How Joker Fails
The character of Batman’s arch nemesis Joker has always been one of the most terrifying yet intriguing characters to come out in comic book history. So when a standalone Joker movie was announced back in 2017, the hype was understandably real. Finally, one of the most iconic villains in the entire comic book industry would get his own movie. Instead of the quirky jokes and bad filmmaking associated with the DC Extended Universe, fans would finally get a dark and gritty origin story for the Clown Prince of Crime.
It was a huge hit, and Joker raked in over a billion dollars, even more than the Nolan — directed The Dark Knight. What made it even more impressive was its mere budget of 55 million dollars, with big hit superhero movies hitting budgets of 100 or even 200 million USD.
But even still, Joker fails as an answer to its problems. While it is still a great film that challenges the hard hitting questions of today’s society while remaining a huge box office success, it’s a film that also falls short at the finish line, and contradicts its main message. And yes, while the story is from the perspective of Arthur Fleck, it also murders its main message by offering him no consequences to all the terrible things that he’s done. The Joker movie offers a violent answer to a very complicated question, and ultimately is unable to solve any of the questions it promised to.
One of the biggest reasons why Joker fails as a social commentary is the lack of consequences. While Arthur Fleck is perhaps just trying to get revenge on the people who have treated like trash, that doesn’t excuse or justify any of his actions. And that’s the problem with Joker, while it tells society to be more mindful of the mentally ill loners, it doesn’t pay any respects to the victims of Arthur’s attacks. The two men he gunned down had a family, Bill Murray had a family, and yet Joker revels in gunning those men down as if they had it coming to them, that they committed an act so horrible that they deserved to be executed. It reveals a glaring double standard in the movie, and treats Arthur’s bullies not as human beings but as stepping stones for Arthur to shoot down to the delight of the audience. And while I do believe media outrage over this movie was a bit too far, it’s not hard for me to see how the movie’s main message could be easily misinterpreted and cause violent actions around the world.
The reason why Joker as a character has always worked is because of his belief that he is doing the right thing; the belief that all it takes is one bad day. While the character of the Joker makes plenty of interesting points and challenges the very essence of what makes a human, in the end, it’s clear that what he does is wrong.
2019’s Joker fails because it doesn’t capture what makes Joker a compelling villain. It is a glorification of murder, of revenge and weakness, and while it offers interesting points, is ultimately unable to achieve its own goal.
Welsh, Daniel (2019) “Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker Is A Bleak Watch — For All The Wrong Reasons. “Retrieved from https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/joker-violence_uk_5d97692ee4b0da7f662628a8
Golberg, Matt, (2020) “‘Joker’: How the Ending Highlights the Film’s Biggest Problem”. Retrieved from: https://collider.com/joker-ending-explained/
“Lord Ravenscraft”, (2020) “Hey So, Joker Isn’t a Super Great Representation of Mental Illness, You Guys”. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTEywd6aIjY
Hunt, Matt, (2007) “How the Joker works” Retrieved from https://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/arts/comic-books/joker1.htm
Geraghty, Jim (2019) “Burning It All Down, Nihilism, and the Joker”. Retrieved from https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/burning-it-all-down-nihilism-and-the-joker/
