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129,860
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in: Dick Giordano/Executive Editor, Brian Bolland/Cover Artist, Richard Bruning/Cover Artist,
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Batman: The Killing Joke

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This title is Suggested for Mature Readers.


"The Killing Joke": A concerned Batman visits Arkham Asylum and goes to Joker's cell. The Joker is sitting alone in his cell, playing with a deck of cards as Batman sits at the opposite end of the table. The Dark Knight tells Joker that the c

Quote1 I mean, what is it with you? What made you what you are? Girlfriend killed by the mob, maybe? Brother carved up by some mugger? Something like that, I bet. Something like that... Something like that happened to me, you know. I... I'm not exactly sure what it was. Sometimes I remember it one way, sometimes another... If I'm going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice! Ha ha ha! Quote2
— The Joker

Batman: The Killing Joke is a one-shot with a cover date of July, 1988. It was published on March 29, 1988.

Synopsis for "The Killing Joke"

A concerned Batman visits Arkham Asylum and goes to Joker's cell. The Joker is sitting alone in his cell, playing with a deck of cards as Batman sits at the opposite end of the table. The Dark Knight tells Joker that the constant madness of their lives must end, or otherwise one of them will surely die at the hands of the other. Joker doesn't move and keeps playing with the cards, and Batman grabs the clown's arm, infuriated. Batman notices that he has white stains on his hands and grabs the man in front of him, who is just a man dressed and wearing make-up to look like the Joker. Batman questions the man about the location of the Joker, who has escaped Arkham and is on the loose.

Joker is looking to buy an abandoned amusement park and after he checks the whole place, he kills the owner and claims the park as his own. However, Joker is lost in thoughts and he starts remembering memories from a past life.

The man who would become the Joker is an unnamed lab assistant who quits his job at a chemical company to become a stand-up comedian, only to fail miserably. Desperate to support his pregnant wife, he agrees to guide two criminals into the plant for a robbery. During the planning, the police come and inform him that his wife has died in a household accident involving an electric baby bottle heater. Grief-stricken, the comedian 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. Unbeknownst to the man, this disguise is simply the criminals' scheme to implicate any accomplice as the mastermind to divert attention from themselves.

Joker 0004

Joker is Born

Once inside, they almost immediately blunder into security personnel, and a violent shootout and chase ensues. The criminals are gunned down, and the comedian finds himself confronted by Batman, who is investigating the disturbance.

Panicked, the man deliberately jumps into the chemical plant's toxic waste catch-basin vat 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. This turn of events, compounding the man's misfortunes of that one day, drives him completely insane and results in the birth of the Joker.

Joker 0113

The Shooting of Barbara

Joker makes his move and he knocks on the door of Commissioner Gordon. Barbara opens the door and is shocked at the sight of the Joker, dressed in a tourist outfit and pointing a gun at her. Joker shoots Barbara in the spine and his henchmen enter the house and knock Commissioner Gordon out, while Joker starts undressing the wounded Barbara and takes out a camera.

Barbara is taken to a hospital and the doctors tell Harvey Bullock that the damage caused by the bullet would make her unable to use her legs ever again. Batman visits Barbara and when she recovers, she begs Batman to save her father from whatever the Joker has planned.

Joker takes Gordon and imprisons him in a run-down amusement park. His deformed henchmen then strip Gordon naked and cage him in the park's freak show. He chains Gordon to one of the park's rides and cruelly forces him to view giant pictures of his wounded daughter in various states of undress. Once Gordon completes the maddening gauntlet, the Joker ridicules him as an example of "the average man," a naive weakling doomed to insanity.

Batman 0424

The Joke

Batman searches all over the city for Joker with no good results. Suddenly, the Bat-Signal beacons in the night and Harvey Bullock gives Batman two tickets to the abandoned amusement park. As Batman arrives to save Gordon, the Joker retreats into the funhouse. Gordon's sanity is intact despite the ordeal, and he insists that Batman capture the Joker "by the book" in order to "show him that our way works". Batman enters the funhouse and faces the Joker's traps, while the Joker tries to persuade his old foe that the world is inherently insane and thus not worth fighting for. Eventually, Batman tracks down the Joker and subdues him.

Batman then attempts to reach out to him to give up crime and put a stop to their years-long war. The Joker declines, however, ruefully saying "It's too late for that... far too late". He then tells Batman a joke, which reflects their current situation and is funny enough to make the normally stone-faced Batman laugh. While they are laughing, Batman reaches across to Joker. They stop laughing abruptly while the sirens of the police cars keep getting louder as they approach the two men. In the end, all noise ceases and only the rain keeps pouring down.

