For those who don’t know, The Killing Joke was written by famed author Alan Moore and released in 1988. The story tells the tale of Batman visiting the Joker in Arkham Asylum to talk to him about their “relationship.” Batman knows that with the way things have been, one of them is going to wind up killing the other in the end. But the Joker has escaped, and he has a plan for not just Batman, but Commissioner Gordon as well.
At the same time, it tells the Joker’s origin story. Something, at the time of release, no one had ever seen before. The theme of the story is how one bad day can turn good men bad. It’s a familiar story for Batman. You might recognize it as the Joker’s plan from THE DARK KNIGHT, used to turn Harvey Dent into Two Face.
The difference here is that by now, in the age of 2016, what was once shocking and appalling, is in fact, kind of boring, and no longer interesting. The big moments of The Killing Joke not only don’t fit in the world of 2016, the animated movie makes a point of exacerbating them in such a way that it’s almost offensive.
The big moment, of course, is when Joker shoots and paralyzes Barbara Gordon, strips her naked, and takes photos of her naked. The moment not only turned her into Oracle, but it was a divisive moment in comics. It created the term “fridging”, among other unfortunate tropes. Despite being a big moment in the Batman universe, it’s generally considered to be a low point for Batman. It demeans Batgirl and makes her a chess piece in the battle between Batman and Joker.
The reason I bring this up is because the movie recognizes this and tries to subvert these tropes by giving us a Batgirl prologue that is supposed to strengthen her character. Unfortunately, it does the exact opposite. It paints Batgirl as someone who exists only so she could have sex with Batman. Which, by the way, does happen, and it’s one of the weirdest things I’ve seen in a Batman movie – animated or otherwise. The romantic relationship established in this prologue doesn’t really carry through into the main story, and it’s even one sided enough that you wonder why they bother adding it the first place. There are other problems with the prologue, like Batman berating Batgirl for doing her job, and mansplaining to her what being objectified is. It’s odd and only managed to make things worse.
Things don’t get much better during the main story. Kevin Conroy’s performance sounds like it was phoned in. It’s shocking, but it’s one of his worst performances in recent memory. I’m not sure if it was the writing of the direction, but Batman is an extremely bland character in this story. He gives off no emotion, even when he visits Batgirl in the hospital after her assault. It’s almost like he doesn’t care. Hamill is the only one having any fun in this movie. As expected, the Joker is the most interesting part of the whole thing and most of that is due to
Hamill’s performance. It’s full of life and insanity, and is easily the best part of the whole movie. It’s even more noticeable against Conroy’s Batman. The Joker’s flashbacks are fun and interesting and do their best to give a new perspective on the character. But the scenes when he’s the Joker we all know and love are the highlights. It’s Hamill at his most Joker-esque.
Overall The Killing Joke is a disappointment. The attempts to add on to the story only managed to highlight the issues with the original story and Conroy’s poor Batman performance doesn’t do the movie any favors. The fact of the matter is, The Killing Joke isn’t as good as people give it credit for these days, and the animated adaptation only makes it more obvious. Do yourself a favor and skip this one. It’s not worth your time and there are better Batman stories out there, both in comic and animation form.
Written by Peter Freeman, TV & Animation Writer -- Click to read Peter's posts
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