ufonaut:

jokin-around:

syn-the-procrastinator:

ufonaut:

DID KING JUST INDIRECTLY CONFIRM CERTAIN THINGS ABOUT JOKER & HARV

idk if it’s just out of context but at least more people know that Joker ain’t straight and Harvey is bi.. 

 now Tom King if you could please drop the predatory gay that’ll be swell

thanks for confirming sexualities but how about learning how to write and making a proper sentence 

☝☝☝☝☝

there are, admittedly, instances of joker being written through the lenses of the predatory gay man trope but i honestly believe this literally wasn’t one of them. it’s one of those rare moments when he was treated on the same level as selina, it had all come down to the two of them & their importance/roles in batman’s life seemed to have been accepted by both, like it’s the one time joker IS actually treated as a viable love interest as much as selina (”we all loved him”; “i could give him that and he’d love me”)

Hope you don’t mind me adding to this because I agree that the predatory gay trope is not what we ended up getting from either #48 or #49, though until we don’t have #50 to see how it all actually ends it may be too early to say that we won’t

have some confused word vomit no one asked for

Look, I’m usually the first to jump on the King hate bandwagon, always; his run has rubbed me the SUPER wrong way ever since it started, even before the ship bullshit, and from the moment they announced that Joker will be disrupting the wedding I expected them to full on wallow in “dangerous deranged gay villain is gonna try to threaten heterosexual love but they will defeat him in the end cause het love wins the day,” and I was fully dying about it even after #48, which SHOCKED me in that it did treat Joker’s feelings with respect. Respect so painful and so visceral and earnest, in fact, that it brought back a ton of painful memories from when I was in Joker’s exact position (the watching someone you love get engaged and married to someone else one, not the murder people in a church one, for you FBI agents out there), and for that reason I couldn’t really approach it with anything else than intense emotion that it was difficult to untangle. Joker’s confusion, his desperation, his incoherence in the face of something that hurts him, in the face of not just a fundamental end to his way of life but also rejection, felt so acutely personal and real for me that it made me uncomfortable in a way that’s hard to describe. Especially since Bruce’s behavior (most of all, his silence, but also the way he kneels with Joker at the end there, and his one “Amen” that rings so powerful considering how little he says in the entire comic) really reminded me of TKJ in the kind of moment of connection it gave them. The comic has Bruce validating Joker, wanting to give him some sort of closure, and looking, if anything… almost apologetic. Like he’s aware of how much he’s breaking Joker’s heart, and the sacrifices inherent in his decision to marry, and maybe, just maybe, acknowledging his own complicated feelings for the man beside him and how those feelings can never be realized because of who they both are. (Yeah, that may be reaching. But I did see all that in Bruce’s gesture and expression at the end there. Sue me for wishful thinking I guess.)

And I was terrified that #49 was still gonna ruin all that by having Selina swoop in to save her man, defeat the gay menace, and her and Bruce abandoning Joker to ride off into the sunset. That, to me, is how it would have played out if they went the “predatory gay” trope without any nuance. 

That’s not what happened.

Instead, from the start, we got is Joker and Selina being framed not only as equal rivals on the tug of war over Bruce, the fight between them only takes up a couple panels and the rest is just… conversation. Painfully honest, actually respectful on both sides, and still laced with hurt that the comic paints as tragic and legitimate. The comic does seem to favor Selina’s point of view in some respect, but in the end, when it takes a stand, it does seem to support Joker’s final conclusions because they ring true with Batman’s long history and the superhero genre conventions as a whole. Who knows Batman better? Who knows and understands him truly? Who would bring him true happiness? How is the wedding impacting the entire city and its mythology, not just those directly involved? This whole conversation reads like a meta examination of Batman’s entire mythos, and in this conversation, it is Joker who ultimately voices the points that seem the most relevant from a meta standpoint: Batman cannot be happy and stay Batman. So the question follows, if Batman cannot be Batman anymore, can he actually be happy? Is he the kind of man who even can settle? (And, conversely, is Selina? To me it’s a resounding no on both). It’s fitting that Joker is the one articulating this, and speaking in a language that seems to encapsulate metaphors and meta-narrative, given the kind of character he is and how he’s historically been aware of being in a narrative and of the norms that govern them all. That, alone, validates him. That, in that one moment at the end of #49, makes him right. 

And we connect that to what @ufonaut already said about Joker’s feelings for Batman being acknowledged and accepted as no less legitimate and viable than Selina’s, we get something profound. Notice that Selina doesn’t refute Joker when he claims that he could have given Batman the kind of happiness she’s bringing him, too, if he wanted to. If he could. She doesn’t argue against that, and seems to agree. She understands Joker’s importance in Bruce’s life and the connection between the two men, and the root of Joker’s pain. She doesn’t rub it in his face or gloat that “ha, Batman chose ME” – well, okay, not too much, there’s still some of it there but at least not during the emotional crux of the issue. She doesn’t mock him for his feelings, or treat them as something deviant. Instead, just like Bruce in the earlier issue, she validates him by talking to him respectfully, even companionably, and some of it is definitely a front to stall and distract Joker but some of it rings genuine as well. Like maybe she wants to talk about all this, and understands that in that moment, Joker is the one she can talk to because their feelings for Bruce are of the same flavor, and just as deep. 

Now, compare all that to a different comic that relied heavily on the predatory gay trope – Nu52′s “Death of the family”/”Endgame.” Both stories have pretty similar framing: Joker sees Batman distancing himself from him and picking someone else, Joker is jealous, wants to reassert himself in Batman’s life by force and violence because it’s the only way he knows how to do that. Both stories frame Joker’s actions in the language of thwarted love. In Snyder’s arcs, Joker tries to win Bruce over by attacking, hurting and kidnapping Bruce’s family, the people Joker knows Bruce loves. Violently so. He is cold and methodical in enacting his plans, he is grotesque – actually, horroresque would be a better way to put it – and he speaks in sexual and romantic innuendo as he brings his mauled ruin of a face close to Bruce in a way that is meant to evoke disgust in the reader. The comic is full of shock value, and collateral damage is something that Joker treats matter of factly, with a coldness and calculation of any serial killer. Then, even though Bruce’s behavior does also lend credence to Joker’s claims about their relationship, Bruce verbally rejects him, and then Joker comes back even darker and more vengeful than ever, intent on destroying the entire city and the two of them in it to pay for his broken heart. 

I’m not condemning Nu52′s arc this way, please don’t assume that – I still love it for what it is and what it does to validate the Batman/Joker connection. But it does villify Joker to an almost unbelievable degree, and the fact that it relies so heavily on basing Joker’s actions on his romantic feelings for Batman, and how the story frames those feelings (especially DOTF, because Endgame does, in the end, give him validation) really does evoke the predatory gay trope. As many of other Joker comics do. I can acknowledge that and still appreciate them for other reasons, in my own way. 

But yeah, compared to all that, King’s Joker isn’t calculated – he’s confused and hurt and acting out without much forethought. He says he set out to kill Selina, but unlike DOTF, the fight between them isn’t one-sided and geared towards torture porn, and while brutal, it’s swift and unexploitative. And while Joker’s romantic feelings are definitely validated and presented as part of his motive, that’s more in the subtext, because textually, his motives are mainly articulated to be: preserve Batman. Preserve himself and their shared narrative through Batman, with death if necessary. Which, yes, still makes him a villain of the story, even if a villain who is ultimately right – but I don’t think his gayness is used to motivate said villainy. Like it was stated above, it’s instead acknowledged as the part of him that humanizes him, that turns him into a tragic figure, that’s acceptable and understandable, even as he does violence on the main characters. And that sort of framing, to me, paints him not so much as the predatory gay trope but rather, a tragic villain who also happens to be gay and in love with the hero. And that, to me, makes all the difference. 

Not sure if I was able to articulate where I see the line between the two quite well enough, but yeah, it does all depend on the framing. It may also all change when #50 drops with its conclusion, I don’t know. But after reading both #48 and #49, I am somewhat won over, and at least I can await #50 with some degree of inner peace because what we got really is so much better and more nuanced than what I fully expected we’d get. 

Also, yeah I really can’t overlook how King casually invalidated edgy fanboy theories about how Batman kills J at the end of TKJ and gave credence to “the queer silence of the killing joke” in one single speech bubble. Gotta give the man kudos for that alone. 

Source: ufonaut

Do you think Bruce is a bad father?

