Looks like this series' take on it is going to be that Oswald is simple going to have some disability to his mobility that makes him walk oddly, reminding people of a penguin.
It looks to me (we'll know for sure in four hours or so) that what happens in the pilot is that he gets badly beaten, which is why he's limping when he gets picked up by the people who call him a penguin. Whether he retains the limp or just the nickname remains to be seen.
That's kind of what I gathered but, at the same time, the guys who picked him up say, "Anyone ever tell you when you walk you look like a penguin?" which I interpreted as the show's way of telling us "he walks funny so this is how he got his nickname." He also seems to have a "No, I never hear that at all.
" sort of reaction to it. (Like someone who hears this all of the time, like if you have a certain name. I for one get asked all of the time if I'm related to a star who shares the same last name as me, phonetically. His is spelled differently.) I think in some of the quick clips later on it seems like he walks with a similar gait at other points in the episode which, for all we know, spans days. But, granted, could also span one or two days.
Anyway, be interesting the see the route they go with his character. I just think it'll be great to finally see a good, faithful, live-action adaptation of the character. (Burgess Meredith aside. He was great but, it was the campy 1960s Batman series/movie.) I've always felt that he could have/should have been used in the the Nolan Batman movies since they had already built an organized crime framework in it.
I'm "least" excited to see the versions of Catwoman and Poison Ivy in this series. First of all, those characters are usually very, very, sexualized in the comics and movies (and to certain degree in the cartoons) so making them children is a bit of an odd choice and awkward. And while young PI could be interesting to see how she grows (heh) over the course of the series as maybe an extreme Eco-Terrorist, I'm not so sure about Catwoman being a young child who's apparently an adept cat burglar. I get the concept of a "life of crime" but at the same time it just seems odd she literally spends her entire life as a cat burglar? And she's, apparently, a skilled one as a child living off the streets?!
I see no need to introduce other child characters other than Bruce Wayne and introducing child versions of other DC characters seems to tread a little too close to Smallville "it's a small world" territory where Bruce just happens to have some connection, or have met, all of his future foes as a child. Possibly to the point of straining the credibility of his maintaining a secret identity in the future. (Granted, the series isn't a Smallvillian origin story for Batman and is more focused on Gordon's earlier years as a beat cop.)
But, man, how long before Gordon investigates a crime in a traveling circus featuring the Flying Graysons and their teenage child (Dick's future father) or a classmate of Bruce's runs for school-president and likes to make choices by flipping a coin?
Hopefully they won't goo *too* much down the Smallville route and make the world so small we see early versions of every Batman character. (Again, I realize Bruce/proto-Batman isn't the focus character here but it seems he plays a significant role, so I wonder if the show is going to drop in on his life from time-to-time/bounce between his story and Jim's.)
The characters aren't grabbing me enough either. If it weren't a Batman show, I'd move on. I'll stick with it though in hopes that something might jell. Agents of SHIELD started off this way, after all. I went from barely interested to more interested there.
