Well, it’s time I got back on my Batman fix. Today’s book is one that I just read. Yes, I’m admitting that I haven’t read The Killing Joke until now. I could call myself a bad Batman fan, but that ain’t happening this time. I’ve read and seen too much. It’s been a minute since I’ve visited the mind of Alan Moore. This story has been something I’ve wanted to cover here eventually.
So, what is The Killing Joke? It was a 48 page one-shot
written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Brian Bolland. John Higgins originally
colored the comic while Bolland handled the colors in a deluxe edition. Richard
Starkings did the letters. It’s one of the stories that made the Joker, who was
already back in his more psychotic roots, even more of a major threat to Batman
and his world. It also gave him a
possible backstory. It even revolutionized Batman’s and Joker’s rivalry. It
also made a big change with Barbara Gordon, aka Batgirl.
The story was well-received when it was released back in 1988.
It was one of the stories that helped make the Joker a household name. It also got
criticism with its treatment of Batgirl, who became Oracle after this story. It
even got made into a movie, and that is something I will review here as well.
With all that said, let me spiel on this a bit:
The story starts out with Batman finding out that the Joker has escaped Arkham Asylum again. Meanwhile, Joker ends up “buying” a carnival. He then later goes to Commissioner Gordon’s house, shoots Barbara point-blank in the abdomen, and kidnaps Jim. Batman checks on Barbara, who was stripped when the police found her, to make sure she’s alright. She tells him to find her dad and get the Joker. She’s also been paralyzed by the shot.
Meanwhile, Jim Gordon is being tortured by Joker. During the story, we get an origin for the Joker. He was a crappy comedian with a child on the way. A couple of gangsters rope him into becoming the Red Hood. Before the crime goes down, he finds out that his wife and child were killed in a fire. Joker dawns the Red Hood mask (forced to), and the two criminals break into Ace Chemicals. The crime goes awry as the gangsters are killed and Joker falls into a vat of chemicals. All of this makes him turn into the criminal mastermind we have now.
Eventually Batman finds them and frees Gordon. He then chases after the Joker. It takes a minute to subdue him, but Batman’s able to stop Joker. Batman tries to talk to the criminal and even says that he’ll help him get better. Joker refuses and says a somewhat funny joke. This strangely gets Batman to laugh, and the two laugh together. The story either ends with Batman strangling the Joker to death or just throttling him for a couple of minutes and then throwing him to the cops.
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| I'd choke the crap out of him myself. |
OPINION ON COMIC
So, what do I think of this supposedly legendary story? It’s
fine… yeah, it’s fine. What, am I supposed to say this has revolutionized my
thinking on the Joker? I just thought it was a fine, short story. It’s not in
my personal echelon of Batman stories, but it is a good one.
It’s first and foremost a Joker story. He’s the main pusher,
and he gets the most development out of it. He gets a backstory that makes him
pretty sympathetic…, if it was real, that is. I’m more a fan of the Joker being
into crime pre-accident, but this did what it needed to do. We have him at his
worst with his actions toward the Gordons. I’ll touch on what he did the
Barbara later, but his torturing of the commissioner was effective. The whole
message of giving Gordon (and even Batman) one bad day to go insane was on full
force.
Batman looked good here. It’s definitely a different Batman that we’ve gotten used to seeing. Here, he’s actually wanting to help the Joker rehabilitate. Yeah, it seems that may not happen, but the fact that Bruce throws it out there is interesting. Now, the ending is interesting. Folk have said that Batman kills Joker here, but since this takes place in continuity, that obviously didn’t happen. Taken as a one-in-done… I can see Batman doing the deed. Considering how far Joker went here, it could happen, and no one would blame him… okay, Gordon would. I could see the opposite happening in Batman throwing Joker to the cops. I guess it just depends on how you want to look at it.
The artwork was pretty cool. Bolland does his best to draw
pretty iconic versions of Batman and the Joker. He’s even able to make them not
always look iconic. The part where Joker messes up Batman’s mask is hilarious.