Well I mean… yeah. Kinda. But also not… entirely? I mean it’s

complicated

Though probably, applying real life terms, it shouldn’t be. If we’re judging Bruce’s parenting by our standards then the answer would be a “yes, he is a bad father,” no questions or qualifiers allowed. Any adult who puts children in the line of fire, who takes them out every night to fight dangerous adult criminals and basically grooms them to be child soldiers, must necessarily be judged as a bad and unfit parental figure. I do understand why many people refuse to interact with Batman content for that reason and condemn the idea of Robins entirely, because yeah, if I heard of someone in real life doing that I’d be the first to call social services.

Personally though, I tend to approach the idea of Robins and Batgirls the same way I approach Batman’s entire crusade, premise, his villains and the no-killing rule – I accept it as a fictional construct that serves a very specific function within its fictional universe, where different rules apply and where there’s narrative purpose and circumstances to those elements that justify their existence, even if only to an extent. So let’s maybe discard the sheer wrongness of the Robin idea for now and focus on the interpersonal aspect. 

Which, in itself… also isn’t perfect, because it’s Bruce, and Bruce can’t people good. Unfortunately. It’s canon that he can’t really relate to the kids he adopts the way a parental figure should, and he is overbearing, uncompromising, emotionally stilted and has all sorts of issues verbalizing positive emotions – or any sort of emotions. His defense mechanism when he’s uncomfortable is to automatically withdraw and go distant and cold, and it doesn’t help that he subscribes to the mindset that in order to protect people, especially those he loves, he sometimes has to push them away. This translates to him being scant with praise and emotional support, and very tough and demanding – often to the point of being brusque – because he thinks he has to be that way if he’s to prepare these kids for the kind of life they seem to want, to arm them the way he armed himself, to protect them and make sure they can protect themselves. It’s easy to see how his own experiences would teach him that sort of tough love approach, and well, he doesn’t actually have a lot of guidance when it comes to physical affection and being a caretaker in the deeper emotional, not just heroic sense. Alfred may have tried his best, but Bruce’s personality and the distance inherent in his and Bruce’s positions mean that he probably wasn’t super open with showing Bruce physical affection, not in the same way Bruce’s parents were. He probably wasn’t sure how much of a father he could be, and how much of a butler Bruce wanted him to remain – it’s a tricky balance to be sure, and it does seem to translate to how Bruce in turn approaches dealing with the children he invites into his life. It doesn’t come easy to him to praise them, to show his appreciation, to comfort them when they need it and to even let them be children. Hell, it’s probably difficult for him just to gauge their emotional state and realize when they need comfort and gentleness because he’s just not equipped for it, by personality and upbringing both. He seems to switch between wanting to treat the children as his peers and holding them to the same standard he holds himself, and between going in the other extreme with his overprotectiveness and the need to exert full control over them because he alone seems to know what will and what won’t be safe. And I think the kids appreciate some of it, but it also creates situations where their emotional needs as children aren’t being met. 

And it does do a number on the kids. Jason is probably the most famous and obvious example since his conflict with Bruce is so open, and Bruce reacts to Jason’s open aggression with the harshness and defensiveness that are his hallmark responses, only exacerbating the conflict even when he tries to fix things between them. But Dick is perhaps an even more illustrative example – it takes him years to get out of Bruce’s shadow, and it this case it means not only coming into his own from being Batman’s sidekick but also from under Bruce’s overbearing, controlling influence and Dick’s emotional reliance on him. Dick, unlike Jason, is eager to please, he’s affectionate and bright and joyful – but he also needs positive reinforcement, appreciation, praise and the kind of reciprocity of affection Bruce wasn’t really able to give him. It’s telling that he’s only able to confront Bruce over that when he’s a grown man and has been away from Gotham for a while. It’s also telling that their best moments seem to be when Dick’s a little boy hero-worshipping Batman, when just being Batman was enough to impress him and earn his love, and then when he’s an adult with his own established turf and can truly work with Bruce as an equal. The stuff between? Bruce clearly has trouble handling that. 

It’s a bit different with Tim, because by the time he comes along Bruce has had a bit more experience, and Tim doesn’t start out as Bruce’s adopted son – he has his own family, which probably helps because then Bruce’s distance isn’t as much of an issue. Plus, Tim’s intellect is definitely a match for Bruce’s, so that makes it easier for them to relate and bond. And Damian – well. Damian probably wouldn’t let Bruce be overly affectionate with him if Bruce tried, which makes their father/son relationship fascinating for a whole other host of reasons cause it’s like watching two hedgehogs bouncing off one another trying to find middle ground.  

I think the kid Bruce has had the most success with is Cassie, and it’s probably due to the fact that, much like Tim, she was already independent and self-reliant and didn’t need Bruce to emotionally support her. She’s also incredibly capable already, and Bruce recognizes and respects that even while feeling protective of her, and it’s fascinating to see him navigate the space between colleague and mentor when it comes to her. She’s probably the closest out of the batkids to also occupy the role “friend,” because – unlike Dick, who’s never really left the “son” slot in Bruce’s mind – she never really occupied the role of “child” to begin with. 

All of this is not to say that I condemn Bruce, or that I think he’s a strictly terrible father. I do think he has moments where he’s genuinely good with the kids and happens to find the right word to say, the right moment to work himself up into a hug. And I think he tries. He tries very hard to step into a role he never expected himself occupying, and to be better at it, and to help those kids as much as he can, but it’s incredibly difficult for him for all the reasons I outlined above and it creates all sorts of issues between him and each of his kids that it takes work to move past. And that’s interesting. That’s very human, for me especially because I don’t have any maternal instincts to speak of and I relate to Bruce when it comes to his difficulties with the role of emotional caretaker for someone vulnerable who relies on him for support. In the end, all of his kids seems to love and respect him – even Jason – which proves that he hasn’t failed completely, and I think they do know that he loves them and, in his way, wants what’s best for them. It’s just the expression of that love that’s a challenge, and it shouldn’t be the kids’ role to understand and realize that but it is what it is and as a result we get some fascinating studies of all sorts of interpersonal journeys that are endlessly inspiring. 

I do think that Bruce has the potential to be a good father, especially since that’s what he seems to want. Maybe he could even be a great one, in different circumstances. I love coming up with AUs and in most of the non-superhero ones I daydream about Bruce actually went through proper therapy, which allows him to be much more open and more competent and – most of all – ready when he does end up adopting his army of orphans, which he inevitably does because I love the idea of batdad and what it could be, in lighter universes. A Silver Age Batman could be a great dad. So could a few others. And that’s fun to imagine, especially in conjunction with batjokes. 

But in main canon storylines, when treated seriously… yeah, it’s complicated, and that’s good. That’s good storytelling, and it’s human, and it’s what makes me appreciate the complexity of the entire Gotham landscape and the messed-up characters that inhabit it all the more. 

I still really want The Batman Who Laughs to meet a real Joker. He’s been whacked permanently out of balance after his J’s death, seeing even an alternate version alive couple provoke a really interesting reaction (also J giving TBWL villain tips lmao)

See, yeah I agree, this WOULD be interesting but also kind of complicated af. Would it be sweet, badass and awesome if they did and if they just had fun wrecking the world together? Sure, and I would love a story like that. Part of the reason why I enjoyed the solo Batman Who Laughs story is the no-holds-barred horror of Bruce giving up control (and yeah, THIS is how I imagine it would happen because to me Bruce’s control relies on him constantly keeping his darker, more violent tendencies in check so giving up this rigid control would mean him going more violent, and not really giving that control up to someone else) – terrifying as it was, it was also, dare I say it, kind of exhilirating? Obviously once he releases this iron hold on himself he finds a measure of freedom, of liberation, that Joker had experienced, and now, finally, Bruce is allowing himself to truly not just understand (he understood before) but to embrace; to truly be on the same wavelength as Joker for once instead of pitting himself firmly against it. There’s potential for it, and their now-shared worldview could potentially entice them to team up at first, maybe even throw themselves into this idea of “us vs the world” in a whole new way, in unison that Joker thought he always wanted; and while it lasts, it would be beautiful (for them and the audience. Fucking terrifying and catastrophic for everyone else).

But thinking about it in more serious terms, it would perhaps be just as interesting to consider that Joker would be one of the people on any alternate earth TBWL would want to kill first, because he knows Joker’s very presence is a threat as much as the “real” Batman’s presence is – not just to the world in general, but to him specifically. If his Joker’s death was the trigger that set him on this particular path, if we ignore the literal interpretation of “Joker toxin made him the Joker” and lean towards the more metaphorical angle, then TBWL would want to prevent any chance of himself reverting, which, with an alive Joker back on the scene, suddenly might seem like a possibility. TBWL’s “birth” was the initial imbalance, a Joker-shaped void that needed to be filled – when that void no longer exists, him filling Joker’s role no longer becomes necessary, and Joker challenging him, serving as a mirror of both his old self and what he’s become, could, potentially, push him back into his old role. As much as he might want to share his new perspective with Joker, as much as he has to say to him, I do think that TBWL also gains Joker’s meta-awareness; he does seem perceptive of the narrative conventions of the DC comic book world, and thinks in mythic proportions much like Joker tends to do, and as a result, I think that this would be a real fear for him.  