Appearing in "The Killing Joke"

Featured Characters:

  • Batman (Flashback and main story)

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • The Joker (Origin) (Flashback and main story)
    • Danny Weaver
    • Huey, Dewey and Louie (Single appearance)
  • Vinnie & Joe (Dies in flashback)

Other Characters:

Locations:

Items:

Vehicles:

Concepts

Notes

  • This story is collected in the following:
  • This was the third Batman story DC published under its squarebound "Prestige" format, preceded by only Batman: The Dark Knight Returns and Batman: Son of the Demon.
    • Due to overwhelming critical and fan reception, it quickly entered second, third, and fourth printings (easily distinguished by cover logos colored differently from the original's green).
    • Cover logos go in the following order by print: Green (neon), Pink (light), Yellow (medium), Orange (light), Blue (medium), Orange (dark), Yellow (light), Blue (light), Crimson; with the 9th crimson print being considered the most rare.
  • Continuity notes:
    • This story was originally released in conjunction with Batgirl Special #1, which established that Barbara Gordon had retired from active duty as Batgirl some time beforehand. While the two stories never directly reference each other, Batgirl Special writer Barbara Kesel later confirmed she was specifically commissioned to facilitate a new status quo for the character.[1]
      • The concept that Batgirl was retired by the time of the Joker's attack has been contradicted by a number of later stories, like the one in The Brave and the Bold (Volume 3) #33. However, these stories ought to be considered as unofficial retcons, written years after the fact and most likely unaware of the status of the character back then.
    • The events of this story were first directly referenced in Batman #426, the first part of the "A Death in the Family" storyline, published only a few months after this story.
    • This story's depiction of the Joker's (possible) backstory draws heavily from the Red Hood's debut in Detective Comics #168. It has, in turn, influenced many later depictions of the Joker's origins:
      • Batman: Shadow of the Bat #38 directly continues the concept of the Joker once being a failed comedian trapped in poverty, and even reproduces several scenes from his ill-fated venture as the Red Hood. However, it also (re)emphasizes that the Joker cannot accurately recount his origins (at one point wondering if his wife had actually been "three wives and a goat").
      • Batman: Gotham Knights #54 follows a similar sketch, though it makes several greater changes, such as establishing that Jeannie had been killed by a corrupt policeman. This version was supposedly witnessed by Edward Nashton shortly before he debuted as the Riddler.
      • Countdown #31 contains a two-page feature—drawn by Brian Bolland—where the Joker directly narrates and taunts the reader with three possible accounts of his backstory. One of these accounts contains the failed comedian depicted in this story; another reproduces this story's illustration of the Joker's first laugh.
      • It should be noted, however, that a number of Joker origin stories—such as Paul Dini's "Case Study" (collected in Batman: Black & White, Vol. 2) and Michael Green's "Lovers & Madmen" (Batman Confidential #7–Batman Confidential #12)—avoid referencing this story in any capacity.
    • Page 9 of the story features a photograph of Bette Kane dressed up as Bat-Girl. This seemingly contradicts her first "appearance" in Secret Origins Annual (Volume 2) #3 which retcons her into always having being Flamebird. However, Young Justice #21 confirms in a throwaway line to Cassandra Cain, the current Batgirl at the time, that she had been Batgirl before, confirming her history and showing that photograph is intact, making The Killing Joke Bette's first Post-Crisis appearance.
  • Due to its prominence, this story was also adapted (in varying detail) by multiple forms of Batman media:

Trivia

  • During Zero Hour, a Batgirl of an alternate timeline appears who was never shot by the Joker. In her timeline, Commissioner Gordon was murdered that night and she grew on to a healthy older career, and even a romantic relationship with Batman himself.[2]
  • In Booster Gold (Volume 2) #5, Booster Gold is sent back in time by Rip Hunter in an effort to prevent the Joker's attack against Barbara Gordon. According to Hunter, however, most historical events are immutable despite however many times one might attempt to manipulate the timestream, and the crippling of Barbara Gordon is one such event. He had been trying to teach Booster a lesson in temporal mechanics.
  • James Gordon, Jr. makes a reference to the events of The Killing Joke in the "Batman: The Black Mirror" storyline. He mentions having been in a cell in Arkham Asylum adjacent to the Joker's, and hints at having given the Joker the idea to attack his sister. This is never further elaborated upon, and may have simply been a tease on the part of James's character, rather than an actual retcon of events.


See Also

Recommended Reading

Links and References

  1. ↑ Killing Joke in Canon Continuity
  2. ↑ Batman #511
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