Rhenzy Feliz gives Victor Aguilar enough emotional weight to hold our attention beside Colin Farrell. The Penguin is a good reason to watch him, though its familiar gangland plotting asks more patience than the performances do.
Fi1m perspective
In The Penguin (2024), Rhenzy Feliz makes Victor Aguilar's vulnerability felt even when he is sharing a scene with Colin Farrell. We worried about Victor because Feliz gives this young man drawn into crime an exposed, unsettled quality that the familiar gangland plotting cannot quite flatten. He holds our attention without suggesting that he needs to compete with his co-star. That is a useful skill in a series whose chief pleasures are its actors, and it makes him worth watching.
Marvel's Runaways (2017–2019) had already given him a lead as Alex Wilder within an ensemble. He then voiced Camilo Madrigal in Encanto (2021) and played Wesley in George Clooney's The Tender Bar (2021). The Penguin gives him a central role opposite Farrell, taking the young outsider casting of Runaways into a crime series. It is the clearest basis we have for recommending him, with enough space for a substantial performance rather than a judgement made from a handful of appearances.
Victor's stutter was part of the character from the audition stage, and Feliz worked with a fluency consultant on the performance. That is careful preparation, though preparation alone would not make Victor worth following. Feliz gives him emotional complexity beyond that one recognisable feature, keeping our interest in the young man and the circumstances he finds himself in. His scenes with Farrell work because he remains a person with feelings of his own, rather than merely someone for the star to act at.
There are limits to how much he can repair. Our reservations about The Penguin concern its slow opening and overlong flashbacks, and a persuasive supporting performance cannot make those interruptions less conspicuous. Farrell and Cristin Milioti remain the strongest reasons to stay with it; appreciating Feliz does not require us to pretend otherwise. Start there if crime drama is your evening's choice, allowing the series some time to settle. We would like his next substantial role to give him a break from being the young outsider.
Biography
Rhenzy Feliz is an American actor. He was born on 26 October 1997 in the Bronx, New York, and grew up partly in Florida before moving to Los Angeles, where he attended Santa Monica High School and majored in drama.
Feliz began his career with a recurring role in the series Casual (2016). He is known for playing Alex Wilder in the series Marvel's Runaways (2017–2019), voicing Camilo Madrigal in the animated film Encanto (2021), and portraying Victor Aguilar in the series The Penguin (2024). He is also cast in the film How to Rob a Bank (2026).
