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Joker


Guest El Chalupacabra
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Hello! [/mrs.doubtfire style] :-)

 

I do hope Joker lives up to your expectations and the critical hype. I feel like DC really needs more hits, both in critical reception and audience reception (via box office obvi).

I think it will live up to expectations. it's an origin story but it's on its own merit which makes it interesting.

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Hello! [/mrs.doubtfire style] :-)

 

I do hope Joker lives up to your expectations and the critical hype. I feel like DC really needs more hits, both in critical reception and audience reception (via box office obvi).

I think it will live up to expectations. it's an origin story but it's on its own merit which makes it interesting.

 

Is there any confirmation that Batman will be in or even alluded to in the movie...or anything else in the DC universe for that matter?

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Todd Phillips, the director, recently reaffirmed that his film is not connecting to Matt Reeves The Batman with Pattinson in that lead. As for Bruce being in the Joker, he is, as a kid... Thats shown in the cast listing on IMDB and Wiki. So, either this is a swerve or the WB just has no Fs to give about trying to make a film universe since Snyders attempt arguably bombed out.

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  • 4 weeks later...

I saw it last night, I thought it was extremely well done.

There are going to be some very fair critiques that it borrows way too much from Scorsese, but recontextualizing it in the way that it does more than helped me push that aside.

I won't go into spoilers, but there was one scene in particular that really put it over the top for me and put everything after it into perspective. It made me realize that this movie was never about a villain origin or the supposed incel themes that memes have suggested, it's instead a really harsh look at the realities of mental illness and care for people with it. It really disappoints me that the conversation around this movie has been about anything but that.

...but one gripe I have is even by the end of the film, you NEVER get the sense that THIS version of the Joker will become the Joker we know as a super villain capable of taking on and matching wits with Batman.

Going to disagree with this one, there was one scene in particular where I totally saw what he would become.

When he looks down at his book and realizes that he can do more with his life instead of killing himself on air, he totally shifts gears into supervillan mode. Suddenly he's able to stop the laughing, is very eloquent, cutting in how he describes the plight of others in his situation, and just devoid of empathy and full of rage when he kills DeNiro. That side of him is only really present in that scene, but it totally shows you the trajectory of where he's going in the future offscreen.

 

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I don’t think we need to avoid spoilers. If you’re reading a thread about a movie that’s been released, you’re doing it at your own risk.

 

I have no interest in seeing the movie, and the more I read the more I’m convinced it isn’t for me. I’m cool with that. One interesting take that I’ve seen, however, is that Fleck isn’t THE Joker, but could be an influence on him. He’s too old to be the Joker who goes up against Batman, but someone could be messed up enough to take on his mantle.

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That was kind of my view as well. This was a different kind of Joker in both portrayal and thesis.

He isn't necessarily the kind of criminal mastermind that you'd think of like from Nicholson, Hamill, or even Ledger. The only personal gain he's interested in is attention, which might be the most dangerous asset of all for someone like this.

His mental state makes him completely unable to empathize or feel remorse, that quick moment where he basically tells the clerk at Arkham seals it. When he realizes he's getting praise for having murdered those entitled bros on the train, the fuel is just poured on a fire that isn't going out. Him calling it all beautiful from the back of the cop car is him becoming addicted to it.

I think this sort of thing makes him even more dangerous than most other versions of the Joker. He'll keep wanting that high and keep upping the stakes for the attention and mob that comes with it.

 

 

For what it's worth, I was ready to hate this movie. I feel like media representation really gamed the conversation against this, it was not at all what I expected. It was dark and hard to watch but damned if I can't stop thinking about it.

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It’s the positive reviews that made me realize it isn’t for me. I’m at a point in my life where I get enough thinking done by reading or watching documentaries. I’m open to entertainment getting me think, but it primarily has to entertain, and this movie just isn’t hitting the right marks for me at this point.

 

Younger me would hate current me for saying it, but for now I’d rather just watch a popcorn flick.

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No surprise given that The Killing Joke is bar none, one of the best Batman stories ever told. Funny that when it was made, it was released as a one-off graphic novel that could have been standalone. There was a whole series of Batman graphic novels in the 80s that were these stand alone stories, that may or may not be continuity. This was post Crisis establishing the multiverse, but before Elseworlds as a thing. But DKR, Killing Joke, Son of the Demon... all meant to be one-offs. There's an entire debate online if the end of Killing Joke actually has Batman killing The Joker.

 

They adopted it into canon in the monthlies once they saw the response to it. Anyway-- point being, it's sort of THE definitive Joker story, and was his canon origin for ages. It did for Joker what Year One did for Batman. So it's no shock how much everyone borrows from it.

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It seems to me, from reading all about it and purposely spoiling myself, that there really isnt a reason for this to be a Joker movie. If it had been in Chicago instead of Gotham and the Waynes had been any other name, the movie wouldnt have been any different. So what really makes this about Batman villain the Joker?

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I've thought that this is only a comic book movie because that's how movies get made now. It feels like it's more of a reflection on the state of movies in general rather than this movie specifically.

If this was just a Taxi Driver homage with some random guy, it barely would have gotten attention and probably would have been straight to Netflix.

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I've thought that this is only a comic book movie because that's how movies get made now. It feels like it's more of a reflection on the state of movies in general rather than this movie specifically.

Phillips made comments to that effect. He decided to make an art house Scorsese lovefest but he knew he had to disguise it as a superhero film to get it made.

