In comic book lore, it took DC Comics 11 years to print a back-story and origin for their most popular villain The Joker, as printed in Detective Comics No. 168. For over a decade he terrified and thrilled children as a white clown faced, purple suit wearing mass murdering psychopath who seemingly had no rhyme, reason or method to his madness.
Of course in comic book films, it hasn’t really worked that way with The Joker or any other major hero or villain. In Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman movie we started the flick from the point of view of Jack Napier and we witnessed a full character change from evil gangster to homicidal joker. Indeed, we learnt a far lot more about him than we did our masked hero.
One thing I believe many comic book films have missed out on in the past is the power of mystery and sometimes writers need to tell us EVERYTHING about a character, shows me that they don’t have as much faith as they should in their storytelling. With some characters it’s surely better to NOT know their origins, especially at first, as it makes them a far more creepy and terrifying prospect when an evil presence just shows up, un-human like.
I refer to Darth Vader and his incredible power in the first Star Wars movie but then we we see him as a kid in the prequels – and the character’s evil presence is stripped away completely.
We don’t need to see that The Joker was a human being. Infact I rather wouldn’t. And thankfully The Dark Knight producer Charles Roven has updated us on a few things today, the main one being the movie is not “The Joker Begins…”
- The IMAX preview with I Am Legend is the first five minutes of the film.
- “The whole thing is not ‘Joker Begins’, because we did not tell how the Joker became what he is,” says Nolan. “During these five minutes it is shown how the the small crook becomes the most-dreaded gangster of the city – it is more like “The Rise of the Joker.”
- Batman’s new mask will have white lenses on the eyes when he turns on the Bat-sonar detection.
- Batman will go to Hong Kong for some kind of “gangster hunting”, but Roven doesn’t say why Batman travels to Hong Kong.
Good or bad news for you?
Did you want to see The Joker’s full origin or do you just think some things are more powerful when we just don’t know why?
source – coming soon, kino.de
8 Comments
Hmmm, I was kind of hoping on seeing a fresh look at the origin. I was wondering if they’d go into how he got those grotesque scars on his face. But I actually kind of am intrigued by this new news. I like the idea of “The small crook becomes the most-dreaded gangster of the city” and him being the Joker the entire time. I guess they can still show how he got the scars with that.
I wonder if they’ll keep the whole “escaped from Arkham” that they established in BB?
Matt,
Good news definatly. Great points you made here. I could not agree with you more. Well, maybe a bit more because this story inspired me to take the argument a bit further.
This totally cheapens the villain.
Perfect, we really don’t need to know the Joker’s origin. It would just waste 15 minutes of screen time telling some slightly altered version of a story we have heard 10 times before.
I agree, it’s a good thing so we don’t get fed too much info straight away. I like the way that this new series is looking at things over the long term – e.g. character arcs over several films rather than the “here’s a new character, here’s how they became a villain, Batman kills him at the end” setup of the Burton/Schmacher movies.
I’d hope they don’t just kill the Joker, then maybe we get more of a backstory filled in later on – we don’t need everything straight away.
Paul T,
I’m 99.9% certain the next Batman movie will have a cliffhanger ending which will spill over into the third movie, which will see The Joker have a big part still.
It would be unwise to kill off The Joker, especially if Heath Ledger has nailed the character like we all hope he has. It would be great to see him return to the character for movie 6 say… but I also don’t want the movie to turn into an X-Men flick where Joker is always the bad guy in every movie.
I don’t get the batman the dark night’s joker. He is such a spin off from the original joker origin story that DC comics have given us. The joker didn’t even have bleached white skin!!! I do like how they potrayed the psycho personality. I actually went to several websites looking up the psychopathic skitzafritz thing, and he definately wasn’t that like they said he was in the movie.
The Origin of the Joker a.k.a. “The Man Who Laughs”.
In the Origin of the “The Man Who Laughs,” the joker is a young lad and a pathetic victim instead
of his usual role as a villain. In this moving melodrama he had a dual role, starring as both
Gwynplaine (The Man Who Laughs), and also as Lord Clancharlie, Gwynplaine’s father, a Scottish
nobleman who has rebelled against King James II in 17th-century Britain. As Lord Clancharlie is
being placed for execution in the notorious “Iron Maiden,” he asks what will be done with his son,
Gwynplaine. King James’ cruel jester pulls the boys mouth apart in a grimace, and the king
understands that the young boy with a beaming, angelic smile will be given to a notorious band of
nomads, the Comprachicos.
The Comprachicos purposely disfigure the young boy by carving the corners of his mouth into a
fixed, hideous grin. As if what they have done turns into a bad Omen, the Comprachicos are exiled
from England, abandoning Gwynplaine in the English countryside during a severe snowstorm burning
his facial expression into a permanent one.
Plodding through the storm, the youngster comes across a baby girl in the arms of her frozen and
lifeless mother. Although the boy doesn’t have any reason to perpetuate acts of kindness due to
his practically shattered spirit, his heart goes out to this young child, and he rescues her. As
he plods through the howling storm with the baby in tow, they are saved by a small traveling
troupe of actors who are led by kindly philosopher, Ursus. Ursus is horrified when he sees
Gwynplaine’s disfigured face, and he realizes that the baby girl, Dea, is blind.
They are both adopted by the troupe, and years later Dea, has grown into a beautiful blind girl.
A romance of the heart, not of the eyes, develops between Gwyplaine and Dea. Gwynplaine, who has
now become a famous performing clown, is finally happy, and fate steps in when Gwynplaine discovers
he is heir to a peerage and is summoned back to London.
It is there that his life will take a fateful turn when the jester who had persuaded the king to
disfigure Gwynplaine and the queen, see an opportunity to continue their mind-twisted torture.
MAYBE THEN ALL WILL UNDERSTAND WHY JOKER LOST IT.
Good job. You really did your research. No, seriously, I’m impressed. I like the whole travelling actor/ cut up face/ clown thing. I think maybe you misunderstood my last post. I knew they had gotten inspiration for the Joker somewhere, I just wanted to know why they didn’t keep to the original origins of the Joker.
One Trackback
[...] friend Matt Holmes has written an article about the new upcoming Dark Knight, and I agree with him completely. As a matter of fact, I [...]