#the thing with disturbances is that they work best on highly rendered images and most of mine are flatter and more cartoony

[azherwind-art]

Some Oc concept art for D&D with a visual disturbance on top, it's giving it a bit of an interesting texture

He's a swashbuckling rogue

[aion-rsa]

The Conjuring 2’s Enfield Case: A True Story That Still Haunts Us Today

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Lorraine Warren has seen true evil at the start of The Conjuring 2 and wants to call it quits — at least for a while — but when the Hodgson family finds itself under siege by a terrible haunting, the paranormal investigators have no choice but to help. Set in the late ’70s in the London Borough of Enfield, The Conjuring 2 ticks off many of the same boxes as the original: haunted house, demonic possession, and a relentless pace full of jump scares that doesn’t let up until the Warrens are back in their spooky museum, locking away their latest ghostly trinket just before the credits roll.

And like the first movie, which is based on the real-life investigations of demonologist Ed Warren and the clairvoyant Lorraine, The Conjuring 2 is heavily inspired by a true story, one that captured the attention of British tabloids — and even the BBC — just as Jay Anson’s The Amityville Horror was hitting bookshelves. The film nods to Amityville, the Warrens’ most famous case, in its opening scene, and later ties it to Enfield through the recurring “Nun” demon Valak.

But there was no demon in the real Enfield case but a poltergeist, a malicious spirit that haunts people through physical disturbances such as shuffling things around a room, levitating its victims, or banging on doors at night. And in the film, the Warrens, who tag along with British paranormal investigators Maurice Grosse and Anita Gregory, do suspect a troublesome spirit before the third act reveal that there’s actually something demonic behind the creepy ghost of Bill Wilkins.

The real-life Hodgson family began experiencing poltergeist activity in their Enfield home in 1977. At first, Peggy, a single mother of four, didn’t believe her daughters Janet, 11, and Margaret, 12, when they told her the chest of drawers in their bedroom was moving on its own. But when the chest slammed against the door, locking Peggy out of the girls’ room and forcing her to run to her neighbors for help, she was convinced.

Peggy called the police, and like in the movie, a constable reported that “a large armchair moved, unassisted, 4 ft across the floor,” according to the Daily Mail. The police officers’ quick exit from the house is played for laughs in the film, but a terrified Peggy Hodgson probably wasn’t laughing at all.

The disturbances only got worse from there. The Hodgsons reportedly suffered all manner of strange happenings in the house for the next 18 months, including furniture being overturned, toys being thrown, banging noises, writing appearing on the walls, and even levitating children. In 2012, Janet told iTV (via People) that cups would inexplicably fill with water, things would randomly burst into flame, and that disembodied voices would speak to them, too.

According to Janet, “The most frightening [encounter] was when a curtain wrapped itself around my neck next to my bed.”

Peggy eventually turned to the press for help, reaching out to the Daily Mirror. The tabloid sent a photographer, Graham Morris, to the house to capture the hauntings, and that’s when all hell broke loose. The Enfield case might be one of the best documented paranormal cases in history, thanks to Morris’ disturbing pictures of his visit to the Hodgson house.

Among these images is a photo of Janet being tossed across her bedroom by the poltergeist while her sister Margaret watches in horror. As you might suspect if you’ve watched The Conjuring 2, it’s very possible that the picture is staged, Janet leaping off her bed and onto the floor, but we can only go by Morris’ account here, and he seemed convinced.

“It was chaos, things started flying around, people were screaming,” Morris said of his visit, according to the Daily Mail.

The Daily Mirror and the Hodgsons next called the paranormal investigators of the Society of Psychical Research, including Maurice Grosse and Anita Gregory, along with Guy Lyon Playfair, who isn’t depicted in the movie.

“When I first got there, nothing happened for a while. Then I experienced Lego pieces flying across the room, and marbles, and the extraordinary thing was, when you picked them up they were hot,” Grosse told writer Will Storr about the first days of his investigation (via the Daily Mail). “I was standing in the kitchen and a T-shirt leapt off the table and flew into the other side of the room while I was standing by it.”

Then the poltergeist decided to speak.

As in the movie, the ghost of Bill Wilkins reached out to the investigators through Janet, a raspy voice emanating from the little girl while her “lips hardly seemed to be moving.” The spirit told Grosse and Playfair that it had died of a hemorrhage in the living room. Investigators later confirmed with Wilkins’ son that a man by that name had indeed died in the house many years before, according to Daily Mail.

In the video below, you can hear Wilkins’ supposed voice for yourself:

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There were skeptics from the start, of course, and the debate around the Enfield case continues today. Even Playfair observed in his case notes that Wilkins generally “refused to speak unless the girls were alone in the room with the door closed” and that the Hodgson children were “motivated to add to the activity with some tricks of their own.” Playfair wrote that when Janet knew cameras were on, nothing seemed to happen. But Grosse and Playfair were believers.

Anita Gregory concluded that the case was overrated, and many skeptics accused the Hodgson family of making up the haunting for fame or financial gain. At different points, the investigators caught the girls bending spoons themselves and banging on ceilings with broom handles. Like in the movie, catching the girls in the act seemed to be enough for Gregory and others to close the case.

In 1980, Janet admitted to iTV (via Daily Mail): “Oh yeah, once or twice [we faked phenomena], just to see if Mr. Grosse and Mr. Playfair would catch us. They always did.” Just ahead of the movie’s release, Janet told Daily Mail that only “two percent” of the occurrences were faked.

But what about the other 98 percent? Many other investigators outside of the SPR visited the Hodgson house in those 18 months, including the Warrens. While Ed and Lorraine didn’t have to save the kids from any demonic nuns in real life, whatever they did see while at the house seemed to convince them that supernatural forces were indeed at work.

“Those who deal with the supernatural day in and day out know the phenomena are there – there’s no doubt about it,” Ed said of the Hodgson case, according to People.

Meanwhile, a magician named Milbourne Christopher dropped by to check things out, and said the activity was the work of “a little girl who wanted to cause trouble and who was very, very clever.” Ray Alan, a ventriloquist, said Janet was playing tricks with Bill’s voice because she enjoyed the attention.

By 1979, the tabloids had moved on from the Hodgsons, while the experts couldn’t agree on a logical explanation. Despite the movie’s happy ending, the real-life case was never truly closed. Janet told Daily Mail in 2015 that things began to “quiet down” in the fall of 1978 when a priest visited the house. But the next family that moved in reported strange incidents too, including hearing voices downstairs and encountering a man walking into rooms. They only lived in the house for two months, according to Daily Mail.

