User blog comment:TheWarrior29/Is Aquaman underrated?/@comment-3343682-20140114091659

The thing is, I'd imagine the pendulum has already been swinging back in Aquaman's favor the past few years, given his generally better portrayals as of lately. I also know at least one of those portrayals has given more focus to his combat ability, so he's sure to consistently remain a force to be reckoned with. While I agree with this main point, however, let me address a few other things:

Simply being in more mature media doesn't make a character better by proxy; that's the sort of logic that caused the Dark Age. Plus, there's plenty of room for more "camp" and lighter portrayals in comics, which is one of the advantages Marvel has had over DC to me (and still has, according to their Young Avengers, especially when juxtaposed with... well, the whole 52).

Moving on: Standing up to Joker is never a question of 'warriorhood'; it's more about the psychological torture that more than likely would be involved in such a battle (which is why Joker is most frequently a Batman villain when he's not against the whole League). This isn't to definitively say that he couldn't reasonably take on Joker, but making this happen in the mainstream would be a question of 'compatibility' (per the psychological bit I mentioned) and making the encounter a smooth-written and believable one - in other words, a good comic.