And from Joker’s point of view, I think it would be a similar deal to how I imagine he’d react to Owlman – delighted at first, thinking that it’s all his dreams come true, and then… no, not really, can he have the original Batman back please? For all his posturing, Joker really isn’t very good with big change. He tends to react negatively to anything challenging the status quo he has going with Batman, even as he thinks that Batman’s corruption is his ultimate goal – he’s far too comfortable and entrenched in their routine for this to actually be the case (it’s partly why I think he regards his own death at the hands of Batman as his ultimate victory: he gets the “I win” moment without having to face the repercussions, meaning, a Batman spiralling out of balance and upsetting their dynamics). He needs Batman to be the way “his” Batman is just so he himself can function as his antagonist; without this basis for his existence, without a Batman to define himself against, he’s lost, directionless, suddenly without the one place and role in this world he’s always been so confident in.

Now, I do think that he’d be far more fascinated with TBWL than he’d be with Owlman, if only because TBWL is very obviously fashioned after him – he’d probably see him as something like his and Batman’s lovechild, and at first, he’d be all thrilled and utterly fascinated and maybe, yeah, maybe a little paternal too. He’d definitely see potential there, and he’d probably try to “play” with this new Batman to see where it can go. 

But yeah, I think that his issues with change would come into play here as well at some point, and then also… Well. Joker sure has an ego on him. That, aside from his dependence on Batman, is one of the most consistent character traits we see in him. He’s the top dog, Gotham’s favorite clown prince, Batman’s greatest enemy yadda yadda, and suddenly, there is this guy “stealing” Joker’s philosophy and trying to out-Joker him. Eventually, I do think that Joker’s ego and insecurity would play up as well, and he’d end up regarding TBWL as competition, which never ends well.  

… This makes me want to fic. Dammit, Nonnie. 

hello! i was wondering (and it may be too much to ask) but have you ever put together a post about how exactly bats and joker are ‚mirrors’ of each other? bc i know they are and i’ve got a few vague ideas of how but im sure you’ve thought extensively of it and I’d be super interested in your opinions!

It’s a fantastic question, friend, and okay, this is like my 4th attempt at this ask and putting my thoughts about this into a more or less coherent tangent, collecting all the ideas I used in my presentations and lectures and conference papers. Right. Let’s see if I manage this time. 

The idea of mirrors is probably the first thing, outside of Joker’s obvious feelings for Batman, that really grabbed me about the batjokes dynamic – I’ve always been into villains and villain/hero ships ever since I remember but none of my previous ships had quite this level of “two sides of the same coin” vibe going on. And with batjokes, it affects pretty much every facet of their relationship, down to their design on a basic visual level. Even just looking at them, without knowing anything about them apart from the fact that they are enemies that exist in the same fictional setting, it’s striking:

On this very basic level, they already function as opposites. On the one hand we have Bruce, whose costume in blacks and greys blends in perfectly with Gotham’s own color palette. Famously, when he stands on gargoyles, he blends in with them to the point that it seems he’s one of them, and that’s so significant when you consider that gargoyles, aside from their functional element in directing rainwater, also had the spiritual function of scaring off evil spirits. They were supposed to be spiritual defenders of the structures they guarded, and Batman, being one with his city, posing as just another gargoyle looking over it, makes a statement: I am one of you, I am a part of you, and I will protect you. Of course, he isn’t quite a part of it given his highly theatrical costume, but by dressing in the colors that he does, his design communicates his intent to become one with the city that made him. He builds himself, consciously or not, as the son and protector of Gotham, as a result of the kind of senseless, random tragedy that encapsulated this city’s spirit. 

Now look at Joker. He doesn’t blend in. He doesn’t try. His form of presentation is also born out of Gotham and its particular brand of tragedy, so he reflects Bruce in the way that, like him, he created himself in response to Gotham – but the reflection is distorted in that Joker defines himself against Gotham, not with it. His statement is: I will not blend in. I am not one of you, and I will never try to be. I am different, I am other, I am apart. And if Bruce declares himself part of Gotham, and if we consider that he was there first and Joker becoming Joker is partly due to Bruce, we can also stretch that to infer that Joker defined himself against Batman specifically. It comes across in his design with his bright colors that stand out against Gotham’s greys, his clownish theme so drastically unlike Bruce’s somber getup, his insolent grin and insistence on cartoonish humor, his silly props, his make-up, his loud, brash, sparkly, defiant behavior (and even in design elements he can’t control, like his face and body type, which also seem opposed to Batman’s). By their designs alone, Joker is subversion of order, while Bruce is the status quo…

Except it’s not quite as simple as them being just opposites, because, again, the root of both their identities is the same. They are both born out of Gotham, and out of trauma. They both strive to use theatricality to take ownership of that trauma, rise above it, and reclaim it and reshape it into something meaningful. They both rely on their larger than life personas, and they are both equally intense in that. And, importantly, they both exist outside of the established order because while Bruce may think he represents order over chaos, you can’t do that if you are a vigilante operating outside of the law. He may want to declare himself visually as part of his city, but he sets himself apart in the same breath by the very nature of what the suit is for. The difference here is, then, that Bruce doesn’t want to acknowledge his own subversiveness, while Joker embraces and celebrates his. So they manage to both reflect one another and see the other as a distorted version of their own efforts, just like a metaphorical mirror image.

And this same principle applies to other aspects of both characters beyond their design.

Take their morals, for example. Again, the philosophy of both those characters stems from the exact same place: a response to tragedy. They were both hurt and traumatized, and developed a certain kind of moral code as a response. Of course, those moral codes are drastically different from one another, since Bruce’s instinct is to protect while Joker’s is to destroy – but again that reinforces the idea of them mirroring each other and Joker reacting to the world against Batman, with just the same kind of intensity and similar methods (theatricality) employed to different goals.

Their personalities, too! Bruce’s seriousness against Joker’s vivaciousness, but Bruce can also be snarky and have a vicious, darker sense of humor, while Joker does give in to moroseness more often than casual fans would know. Their intelligence is definitely on the same levels, but while Bruce honed and sharpened his for very particular skills, Joker applies his in a haphazard, whimsical manner that is just enough of an inversion of Bruce’s to pose a serious challenge but which is also similar enough for Bruce to recognize and divine patterns in. Joker seems sociable while Bruce seems standoffish – but Bruce is the one with a support network and a host of emotional attachments with friends and hand-picked family, while Joker, most of the time, only forms shallower, short-term attachments that he gets bored with more often than not. Physically, Bruce seems far more able while Joker relies more on his brains and manipulation skills – but of course Bruce has a genius-level intellect while Joker can definitely hold his own in a fight as well. And, of course, both of them, as two human beings devoid of superpowers, rely on gadgets and technology for their “performances” (and I’d argue that both of them think of them as performances, yes, Bruce too though he may not want to admit it). Joker even makes a point to intentionally mirror Bruce’s gadgets by making his own Jokermobile, by fashioning his own utility belt, by customizing everything with his trademark – except in his case it’s his own face, because he operates out in the open with his face unobscured, while for Bruce his trademark is intrinsically tied to his identity under a mask. 

(And speaking of masks, there’s a super interesting argument that can be made here about the two of them symbolizing two different “types” of queerness: Joker as the out and proud flamboyant gay man, openly challenging societal norms with his very existence, and Bruce as the closeted one, who tries to fit in but whose true nature only comes out at night when he feels secure enough in a – tight, leatherish – costume to be himself. It’s not just me talking out of my ass, too – this argument has been made in a number of academic papers, such as “Queer Silence and the Killing Joke” and the many papers examining Batman and camp. It’s undeniable that the superhero’s secret identity narrative is a very poignant metaphor of the queer experience. In this, too, these two do serve as mirror images of each other.) 

The Lego Batman movie got it: mirrors are present in that movie from the very beginning, when Batman quotes Michael Jackson’s “Man in the Mirror” which turns out to be the theme song of the entire movie, referenced at the beginning, the middle (the party where it’s performed by Richard Cheese) and at the end with the happy ending. There is a hall of mirrors scene in which Joker and Batman chase each other around, and Bruce faces Joker reflected at him (a scene that, meaningfully, happens in batjokes content over and over and over, from Miller’s TDKR to “Gotham”). In the Polish dub Joker even tells Batman directly that he’s his “mirror image,” reinforcing the story’s overarching theme: Batman is more similar and closer to the people around him than he thinks, and he’ll only be able to function and start healing if he accepts that. The fact that this movie also directly quotes “The Dark Knight’s” line with “You complete me” also leads me to believe that the focus on mirrors in particular was a reference to batjokes dynamics specifically. 