Years later, Janet called the events she lived through in that house traumatic, revealing she had a “short spell” at a psychiatric hospital and that she was bullied at school, where her classmates called her “Ghost Girl.” She told Daily Mail that her mother also had a nervous breakdown. It’s not surprising, then, that Janet “wasn’t very happy to hear about the film” being made about the Enfield case, as it dug up old memories she’d hoped to leave behind when she moved out of the house at age 16.

But The Conjuring 2 wasn’t the first to dramatize the events of the Enfield case. The BBC’s controversial 1992 mockumentary Ghostwatch took a rather different approach. Disguised as a special live investigation of a haunted house on Halloween night, the 90-minute program was hosted by real-life broadcaster Michael Parkinson and featured several other TV presenters to lend it an air of credibility. The mockumentary even had a call-in number viewers could dial into to share their own ghost stories.

While the reporters are highly skeptical of the hauntings at first, strange things begin to happen that become more difficult to explain as the film progresses, and Ghostwatch crescendos when the reporters and their paranormal expert realize they’ve fallen prey to a very real poltergeist. The terrifying final scene of the film proved so controversial that the BBC received thousands of complaints after the airing as well as calls from frightened viewers who thought the program was real. The BBC never aired Ghostwatch again, although you can now find it on the Internet Archive. Today, the film is considered a cult classic among horror enthusiasts.

But in the end, The Conjuring 2 and Ghostwatch are just two more chapters in a story that continues to fascinate believers and skeptics alike more than 40 years later. And despite the many attempts to investigate the case or dramatize it, no one but the Hodgsons will ever know what truly happened inside that house in Enfield.

The post The Conjuring 2’s Enfield Case: A True Story That Still Haunts Us Today appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[kiruuuuu]

Bandit/Vigil oneshot in which Vigil recuperates and Bandit is detrimental? (Rating M, angst, hurt/comfort, mentions of torture, ~3.9k words) - written for @blitznbandit as a Christmas present 💞💞 I didn’t mean for it to get this dark but I hope you enjoy it nonetheless. Best wishes and Merry Christmas! :)

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He returns fragmented. Having lost pieces along the way, parts of him damaged, he’s less than before. Less human, less capable, less trusting. A few chunks were beaten out of him, knocking others loose in the process and therefore he’s hesitant to ask for help in patching the holes, in case someone isn’t careful enough and makes it worse.

Though it doesn’t feel as if it could get any worse.

Visual representations of his state adorn him, discolouration of skin, tears, cuts, attempts at extracting the highly sought-after information through his outer shell though they didn’t manage to pull it out of his flesh. They tried, however. Most of it is unnatural, he supposes, frightful even, renders him fragile-looking when his mind has never been as stony as it is now. He won’t break, might splinter and chip in places, but he won’t shatter. He hasn’t so far. He’s not going to now.

Dokkaebi cries. She just stands before him and lets tear after tear roll over her cheeks, unsuccessfully trying to muffle her sobs and he’s lost, misplaced his script on what to do now, how to react, and there’s no teleprompter or anyone taking charge, so they stand there: Dokkaebi crying and him fighting one of the waves bringing blurriness and further detachment which have become so intimately familiar to him by now. The whole scene might as well be a video on a screen, despite the fact that the wet ground smells of grass and cool air surrounds him.

The scenery changes, someone pulls the slim woman away and another silhouette by his side gently leads him across a canvas of places, all of them unreal and not registering in his head though less shrill than the sterile, smelly white ones in which he spent … an undetermined amount of time. He doesn’t know which day it is.

Voices underwater pose questions his subconscious knows the answer to and therefore he’s able to keep up a semblance of normalcy while his thoughts repeat the endless litany of wanting to sleep. Wanting to go home. Wanting to feel safe again. Wanting to remember what it’s like to feel. At certain points, there’s absence of sound and it makes him itchy, raises his alertness without contributing to clearing his mind and thus leaves him skittish, so it’s no surprise than he flinches violently at a small touch. He’s up on his feet immediately, turned towards his threat who isn’t a threat at all, he knows this person, can conjure up their image in his head yet couldn’t tell who it is or from where he knows them. Relaxing is hard when he’s not sure of the identity of this person, but the guy in scrubs – it’s a doctor – no, it’s Doc – says his name, Gilles, and it could be someone or it could be no one.

His fight response has been triggered and so his system is painfully vigilant even when he’s suddenly sitting down again and he idly wonders whether he’ll ever feel like anyone at all again.

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He’s a foreign body, bumbling uselessly and getting in people’s way while they, somehow, he has no idea how, go about their lives. Imitating them is impossible as simple interactions drain him to a worrying degree, so treating his own existence as an inevitable misfortune with which all of them are stuck seems to be the only alternative. If speaking wasn’t such a chore, he’d apologise the whole day. Keeping out of sight and turning himself invisible is his preferred course of action even if it means some people startle at him walking into their peripheral vision as if he was a ghost.

By now, he’s begun to sort experiences into boxes. Not being able to trust his own memory is at best unpleasant and at worst wholly disorienting and disturbing, so he endeavours to fill the gaps and shave off excess. Some of it undeniably happened as he’s carrying the proof on his body, even if he doesn’t recall a blowtorch, while other details are strikingly vivid yet make no sense. He was held underground, not in a forest and still, he feels thick, wet leaves caress his skin and branches snap under his sole. No, there were no windows nor any indication as to his location, the photos show him what he might’ve seen in a film once yet nothing he recognises. But he drowned. In the dry cellar, forbidden to wash himself, every drop sacred, he could’ve drowned. It certainly felt like it and the cruel irony of wanting to drink it all, the knowledge it won’t kill him didn’t make it better. He’s started exclusively taking baths. He doesn’t like the feel of water on his face.

Compartmentalising helps, albeit it’s a double-edged sword as it further alienates him from those who appear to need him most. The causality of it is puzzling as he’s fine by himself yet it’s others who seek him out nonetheless, require assurances and an affirmation that they’re doing all they can. They’re the ones needing a pat on the back but he unlearned it all, so all he earns is concern at his empty stares. He begins avoiding them, the only exception being Blackbeard – the American’s voice is unimpeded by his silence, penetrates the sound barrier erected in self-defence and fills his head with words, phrases, ideas which resonate with something forgotten inside him. Blackbeard is familiar and calming and no one would guess he’s talking to a husk with how animatedly he gestures and slowly, slowly, his utterances begin to develop meaning.

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Vigil starts healing. It’s a multi-faceted process and accompanied by a significant amount of itching, both outside and inside. His senses return to him in a more conscious fashion than simply identifying potential dangers in his vicinity and his body’s ability to obey improves though it’s still held back by overpowering fatigue; at least there are no more dizzy spells or involuntary movements. Not as many anyway. The variety of injuries invite him to scratch, especially the blisters and the scabs, the freshly opened ones – usually a result of carelessness or a motion too extreme – send out white hot, pulsing signals impossible to ignore. He becomes intimately familiar with every visible piece of writing in Doc’s office as he reads it over and over and over again. Reading anything other than single words and simple sentences is too much.

