10 Things DC Wants You To Forget About The Penguin
6. He Was Inspired By A Cigarette Mascot
The inspiration for a character can come from all sorts of places. For example, it's a well known fact that the Joker was inspired by the 1928 silent movie The Man Who Laughs and its disfigured protagonist Gwynplaine. However, the Penguin's inspiration is far less impressive.
The central concept for the Penguin came from artist Bill Finger's observation that, to him, high-society gentlemen in tuxedos looked just like emperor penguins. What inspired this observation, was a cigarette mascot.
Kool cigarettes were advertised at the time by a penguin in a top hat with a cane, a monocle and a cigarette hanging out of its mouth. The design is an obvious inspiration for a lot of the Penguin's most iconic elements.
The problem with this is that Penguin is often looked down on by some people as one of Batman's sillier villains and knowing that he was inspired by a fancy penguin trying to sell you cigarettes doesn't exactly help to dispel that image.
Somewhat ironically though, Kool's dubious medical claims of being good for colds and dry throats on their original adverts seems like the kind of shady business practice Oswald Cobblepot would be behind.