So yeah, to sum up, this theme means so much to me and it permeates the entire dynamic so thoroughly; it informs practically every element of their relationship. They are similar in crucial ways, and totally different in other, just as crucial aspects; and the very specific ways in which their similarities and differences manifest themselves do really invoke the idea of mirror images, or they do for me. This angle of reading them also, in my opinion, does a great job highlighting why the pairing works so well for me, while the heterosexual canon pairings for either of them don’t, really; the idea of the two of them completing one another so thoroughly, of echoing and clashing in equal amounts and to such a deep, fundamental degree, is so appealing to me that other relationships will always fall short. 

Makeup Joker or acid accident Joker?

Okay let me address this one with a teaser quote from the new yet-unfinished HWA chapter:

Joker’s brow furrows; he looks surprised by the question. “Why do you assume it’s a case of either or? They don’t have to cancel each other out, you know.”

Bruce’s heart sinks. “So it’s both.”

“Obviously.”

I go into more details about my personal headcanons about Joker’s skin and the ramifications of the accident in the chapter itself, but here let me just say that it’s very, very, very important to me personally that it’s both. I’m uncomfortable with Joker designs in which his white skin is only facepaint, and I am similarly put off by designs where EVERYTHING in his look was created by the chemicals. Both those types of design, in my opinion, miss the mark on one aspect of Joker that is especially empowering to me personally: the idea of reclaiming trauma and building yourself from the ground up from tragedy. 

The accident leaves Joker disfigured – there is no two ways about it. He can’t really go out in public without drawing attention, he can’t pass for “normal,” he can’t escape visual reminders of the trauma he experienced because it’s imprinted right there, literally on his body. He’s reminded of it whenever he so much as catches a glimpse of his own hand, and, if he himself is to be believed, he suffers from chronic pain because of it. And what does he do to cope with it?

He uses makeup and clothes to fashion a persona for himself that can not only work with the physical disfigurement, but that is inspired by it and relies on it for its effectiveness. Joker knows he looks “eerie,” “disturbing,” slightly supernatural even, and he twists that to create himself into a moden myth because, as he says in “A Clown at Midnight”: “Why be a disfigured outcast when you can be a notorious Crime God?” 

Why indeed. By fashioning himself into the Joker, he claims his own identity for himself and attempts to control other people’s perception of him, and it helps him reach self-actualization in this very cathartic, in your face way, claiming I will not be a victim. If I have to be broken, I will be broken on my own terms. And that’s empowering. That’s also a recognizably queer narrative – owning your own trauma – especially when you consider his tools of choice: makeup and explicitly queer presentation (especially purple, which used to be associated with homosexual men). The way he presents is very tightly controlled. Even when his lipstick appears smeared, it’s for a specific effect (unless it’s the result of a long night fighting Batman). I like to think that he weaponizes his makeup but also uses it for cosmetic purposes, for example to smoothen his skin and to cover up the more scar-like appearance of his mouth, which comes in equal amounts from his need to control his appearance as it does from simple vanity (I like to think that the accident left him looking rather more grotesque and that he uses cosmetics to cover the worst of it up, and to play up his chosen image).

There’s also another factor due to which this take on Joker is so important to me, and it’s the second part of that “Clown at Midnight” quote: “Why be an orphaned boy when you can be a superhero?” Joker is consciously drawing parallels between his own “ascension” and Batman’s, and yes, when we look at it from this perspective, they do come from a very similar place as both of them came to be who they are, came to adopt the imagery that they did, out of a very traumatic event that changed them both forever. They both decided to build themselves into legends, they both adopted theatricality as a coping mechanism, they both live as those larger than life symbols to escape the brutal mundanity of tragedy, and they both set out to control and manipulate how they are viewed (with even a common purpose: inspiring fear, though in completely different ways). The fact that they mirror one another so closely in their “origin” narratives is so poignant and important, and I don’t think it’s fully there in quite the same way if it’s a matter of either the makeup or the acid for Joker (although it can definitely work on similar levels in specific narratives). 

So, to sum up:

Hey… if you have the time, could you do a big analysis post on Gotham Adventures #1? The one where Joker moves into the Batcave?

Hey friend it’s always a pleasure getting those asks because I get to revisit some of my favorite comics and then flail about them, and this is gonna be another one of those instances – not so much an analysis but rather “why Dracze loves the thing”

So let me just say one thing right out the gate – many animated Jokers don’t quite hit the sweet spot for me, and this goes for BTAS Joker as well (yeah I can already hear your outraged cries)

I like them! I do!

They’re just…

not quite nailing that very specific vibe that made me love character the most. Comics and some games so far, and recently “Justice League Action” Joker and “Brave and the Bold” Joker, have been the only Jokers that made me go “Yup, THAT is my Clown Prince of Crime right there.” 

That said, I still enjoyed “The New Batman Adventures” and while not quite mine, this Joker is still hella fun. And so is this comic – it’s fun, and fast-paced, it gets its emotional core to work really well and its entire premise is straight out of a fanfic scenario so there is very little here not to love. 

Basically, during one of his crime sprees, Joker caused the death of the son of a would-be mayor (”He had it coming!” J declares, “He splahed mud on my new khaki walking shorts.” Which. ugh. J. I love it when he’s petty but… khaki? really?) and the grief-stricken father decides to take drastic steps: if Batman and the “liberal” Gotham justice system are not willing to take out this public menace for good, then he will put a prize on Joker’s head (to the tune of 50 million dollars!!!!) for anyone who actually manages to kill him. 

And the Gothamites… 

Let’s just say they embrace the idea

Since there’s a literal bloodhirsty mob waiting for Joker outside of Arkham, the Asylum’s director rightly assumes that bringing J there might not be the best idea. To which Gordon replies that actually he has no idea where Joker is, because Batman never turned him over to the police. 

And that’s because, in true Batman fashion, instead of taking the risk of someone getting to kill Joker, Bruce decides to hide him away in the only safe place left in the city: the batcave. 

Right off the bat, we get exactly the kind of comment from J we’d expect:

(D’awwwww. This ship literally sails itself I swear to God.)

 Tim and Barbara are already in the cave, and as Bruce handcuffs J to the railing (jumping the gun a little there, Bruce? the clown literally just got in. Maybe wait a little until the kinky stuff huh?) Then in rides Dick on his motorcycle, and J warms right up into the role, going into full mom mode:

And I’m sorry but I’m having the time of my life here because my ultimate fluffyverse dream is to have J be part of the batfam not just for Bruce but for the kids as well and any glimpse of it, even in joke, is still treasured. 

Trouble starts when Alfred descends into the batcave – J can’t see him, or he’ll know exactly who Batman really is, so Tim rushes to the rescue and tackles Alfred out of view, saying this:

Yeah no that’s not gonna put anyone at ease there, Timmy my boy.

Okay, so then the plot kicks in for good – Batman is needed since the Riddler is out on the town, leaving Gordon cryptic messages. Bruce leaves J with Barbara (and the creative team indulge in a bit of TKJ-evocative intertextual play, which honestly I could have done without) and leaves with Tim to deal with it. Riddler’s puzzle leads him to an abandoned theater where the trap is sprang – Riddler wants to keep Robin as a hostage until Batman delivers Joker to him, so Ed can kill him and earn the 50 mil. He emphasizes that he’s not above torturing Robin to get the information he needs if Batman doesn’t comply.

In the meantime, we cut away to Barbara who is on clown-sitting duty. J does his usual little shit stuff – sings, tries to rile Babs up with bad jokes, pretends they’re having a slumber party while lounging on the rail like… this…

And when he realizes that she won’t rise to his bait, he turns to the ultimate “gag” – he proves that what Batman cuffed was just a fake replica arm, and that he could have gotten out of the handcuffs at any time. He just waited to do so until it was “funny.” It’s a good moment, reminding us that Joker is SMART and a worthy opponent for Batman, and yeah the first time you read it it’s pretty damn terrifying. 

Barbara, being the awesome badass she is, jumps straight to action and holds her own against J pretty damn well – but not for long. Sadly J manages to one-up her and we get a very disturbing “censored” panel of him clobbering her with his fake arm until she passes out (again, uncomfortable imagery I could have done without, poor Babs always getting the short straw here). Then J wonders what to do with himself until he is distracted by the sight of stairs. He follows them up to emerge from behind the grandfather clock to the manor proper, indulging in a “Shining” referece

(the layers of meta are kinda blowing my mind here)

His adventure is short-lived though, since Alfred promptly whacks him on the head and drags him right back down to the cave to a waking Barbara. Go Alfred. They then proceed to tie J up with duct tape, because “a gentleman’s gentleman is always prepared.” 