His sleep is restless and the source of most of his frustration as the exhaustion turning him sluggish and numbing his limbs is omnipresent yet relief unattainable. Sometimes, he wants to scream and thrash, pound the mattress with his fists because it’s so unfair, he’s tired, it’s dark, why won’t it work, why won’t it work why won’t it work why won’t it work why won’t it work – furious, he feels pressure on his eyes and gets up, resists the urge to put his fist through something and walks until he’s light-headed, tries push-ups on his elbows, feels stitches and bandages pull on his skin. And even when darkness does envelop him, brilliant dreams ensure he wakes up sweat-soaked and gasping for air.

He dreams of him. And in a way it’s more terrifying than just re-living memories.

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Before he – before it all happened, he caught the eye of a predator. Felt slitted pupils lazily glide over to him, unfocused and slow as he poses no threat, was unhurriedly yet thoroughly studied and classified as easy prey. To this day, he’s unsure what made him stand out, which of his eccentricities painted a large target on his back causing claws to bury themselves in his vulnerable torso. He was hunted down and slain for sport, he assumes, incapable of defending himself; only then the dangerous creature did develop an appetite after all. Devoured whole, Vigil cowered, obeyed, surrendered.

His memories convince him that he enjoyed it. Basked in the unexpected attention, revelled in a deluge of foreign sensations, released tension under experienced fingertips ghosting over him. Every single instance lasted at least an hour and he thought each the last one, anticipated being deprived of this… this frenzied feeding sooner rather than later, yet repetition tricked his mind into believing it’d become a habit. In a way, he wasn’t wrong: it was a regular occurrence, the intervals shrinking continuously until he couldn’t reasonably predict the next one anymore, merely waited for it to happen excitedly.

The anticipation has vanished completely now. It’s been replaced by a stoic dread he insistently denies and the pleasant memories are sullied by his dreams. He would prefer to limit his nightly terrors to the faceless monsters who – who did all this to him, who altered his very being, yet they’re not the ones holding him down, kicking and slapping, trying to force him to betray the very organisation which eventually came to his rescue. It’s not them. It’s him.

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Training is hell, icy fire licking the insides of his lungs, inflamed muscles hindering his every move. He needs to, needs to catch up on all he missed after having spent too much time idling fruitlessly, hoping moronically for everything to sort itself out somehow, as if there was a spirit for broken minds who could mend them with a flick of its wrist. If such a thing exists, it must be very busy.

No one can help him but himself, especially not the woman he’s meant to trust and tell everything that happened. She’s trying to be comforting and soft but comes across as otherworldly, shapeless and inconsequential – time and time again she brings up topics Vigil feels are entirely irrelevant and meets his badly suppressed anger with pretentious understanding, advises inane exercises he refuses to do in his spare time and hovers just around the edge of actually reaching him. Blackbeard breaks through nonchalantly, acts as if nothing has changed while picking up bits and pieces, distractedly putting them back where they belong without mentioning it. Vigil much prefers his company.

In time, Dokkaebi finds it in herself to grow cold as well, shield herself and meet his downcast gaze and inaudible words with her usual boisterous behaviour, complaining about him taking too long with everything, eating, walking, healing, and her impatience and lack of compassion help him redefine himself as more than just a victim. He remains an operator, abilities tried and tested, and therefore expecting him to function as one is reasonable; he needs to pull himself together. So he trains. And keeps failing.

The whole atmosphere shifts as soon as he enters the room. Silently, he moves and manages to steal Vigil’s breath despite his casual demeanour, causes an adrenaline rush unlike any other he’s recently felt. He’s trapped, alone, for the first time sharing space with him on his own since he came back and it’s terrifying. Golden brown eyes petrify him, lock him into place and there’s no doubt he’s here for Vigil. Probably feels like he’s given him enough time to recuperate, now he’ll demand his share once more, sink his teeth deep and leave him behind bleeding. So far, he’s kept his distance, didn’t even grace his mark with a single glance. For what felt like weeks.

Vigil needs something to do, mind aflutter in panic, and despite every cell in his body urging him to escape, slip away and hope he won’t pursue, he decides to be proactive. To him, it feels like the first choice he’s made in a while. Lying down on the nearest bench panders to his persistent fatigue and yet it hinders him not at this moment for the heady rush of danger encompassing him counteracts his usual exhaustion. “Spot me”, he demands and wraps his fingers around the cool metal bar above him.

The hairs on the back of his neck rise proportionally to how near he is and when Bandit comes to a halt right behind him, he nearly trembles. They study each other motionlessly and for an eternity, Bandit looking down, Vigil looking up. “You’re too weak”, an accented voice informs him though hands contradict it, reach out, ready to support if necessary. Vigil averts his gaze and lifts the weight, brings it into the correct position and lets the familiar feel calm him – this, he knows how to do.

“I’m not”, he protests because he can and couldn’t tell when he last said no to anyone. Repetition and concentration both put his thoughts to rest and occupy him, render him complacent as he watches two pairs of hands rise and fall gently, one of them radiating volatile energy, threatening to turn on him any second, cover his eyes, punch his throat, hold his mouth and nose shut.

He’s scared.

And then something does go wrong, a sharp pain pierces his consciousness and reflective silver fills his vision; the bar came to a stop alarmingly close to his face, mere centimetres from possibly finishing what was started a while ago. His head wound still isn’t healed fully. Dumbly, he stares at it as if mere thought could make it vanish, then capable arms work to return the weight to its rightful place. And he tells him in a judging tone: “Don’t overexert yourself.” Before Vigil can even consider talking back, more words are tacked onto the presumptuous statement: “Start easy. You’re not used to it anymore.”

And this is when it tilts over. His rage is partially unfounded, Bandit has no control over his dreams, can’t influence what his dream self does yet is solely responsible for staying away all this time – his actions, or rather the lack thereof, cut deeper than Vigil was aware, fuelled an underlying self-consciousness and insecurity. He felt discarded, unworthy, and now that he’s in better physical shape Bandit seeks him out again? Hardly a coincidence. He must’ve enjoyed how submissive Vigil was, how responsive, but felt no urge to to accept the responsibility which comes with commitment. Where were you?, Vigil wants to spit in his face, Where were you when I needed you most? I’m no toy. I’m not at your mercy. I’m not to be abandoned like this.

His fury both causes accusations to bubble up in him and holds his tongue, a learned reflex to any extreme emotion. He’s long cut off the spikes in his moods, mellowed them out so no extremes happen, keeps it all safe and sound in the middle. Sitting up, he notices his hands shaking. He’s not afraid of him anymore, somehow knows Bandit will never go as far as his projection did repeatedly, not when he’s this passive, this passionless about him. All that time he always set aside seemed to have been a lie, a convenience. He was a fool to believe it to be more.