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Not bad... I don't know how well it'll hold up over time, but I at least had a smile on my face by the end. The plot beats of the first thirty or so minutes felt a bit too obvious, and it's overall thin on plot, but it goes on a fairly entertaining streak after that. It doesn't really seem to have anything particularly deep to say and doesn't tie in to the Batman mythos in any sensical way, but it's worth seeing.
It's strange, I think there are two ways to view the movie: one is taking most everything that's happening as a reliable series of events (barring the one that's telegraphed) in which case I think the movie is pretty terrible. The second is viewing it as being fluid with time, space and memory. That the entire film is a sort of quilt of how the Joker constructs his self-identity, that HE is the unreliable narrator of the film. In that way I enjoyed it, where I think the only "literal" events in Joker are his mother's insanity, his own childhood abuse, his counselling and going off meds, and probably the murders on the subway. The rest to me felt like the Joker's own fever dream of a world overrun by clowns (projections of himself) and the Wayne family being a stand-in/loose connection for his personal obsession with Batman. Maybe I'm reaching or wishful thinking, sure, but it really felt like maybe The Joker wasn't actually/necessarily in this 1970's timeline, or at least his adult self. Him murdering DeNiro's character on the talk show being something he did much later and reincorporated into his past memories. And that the end of the film could have been one of the many times he breaks loose from Arkham, with Batman crouching on a rooftop, ready to swoop in and punch him in the face for the umpteenth time. Or maybe not, and that's just how I would have written it. :shrug:

 

After thinking about it more, I believe the major thing that's missing was a convincing transformation... not just into "I'm not a dopey pushover anymore!" territory but into the realm "I've been consumed and my humanity is now gone". It doesn't seem like there's a line he fully crosses, like the filmmakers were too in love with the Arthur character or something. In order for this to work best the tragic aspect needed to really hit home. As it is, Authur remains a mostly sympathetic character throughout. At some point his arc needed to take him to a place where the audience can't follow anymore: either relatively gradually like Jake Gylenhaal's character in Nightcrawler, or just a point where he starts acting solely out of joyous malice in a manner that can't be justified by society's (or his mental faculties) abandonment of him.

What I feel is sorely missing from this portrayal of the Joker is his "self aware" side: the manipulator. Or at least the calculated psychopath side that feels purposeful behind all the anarchic chaos. Heath Ledger pulled this off well. He was silly at times, even kinda dopey, but could turn savage on a dime, and his overall scheming nature is apparent and ongoing.
Even if the Joker is intended to be the unreliable narrator, and sees his actions as motivated or even "good" in some warped way, there still needed to be a certain portion of the film grounded in "the reality" of the situation. Joker sees himself as a source of whimsical, (and murderous) attention seeking anarchy that exposes (what he views as the world's) hypocrisy; at some point the film needed to show us the monster. The fantasy/disconnect of Joker's warped mind versus the destructive consequences.
The Arthur whose humanity we connect with needed to be killed off, and it isn't, he just kinda settles permanently into the "redrum"/Private Pyle brooding "dark place". Sure, he seems to enjoy the consequences, but it doesn't ever feel like he has full agency, he merely dissolves under the weight of his horrible existence.

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  • 2 weeks later...

This movie did a lot of stuff well...acting, mood, setting, etc. However, I felt that as much as this was to give the Joker another level of depth, this felt like he was still one-dimensional...just a different dimension. Most of this movie just felt like revenge porn.

 

The great thing about Ledger's Joker is that his background doesn't matter. He's kind of like Yoda, his background being a mystery is part of the character. I get that this is just one take on the Joker, but to me it was a take that wasn't needed.

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Just got back from it - was my birthday present from my mother and brother. I loved it!!! This was THE origin movie, while still being surprisingly as original as possible.

 

So the question is..... is he Thomas Wayne's son? They said he was adopted by Penny but was that what they told her? Thomas is powerful in this version and it's conceivable that he did pull a Schwarzenegger and banged her, had a love child then made her crazy.

 

9/10

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Just got back from it - was my birthday present from my mother and brother. I loved it!!! This was THE origin movie, while still being surprisingly as original as possible.

 

So the question is..... is he Thomas Wayne's son? They said he was adopted by Penny but was that what they told her? Thomas is powerful in this version and it's conceivable that he did pull a Schwarzenegger and banged her, had a love child then made her crazy.

 

9/10

I did like this being open-ended and was well done. To me, I don't think it is important whether he is or not...but I enjoyed watching how Phoenix processed it.

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  • 1 month later...

Finally got around to seeing this. I loved it-- but at the same time it frustrates me to no end that DC's cinematic universe has no continuity. I guess I shouldn't be surprised given that this is my primary complaint about DC comics too.

 

I wish they'd look at the success of this film and realize Bat-fans would fully accept a Batman film that wasn't some over the top, bloated, fx laden bs.

 

I will say, one thing they nailed that no other Batfilm has-- Gotham City. This was straight out of Year One. Gotham is basically a character in the Bat mythos. It's a city that forges madmen.

 

Snyder made Gotham Jersey City to Metropolis's NYC. Heresy.

 

Nolan TOLD us how rough Gotham was, outside of The Narrows in Begins, it was nothing but people talking about how brutal gotham was.

 

Burton/Schumacher were making cartoons.

 

Joker did Gotham right... but ultimately I feel cheated I wont see this Joker face Batman.

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