • Earlier, when Pierce is so snobbishly calling the police incompetent to rescue Veronica from Penguin, it's Commissioner Gordon rips into Pierce for basically being a rich twit by inviting the Penguin as a novelty rather than regard he was a dangerous criminal.
• Redemption Failure: The Penguin is released from prison, turning over a new leaf. Veronica dates him for the publicity, but soon starts to grow fond of him. It crashes down when her original motives are revealed.
• Reformed, but Rejected: The Penguin can put up with Batman refusing to trust him, but he doesn't take it well when he learns Veronica was just pretending to accept him.
• Rejected Apology: After the Penguin is arrested at the end, Veronica tries to apologize for what happened. His reply? "I suppose what they say is true: society is to blame. High society."
• Rich in Dollars, Poor in Sense: A dangerous example. After the Penguin is released from prison, Veronica, upon urging from Pierce, pretends to have a crush on him, both of them thinking that having a notorious criminal around would make them the talk of the town. The Penguin is actually happy for a while, and is considering giving up crime... Until he realizes he's being used. At that point, he kidnaps Veronica, and tries to kill Pierce when he delivers the ransom. Once Batman has apprehended him, she feels a little sorry for it all and tries to apologize... to which the Penguin responds, "I suppose what they say is true: society is to blame. High society."
• Shout-Out: The Penguin quotes a line from Lord Tennyson (butchering it, naturally): "Tis better to have loved and lost (and made a small profit) than never to have loved at all."
• Show Within a Show: Veronica, Oswald, Pierce and Bruce go To the Opera Tonight to see Pagliacci. The actor sings "Vesti la giubba" (wear the clown costume): the story of Canio, a Sad Clown that suspects his wife is cheating on him, but finds himself forced to be a Stepford Smiler due to his work as a clown. His internal Mood Dissonance is so great he has a Freak Out in scene and pulls a If I Can't Have You… with his wife.
• The Snark Knight: Penguin deals with aggression this way, invoking the Gentleman Thief and Gentleman Snarker tropes. His tragedy is that, being in an Action Series, nobody is impressed:
  • At a very rude bus driver.
    Bus driver: You comin' or not? I got a schedule, y'know?
    Penguin: And a lovely disposition to go with it.
  • And at Batman:
    Penguin: Say, who's there? Two-Face? Croc? Joker, old shoe?
    Batman: None of the above, Penguin.
    Penguin: Oh no. Not you.
    Batman: Get used to it. Wherever you go, I'll be right behind you.
    Penguin: Precisely where you belong.
• Stepford Snarker: Penguin has intense feelings of sadness, anger, loneliness, and some other negative emotions, but when his dream of living with the Upper Crust comes true, he still wants to hide these feelings from the people around him by being snide and sarcastic. His comments about everything and everybody show that he is still the same insecure person.
• Tuckerization: The streets Pierce to which is sent are named after comic artists Steve Englehart and Mike W. Barr.
• The Un-Smile: Veronica is clearly uncomfortable whenever Penguin makes a faux-pas.
• Villain Episode: The Penguin is the main character of this episode, not Batman.
• Villainous Valor: The Penguin is a courageous fighter, beating back a gang of bullies who are trying to mug him using only his umbrella (an ordinary umbrella, not one of his tricked-out ones). Though at this time he had every intention of leaving behind his villainous ways.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Batman is absolutely certain that Penguin will get into more trouble, but he genuinely believed that the guy was a Falsely Reformed Villain just biding his time. It never occurred to him that Penguin would genuinely make a go of reforming and only backslide in the face of being badly mistreated.
• Yank the Dog's Chain: Penguin expected a far bigger public response to being let out of prison, only to be generally ignored. He had even hoped some of his criminal pals would greet him at his place, but instead it was his least favorite costumed individual.

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