Alfred Pennyworth for president.

Over with Bruce and Tim, they manage to get out of Ed’s ambush, but Ed himself slipped the fray and left another clue. The good citizens of Gotham are still on their full scale clown hunt, scouring the city with guns and any other weapon they can whip up on such short notice. There’s a bit of a kerfuffle when some random guy appears to have the real Joker in his custody, but in no time at all it’s revealed that it’s Clayface hoping to trick everyone and get the prize impersonating Joker; Nightwing takes him out with very little trouble, but ugh, yeah Dick, better wash that hair. 

In the meantime, Bruce gets back to the cave, and we get to my favorite part of the entire issue. Let me just paste the entire exchange here because it’s so good it speaks for itself:

THIS. THIS RIGHT HERE. THIS IS WHY I’M IN THIS FANDOM IN THE FIRST PLACE. The game of wits. The one-upmanship. Joker’s thirst for Batman’s attention (the “…and you’re ignoring me” comment is genuinely chilling). Joker’s constant need to hit a nerve with Bruce, and Bruce’s indulgence (if he REALLY wanted Joker to shut up he would have gagged him right from the get-go instead of just vaguely threatening to do that). The fact that Joker wants to HELP (and be a nuisance while he’s at it) because the only thing as funny as messing with Batman is messing with the other rogues, ALONGSIDE Batman. The fact that even tied down and in a position of subservience Joker can completely control the situation. And that J blasts the illusion of Bruce genuinely getting the upper hand over him wide open with his admission that he’d been letting Bruce win, because he knows full well that with Batman gone he will have nothing to replace him with, no reason to keep on existing (that last bit doesn’t really apply to Timm-era animated Jokers who aren’t quite as wholly dependant on Batman for their existence as comics Jokers, which is part of why they don’t quite do it for me, but the sentiment of needing one another is still very much there in this exchange). That’s how I read their interactions too – Joker does go to a lot of effort to give Bruce a way out, always, even if he pretends it’s not the case. If the game is over, it’s over. It doesn’t make sense to end it while he’s still enjoying himself.  

Joker really can play Batman like a “trombone,” and I LOVE the fact that even as they’re openly antagonistic, even as Batman is gearing for violence (!) Joker still ends up helping. (I like to think he used the musical instrument metaphor on purpose, to help Bruce get on the right track with the riddle. Because he’s a slippery bastard like that.)

With that clown-inspired lightbulb going off in Bruce’s head, he finds and takes out Eddie with no trouble at all, and admits:

Story of Bruce Wayne’s life. 

Okay, so the part between Bruce and J in the cave is definitely my favorite and a top notch batjokes moment, but the finale is really good too, and a very emotional way to wrap up the issue. Mainly: Bruce decides that the mayhem won’t stop until Reid, the man who issued the reward, retracts it. So he goes for a bold statement – he kidnaps Reid in the middle of the night, takes him right to a tied-up Joker, and gives him a choice. He won’t let Reid “buy a murder” – if Reid wants the Joker dead, he’ll have to kill him himself, and Batman is giving him that opportunity right then and there.

He then retreats into the shadows, and Reid is seemingly left alone with his worst nightmare, and for a moment it seems that he might actually do it. When Joker actually baits him (”Get on with it!”) the man lunges for him. 

But of course we know that Bruce wouldn’t put Joker in such a risk if he didn’t have every confidence that the man won’t be able to follow through, and he’s right. Reid hesitates, hands trembling, and then gives up, and admits that no, he can’t do it. He won’t kill another human being, no matter how depraved. We then learn that he does retract the reward and instead will use the money to start a fund for the victims of violent crime and their families – a very worthy goal, and one that is a much better healing mechanism than the drive to get revenge, as the comic reinforces at the end. 

So yeah, strong stuff, a solid story with real emotional stakes told over just a few pages, but it’s no surprise – Gotham Adventures tends to be like that, telling smaller, quality human stories tha strike a nerve at the very least. This first issue does a great job of setting up the kind of themes the series will try to tackle, and the central theme here – not forgiveness, exactly, because J is never forgiven, nor should be he, but rather the slow trajectory of grief that can turn even the most benevolent and humanitarian of people to their lowest point, then redemption and reclamation of humanity even in the face of that tragedy – is a touching one to pursue, even if it came across a little ham-fisted here at times.

I would have loved the issue for the batjokes moments alone; the fact that it was centered around an ordinary man’s moral stumble and eventual redemption, that it focused on a very human idea of hope in getting back up again and doing more good in the world even with the burden of heavy trauma, just makes it all the more great. 

I also love how the story validates Bruce’s rule not to kill his enemies, nor to let them get killed – it’s that human instinct to protect, redeem and win over those dark impulses that’s celebrated by the narrative. Unlike other stories like for example “Devil’s Advocate,” Bruce’s decision to protect Joker is never questioned by his allies – none of the batfam protest it, and neither does Gordon, all agreeing that this is necessary if only because if Joker actually does get killed, they’ll have to put Reid, a good man and known humanitarian, in jail. More than that though, the possibility that Bruce might NOT protect Joker and just let him get murdered, as it arguably would make the city safer in the long run, is never raised in this story, where it would have been so easy to once again make it the center of the conflict. I’m GLAD this issue doesn’t go there because the to kill or not to kill angst is something I’m frankly tired of, in Batman canon and in fandom discussions alike. Here, it’s a non-issue because the answer is obvious to Bruce and to everyone who really knows him, and it’s a breath of fresh air to have that kind of unquestioned certainty and validation of Bruce’s personal moral code. 

So yeah, in short, it’s a great, funny, witty, moving standalone story with fantastic character beats and a plot that you could easily see happening in Gotham. Go read it. 

And enjoy even more fodder for all our “J is trapped in the batcave” fanfic.

Hey so all that talk about White Knight and Harley being caught in the batjokes drama makes me wanna point you guys to another one of my favorite batjokes comics:

Harley Quinn #25 (2002)

Yup, you heard that right. There was a time when an issue of a Harley solo was one of the most shippy, gayest stories you could ever see.

Hear me out.

So that cover looks pretty straight, right? It definitely tries to set us up to expect a Joker being jealous of Harley and some sort of weird relationship she now seems to have with Batman. 

And he is jealous.

Just not of Harley.

And that? That is fucking intentional, both out and in-universe, because, you see, Joker apparently escaped from Arkham a while ago, and… nothing. All is quiet, all is still, no clown shenanigans rocking the city, not even a confetti cannon going off in the middle of the night. And the longer this goes on the more antsy Bruce gets, until he decides that this is getting ridiculous and proceeds to hatch a truly devious ploy: he and Harley – who is now the boss of her own little gang and through with Joker – make a deal to make it seem like Harley is now Batman’s biggest enemy, because Bruce is super sure that this will finally bring Joker out of hiding.

Take that, people who still think that Lego was the first to take that “greatest enemy” angle and run with it. Bruce was ready to manipulate that shit in 2002 (and earlier) because he is just that fucking confident that it’ll drive Joker into a jealous rage.

Spoiler alert: he’s right.

After one such pretend heist during which Harley appears to be able to beat up Batman (it’s adorable) she gets a call from J, who sets up a meeting. The directions she gets lead her to the sewers and into a gross old fallout shelter, where J greets her by, uh… shooting at her. You know, as you do. And this is where the best part starts: Joker is not, as Batman feared, hiding away working hard on some sort of brilliant plan of mass destruction.

He’s moping.

He’s living on canned food in someone’s fallout shelter using cardboard boxes for furniture, sloping around in sweatpants and not shaving. Just look at this loser:

Good question, Harls. Joker is pretty clearly not okay. And I am loving it. 

He pretty much confirms that Bruce’s plan worked to a T when he reveals just why he wanted to meet with Harley in the first place:

So basically J sends Harley out as his messenger girl, to tell a stupid meaningless joke that he just came up with on the spot (while pretending that this isn’t the case) to Batman, who immediately starts wracking his brains for clues as to what this joker might refer to. Bruce is of course suspicious of Harley and her motives and correctly thinks that she already divulged the entire plan to J and will want to protect him, but that doesn’t stop him from keeping up the deal and meeting with her. This is when this meaningful exchange happens:

Yeah, girl. Better late than never.