“I missed you.”

Resisting the impulse to spew I was right here is difficult but possible. Instead, he allows a question to see the light of day which has been eating away at him for a while. “Why me?” He’s long ceased to pose it in relation to tragedies, long accepted the fact he will never know the answer. Coincidences are free of judgement, his place of birth pure chance, his capture an unfortunate event – none of it specifically geared towards breaking his spirit by a higher power or the universe itself. However, this time it might yield an answer. He sincerely hopes it does, yet with every passing second in which Bandit mutely regards him with an unreadable expression, the probability decreases. “You can have anyone.”

“But I don’t want anyone.”

The message is clear though its origin nebulous. But why. Why me. Upset, confused and upset over his confusion, he attempts to flee the conversation, extract himself as he’s unsure how to face this man, how to deal with his own emotions. Getting past Bandit proves impossible though, the slim figure is an unsurmountable obstacle, soft eyes fixing him in place and a tentatively outstretched hand has him flinch first, then accept the touch of a palm on his elbow, travelling up until it comes into contact with his still discoloured jaw. Turning away is futile, fingers wrap around his own and then a body moulds itself around him despite his resistance. He’s suffocating, refuses to breathe in this wild scent of blood, sweat and hunger, realises too late he smells the same.

Bandit waits until his thrashing has subsided, patiently holds on as if he knew what he was doing. Eventually, exhaustion drives Vigil into the arms of his hunter and he relents at the cost of his sanity, dignity, sense of self-worth. Accepting warmth and human contact is surprisingly arduous but the pay-off staggering: he thaws, he melts, he dissolves under gentle hands, in a loose embrace, and its realness leaves him reeling. Logic tells him he possesses the same body heat, must feel nice to Bandit or else he would’ve withdrawn already, yet the idea of him feeling as good as Bandit does to him now is unimaginable. He needs more.

A quiet plea is met with hesitation at first, but when he emphasises it, Bandit nods. “Let’s go then”, he says, voice shaky.

.

Before even any fabric is shed, Vigil starts to struggle. His side is still sensitive, so he forcibly removes Bandit’s hand when it brushes over it, he doesn’t enjoy the feel of the tongue on his collarbone and pushes his head away, yanks at clothing to keep the German half off him. Though it’s thrilling and the low pulsing need permeating his being is the sharpest feeling he’s had for a while, he’s worried about showing his mutilated body, about evoking disgust instead of lust, about memories of sadistic grins and fire and needles and fists and water taking control of him. His subconscious fear manifests in the turning away of his head, in refusal to make eye contact, in jerks and light kicks and shoving.

“Do you want me to stop?”, Bandit asks and kisses the hand he caught as if it hadn’t tried to pull on his hair. No judgement in his inquiry, strangely enough. He would actually stop. There is no doubt.

A violent shudder seizes his body and he couldn’t tell whether it’s born from pleasure or dismay. The lips are ticklish and he doesn’t think he’d survive it if Bandit rejected him. “No.” He surprises himself with the response; the safer option would be to give up, not even allowing for the chance to harm himself further by ruining the one hopeful thing in his life at the moment, yet the drive to feel human again is too powerful.

So Bandit continues, undeterred by the resistance he faces and – it’s different to the times before, softer, more patient. At first it seems as if he, too, believes Vigil to be fragile and therefore takes certain precautions, isn’t as rough as he was previously, but the more time passes the more one undeniable truth crystallises and makes Vigil’s heart come alive: Bandit isn’t treating him like something delicate. He’s treating him like something precious.

His caresses don’t shy away from faded bruises or bandages, touches actively follow scarring unless Vigil displays discomfort, and though he’s careful, he’s far from tentative – repeatedly, he unintentionally causes stabs of pain hindering Vigil’s attempts to wholly give himself up and revel in the familiar affections. In response, Vigil lashes out on a small scale, bites a little too hard, scratches instead of stroking skin, and never once earns any form of protest. Bandit allows him to fight back mostly symbolically, something he was never able to do in the hands of his captors. He loses his inhibitions and wonders why it feels so good to inflict pain, ponders whether it’s linked to Bandit not paying him any attention while his mind was heavily impeded, when it hits him out of the blue.

A kiss to the top of his head makes him smile, stretches his lips all by itself. During a small break, he marvels at Bandit’s body. He even takes the initiative at some point and is rewarded with an almost enamoured gaze in return which drags something in his chest to the surface; something he was sure to have lost. They draw meaningless patterns on skin lazily, let their whims decide on what they do, and it’s peaceful.

Vigil feels like himself again. Not entirely, he hasn’t reverted back to his old self, that would be nothing short of a miracle, but his sense of self has returned – he is Chul Kyung Hwa, he is Vigil, he is part of the White Tigers and Rainbow and right now, he is here because he wants to be. And he will not let misfortune define him.

.

A careless remark, nothing more, Blackbeard’s usual dry humour showcased in a blunt comment and yet its utter lack of respect is scandalising and amusing enough for Vigil to laugh. Not a loud, full-bellied laugh which could hope to compete with the American’s, no, a quiet chuckle rather but an expression of entertainment nonetheless. They’re eating together and Vigil is picky, has traded parts of it with his teammate and others, approaching them first. Bending his mouth around pleasantries remains a feat he has yet to master but even so, it’s met with genuine friendliness and relief he generously overlooks.

Dokkaebi picks up on it immediately, abandoning her conversation to grace him with a meaningful smirk. “You just laughed”, she states triumphantly as if it was her own achievement.

Days ago, he wouldn’t have replied but he’s come to realise once more that he likes her, enjoys her company. Looking back, he feels bad about not reassuring her the day he returned, piling on to her already overwhelming grief. He admits: “I feel better.”

She nods; it must be glaringly obvious. “Must be contagious, even Dom smiled at me earlier.”

“Is that noteworthy?”

“He’s had it rough too.” His expression must display some of his disbelief for Dokkaebi explains herself: “He was with us the entire time we tried to find you, probably put in more hours than even Craig. And then, when you got rescued, you… I don’t know what you were on, I wasn’t there. But you were terrified of him – of them all, but him the most. I think it hurt him. Doc told him to stay away from you for a while, just in case.”

Dreams tightly intertwined with memories, forming an entirely unfair and inaccurate hybrid which painted Bandit in a much harsher light than he deserved. He never was a predator, Vigil never his prey, and while he was indeed devoured, it was preceded by awkward half-conversations and uncertain gestures; the time they spent together valuable to both of them. He’s been unjust.

“But he seems better now, and so do you. Maybe you should talk to him.”

