midnight-musings-blog

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Joker is truly on cloud 9 here lol

Jiminy Christmas, the Batcave!

Batman: The Brave and The Bold Game Over for Owlman!

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Ooh, what story is this from?

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The Joker side profile sketch - the hair, so wavy😍

I got some new colour pencils from Castle Arts, so made use of them for my third Joker profile sketch. I wanted to better portray the hair and I think I've achieved that here. So green and wavy... oh you could just run your hands through it 😍😳

It's turned out rather Brian Bolland with a touch of Neal Adam's in style, which makes sense given that they're some of my favourite Joker artists although I didn't really use anything specific by them as a reference all that much for this.

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“Remember, Robin… the Joker’s my meat!”

Detective Comics #71 (1943)

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Joker drawing - front profile study

I used the original Joker card design by Jerry Robinson (above), and the inspiration and quote is from Batman #1 in the scene that Joker kills Judge Drake. The look is classic Joker, particularly bronze age in terms of the clothing. Appearance is a bit Brian Bolland, Neal Adams, Dick Sprang ish with my own spin.

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The Joker

My Joker sketch. For the pose, I used the Conrad Veidt costume test headshot for The Man Who Laughs, 1928 as that's one of the original references used when Bill Finger, Jerry Robinson and Bob Kane created The Joker.

Then a selection of stuff by Dick Sprang, Neal Adams, Marshall Rogers and Brian Bolland for ideas. The nose is very Sprang and Rogers like in style as that's how I like it. I also love how in older comics the hair is drawn black with green highlight to suggest shading, so I've imitated that. Although wanted it to be my own version, not a copy of a style, which I think I've achieved.

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Amen.

It's so common now to just have Joker as oooh so evil and kills everything and piles of bodies as soon as he appears. I notice this in comics from the last 20 years, latest example is in the stuff featuring Joker written by Tynion (his Batman run, Punchline one shot and solo Joker series). Just leaves me cold tbh. It's just boring when it's like oh Joker killed some people, but who cares? Joker should have style and yes humour to what he does. A good writer can make you love Joker and his antics, yet also horrify. That charming evil makes him interesting as a character, but when you only present horror what are you left with? Just a typical one dimensional serial killer.

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Legends of the Dark Knight #50 (1993) Dennis O'Neil and Bret Blevins.

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Batman and The Joker  

by

Marshall Rogers.  

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Yeah, I agree. Three Jokers was good but perhaps a bit underwhelming.

The Killing Joke, though rightfully considered great and influential, is a bit overrated and has it's flaws. So, seeing the comedian Killing Joke Joker be presented as the true original in Three Jokers was underwhelming as it's too obvious. Personally, I think that is why it felt like Three Jokers had a great premise, concept and art to die for, but a disappointing ending. Because it's like, oh it's The Killing Joke Joker yet again. And oh it's Joker obsessed with Batman yet again. Yes, that's a longstanding character trait of Joker, but tbh I wish the "one bad day"/two sides of the coin thing was toned down as it becomes boring. It also feels a bit pointless and a waste to have the three Jokers concept to then say actually these other two don't matter.

The Clown Joker is Bronze Age Joker imo. As he's the one with the Joker Fish and the crowbar (I'd consider A Death in the Family to be late Bronze age as the Joker look is very much in that style). With a touch of Silver Age e.g. with Gaggy being there. I love the Bronze age style Joker (The Joker Bronze Age Omnibus is an absolute treasure) it's sad to have him dismissed.

Likewise, the Criminal Golden Age 1940s Joker was the most intriguing tbh. I actually like the Golden Age Joker of Bill Finger quite a bit, and I recommend to read other 40s stories featuring Joker, not just the first story in Batman #1. Three Jokers portrays the character as this serious character, which is not entirely accurate to 40s Joker tbh, unless you've only read the first Joker story in Batman #1. I'd have loved to see more of Golden Age Joker tbh as it would be great to see that 40s Joker again, but with improved artwork and tighter storytelling.