Harley then goes on to report back to J, who sends her with another joke-clue for Batman, and so on, and so forth, with Harley literally passing messages between these two idiots back and forth like they’re all in kindergarten. Poor Harley is pretty sick of it, and looks it too, which, yeah, she damn well should be. In general the way Harley was written in her first solo series is pretty awesome – she is still peppy and cute and all that, but she’s also super smart and capable and with a truly sharp edge, and a self-awareness that manifests itself even when she is still with J in issue 1 and willfully tries to convince herself that the signs she sees are not what she deep down knows they are – which is a part of her that I find both fascinating and heartbreakingly believable. 

This issue is the first time she meets with Joker after their very messy and pretty damn final breakup in issue 1, and her disillusionment with him really comes across. Especially near the finale, when J finally comes across his big plan based on what Batman pieced together from his bursts of random nonsense: 

Harley tries to convinve J that it’s the height of stupidity to actually go through with a plan that Batman already knows about (not to mention that it was actually Batman himself who unwittingly came up with it) but J is excited and eager to jump into it, and so, he – now in his Sunday best – and Harley go to a professional novelties convention with the intention to gas the place.

Of course, Batman is there to stop them. And of course Joker is delighted.

 Before these two can get going on their traditional fight-as-fuck routine though, Harley finally interrupts and gives these two idiots a much-needed piece of her mind.

“You two deserve each other” indeed. Atta girl, Harls. You tell them. Let it out baby. 

Joker then tries to talk his way out of trouble promising Harley that they’ll be partners from now on, and then… hightails it out of there as he is wont to do, fully expecting Harley to get arrested. Except she drinks the Joker venom herself and fakes choking on it, and Bruce – fully knowing that Harley is immune to the toxin because of Ivy’s intervention – lets her go, and goes after Joker instead. Just when J is getting arrested and calls Batman out on letting Harley leg it, Bruce remarks that next time he won’t be so lenient – and he doesn’t doubt that there WILL be a next time because “Harley doesn’t just love you, Joker, she loves trouble…” 

And that’s a characterization of Harley that drives most of this solo run, and that I absolutely love. At this point in her development Harley admits that Joker will probably always be her weakness but she is strong enough to be able to let him go even despite that, and to enjoy her independence, and to build her own place in the Gotham crime hierarchy independently of him, and this – this run-in with him, this experience where she served as a go-between for him and Batman as they indulged in a game of mental one-upmanship that they both cannot resist, spurring one another on without realizing and playing off each other without even being in the same room because one just cannot let the other go… This is just the final straw confirming her worst and darkest suspicions about Joker and Batman and her own place in this weird triangle, which had always been rather a lot like a third wheel. 

Well, she’s sick of it. She won’t let either of them draw her into their game again. They deserve each other, and she raises above it, and everyone is the better for it. 

I am so proud of my clown daughter.

To sum up: you should definitely pick up this little story. It doesn’t have any grand ambitions but it definitely succeeds in what it sets out to do, and in its own way, it is a powerful statement not just on Harley herself and how far she had come but on the Batman/Joker codependency as well. The delightful irony here is that Joker would have probably just stayed in the fallout shelter for God knows how long, moping around being depressed and uninspired and hurting no one but himself, if Batman could just leave it alone. But no. Bruce was so obsessed with Joker’s radio silence and what might he be up to, so bothered by it, that he had to find a way to flush him out and ended up unwittingly masterminding Joker’s plan for him because that’s just how these two idiots are: they are constantly enabling one another, whether they realize it or not. They literally cannot stop. 

So yeah, here’s one way in which this triangle was already dealt with in canon, and in my opinion, it’s great. Go read it. You’ll have fun. 

Have you ever talked about Batman: the devil’s advocate comic? I’d love to hear your opinion on it and how batjokes-y the whole thing is with bruce trying to save j from the death penalty

You know what, I keep referencing it and bringing it up in other posts and discussions and stuff, but I never made a post dedicated entirely to this little piece of batjokes brilliance

Which is kind of criminal considering that it IS one of my favorite batjokes stories and Chuck Dixon is one of my favorite Joker writers

It’s just that it’s so INCREDIBLY gay that I guess I tend to assume that everyone in the fandom has already read it, which, if you haven’t, you should. It may not be the best comic ever written and it’s got plenty of typically-DC icky stuff, especially its attitude to mental illness, but if you like batjokes the sheer amount of reinforcement the ship gets here makes said ickiness easier to forgive. It’s basically a ship manifesto all on its own even though it makes some token effort to appear as if it’s not (such as the explanation Tim offers for Bruce’s obsession with saving Joker). 

The entire thing is based on the premise that Joker is caught and – gasp! – actually sentenced to death for the crime of poisoning a new collection of “comedian” stamps with Joker juice. The sentencing is achieved due to some courtly shenanigans that are meant to introduce some realism into the Gotham justice system, an attempt that to me is a bit misguided because the way Batman comics use the insanity plea never could hold up in the real world so trying to imbue comic book logic with realism only succeeds in calling to attention how ridiculous Gotham’s justice system actually is, but anyway, it makes for a good story so I’m not to bothered by that. Because the kicker is that for once, instead of bragging like he usually does J seems genuinely confused by the charge and claims he didn’t commit this particular crime, and the comic reveals very early on that it’s true, making sure we know right from the get-go that the meat of the story here is not so much a “whodunit” but more about the tension between Batman – who feels that Joker is innocent and makes it his mission to prove that to save his nemesis from the electric chair – and EVERYONE ELSE, who are like, “come off it man, who cares if he did it or not, he’s done plenty of other stuff to warrant the electric chair a thousand times over.” 

Which you know, they have a point. 

But no! Bruce is genuinely PISSED when the court reaches their verdict:

And then it’s a race against time to prove Joker’s innocence before he is killed. 

And it’s beautiful.

Joker is his usual primadonna self and loves the attention from the press so much that instead of helping Bruce out with the investigation he demands that his execution date be SPED UP (dammit J), and the comic follows him as he tries to adjust to an actual prison. Bruce actually expresses concern about that, and visits Joker in two pretty brilliant scenes when the two of them have a quiet moment imbued with so much easy familiarity, like this one:

(I mentioned before that Dixon seems to be fond of that kind of panel composition – Joker lying on a cot with Batman’s shadow draped over him – since he uses it again in another brilliant story “Fool’s Errand” I analysed in detail before. It appears in this comic twice:

Each one of those scenes has this feeling of familiarity and intimacy, almost fondness, between these two that Dixon tends to present so well, and he’s one of my favorite Batman writers because he manages to convey that from Bruce’s side as well, reluctant as it may be. This bond between them goes back and forth and you can really feel it when these two interact.

(Plus, that shadow thing carries some delightful symbolism which I’m sure I don’t need to geek out over in any detail because it’s right there. Gaaaah. I love it.)

Also note, in that first scene, that Joker’s toe nails are painted? Nice of the prison guards to let him do that, wasn’t it? His fingernails are painted green too the entire time, and that’s not the only callback to his queerness since we also have this scene of Joker greeting his male lawyer:

And then, of course, the LEGENDARY panel that still keeps me up at night, the scene where Bruce is scouring Gotham’s underground and Joker’s known associates for clues to prove his innocence, and gets this:

So in my head this guy’s name is Billy and I have an entire backstory figured out for him and this little confession, but that’s not all that important – what’s important is that “Devil’s Advocate” casually gave us proof that Joker sometimes has dalliances with his henchmen and this is basically the best thing ever okay. It is. And I don’t care that technically this could mean that Billy here was coming onto Joker and got rejected – nope, I’m not accepting that, to me Joker entertained himself for a bit with Billy boy until Billy got clingy and J got bored with him and uh, sent him on his way a little bit more violently than is customary. That’s my story and you’re gonna have to pry it from my cold dead hands. The Joker is not straight. 

Anyway, we got this casual confirmation of Joker’s queerness in the same book that focuses on Bruce’s increasingly desperate quest to find the real culprit and stop his boyfriend husband nemesis from getting his brain fried. Gordon calls him out on it, several times. Alfred calls him out o it. Barbara literally hacks into the batcomputer to prevent Bruce from using technology to save Joker. Only Tim seems to be accepting of it, which, man, I love Tim, he’s such a sweetheart. Bruce doesn’t listen to any of them. He just keeps doing his thing, refusing to heed any arguments, until he succeeds in literally the very last minute, with Joker already strapped to the chair.

Joker’s reaction?

He never slept through the entire comic, existing in a state of super high stress that culminated in this scene, and this culmination was so much that his body literally shut down on him. Which is basically my headcanon on how this stupid clown operates – he has no idea how to properly care for himself and just keeps going and going and going, firing on all cylinders, until his body refuses to carry on any longer and simply breaks down. The last scene of Joker back in Arkham supports it with how unhinged he is there, and it’s great to see some of it in an official Batman book.

