Robin Lord Taylor Explains Why 'Gotham' Season 5 Is Special

Be ready for Gotham to go to new and special places it has not been before in the fifth and final season.

Fans have showered Gotham star Robin Lord Taylor with praise since the series' first season, calling his performance as The Penguin one of the best ever on a comic book TV series. And, as the series comes to an end in 2019, he is not quite ready.

"After season one, we started making it more of a serialized story so that stories blended into each other so that things that happened in episode two carried into episode three, four," he told an audience at Toronto's Fan Expo last weekend. "Once that happened, it all has melded into one story. I will say that there's something special about these ten episodes, becuase we're coming to an end and we're launching these characters into the place that you all know them from -- that you think of when you think of these people. I will say, too, that we're just on episode four, but the amount of emotion that's real...there's so much heart in all of these episodes, because we've carried this story with us for five years and so now to give it the justice it needs, we're all putting all of our strength into every moment."

During the same panel, Taylor broke the news to fans that he was not going to be packing on the pounds to play a comics-accurate version of the pot-bellied Penguin, but assured the audience that there was plenty more -- including some material to please long-time fans -- to come.

"What you definitely will see this year is more of the iconography of the Penguin," he told the fan. "Things that you think of the character, we're going to start bringing those in as we're going along....My whole approach this year has been that I don't want to read ahead. I just want to stay in the moment and I'm trying to absorb every single moment I can with these amazing people and this incredible character. So I don't know very much but little pieces we're going to start working through so that I think you'll all be really happy."

In general, it seems as though Gotham is looking to add more and more of Batman's iconography in the coming season, introducing more villains like Magpie and Bane, and giving Bruce a new Batcave at some point before he finally becomes Batman for real. Along the way, elements of Frank Miller's comic book miniseries The Dark Knight Returns will end up in the show, as The Mutants gang are introduced.

Gotham's fifth and final season is set to premiere on FOX in early 2019. A Gotham sneak peek panel will take place on Sunday, October 7 at New York Comic Con, so we can expect to get our first real information about the final season then.