I'm not really a fan of the dismissal of Golden Age Joker and Bronze Age Joker as imposters in favour of Killing Joke Joker. Frankly the latter already takes so much attention and references (in other comics, video games, and films The Dark Knight and Joker etc), that it becomes tiresome. And it oftens feels like a surface level understanding of the character; not delving much beyond it. So, let's see some love for the former versions. Those eras of the character are also significant. The Killing Joke is great, but it is not everything.

SO the three jokers is finally done! what do you think of this final issue/the mini as a whole?

Anonymous said: How about all them Jokers?

Anonymous said: So Three Jokers ended. Was this peak Johns? Will he finally let poor Alan Moore rest in peace now that he took the axe to the work Moore has already disowned anyway?

I’m not going to talk all that much about Three Jokers in a plot sense - except for major spoilers regarding the very ending, because it’s impossible to discuss the point without it - but that’s actually pretty easy, because almost everything here is weightless. Jason and Barbara do not matter. The big loud proclamations of this being about Trauma and our ability or inability to move forward with our lives with it do not matter. One, arguably even two out of three Jokers don’t matter. Nothing changes or matters coming out of it, the “is it canon even though it’s Black Label?!” debate was misguided all along because it has just as much impact either way, every tease of significance not even a gag, but at best a pratfall.

Before getting to what DOES matter, at least as far as Geoff Johns is concerned: this comic is hilarious. I don’t want to spoil any of the ways it’s hilarious if you somehow haven’t seen any of them, but this is the storytelling tone-deafness and desperation for achieving The Biggest Moment You’ve Ever Seen no longer merely every issue, but every panel, of Justice League-era Johns, mixed with the faux-formalism and haughtiness of Doomsday Clock Johns. The result is the closest thing I’ve ever read to professionally published fanfiction in the most archetypal sense, except that in most actual fanfiction Jason Todd would’ve kissed a boy and/or he and Barbara Gordon would have talked about their feelings in an actually substantial sense, so something productive would have come of this. I’m talking about the bad fanfiction folks, and it’s frequently a delight.

Oh, and Jason Fabok, Brad Anderson, and Rob Leigh deserve lots of credit for making this gorgeous, but not enough to excuse their involvement. Also ‘Joker wants to engineer Batman’s catharsis with Joe Chill because he doesn’t want Batman to hate or fear anyone more than him’ is a great idea that deserved to be in a better comic, so compliments(?) to that aspect as well.

Alright SO

The key to the whole thing is that the identities of the three Jokers went through three iterations prior to publication. When initially announced, it was Golden Age Joker, Killing Joke Joker, and Snyder/Capullo Joker. A little while later in interviews he discussed it as Golden Age Joker, Silver Age Joker, and Killing Joke Joker. In the comic it’s nominally supposed to be Golden Age Joker, Death In The Family Joker, and Killing Joke Joker, but in practice I’m pretty sure it’s supposed to be Silver/Bronze Age Joker still rather than DITF? Initially I thought it was *purely* laziness, and I’m sure it was 90% that, but the real point is that it was always Original vs. 80s, with an inconsequential spare thrown in so Johns could call it Three Jokers, because jokes come...in threes!

And then of course 80s Joker, the Joker Geoff Johns likes because that’s what he grew up with, not only kills Golden Age Joker but reveals that he was in fact the real original Joker, because fuck even the progression and structure of linear time, only the Geoff Johns version matters. The premise of Three Jokers, a book that Johns had four years to write and spent four years trying to hype us up on is that fuck you, person who buys Three Jokers, for wanting three Jokers, because that implies the possibility of a multiplicity of interpretations of characters instead of their only ever being one true correct take as defined by Geoff Johns. Also said defined interpretation is in this case UNKNOWABLE, MYSERIOUS CHAOS! but also Killing Joke’s maybe-real-maybe-not-open-to-interpretation flashbacks are now 100% officially the canon Joker origin because again there can be no room for deviation from his Correct Take on the DCU.