Anyway yeah “Devil’s Advocate” is a great fun ride full of batjokesy affirmation, so if you’re feeling down and want the reassurance of good batjokes canon content, it’s definitely worth your time. 

What’s your opinion about Batman №663 (The Clown at Midnight)?

So sorry for sitting on this ask for so long, Nonnie. It’s just that Clown at Midnight is… special. I had to find a moment to sit down and reread it first, and force myself to actually pay attention. 

Oh, Grant. What an interesting mind you have.

“Clown at Midnight” is special not just in content but also in form – it’s in prose, with 3-d digital illustrations. Probably the only actually numbered issue of Batman that’s written in this way, and your name has gotta be Grant Morrison for DC to allow such an experiment in the first place.

That already should clue you in to the kind of story it is.

On the surface, if we take only the plot into account, it’s pretty straightforward: there’s a clown funeral, all of them were once associates of Joker, gas goes off in the middle of the funeral, everyone dies. Batman investigates and finds Joker’s calling card on the scene. He goes to Arkham, where Joker is recovering from being shot in the face by the fake Batman a while back; his face is in bandages, he’s doped up on drugs and he can barely speak, but he still telegraphs to Bruce – by blinking in morse code, of all things – that he’s responsible, and that he’s only just beginning. 

Then he breaks free, with the help of Harley who poses as his speech therapist; he has a fight with Batman; Harley shoots him, frustrated at the way J is ignoring her. He’s thrown back in his cell. The end. 

Simple. And it kinda has to be, because the writing is anything but. The main point of the story is for Morrison to explore the character of the Joker, and mainly his own idea of him, as he is transforming from one persona into another, a process triggered by his near-death experience and the bullet to the face. I’ve already talked about how I think Morrison’s theory about Joker’s “super sanity” and his lack of a personality work as an in-universe theory that attempts to profile Joker’s unique kind of mental illness, but how it’s not really possible as a meta explanation, and I stand by it. Even so, I like the idea on a metatextual level as long as it’s not taken as read – and yeah, the way Morrison approaches it here is very metatextual, even more so than it is in “A serious house on serious earth.” 

It’s a difficult read. At first, I admit, I was pretty amused by the more… purple moments in the prose, and there are quite a lot of them, or at least there are passages that veer dangerously in that direction. But what stops the issue going off in that way is the fact that Morrison peppers it with quite a bit of what we in Poland call turpism, i.e. the artistic use of the ugly and mundane, often for shock value. Ugliness is dripping from those pages, in the form of bodily fluids (a lot, lot, lot of mentions of bodily fluids), injury described in the most grotesque, stark language, mentions of dirt, physicality; even the metaphysical processes going on with Joker are described in such a way, with the chapter title of his metamorphosis being “Joker Maggot.” This kind of imagery is what stayed with me after reading it for the first time and it’s what jumped out at me again as I reread it – it’s really quite powerful the way Morrison uses that type of ugliness here.

Another element that stands out to me is that frequently, Joker’s transformation process is framed in a very feminized language of birth. Take this passage for example:

Again, the process is highly physical, with “spasms” and even more poignantly, “cramps” incapacitating him. Joker “squeals.” “I’m having a baby!” he wheezes. He’s “jazzing like a showgirl,” he’s giving “blasphemous birth” to himself. In later passages there’s more imagery like that, images of Joker eager to “give birth from his mouth to pestilence and desolation,” soiling the world with his “children.” That’s just a few examples, and the entire text is sprinkled with such language, which complicates Joker’s gender expression, gives him feminine-coded attributes and further posits him as a character beyond a known physical persona, with this queering element being a big part of the entire process.

This passage also touches on what Batman means to Joker’s process of self-actualization, like in this passage:

The entire sequence of him trying to find a new voice for himself is centered around Batman.

Also:

To put it shortly – Batman is not just important to Joker. He’s essential. Even here Joker is admitting that what he’s doing is in parallel to Batman – “Why be a disfigured outcast when I can be a notorious Crime God? Why be an orphaned boy when you can be a superhero?” – posing both their identities as self-made, as sculpted out of tragedy. The final chapter is even called “The Unbearable Inevitability of Batman and the Joker,” and it has a meaning in the meta sense – these two are inseparable, each being a part of the other – as well as a more literal one, presented through the eyes of Harley, who was tricked into believing that the “sacrifice” Joker required for his rebirth would be Batman when in fact it was very nearly her. She would have gotten killed if she hadn’t fought back against Joker, who was prepared to slit her throat; and then she stood by as Joker and Batman clashed, beholding the spectacle, until it got too much for her and she ended the struggle by shooting Joker.

It’s noteworthy the way Morrison presents Harley through Joker’s eyes – to Joker, she’s an interruption:

He’s freshly transformed in this passage; ecstatic with it, with the possibilities, with the entire metaphysical process he’d just gone through. And then this moment is brought to a halt by Harley’s interruption – note the language Morrison uses to frame that. Bringing us down from a near religious experience and metaphor to “that tall guy with the hairdo (…).” The elevated with the mundane, the intellectual with the physical. And then there’s “the most boring board game ever invented,” “dinner gone cold,” “something he once gorged on but never, ever wants to eat again,” still very firmly in the realm of the physical, of the bodily.

So we have this interruption – Harley shattering the moment of mental ecstasy, while Joker is thinking about Batman and smiling because “he can’t stop” – and then we also have a less metaphorical, more direct interruption, of a literal, physical confrontation between Joker and Batman (which is also framed in pretty sexualized terms, like in this bit:

which Harley forcibly ends with her gun just as it is getting really, really violent. She also follows it up with “You gotta stop ignoring me, Mistah J!” framing her act explicitly as one of jealousy.

Which, on the one hand, is rather… distasteful. But on the other, it presents a pretty interesting way to imagine how Joker might view Harley, especially when it is so starkly contrasted by the ecstasy he experiences when he transforms thinking about Batman – and how she is literally getting in the way between Batman and him, in more ways than one.

There’s other noteworthy things about it as well, one of my favorites being this:

Once again drawing attention to the performance of a self born out of tragedy (which is so, so, SO important to me about Joker’s entire concept, this idea of owning your own trauma and building on it to dictate and control your own image) and the mention of Joker’s other past personas, with the emphasis of his Silver Age one meant as a “gentle mockery” of “young Batman’s pretensions.” That is such an appealing, accurate take on Silver Age Joker that it’s one I instantly adopted into my own writing and headcanons, and I especially appreciate the use of the word “gentle” here which really paints a very specific picture of their relationship as it used to be. 

So yeah, there’s definitely a lot of interesting stuff to dig into in this issue, so many elements to study and peel apart. It has to be said though that, once again, it’s not an easy read, and it tends to be very absurdist and surreal at times, and bloody, to the point of gratuity. So bear that in mind if you feel like giving it a read.

Overall it’s hard for me to say if I even have a single opinion on this text. It’s interesting; it has some fantastic insights and striking imagery. The prose, on the whole, is powerful, though it also has some head-scratching moments. I appreciate what it’s doing, and the message it’s sending, even as I’m critical of the prevalent and exhausting deaths, the cruelty of it, and the treatment of Harley, which, as we’ve seen above, is… questionable, and even more so in passages I decided not to quote. Definitely an interesting take on Joker, and worth a read if you’re a fan of the character, if only to make up your own mind about it.

Just… don’t say I didn’t warn you. 

(utrh anon) i meant the animated movie but both is good 👍👍👍

So let’s stay in the Batman-Joker-Jason debacle tonight and take a look at “Under the Red Hood” and how it all but affirms batjokes mmmkay

(sorry Jason)

Right! I needed a while to decide how I want to do this because adaptation studies is one of My Things (it was supposed to be the topic of my aborted PHD) so the logical thing to do would be to start from the comic and then see how the animated version changed things around

but I think I want to start with the movie because it holds a special place in my heart, not just for being an amazing piece of Batman canon but also because I probably wouldn’t be sitting here in my Batman print pj’s up to my ears in batjokes if it hadn’t been for it. While I have some hazy memories of watching and liking the Batman Animated Series when I was a kid, for the longest time, I was convinced I didn’t actually like Batman. The Nolanverse movies, while objectively good, did nothing to endear the character to me, and even when I was converted to realizing that I could actually enjoy superhero stories – and what a shock that was to me, lemme tell ya – I still regarded Batman with extreme suspicion as the poster boy for toxic nerd masculinity. 