There are points where that smile on Joker disappears. He knew how to handle
the action, the suspense, and the more introspective moments right. We didn’t
need to see the Gordons naked, but that’s a point for another day.
As for the cons, there aren’t many. A part of me does wish it was longer on Batman’s end especially since two of his allies are hurt. Batman’s and Joker’s relationship is also a bit weird here. A bigger sticking point I and pretty much a lot of folk have is the depiction of Barbara Gordon in this story. She’s a pawn that gets sexually assaulted and permanently maimed: pure and simple. Yeah, other writers were able to pick up the pieces and do great things with her as Oracle, but doing this to her just felt wrong. When we got to the page of Joker’s pics, it was pretty unsettling. That may be the point, but still. Other than a couple of nitpicks and a really big red flag, this is a nice read.
OPINION ON ANIMATED MOVIE
Then, we get to the 2016 animated movie. It featured the
voice talents of the best versions of these characters. Kevin Conroy is Batman,
Mark Hamill is the Joker, and Tara Strong is back as Batgirl. While we get the
comic told, we also get a prelude that features Batgirl dealing with some mafia
thug. We also have Batgirl and Batman… getting wild in a clocktower for some
reason or another. After all that crap, then we get the Killing Joke.
This is a pretty flawed movie. It has its fair share of good and bad. I’ll get the good out of the way first. The character designs are fine but not perfect. Our main players here do look good though. The voice acting is pretty good at some points. It’s always cool to see the iconic versions of these characters return for a while. Once the actual story from the comics starts, it’s uphill from there. While the animation is pretty weak, it has moments where things work. And that ends the good for this movie.
So… what happened??? I know that the story is a bit slim for an 80-minute movie, but this was sometimes rough to get through. It has major problems, but the thing that kills it is that first half. We get a 30 minute prelude that involves Batgirl being a novice, almost killing some thug named Paris Franz (ugh), and sleeping with Batman. That last thing is bad enough, but the rest is pretty dreadful too. The writers said that they wanted to do something good for Batgirl, but that was apparently a lie because this wasn’t it. That’s not even counting what Joker does to her! Batgirl just gets it bad in this whole movie.
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| Ugh... |
Also, what is up with the Batman/Batgirl ship? I know folk
hate it, and I can’t blame them. I know
it first appeared in Batman Beyond, but I’ll admit that I didn’t have much of
an issue with it there. As for everywhere else, it can burn. They even tried to
explain what happened in a Batman Beyond comic that made it even worse! I’ll
let you find that for yourself. I don’t think anyone liked it in the movie, and
it didn’t feel needed. Heck, you probably could’ve subbed out Bruce for Dick
(Nightwing), and things might’ve been okay.
Anyway, that first half barely connects to the main story the movie’s based off of. Instead, we’re following some random thug for most of it, and we have Batgirl acting really amateurish here. Then, we get to the Killing Joke and things are somewhat better. It more or less plays out the same with small changes, and that’s not bad. Unfortunately, the animation used here was pretty poor. While the designs worked, the animation had a pretty janky, cheap look to it all. I don’t know what happened there. Other than these things and small nitpicks, this was a middling movie.
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| Oh yeah, what was up with that music interlude? I guess it was nice to hear Mark Hamill sing again. |
………………………………………………………
In the end, The Killing Joke is a nice story even if it has really
questionable plot points to it. As for the movie, “meh.” Where the story falls
on my faves list is tough because… I don’t think it would make it. It’s a good
story for the most part, but I feel that later stories and movies took what
worked here and a did better job with it. If you’re looking for a movie where
Joker goes all out nuts on the Bat-family, just watch Batman Beyond: Return of
the Joker. Well, that should do it for me. Since September’s coming up, it’s
time to don the red cape, rip open the shirt, and go to the Fortress to find
some Superman things to cover. Until then, Peace, God Bless, and be careful out
there.
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