This is not a comic about Batman - Geoff Johns doesn’t give a shit about Batman, I suspect because it’s difficult at this point to be transgressive with him compared to his peers - and it’s not even really a comic about Joker. It’s a comic about fuck Bill Finger and Jerry Robinson, fuck Gardner Fox and Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams and Steve Englehart and Marshall Rogers, fuck Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo, and thanks a ton Alan Moore and Brian Bolland but also fuck you too for getting vague and later uppity. Only Geoff Johns’ favorite comics have ever mattered or ever will, and if you disagree you are his enemy and Joker will personally kill whatever inferior version of a character you incorrectly like instead. He will have Joker say who he is doesn’t matter, and then in the last two pages reveal who Joker is, while Batman in the last panel speaks for the author by agreeing with the thesis that who Joker is doesn’t matter, because it doesn’t matter if any of it contradicts itself, Geoff Johns can have his cake and eat it too and then throw out the rest of the bakery, and fuck you for being a smug little smartass punk who thinks he could ever possibly know better than Geoff Johns about literally anything.

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End of the Joke

I don’t care for Punchline. DC is giving her this massive, undeserved, push toward something bigger, I think, and it’s frustrating to watch. Her debut is right before Joker War so I imagine she’ll be a force in Gotham going forward, maybe on her own, maybe as Joker’s partner, maybe as his replacement. I don’t know, I don’t care. What immediately strikes me is the fact that Joker’s new girl is kind of… corny. I believe that the most effective Joker is a lone Joker. A Joker allowed to be revel in his violence and depravity, free of a colorful supporting staff. That’s his allure. Every other Gotham villain has henchmen or mob connections. Mr. Napier does not. Joker is a boogie man who only solicits expendable manpower in accordance with the scheme. He is an island of pure, malevolent, chaos. For me, Joker is Tyler Durden. He is the anarchist. The mass murderer. The dog chasing cars. He’s an enigma that is more than the physical. Joker is Batman’s opposite in every way. He is the king of Gotham’s underworld, even if he chooses not to wear that broken crown and leaves the throne vacant. Joker doesn’t need a second. Harley worked because she was a very different character, first introduced into a very different medium. Harls had years to develop in Batman: The Animated Series before she made the jump to the comics. Even her Ivy romance has roots in BTAS, no pun intended. Harley Quinn organically grew into a great character. Punchline, however, feels forced. She feels really try-hard. She feels disposable. I don’t know if it’s because she only has a handful of appearances but, so far, most of them have been written by her creators, which does not bode well. If they can’t get the character right, then the character will never be right and is, effectively, a wasted opportunity.

I think i dislike this chick so much because she’s a goddamn Mary Sue. Harley earned her agency after years upon years of trauma. She was manipulated, abused, and violated, by Joker. Overcoming that violence on her way to becoming a principal character of the entire DC universe, is a true story of growth with some incredibly compelling themes that have been explored at length. The Harleen we see in Mad Love is a completely different character to the Harleen we see in Birds of Prey. Hell, her first appearance way back in Joker’s Favor was perfect. She was lively, energetic, visibly traumatized, and humanized the abject horror Joker embodies. Harley feels like she’s been with the Joker for years. She fits that dynamic. Punchline does none of that. Her first appearance reads like edgelord fan fiction. Harley was more than her Harley Quinn persona. Punchline is not. Its funny to me that she references not being one of Joker’s fangirls because that’s exactly how this story portrays her.

The goth outfit. The super-crazy facial expressions. All of that big “I’m not like other girls” energy. The fact that she found the formula for Joker Venom online is just the worst. Even more egregious, the fact that she was able to modify it into a liquid form which not only inflicts more acute symptoms upon the victim, but leaves them alive for interrogation, and Joker, himself, never tried that, is borderline unbelievable. Rey Palpatine is the poster child for Mary Sues but Punchline is really giving the impostor Skywalker a run for her money. The first time i saw this chick in a comic, she fought Mercy Graves to a stalemate. Mercy f*cking Graves. Lex Luthor’s bodyguard. Harley was able to do that in the World’s Finest crossover special but she has a background in gymnastics and martial arts. Punchline is a child compared to her. She can’t be more than twenty-two years old, considering she’s still in college and that’s IF she’s a Senior. You’re telling me that this kid, who has shown no special abilities, genius level intellect, or enhanced skills, can best one of the strongest martial artists in the DC universe? More than that, she beats Harley, herself, in a fight. How??