“Yes”, Vigil agrees readily, startling her into silence. “Maybe I should.”

When Bandit and he finally make eye contact across the room after a lot of furtive glances, Vigil presents him with a tentative smile. And is not at all prepared for the wide one he’s granted in return.

[caveartfair]

When Can Artists Bend Ethics for Art’s Sake?

Sophie Calle, Suite Vénitienne, 1980. “At the end of January 1980, on the streets of Paris, I followed a man whom I lost sight of a few minutes later in the crowd. That very evening, quite by chance, he was introduced to me at an opening. During the course of our conversation, he told me he was planning an imminent trip to Venice. So I decided to follow him.” © Sophie Calle / ADAGP, Paris & ARS, New York, 2018. Courtesy of Perrotin.

What right does an artist have to use other people in their work—to invade their lives, violate their privacy, or cause them harm? What will we forgive in the name of art?

These are the questions I was asking a decade ago when, for a graduate performance art class taught by Tania Bruguera, I paid a classmate $1 to befriend my best friend Laura and write reports on how she thought Laura was coping after a recent break-up. At our final class, I passed around a folder containing these reports and a photocopy of the $1 check I’d written. The folder reached Laura last. I watched across the table as she read the document of my simultaneous care and betrayal.

I got an A for the class, but lost my friend. It was a horrible thing to do, but I was 21 and obsessed with Sophie Calle and the line between art and life. Since the 1970s, Calle has repeatedly invited us to question whether artists should be held to the same standards as other people. In viewing her work, we must ask whether invading someone’s privacy or betraying their trust is an acceptable emotional cost to art.

Sophie Calle, The Hotel, 1981. “On Monday February 16, 1981, I was hired as a temporary chambermaid for three weeks in a Venetian hotel. I was assigned twelve bedrooms on the fourth floor. In the course of my cleaning duties, I examined the personal belongings of the hotel guests and observed through details lives which remained unknown to me. On Friday March 6, the job came to an end.” © Sophie Calle / ADAGP, Paris & ARS, New York, 2018. Courtesy of Perrotin.

In 1979, Calle followed a man she’d met at an art opening in Paris to Venice, where she spent two weeks spying on and photographing him as he went about his business in the city. She presented the images alongside text detailing both her observations and emotions during the period, as Suite Vénitienne. This man, identified only as Henri B., was the first unwitting participant to Calle’s artistic game.

In 1983, she found a lost address book on the street and photocopied the contents before returning it. She then telephoned each of the contacts to question them on the identity of the owner, and published her findings as a series (“The Address Book”) in the French newspaper Libération. The owner, the documentary filmmaker Pierre Baudry, threatened to sue her, wrote open letters to Libération, and eventually sent the paper a nude photo of Calle that he demanded they publish as retaliation. This literal tit-for-tat response to her exposure of his identity did not perturb Calle; she ultimately incorporated it into the piece.

For The Hotel (1983), Calle worked as a chambermaid, exploring and documenting the private belongings and writings of hotel guests. Observing this piece, we experience both Calle’s curiosity and the unsettling thought that, at every hotel we have ever stayed in, our own possessions might have been subjected to similar scrutiny. What might someone like Calle have learned from our nightgowns and slippers, our diaries and postcards? How might she have misinterpreted us?

Sophie Calle, Suite Vénitienne, 1980. © Sophie Calle / ADAGP, Paris & ARS, New York, 2018. Courtesy of Perrotin.

Neighbors #14, 2012. Arne Svenson Robert Klein Gallery

A crucial element of these early pieces is Calle’s involvement of the viewer in her transgressions. By inviting us to immerse ourselves in the narratives of her observations, she makes us complicit in her voyeurism—even as we question it. It is not just Calle invading these strangers’ privacy and observing their lives without consent, but us, too. We may not agree with her methods, but by engaging with the work, we find ourselves tacitly condoning it.

Decades later, though, the question that still hangs over these pieces is whether or not they were ethical. Did Henri B., Pierre Baudry, or those hotel guests have a right to privacy? Can any of us expect to be protected from the artist’s gaze?

In 2013, Arne Svenson caused a Calle-like controversy for using a telephoto lens to take photos of his Manhattan neighbors, later exhibiting the work in a local gallery. Svenson was sued, but won the case based on his First Amendment rights, and “The Neighbors” went on to be exhibited across the country. Though the discussion continues as to whether Svenson’s photographs of families, children, pets, and intimate, private spaces is ethically acceptable, the judge’s ruling makes clear that legally, at least artists have a right to invade aspects of our privacy.

Santiago Sierra, 160 CM LINE TATTOOED ON 4 PEOPLE, El Gallo Arte Contemporaneo. Salamanca, Spain. December 2000, 2000. © Santiago Sierra. Courtesy of Lisson Gallery.

Considered in conjunction with conversations about digital surveillance, data protection, and online privacy—not to mention random strangers who might be livetweeting intimate exchanges—this ruling might seem rather scary. Belgian artist Dries Depoorter uses digital technology to explore this fear. For Tinder In (2015), Depoorter traced women (and some men) who appeared on his Tinder app to their LinkedIn profiles, then displayed and published their profile pictures from each side by side, pointing out both the ease with which individuals can be traced, and the split-personalities of online identities.

The interesting thing about all of these pieces is that, while their controversy lies in the question of an individual’s right to privacy, the works themselves actually reveal very little about their subjects. In reading the texts accompanying Calle’s work, we learn much more about the stalker than the stalked. It’s easy to understand the sense of invasion felt by Henri B. and Pierre Baudry, as well as Svenson’s neighbors and Depoorter’s Tinder matches, but perhaps the true grievance is that the artists have used these strangers’ images and identities to create works that have nothing to do with them.

Spanish artist Santiago Sierra’s use of anonymous individuals raises similar ethical questions, though rather than invading their privacy, he asks them to submit to him bodily. For 160cm Line Tattooed on 4 People (2000), he paid heroin-addicted prostitutes the price of a shot of the drug to allow him to tattoo them. For Group of Persons Facing a Wall (2002), he paid homeless women the price of a night in a hostel to stand facing a gallery wall. And for 10 People Paid to Masturbate (2000), he paid workers $20 to masturbate in front of a camera.

Santiago Sierra, 10 PEOPLE PAID TO MASTURBATE, Tejadillo Street, Havana, Cuba. November 2000, 2000. © Santiago Sierra. Courtesy of Lisson Gallery.

Unlike Calle, Svenson, and Depoorter, Sierra does seek consent from his subjects, but the nature of this consent is highly questionable. These pieces draw attention to the exploitative, transactional nature of our society, pointing to the commodification of bodies and exposing the power structures that operate within our everyday lives. Conceptually and politically, the works might be seen as noble, but in actually using the bodies of vulnerable individuals, Sierra must enact the very exploitation and dehumanization he critiques. He forces us to ask if it is okay for an artist to use people. Can the end justify the means?

