Five Particularly Cruel Moments From The Joker
There is a vein of cruelty that runs through most of what the Joker does. He never goes the easy route, though. He is not the “shoot you in the head” type of villain. No, if he wanted to shoot you in the head, he would GET INSIDE your head. He would do something to break you, and then mail you a gun and a single bullet and a nude picture of your Mom. That is just how the Joker works. He may want to get from A to C, but you know he is going to skip B entirely, and reroute the whole plan from Z on backwards.
That is what I love about him. He has a goal, and it may seem simple, but how he plans to get there is nothing short of twisted genius. He may not always execute these plans, but even when he fails, don’t you think that is what he wanted? Here are five deliciously deviant Joker moments that truly set him apart from all the villain clones that seem to permeate so much of modern fiction.
Cripple Commissioner Gordon’s Daughter To Break Him in The Killing Joke
I would hope all you guys would know I had to begin with this. That sentence sounded weird so I had to read it three times to make sure it was correct, and even now, I’m not so sure. Anyway, this was the moment for me when I stopped seeing the Joker as the clown prince and started seeing him as the maniacally brilliant madman he truly was. The whole entire ordeal the Joker puts Jim Gordon through in The Killing Joke is the stuff of nightmares.
No, literally.
” Hey, I just paralyzed your daughter, and I am not even going to tell you what that little mutant girl intends to with that pole. “
Now it’s plain to see by the end of this book that it takes more than that to break Jim Gordon (wait, more than having your daughter paralyzed and being slowly driven insane, naked and drugged, inside a messed up fun house crawling with circus freaks, all while getting images of the event flashed on massive screens, over and over?!! Even writing that almost broke me) but this story also chose to tell us a back story about the Joker, and what turned him from an ordinary man into an insane sociopath, filled with contempt and madness.
One bad day, that was all it took.
The Joker loves how much body Pert Plus gives his hair.
The Joker Gets Revenge By R*ping His Partners Ex-Wife in The Joker
I know this one might piss some people off, because it was made after Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight, and was obviously aimed to mimic Heath Ledger’s Joker, moreso than following Joker canon. But still, this moment is so sick and twisted, and seems like something the sickest version of this character would do to exact a sort of mental revenge on someone, which is just why he does it. Let me explain, without ruining this for anyone who hasn’t read this disturbing take on the Joker yet.
It’s not a sex toy under that blanket, but with this version of The Joker, would that even surprise you?
So Joker is (inexplicably) out of the Asylum. And he needs a partner. You know, someone to drive him around and open doors and announce his presence and such. This is where Jonny Frost comes in. Jonny Frost takes the gig and tells us this story. And basically, the Joker takes a few days to reintroduce Gotham to his ways, and reclaim his spot as the king. Some of the things he does to reclaim that spot are unsettling at best, but none quite as unsettling as how he treats his new buddy, Jonny Frost.
The generic driver is Jonny Frost, and he just took the worst job of his miserable life.
So at one point in the story, Frost meets up with Harvey Dent and when the Joker finds out about this, considers Jonny to be “cheating”, so he decides he should cheat, too. And he, well, you read the header up there, unfortunately.
I think the Joker is such an enigmatic and vile character, it’s sometimes easy to lose sight of the fact that he is a deplorable human being, capable of some truly terrible things. In this book, you see that side of the Joker more clearly than you ever had before.
A man who clearly finds joy in being cruel.
When Joker tells you to eat your pasta, you eat your f*cking pasta!
Though The Joker graphic novel deviates from the comic book lore, it is a must read for fans of dark and twisted tales, and anyone who was a fan of Ledger’s Joker.
A solid list for sure, but there was one glaring omission; Joker kidnapping Robin, torturing him, and hijacking his brain in Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker. He kidnaps the Tim Drake Robin, a prepubescent boy, tortures him to destroy his personality and makes him into a miniature Joker, complete with the frozen grin, green hair and chalk white skin. Like in the Killing Joke, he documents the process and shows the films to Batman. It is an incredibly dark, twisted, and sadistic scene, made all the more shocking because it is from a film based on a children’s cartoon. As an added bonus, you get the amazing voice work of Kevin Conroy as Batman and Mark Hamill’s Joker.
heath ledger did a great job, for sure, but i honestly wish crispin glover was the joker. he looks the part, has the acting chops, and is so freakin weird and invested in his roles (willard, anyone?) . he is so dynamic, would have been amazing.
yes i know, ledger fan boys, let the death threats come
I thought Lee Bermejo’s Joker design was out before The Dark Knight.
+1 for Tom Waits interview.
-1 for Soulja Boi.
The problem with “The Joker” is that it only VISUALLY echoes Ledger’s Joker, and really isn’t much like ANY Joker. “Joker” just shows as another sick deviant, not the deranged malevolent genius. Also? The guy who wrote it is a misogynist piece of shit who openly says he hates women in his interviews, who set OUT to make Joker a sleazy greasy violent creep in this story instead of who the character is. All you need to do is read his take on Harley Quinn in an interview about “Joker” from the sadly now gone Wizard Magazine to need a shower.
