Originally published on Patreon
The first issue of The Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing set up a new status quo for the villain, having him leave Gotham for a cross country tour where he'd spread his brand of chaos to other cities. However, things back in Gotham became a little more complicated when a man the Joker shot in the head climbed out of his grave and stumbled into a bar where he killed someone in the bathroom, where he pulled the sack off his head to reveal....the Joker.
It as an unexpected development for what seemed a pretty simple new direction for the titular character, and one that makes this second issue very important. What does this all mean, who is this second Joker, who's the original? There are a lot of questions that need answering. And this issue gives us tiny clues, but holds back on really giving us many answers.
The first half of the book follows the wounded Joker in Gotham as he stumbles round the city, looking for somewhere where he can lay his head for a bit to recover. He gets in a couple of scrapes along the way, enough that some people start to talk about how he's still in Gotham, and for rumours of his presence there to start to spread. He eventually finds one of his old gang, and manages to take some time to recover for a bit. Out and about in Gotham, however, Jason Todd in on his trail, trying to track down this new Joker.
After getting some rest and some new clothes, the Gotham Joker heads to Harley's ferry, and gets knocked out and tied to a chair. After a small conversation, Harley lets him go, believing him to be a fake Joker because of the way he's acting. Whilst The Joker considers if he could somehow be a fake, Red Hood smashes through the door and grabs him.
Outside Gotham, the other Joker hears news that the man he shot in the head is still alive.
So, it's still unclear as to what's happening here, of which of these two men, if any, is the real Joker. Both of them present interesting arguments for being the Joker. They both seem to have the Joker's memories. They both seem to believe they are the Joker. But there are some differences in how they act, and even how they look, with the art team going out of their way to make the two men different enough that you can see different qualities of the character in them.
It'll be interesting if the series continues on in this way, in using the two different Jokers to explore different aspects of the character. But what does it all mean? Has the Joker been split, or are these alternate universe versions of the Joker, or is Harley right, and is one of them someone who's been manipulated into thinking they're the Joker through brainwashing? This mystery is still fresh enough that it's enough to carry the series; though I expect that things will have to evolve soon, and that bringing Jason into it is how the series is going to do that.
The back-up feature is once again set in a older time, designed to feel like a book from the Golden Age. In this adventure the Joker is upset that his 'friends', the other villains, don't seem to particularly care about him, or say nice things about him. So, in order to get around this he fakes his death and arranges a funeral for all of the villains to attend and talk about how much they cared about him and loved him.
It's a little ridiculous, but absolutely feels like something from a bygone era. The villains turning up at the suburbs to come and hang out at Jokers house, the villains all in costume wearing their funeral outfits over the top of them, the things they say about the Joker during their eulogies. It all feels silly in the best way. It's not clear why this is part of the book, or why it connects to the main story (if it even does), but there is a moment when the villains believe him to be an impostor, which does make me think of the main story a bit.
Wherever this series is going, it seems to be gearing up to be an intriguing mystery.
This article, and many others, can be read a month early on my Patreon for as little as $3 a month!
No comments:
Post a Comment