In 1992, Paul Auster based a character in his novel Leviathan on Sophie Calle, borrowing some of her works as well as inventing new ones. This depiction of Calle is heavily critiqued in Chris Kraus’s autofictional novel I Love Dick (1997); she claims Auster’s version of Calle is “a waif-like creature relieved of complications like ambition and career.” Ironically, this criticism—that using a real person as the subject for art strips that person of their individuality and complexities—can be levelled just as fairly at Suite Vénitienne, The Address Book, and The Hotel. Like Auster, Calle presents her subjects as simplified versions of themselves, and treats them like fictional characters in a narrative she remains in control of.

It is, I think, this relieving of complications that is most disturbing and, in the end, most painful. Should we find ourselves the subject of an artist’s gaze, most of us would like them to see the whole of us, to render us fairly and try to understand our complexities. Unfortunately, the artist’s motive is often more to do with projecting or reflecting a part of themselves rather than reaching an empathetic understanding of their subjects. What they were looking for, really, is a mirror.

Dries Depoorter, Tinder In, 2015. Courtesy of the artist.

In the play between the private and the public, artists have both the ability and the right to provoke, shock, and disturb. What we often fail to recognize, however, is that by giving them a platform, it is us as viewers who have bestowed this position of power upon them. By consuming and applauding Calle’s early works, we effectively opened our own curtains to Svenson and gave our profile photos to Depoorter. Perhaps the question is not whether artists have the right to invade our privacy or cause us harm, but why we’ve allowed them to.

I’m not proud of what I did to Laura back in grad school. A decade later, I’m appalled by my callousness and can hardly remember my own justifications. But I do remember the surprise I felt at her anger. I remember expecting her to understand, wanting her to acknowledge my cleverness, to think about the nuances of privacy and trust, and sense as I did the precarious power wielded by the word “art.” I wonder if it is this kind of optimistic thinking that drives Calle and other artists. For those who have devoted their lives to their work, perhaps it doesn’t seem so extraordinary for them to imagine others should be willing to devote theirs, too.

from Artsy News

[smartphone-science]

When someone applies the sword on you, be it a stab, slash, or a quick hilt hit, it often leads to your demise. On chance occasions that it doesn’t, it will still hurt like hell. And who else were more glad to use their swords than the Romans? They were a people that applied their swords liberally on other people. So others returned the favour with whatever weapons they had, ensuring that the Romans received their fair share of deaths and injuries. But what the Romans did better than most was to recover from what would’ve been fatal offences. That is because Roman military medicine was far more advanced than their ancient peers. 

Military physicians played prominent roles in ancient warfare. In Homer’s Iliad, the physicians Machaon and Podaleirius, sons of the Greek god of healing Asclepius, were part of the Greek contingent that caused a decade-long disturbance in Troy. In fact, one of them was instrumental in the Greek success. When the Greeks successfully extracted augury from Helenus, after a forceful physical inquiry (read: torture), they were told that the arrows of Philoctetes were necessary to bring down Troy. These armaments weren’t ordinary projectiles, for they were once used by Heracles (Hercules) and were thus bestowed with divine properties. In Sophocles’ Philoctetes, the spirit of Heracles reveals the future to Philoctetes, “For it is fated that Troy shall be once more/ captured by my bow.” But Philoctetes was nursing a festering laceration that had been plaguing him for years and he wasn’t able to do much. So the Greeks had one of Asclepius’ sons cure him of his complaints. With his health back to normal, so too was his aim. Helenus hit the bulls eye with his prophecy, for we all know who won that war.

However, most of what the ancients practised on the battlefield were simple first-aid treatments. Celsus writes in De Medicina that even the medical activities of Machaon and Podaleirus were at best only for the relief of “wounds by the knife or by medicament.” That is to say, they cleaned and dressed wounds, sometimes did a little surgery, then hoped for the best. But when it came to handling infectious diseases and sepsis, military physicians were ill prepared theoretically and pragmatically to contain them.

If the Romans wanted to be the elite military might of the ancient world, they had to do things differently. What they did was to stress the importance health and medicine in their military organisation and philosophy.

Not much is known of Roman military medicine during the republic’s stretch. But there are textual indications that there might have been practising physicians on the field tending the injured. Cicero extols the bravery and endurance of seasoned soldiers when wounded for they only seek to be bandaged by their comrades, while newer recruits squirm and scream. In Tusculanae Disputationes he writes:

“Thus you see, when the wounded are carried off the field, the raw untried soldier, though but slightly wounded, cries out most shamefully, but the more brave experienced veteran only enquires for someone to dress his wounds.”

It is unclear in Cicero’s statement whether there was a specialised platoon tasked to nurse the wounded or if other soldiers were responsible for dressing their bleeding compatriots. 

Things changed drastically on the battlefield when Augustus rose to power. Augustus laid the foundations for the professionalisation of a medical division in the Roman army. This was largely influenced by his adoptive great-uncle, Julius Caesar, who was the first to grant civil rights to foreign physicians practising in Rome. But aside from his political edicts, Caesar’s great contribution to Roman military medicine was in his administrative approach.

Julius Caesar by Peter Paul Rubens.

Caesar’s military organisation addressed the physical needs and demands of military life. He didn’t only focus on training his soldiers in the arts of warfare and the use of weaponry, but he also made sure that they were able and healthy human beings. “Health and safety” were two areas that he carefully attended, according to his De bello Civilli.

To keep his army in good health, Caesar had them do regular exercises and kept them busy with chores and activities. “Exercise contributes greatly to health,” he writes, “and therefore the Romans took care to keep their troops always employed, either in casting up new works round the camp or in hunting after provision and forage, or in performing those several exercises, that tend to render the body robust and active.”

Caesar also recognised that their enemies weren’t the only ones that imperilled their campaigns; harsh environmental conditions also posed grave dangers to their ranks. To minimise unnecessary casualties from avoidable environmental risks, Caesar carefully surveyed areas for the best possible placement of his camps. He says “safety was likewise another important consideration with the Romans. To this end, in choosing a place of encampment, they always had a particular eye for the convenience of water, provisions, and forage.”

Surely, these weren’t novel innovations in military organisation and administration. Many also included regular exercise and labour in their regimental training. But despite falling short of originality, what was unique in Caesar was his emphasis on individual development as a means to collective success. Soldiers weren’t only expected to kill the enemy, but Caesar demanded of them a standard of personal growth. And this he made possible by championing health and safety in his military administration. Under Caesar’s leadership, soldiers weren’t just expendable resources that could be easily replaced. Caesar shaped them into healthier humans, hence, much better killing machines. Caesar, ever the revolutionary, made being healthy extremely lethal. 

