Batman: The Killing Joke Review
Batman: The Killing Joke, the latest film by Bruce Tim, co-creator and producer of Batman: The Animated Series, does not quite live up to the hype that surrounded this movie ever since Warner Bros. Animation released the first trailer. Based on the classic graphic novel of the same name by Alan Moore and Brian Bolland, The Killing Joke is the darkest and most controversial Batman and The Joker story to date. An R rating, combined with both legendary voice actors Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill reprising their roles as Batman and The Joker respectively, had fans like myself excited beyond belief. Kevin Conroy’s Batman and Mark Hamill’s The Joker are what I consider to be the best voiced and most iconic animated superhero/super villain portrayals of all time, with Mark Hamill even coming out of retirement to resurrect his greatest masterpiece. When you think of Batman and The Joker, you imagine them with these voice actors, so naturally as the potential last time these two legends are together again in a film, the movie has to be amazing right? If it is their last film together, these two voice actors deserve to put their respective characters to rest and ride off into the sunset in a blaze of glory. Well unfortunately this film does not deliver that storybook ending.
***Warning, spoilers ahead
The Killing Joke begins its first half hour as something of a melodrama, with Barbara Gordon, voiced by original voice actress Tara Strong, narrating to the audience about how she has been fighting crime as Batgirl alongside Batman for three years now. Barbara works as a librarian during the day, and vents to her best friend about how she’s been seeing her “yoga instructor” (Bruce Wayne). Barbara is infatuated with Bruce, who seemingly has more of a fatherly relationship with the young Batgirl. A young member of the Mafia makes a play to overtake his uncle as mob boss of Gotham city, and in the process tries to get close and personal with Batgirl. Batman, being wary of how dangerous it can be of a villain to make things personal, forbids Batgirl in typical Batman fashion to further pursue the young mobster. In turn, Batgirl of course does not listen and continues her investigation. A short while later as events unfold, Barbara’s and Bruce’s sexual tension culminate in a very surprising, controversial, and out of character sex scene. Let’s discuss why this is so controversial. First of all, Barbera is a young woman who looks and acts like she can be in college, and if not for the film mentioning she’s a librarian during the day, the audience would most likely assume she might not even be old enough to drink. Bruce Wayne is a much older man, so this age difference is most likely around 20 years or so. Second, Bruce and Barbara had a father daughter like relationship, so the whole thing was shocking and just felt wrong. Third, this is BATMAN we are talking about here, The Dark Knight, who does not break character, who does not give in to or show weaknesses, who claims relationships can cloud the judgement, let alone let basic human pleasures get in his way, ever. The film makes no attempt at all to explain why this was so, so the audience is left guessing as to why Batman would suddenly allow himself to give in to desire. As a Batman fan, this scene genuinely angered me, and the lack of explanation made things so much worse. As stated earlier, this sequence took a half hour to complete, so no Joker at all until after the first 30 minutes of an hour and 16 minute film.
Barbara decides that it would be too difficult for her and Bruce to continue on as Batgirl and Batman due to the inevitable conclusion that their feelings would get in the way of fighting crime, so Barbara gives up being Batgirl and leaves that part of her life in the past. A short time later, Batman investigates a crime scene which contains a group of dead citizens that resembles The Joker’s handiwork all too well. The Joker is supposed to be locked away in Arkham Asylum, so Batman decides to pay a visit to his nemesis and discusses how he believes the roller coaster ride relationship between the two will conclude. Turns out, The Joker escaped Arkham, and is planning something “big” this time around. Now we get to the meat of this film, the shocking, dark, and twisted moment readers of the graphic novel were expecting. The Joker goes to Barbara Gordon’s apartment, shoots her point blank range, paralyzing her from the waist down, and kidnaps Commissioner Gordon. Certainly this is one of the more gruesome and darker scenes we as an audience has seen from The Joker, but definitely not the worst. The Commissioner is taken to an amusement park, where The Joker and his minions, who have zero explanation and backstory, begin to enact The Joker’s “plan”. As the film drags on, more and more flashback scenes to The Joker’s origin story are shown, culminating in explaining how The Joker came to be and why he is the homicidal maniac that terrorizes Gotham City. So, The Joker’s “plan” is to show that “all it takes is one bad day” and that an ordinary man would resort to descending into madness in order to dull the pain of a psychologically traumatic event. The Joker tries this with Commissioner Gordon, and ultimately fails in his attempt to drive the commissioner mad. In what I consider to be a mediocre fight scene, Batman triumphs over The Joker as Batman fans are accustomed to seeing time and time again. This time is different, as Batman offers to rehabilitate The Joker, but the clown refuses. The Joker then tells Batman a joke, and Batman bursts into laughter with The joker, until only one of them is left laughing as the camera pans off screen.
Batman: The Killing Joke offers viewers too little too late. The opening sequence and story between Barbara Gordon and Bruce Wayne did not need a half hour of the film to explain, and while the story between the two was believable, its execution was simply terrible. The melodrama should have only lasted 10 minutes maximum, with its conclusion leaving Barbara Gordon a lover scorned by Batman. The audience next sees Barbera after the credits, with her becoming the character known as Oracle. Kevin Conroy slightly changed the voice of Batman in this film, which was not his best work in my opinion. What the film should have focused more on is The Joker himself. the Joker’s psychotic tale of madness, a more sinister plot, and heavier action sequences between The Joker and Batman would have helped to please audiences. Other films such as Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker, and the comic Batman: Death of a Family, contained much more disturbing and gruesome Joker content. I understand the makers of the film wanted the it to be a more psychological tale, with action being put to the wayside, but since about half the content in the film had to be added in order to become feature length, the writers should have gone above and beyond. The animation in the film is also sub par to say the least, with recent Batman and Justice League films having greater quality. Overall this film is about a fraction of what I expected it to be, with some great dialogue from Mark Hamill being one of the only redeeming qualities. I would give this film 2 out of 5 stars, and with Mark Hamill announcing on Twitter that this won’t be the last we see of his Joker, I have hope that a Batman: Death of a Family film is in the future as redemption.
The film can be watched free here