There is no conceivable way Punchline defeats Harley in a scrap. None. Harleen’s gone toe-to-toe with Batman and even bested him a few rounds. She’s been a Suicide Squad survivor countless times. She pulled through i don’t know how many attempts on her life at the hands of the Joker and you’re telling me that Punchline, this glorified emo kid, bested her in fisticuffs, nearly killing her in the process? There’s no way. There’s no way Harley jobs that hard to anyone but, here we are. Because the writers and creators of this character are creatively bankrupt. They wanted their OC to be better so they made Harley worse. They wanted their OC to be anti-Harley, but as popular as Harley, so she had to beat Harley. That’s bad writing, man, and considering these stories are our first experiences with this character, that might be her death knell. It’s a shame because i actually think there is merit in the idea of Punchline as a character.

Punchline could have been something special, a Batgirl to Joker, so to speak. Literally just crib Batgirl’s entire origin and apply it to Joker. Disillusioned college student who derived her own persona independent of, but based upon, Joker. She’d be able to start small, committing base murders because, apparently, she has a thing for knives. Slowly gaining experience and reputation over time as a killer, as a villain, outside of Joker, eventually making her proper debut as a new force in Gotham villainy; Punchline. Show us how clever she could have been removed from Joker. Give us evidence of her ingenuity. Show us what she could do with a few drums of gas and a couple of bullets. Make her the anarchist and domestic terrorist she seems to want to be, outside of that Clown Prince choker. Imagine if she Tyler Durden’d her way through Gotham in a massive, bloody, spectacle, similar to how Joker did in The Man Who Laughs, as an homage to her inspiration. You’d have sold her lethality to the audience, put her on the level of a major Gotham threat, and made it believable that Joker would want her on his team. Instead, she poisoned a guy with a Joker Venom recipe she got of Reddit, because he was uncomfortable with her anarchist manifesto that probably bordered on hate speech, while Joker hid in her dorm room closet watching. This is the lamest origin to an antagonist, ever, especially one we’re supposed to believe is an actual threat. How did editorial let this sh*t get published? I do have to give it to Tyrion and Jimenez, though. Naming her Punchline was a stroke of genius because, so far, she’s definitely been the butt of a bad joke.

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Don't think I've seen a better Joker cosplay over the years tbh. There are others but this classic look is my favourite preference though.

The Joker - “Portrait of a Madman" Cosplayer: Anthony Misiano (Harley’s Joker) joker cosplay | tags

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The problem with becoming a fan of The Joker character, especially of the Bronze Age type and some Golden Age stories, is that I find myself a bit disappointed and worse bored with how the character is generally used in recent years. Joker should never be boring, so that is bad. Joker should be a deadly villain, but I'm tired of having vast swathes of dead bodies whenever he appears, and I don't care about pseudo-philisophical tangents about nihilism/life being a joke/one bad day etc. Yawn. I know this has been popular due to the influence of The Killing Joke, and then the charactersation of Heath Ledger's Joker, but oh my god just want a fun Joker that does not have this baggage.

Frankly, this is why I really like the Joker Bronze Age Omnibus collection. Not all of the stories are good but plenty are, and they just get a perfect balance of lethal and entertaining. It's also a reason why I really love Steve Englehart and Marshall Rogers Batman: Dark Detective story, which is a sequel to their Strange Apparitions Batman run in the late 70s. This sequel was published in 2005 but is very much a Bronze Age throwback. Their Joker is deadly but hilarious. It might be silly but frankly I like that. It's refreshing.

I do like Paul Dini's Slayride one shot though, that's got the balance that I like.

Ok, end of rant 😆

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Too much information, Joker...

Conversation (albeit of a rather one way type), between The Joker and Silver St. Cloud, who he has taken hostage to force Evan Gregory to drop out of running for governor. Batman: Dark Detective, 2005.

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Also, just thinking about this panel, can we just think about the Joker asking people why they hesitated to pick up and help HIM?! Remember that this is The Joker that we're talking about. Lol I reckon he finds that pretty funny too honestly.

This is an early story for the character, but by this time he's got a reputation for killing and as a master criminal so he's by no means harmless. Although, in fairness there is a theme in the early 40s of other criminals admiring him but assuming he is only like them and so can be reasoned with. This story is one of the first to show that he can't be.

Let's just appreciate this characters' style

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Let's just appreciate this characters' style