Centuries later, the same reflections still survive in Roman military philosophy. The 4th century CE Roman writer Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus writes in De re militari that commanding officers must be held accountable for and should attend to the health of their troops. He writes that “it requires constant vigilance on the part of the officers and tributes and of the ‘count’ who holds the senior command to see that ordinary soldiers who fall sick from this cause may be nursed back to health with suitable food and tended by the doctors’ art.” He emphatically ends his suggestion with “It is hard for those who are fighting both a war and disease.”

Perhaps the most enduring legacy of Roman military medicine was the development and standardisation of the hospital as an essential component of army encampments. Seeing that the demands and needs of the empire were different from the republic’s, a reorganisation of the military was realised under Augustus’ rule. Under his modernisation scheme, he added to the ranks the milites medici: hired physicians assigned to every division. With plenty of doctors and physicians to see the wounded, the birth of military hospitals was now at hand.

Roman field hospitals, or valetudinaria, slowly replaced the old ad hoc tent stations for the injured. The valetudinarium maintained some of the rudiments of the former layout, but was reorganised into a highly functional and pragmatic setup. Its emergence was the culmination of Caesar’s insistence of having a healthy mobile army and Augustus’ new vision of a stable empire. The physician and medical historian Guenter Risse says that “the establishment of military valetudinaria can be seen as the product of a new imperial military policy”. The stability of the empire Augustus and his trusted general Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa envisioned and worked into fruition depended on the fortitude of their soldiers stationed on the empire’s frontiers. Having military hospitals across the empire reduced casualties from treatable conditions and ensured that injured soldiers received immediate care so they can be sent back to the battlefield as soon as possible.

Floor plan of the valetudinarium at Neuss, Germany. Taken from Vivian Nutton’s Ancient Medicine.

Sanitation was an important feature of the valetudinaria. Having a clean and separate section in the camp where the sick were treated minimised cases of disease transmission among the soldiers. The physical setup of the valetudinaria also enabled field surgeons to have the cleanest possible conditions for operations. Medical historian Valentine Belfiglio notes that the Romans sanitised “surgical instruments, lint, fibulae, and bandages” by boiling them “in water prior to use for every operation.” He adds that the valetudinaria had “a few rooms for patients requiring isolation.”

Surgical tools of a Roman surgeon. Taken from Vivian Nutton’s Ancient Medicine.

It is no surprise that Roman military medicine found its earliest patron in Augustus. In the early years of his rule, Augustus succumbed to a life-threatening illness. It almost seemed that the empire was about to fall after it had just learned to stand. But the treatments advised by the free-borne physician Antonius Musa healed Augustus. Free from the dangers of disease, the young ruler was now able to continue consolidating his rule. But even with all the bothersome affairs of governance, Augustus never forgot Musa’s service. He heaped praises on the worthy doctor and even built a statue of him to commemorate Musa’s work.

Antonius Musa depicted as Asclepius. Image from the Wellcome Collection.

The importance of healing is even acknowledged in the mythology that Augustus favoured. In Publius Vergilius Maro’s Aeneid, the Trojan refugee and mythical founder of Rome Aeneas is taken from the battlefield after getting hit by an arrow on the leg. His opponent, Turnus, takes advantage of this and intensifies his assault on the demoralised troops. The “aged” and “dearest of all to Apollo” Iapyx attempted to remove the malignant arrowhead, but to no avail. Alarm and dread resounded in the camp, as their leader Aeneas was in deep pain and agony. But the gods had a different idea, especially Aeneas’ mother, Venus. She fashioned an elixir from an unknown herb and had Iapyx administer it on her son. Then,

Aged Iapyx bathed the wound with this liquid, not knowing its effect, and indeed all pain fled from Aeneas’s body, all the flow of blood ceased deep in the wound. Now, without force, the arrowhead slipped from the wound, following the motion of his hand, and fresh strength returned to Aeneas, such as before.

With renewed vigour and energy, Aeneas returned to the battlefield and after an intense series of bouts felled Turnus. 

Healing was central to the Roman identity. In no other dimension in Roman life was it more appropriate than in their military, the most elite force in their heydays. Endurance and resilience, characters of the Roman juggernaut, was further bolstered by the idea and practice of healing that the Romans learned from the people they fought and conquered. It can be said that Roman military medicine was a course conducted in warfare, and the Romans studied it diligently. Blood is thicker than ink, and blood spilled by swords taught Romans valuable lessons, even if it killed and hurt them a lot. Can we truly say then that the pen is always mightier than the sword – given that swords teach us to heal?

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[thegothamarchivescomics-blog]

The Killing Joke Overview

The Killing Joke is a one shot storyline exploring the origins of Batman and probably the most famous Batman/Joker book of all time. In fact, The Killing Joke is probably one of the most famous comics of all time. Known as a possible Joker origin story and for its dark themes, The Killing Joke explores the relationship between Batman and Joker and how they are mirror images to each other, along the way are some chilling scenes where Barbara Gordon famously gets shot and subsequently paralysed before she is sexually assaulted and has pictures taken to torture her father. The Killing Joke is a must read for anyone into comics and should be on the shelf of every Batman fan. Truly iconic.

Batman: The Killing Joke (Deluxe hardcover, which was reviewed) includes the full “Killing Joke” storyline as well as “An Innocent Guy” from Batman: Black & White. This edition has been coloured by Bolland himself and not John Higgins colours from the original.

The Killing Joke Key Information

Book Name The Killing Joke Book Series Limited Series One Shot Edition Reviewed Deluxe Edition Hardcover Year Published 2008 Originally Published 1988 Writer(s) Alan Moore, Artist(s) Brian Bolland Pages 64 Issues 2 Where to Buy Amazon Notable Heroes Batman Notable Villains Joker Chronology Previous The Nights of the Beast Chronology Next

Arkham Asylum

[amazon box=”1401216676″ title=”The Killing Joke Deluxe Edition”]

The Killing Joke Review

The Killing Joke has remained a prominent comic book classic for nearly 3 decades now. The 1988 installment by Alan Moore and Brian Bolland boasts one of the most notorious Joker comics of the entire series. Follow the Dark Knight on one of his darkest and most controversial stories yet. Critically acclaimed and incredibly brutal, this story has even won the praise of Tim Burton who comments; “I loved The Killing Joke… It’s my favorite. It’s the first comic I’ve ever loved.” This is a highly recommended read if you are ready for what’s in store for you.

To start out, I love this artwork. Both the characters and scenery are highly detailed and revised colours from Bolland is certainly an upgrade. Compared to other comics of its time, it has a LOT of work put into it and I am a huge fan. Even though the comic itself is rather old now, the artwork could not be farther from dated. And if you put this next to other comics from the era it is way ahead of its time. I especially love any and all scenes that include rain and shadows as I think Bolland did an exceptional job with bringing this story to light.