“I see Harley as like a stripper, she’s there to look at, not to have any substance. I don’t wanna know your name, I don’t want to know your life story, just show me your tits and dance baby!”.
And yes, that’s a verbatim quote, I have the issue right here in front of me. Brian Azzarello is a glaring example of everything that’s wrong with the comics industry, and why most of it still runs on a neanderthal mentality when it comes to female characters.
While I also believe that the Joker is a complex enough character to allow various interpretations, I moreso agree with Penny Marie in saying that “The Joker” was mostly just offensive and shocking for it’s own sake.
There was no cleverness to Azzarello’s version of the Joker, no dark message to be reflected back from the mirror, no point to it all. It’s a crappy book with no depth that really doesn’t offer anything new to the character IMO.
If you thought voting to kill Jason Todd was sick, what in the hell do you think of our society now that praises The Joker? You can say we praise the performance by Ledger, but you know that isn’t true. We like the character, the chaos, the violence, and the ability to hurt anyone and everyone beyond recovery. This whole list is about he was able to hurt people, and how awesome he is. Don’t get me wrong, good list, but over the last four years since that movie came out, the knot in my stomach has been getting tighter and tighter. I don’t think film influences society beyond what it’s morals are, but I think the reaction to film mirrors society, and this is disturbing.
Im pretty sure Waits and Ledger started hangin out before Dr. Parnassus. Penny you should relax. The Joker is a sleazy, greasy violent, creep. Do you think he should be some misunderstood, anti-hero?
While all of these are good, they’re pretty famous. Apart from echoing Return of the Joker’s inclusion, one of the key Joker moments for me comes from one random issue in the ’90s.
The basic plot is that a man has kidnapped his wife and child, then killed himself. In trying to rescue them, Batman realizes the man was in Arkham recently and celled next to the Joker. Confronted, Joker admits he suggested and encouraged the man’s madness by communicating via morse code, then tells Batman where the child should be. Batman races to the location, and saves her from drowning just in time. Returning to question the Joker again, he expresses surprise that the clown helped him, and that the girl was alive to save. The Joker responds that he realized Batman had grown to expect him to kill all the victims & so ensured this one lived, so that from now on there would always be that shred of hope inside his foe that could be crushed on any given occasion.
It’s a throwaway, stand-alone comic, but that moment to me encapsulates the potential for cruelty in the Joker. He may not always commit crime ‘for the evulz’ but when he does, he goes the extra mile to wrench the knife deeper.
The Joker (Especially Heath Ledger’s Joker) connects with our darker side and makes us question human nature, he makes us ask ourselves if we could be him and that makes him the greatest modern villain out there. The only character who I can think of that is in the same league as the Joker is Norman Bates but even he doesn’t come close. As someone who is interested in becoming an author some day I will always look to the clown prince for inspiration when writing a villain, actually I was thinking that it would be quite cool to take a Hunter S. Tompson-esque style, a king Lear inspired plot and insane villain like the Joker and just see how it turns out.
I never even thought of crispin glover being the joker…you just broadened my mind man. I love crispin, and it would have been very epic to see him as the joker.
Jim Aparo drew Joker the way he was supposed to. The Joker doesn’t HAVE different expressions. He’s always smiling. Duh-DOY.
I agree completely with Return of the Joker. I would also include when he shot Sarah Essen in the head, walked right outside and surrendered to Commissioner Gordon in front of everybody. After kidnapping a bunch of babies, of course.
no, I disagree with drunkenjunk.the Joker is not sleazy in the least-he’s probably the top class in the heirarchy of villains.there’s a difference between criminals and villains,and the Joker lands well on the villain side.what I’m trying to say is,think of it as regular society.there are the bums,the middle class,and the high ups.what we call criminals-burglars,bank robbers,etc.- would fall under bums.then there’s villains like Two-Face,who are evil and sick but not quite twisted enough to be a hugh up.and then there’s the Joker,who is not only sick,twisted and evil,but also an absolute genius.he takes evil beyond sleazy crimes and turns it into something that makes your jaw drop and your mind stutter.the words “oh my God” are often uttered more in reaction to the Joker than in reaction to an actual event.
A wise man once told me:
Do not write about Batman, man.
Any form, the Joker, any of it.
Those fans are rabid and there is
NO way you can please them all.
That man was Kevin Smith.
And that conversation never happened.
But I pretend it does, and it feels authentic, don’t you think?
“Actually, I would say as a result of Heath Ledger’s performance in The Dark Knight, I may actually prefer the sicker version of the Joker now, actually” This is the only part of the article that bugged me, just because of how many times you said actually 🙂 Other than that, awesome read!
I agreed with this list, until you put Heath Ledger’s Joker on it. First of all, if you’re gonna put a moment from The Dark Knight in this then the “Magic Trick” was the worst one to put. How about when he kidnaps Harvey and Rachel? How about when he blew up the hospital? How about any scene in which he actually did something cruel?
Second of all, Heath Ledger’s Joker is no where near as awesome as you say it was. He was annoying and only did one even remotely funny thing. The “Why so Serious” quote was incredibly nerve wracking. Also what was up with that annoying ass tongue thing of his.
I stopped reading as soon as you insulted Jim Aparo.
… Where’s the rest of the article?