Until, somehow, youtube suggested to me a clip of Jason’s torture from the beginning of the movie. I was a TheMarySue reader at the time and there’d been quite a few discussions of Joker on that website, especially in the context of The Killing Joke, and as someone who’s always been interested in villains and to whom Joker always seemed kinda peripherally fascinating, I decided I wanted to know more. I was also very much into Avatar the last Airbender at the time and Jason looks a lot like my baby boy Zuko in that scene, so I watched the recommended clip with quite a lot of curiosity. That got me curious enough to watch the entire movie.

And lo! Behold! There was a Batman complex enough, deep enough, interesting enough that I realized that hey I might actually enjoy this! 

And yeah, the batjokesy elements were a huge, huge factor in my fascination with the movie. As a sucker for hero/villain ships in general I really stood no chance. Right off the (ha) bat, we begin the whole story with this incredibly pivotal moment – Jason’s murder – and even that tragedy, which by all means ought to be focused on Jason (and to some degree is), is framed as a personal conflict between Batman and Joker. Joker’s parting words to Jason make it clear: “Tell the big guy I said… hello.” The understatement, combined with DiMaggio’s chilling acting, and the close-up on Joker’s smile, were shot brilliantly to convey that yeah, the kid is just a tragic pawn to Joker in a game of chess he’s playing with Batman. Collateral damage. It was never about Robin specifically, which only makes it all the more tragic.

Then we have the flashback of Joker falling into the vat of acid, a direct callback to his past as the Red Hood meant to bring attention to the fact that Jason is taking Joker’s old name. Why? Honestly it’s still a mystery to me why he would do that and I’ve had endless discussions about it with my friend who’s a huge Jason stan, but the fact that the flashback is there – as a means to give more background to audiences who aren’t that familiar with the canon, yes, but also to lampshade Jason’s choice and its implications, not letting us forget where the name originated – is once again underscoring this complex relationship web that these three characters are caught in. In the end it all comes down to the three of them. Also interestingly, Jason refers to Joker’s vat of acid accident as possibly “Bruce’s greatest failure,” placing his own death below it. Is it because he himself sees it that way, or because he thinks that Bruce does? In any case… yikes.

Then of course we have that iconic scene where Bruce and Dick follow the Red Hood connection and visit Joker in Arkham, and oh. My. God. Is that scene chock-full of juicy ship material. Not only does Joker greet Batman with “You look good; been working ou?” while he gives him LITERAL BEDROOM EYES 

Not only does it contain some disturbingly cute J moments when he just looks so EAGER to help out and get involved when Bruce presents him with the case; not only does it have beautifully written dialogue establishing the history between all 3 characters present in the cell, placing Joker in this really twisted, dark “weird uncle” role when he remarks, with a weirdly nostalgic smile, on how much Dick has grown (”Oh birdboy, you’re so much less fun now!… all grown up, in your big boy pants…”) and then turns right on to spin this even darker and taunt Bruce about Jason like the unbelievable asshole he is… It also contains some fascinatingly sexual tension when Bruce raises to his bait, grabs J by the straitjacket and slams him into the wall where their faces are inches apart.

LOOK AT THAT SHIT. J is so obviously turned on by this, and ngl, so am I. *cough*

Honestly I think this right here is the moment when I already sank past the point of no return because it’s honestly batjokes at its most quintessential – violent, dark, with Joker baiting Bruce to hurt and even kill him WHILE he cloaks it in this highly sexualized language (”Are you finally gonna do it this time…?”) just as it showcases Bruce’s own violent instincts and Joker’s pleasure at them as he lies there on the floor laughing and remarking that he’s disappointed that Bruce didn’t actually follow through and kill him. And Dick looking on at that display, horrified, whilst to the two of them it feels like bread and butter. I mean. What sort of twisted, magnificently layered nugget of characterization have I just witnessed…! And then the cherry on top – Joker’s narcissism. “You really think that I’d have gone to all that trouble and NOT LET YOU KNOW IT WAS ME.” Genius. Fucking genius. I’m in love.

Then we get some more wonderful Joker moments as Black Mask is forced to negotiate with him and set him free, but the core of it is that Jason knows enough about both Bruce and Joker and their relationship to know that Joker can be used as bait. And that, that is another thing which I love about the entire story – it could have so easily been JUST a standard revenge plot. Jason comes back to life, is furious, wants to kill the man who killed him. It would have been natural, understandable, it’s what I expected to get. But instead the finale – an intimate and small scene between just those core 3 people but all the more POWERFUL for it – reveals that no, it’s far more complex than that. Jason does want revenge – but not on Joker. Joker is just a pawn while Jason’s real target is Bruce, in a clever reversal of Jason’s murder when he was just a pawn to Joker to get to Bruce. What a way to drive home the parallels between the two J-men – Joker and Jason, both having Bruce as their endgame, both using one another, both violent and without any qualms about killing, who are trying to prove a point (again, Jason’s choice of moniker only drives all this further home, showcasing that in a way, Joker may be as much of a spiritual father to Jason as Bruce is). It’s just so, so good that this is Jason’s approach to Joker now – he understands that Joker is Joker, that’s just what he does, and understands that he was collateral damage. He even doesn’t hold it against Bruce that Bruce didn’t manage to save him, because he understands, probably better than most, that Batman is only human. 

No, his real grievance, what really hurts him and what motivates him, is that even after all that Bruce still hasn’t killed Joker. And that. That right there is what sealed the deal for me. This entire exchange is just so beautifully written and acted for all 3 characters and I could spend days going over every single shot and line, but we all know how it plays out so let me just say that the batjokes dynamic and the way Jason frames it is such a fantastic way to capture all 3 characters and draw this amazing tragedy that had me sitting there stunned. The parallels between Jason and Joker. The connection between Joker and Bruce. The baggage between Bruce and Jason, so amazingly complex and layered. It’s beautiful, and manages to say so much, and holds so much tension that honestly I wish more Batman titles took a leaf out of this movie’s book to see how it can be done. The fact that Joker is thrilled to be a part of this story, is just having the time of his life, and then wants all three of them to die together regarding it as a happy ending is just… I love him. I love that twisted fuck so much. 

And if you think that was gay af, the comic is gonna blow your socks off.

First of all, the comic is amazing, just as good as the movie if not better, so go read it right now if you haven’t.

Second of all, Jason doesn’t manipulate Black Mask into releasing Joker from Arkham; he beats him up viciously first and kidnaps him himself, and when he does, there is some frankly amazing banter going on between the two J’s:

And this just KEEPS GOING, the two of them playing off one another with the sass and one-upmanship and hitting each other’s weak spots (Joker comparing Jason to Bruce; Jason implying Joker isn’t as “insane” as he thinks he is) and yeah, remember that talk of family and Joker being weirdly presented as part of it? It’s all the more visible here, as is Joker’s role as pawn in all this, with Jason’s attitude towards him only highlighting that he doesn’t even… hate Joker all that much for killing him? I mean, he does, obviously. But not like we’d expect him to, and he reserves most of his resentment fro Bruce because again, he understands that Joker can’t really help himself, he’s so driven by his own special brand of madness. He tolerates Joker here, even humors him with their back and forth, and it’s fascinating watching them interact like this.

And then there’s this ICONIC moment of Jason dangling the Joker bait for Bruce by. Sending Bruce. A lock. Of Joker’s hair. In a fucking green box wrapped in purple bow. 

I mean.

HE SENDS BRUCE A LOCK OF JOKER’S HAIR

I honestly don’t think this can be emphasized enough because WHO DOES THAT

This just screams that Jason knows exactly how much Joker means to Bruce; just this one act is enough to send a powerful message, and it’s a message that Bruce responds to immediately as Jason knows he would – he literally turns the car around the moment he learns of this – and is in hero mode the whole time he fights Jason, his very first (and, in that issue, only!) words to him in their final confrontation being, literally

and

I mean on the one hand, I feel terrible for Jason because boy this must hurt like a bitch. But on the other… 

holy batjokes batman.

The finale here is just as emotional as the animated movie with most of it playing out the same way, except bloodier (Bruce sends the batarang at Jason’s neck instead of the muzzle of his gun, which only underscores his desperation and the lengths he’s willing to go to to save Joker’s life – again, POOR JASON). And to finish up, Jason’s phrasing – “Him or me, you have to decide” – once again drives home just how transparent Bruce is in his relationship with Joker, and how devastating their entire set of issues is to everyone involved with them, and just

I cry

perfect batjokes content is perfect and I just want to wrap Jason in a hug and convince him to leave those idiots to their idiocy

thanks for this ask and allowing me to revisit this great story! <333 Not sure if this is what you wanted and I can go on and on about this story in both mediums for days which is why I feel I should stop now before I dissolve into even less coherent rambling.