It opens right up to a rather famous scene in the Batman series. Batman goes to Arkham Asylum to sit down and confront the joker about their “relationship.” Namely, what does he think the endgame is here.

“I’ve been thinking lately. About you and me. About what’s going to happen to us in the end. We’re going to kill each other, aren’t we? Perhaps you’ll kill me. Perhaps I’ll kill you. Perhaps sooner. Perhaps later. I just wanted to know that I’d make the genuine attempt to talk things over and avert that outcome. Just once.”

Of course, his pleas fall of deaf ears and that someone had been sitting in for the Joker the whole time. With a start like this, you know things are going to be intense, it’s just a matter of how and when. Even Bruce Wayne could not have anticipated the horrors that were to come. That and that this opening implies foreshadowing and an explanation for why the Joker wants to destroy Batman so much.  This is implied as the comic progresses as well.

“How can two people hate so much without knowing each other?”

There are a lot of questions we were left asking ourselves in the beginning. All we know for sure at this point is that the Joker has bought himself a circus and has already claimed his first victim in a horrifying manner.

What I do really appreciate about this comic is that it does give some of the background to the joker piece by piece. While it doesn’t come outright and say it, the evidence is there and you are just left waiting to see when this awkward and sweet guy (with a pregnant girl no less) became the man he is today.

The plot’s real turning point is the one it is best known for. If you have not yet read the comic, I advise you to stop here to prevent yourself from getting any unwanted spoilers. I also advise you this is where things take a dark and personal turn, even for Batman comics as not many writers went this route before or even after.

The Joker shows right up to the Gordon’s residence, which at this point in the series hold two very important characters. James Gordon -from the Gotham City Police Department – and Barbara Gordon –Batgirl. Without even much of a fight at all, Joker shoots Barbara point blank in the stomach, right through the spine and rendering her paralyzed. What happened between her being undressed by Joker in the empty apartment and being found and brought to the hospital leave a lot of speculation to the readers. What was said was that he took inappropriate photos of her, but there are a lot of pointers that something even more sinister took place there, many people think she may have been raped while others think it stopped at photos. You could speculate all day about this, and at the end of the day it’s up to the reader to decide what happened.

This particular incident has been fought with some criticism over the last years. What happened? Should writers have done this? Was this going too far? People have had a lot to say about it, but if nothing else this certainly gets the message across that the Joker is a terrible human being and must be stopped.

If also leads you to further wonder what happened to the Joker back then? Flashbacks of a guy that would do anything for his family to this?

To top it all off, he has James Gordon captive.

Things become a lot more visually disturbing at this point -it does take place in a circus after all. I don’t even entirely know what to make of the small and creepy creatures that have to monitor Gordon. They are just small creatures reminiscent of those “horror baby dolls” you see every once in a while, wearing dresses and bondage outfits. They strip Gordon down until he is wearing nothing but a spiked collar and a leash (and I mean NOTHING) and parade him around the freak show that resides in the service. Joker sits atop a throne of naked baby dolls and rambles on about madness. I don’t think anyone could have come up with a worse nightmare inducing image than that.

The naked and very disturbed Gordon is forced into a dark ride where he is not only confronted with more images and videos of Joker -but the naked images of Barbara! This was very dark for a number of reasons. For one, that was his daughter and it was a dark scenario. We had been with James Gordon through so many installments and seen everything he had done for his daughter. This was torture. On top of it, this was Batgirl! Not some side character or installment-exclusive character, but the actual Batgirl! Although, in Batgirl New 52 Volume 1 and Volume 2 it does become apparent that Joker did not know the superhero connection at this point. This was torture to readers to see her like this! As he rides the train all the way through his nightmare we are forced to watch Batman pull every move to try to get the Joker’s location.

At least by this point, we are shown the reason why Joker hates the Batman, as in a very long and complicated scenario, Batman did ultimately knock him in the water. It is weird and rather metaphorical when you think about it like that. That Batman created the Joker, his worst enemy and ultimate rival and in some sense the Joker created the need for a Batman.

Once Batman arrives the ultimate battle ensues. The battle to end all battles in a way. This was the most action-packed scene in the book (considering a lot of the violence was rather one-sided up until this point). It has so much going on and everything creative and aggressive you would expect from a story such as this. I have to say this was also the most colorful part of the entire installment which says a lot about the significance from this scene.

At the end of this cut throat battle where it really could have gone either way, there was just so much you weren’t sure of. Why not just off another main character this time? It was an intense battle that ultimately and only slightly led with Batman’s victory. What I found most surprising was Batman’s lack of anger at this point. Like, it was severely underwhelming. With everything that -arguably the closest- people in his life had just gone through, he was still very level headed about it.  I guess that is just one of those things that makes Batman Batman, but still, I would have hoped for a little bit of cathartic aggression to go off at this point (if nothing else but to give me some vicarious relief).

Instead, he goes on just like the comic opened up with. Wanting to know how and why things turned out the way they did. Also wanted to make amends and not end up having to kill each other.

“It doesn’t have to end like that. I don’t know what is was that bent your life out of shape, but who knows? Maybe I’ve been there too. Maybe I can help.”

Again, reaching out as a friend is this very Batman style and I can understand that Joker snapped. I get that you have to give some villains with tragic background stories some leeway, but at the same time, that’s an awful big jump he’s making. For a vigilante that has devoted his life to revenge, I understand where he is all about stopping people from ending up in these situations and attempts to sympathize. Getting past what villains have done and rising above is kind of his thing. However, these atrocities were on a whole other level. On the other hand, this guy is completely driven by vengeance but believes that he will be there for Joker if he needs help because he can rise above everything that has happened in the past pages?

It ends with Joker’s depressing turn down and them both laughing hysterically as Batman has him in an aggressive grip -also laughing hysterically. A disturbing ending to and overall disturbing comic. Aside from the lack of emotion. I really wish that he would have found out what happened to make Joker go mad as well as the role he played in all of it. I know they do touch upon this later on in the next installments which I do appreciate.

Summary

Seriously, buy this book. This was an amazing comic and has to be seen to be believed. Don’t watch the latest film adaption first. An easy 5/5. This is a classic with a gripping tale and amazing artwork. Lacking a bit of action until the end, but that last scene more than makes up for it. Highly recommend this story to any and every comic book fan. It is easy to see why this is remembered as one of the greatest Joker tales of all time!

Once read you will never be able to forget it.

Batman: The Killing Joke Image Gallery

Batman: The Killing Joke Review The Killing Joke Overview The Killing Joke is a one shot storyline exploring the origins of Batman and probably the most famous Batman/Joker book of all time.