Batman The Killing Joke

Plot

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While out on patrol, Batgirl (Barbara Gordon) fails to stop a robbery, but manages to stop one criminal with help from Batman. Paris Franz, the robbers' leader and the nephew of a powerful mob boss, develops a dangerous obsession with her and starts sending her messages. After Franz tricks her into finding his uncle's dead body, Batman becomes concerned about her safety and takes her off the case, telling her that she will eventually be tempted to kill the criminals she pursues. Outraged, Batgirl attacks Batman psychically and verbally, which somehow leads to sex. The next night, Batgirl tries to apologize to Batman, but he is ambushed by Franz and his men, prompting her to come to his aid. When she arrives and overpowers Franz, he makes her lose control and give him a savage beating, stopping just short of killing him. Realizing Batman was right, she retires from crime-fighting.

Sometime later, Batman investigates a murder scene with Detective Harvey Bullock and concludes that the Joker, currently held at Arkham Asylum, might be behind the crime. He goes to Arkham to talk to him, only to discover that he has escaped and put Franz as a decoy in his place. Joker then attacks Barbara and her father Commissioner James Gordon. He shoots her in the stomach, paralyzing her, while Gordon watches helplessly. Joker takes Gordon to an abandoned amusement park, where he strips him naked and subjects him to torture, showing him photos he took of Barbara, naked and in pain.

The story is intercut with flashbacks of Joker's origin. It is revealed that he was once an engineer who quit his job to become a stand-up comedian, only to fail miserably. Desperate to support his pregnant wife Jeannie, he agrees to help two criminals rob his former workplace. The criminals tell him that he has to use the Red Hood's mask and caped costume, secretly intending to frame him. During the planning, the police inform him that Jeannie and their unborn child died in a household accident. Grief-stricken, he tries to withdraw from the plan, but the criminals strong-arm him into keeping his commitment to them.

The Killing Joke was already one of the most controversial stories created in comics. In the graphic novel, the Joker paralyzes Barbara Gordon, a.k.a. Batgirl, and shows nude pictures of the crippled woman to her father, Commissioner Gordon. Now, an animated movie based on that iconic storyline, which screened at San Diego Comic-Con on Friday night, has sparked another debate by altering the relationship between Batman and Batgirl.

In the 1988 graphic novel written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Brian Bolland and John Higgins, the Joker breaks out of Arkham Asylum and kidnaps and tortures Commissioner Gordon to prove even the most noble people can be pushed to madness. One of his torture tactics is to hurt Gordon’s daughter Barbara. The Joker shoots her, paralyzing her and ending her career as Batgirl, before stripping her down and taking pictures of her to show to her father.

Though many call the book the definitive Joker origin story (the tale includes flashbacks to his pre-Joker career when he had a job and family), feminists have long critiqued it. They argue that the sadistic plot twist objectifies Gordon and strips her of her power in a manner that would never happen to a male character. Moore himself has even said in retrospect, “I don’t think it’s a very good book” and expressed regret about the Barbara storyline. Even the creators of the new Killing Joke film have acknowledged in interviews that in the comics Barbara is a plot device, there only to be hurt and motivate Batman’s quest.

Those critiques led to backlash when DC Entertainment announced thatThe Killing Joke would be adapted into an R-rated animated film (with Mark Hammill playing the Joker). But outrage only grew on Friday night when footage from the film leaked before the Comic-Con screening and news broke that Batman and Batgirl have a sexual relationship.

In the beginning of the film, Batman and Batgirl, who have a father-daughter dynamic, have sex on a rooftop. Then the plot of the originalKilling Joke with Barbara’s maiming is set into motion.

The creators have said that an entire prologue focused on Barbara, including her sexual encounter with Batman, was included in the film to develop her character in a way that the comic failed to do. “It was really important to us to show that both of the characters make some pretty big mistakes. I mean, his “parental skills” aren’t that great,” artist and producer Bruce Timm said in an interview with Vulture.

But some audience members were even more disturbed by a line that suggested the Joker rapes Barbara Gordon. In the film, Batman talks to a group of prostitutes who say the Joker always goes to a brothel when he breaks out of Arkham. This time he didn’t, and one of the prostitutes concludes, “Maybe he found himself another girl.”

Timm says the filmmakers did not mean to imply that the Joker raped Batgirl. “I don’t think that actually,” he told Vulture. “If I had, I probably would have changed the line. I never, ever thought that he actually raped her. Even in my first read of the comic, I never thought that. It just seemed like he shot her and then took her clothes off and took pictures of her to freak out her dad.”

The man who will become the Joker is an unnamed engineer who quits his job at a chemical company to become a stand-up comedian, only to fail miserably. Desperate to support his pregnant wife Jeannie, he agrees to guide two criminals through the chemical plant where he previously worked so that they can rob the playing card company next to it. During the planning, the police inform him that his wife has died in a household accident. Grief-stricken, the engineer tries to withdraw from the plan, but the criminals strong-arm him into keeping his commitment to them.

At the plant, the criminals make him don a special mask to become the infamous Red Hood. Unknown to the engineer, the criminals plan to use this disguise to implicate any accomplice as the mastermind and to divert attention away from themselves. Once inside, they encounter security personnel, a shootout ensues, and the two criminals are killed. The engineer is confronted by Batman who is investigating the disturbance.

Terrified, the engineer jumps into the chemical plant's waste pound lock to escape Batman and is swept through a pipe leading to the outside. Once outside, he discovers to his horror that the chemicals have permanently bleached his skin chalk-white, stained his lips ruby-red and dyed his hair bright green. The engineer's disfigurement, compounded with the loss of his family, drives him completely insane and marks the birth of the Joker.

In the present day, Batman goes to Arkham Asylum to talk with the Joker about ending their years-long feud, only to realize that the Joker has escaped and put a decoy in his place. Soon after, the Joker shoots Barbara Gordon in the stomach, paralyzing her, and kidnaps her father, Commissioner James Gordon.The Joker imprisons Gordon in a run-down amusement park. His henchmen then beat Gordon and cage him in the park's freak show. it's implied not explicitly said is that the Joker gives Gordon LSD to continue his mental torture. The Joker chains Gordon to one of the park's rides and forces him to view giant photos of Barbara, laying down and in pain. Once Gordon has run the horrifying gauntlet, the Joker puts him on display in the freak show, ridiculing him as "the average man," a naïve weakling doomed to insanity.

Batman's attempts to locate Commissioner Gordon are unsuccessful until the Joker sends him a clue that leads him to the amusement park. Batman arrives to save Gordon, and the Joker retreats into the funhouse. Though traumatized by the ordeal, Gordon retains his sanity and moral code, and he insists that Batman capture the Joker "by the book" in order to "show him our way works". Batman enters the funhouse and dodges the Joker's booby traps, while the Joker tries to persuade his nemesis that the world is "a black, awful joke" that is not worth fighting for, and that it only takes "one bad day" to drive an ordinary man insane.

Main Cast

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Batman

Barbara Gordon

James Gordon

Alfred Pennyworth

The Joker

Jeannie

Danny Weaver

Two-Face (Cameo)

The Penguin (Cameo)

Red Hood (In Flashback Only)