I connect a lot more w BB and TDKR

My personal choice would be The Dark Knight. Not that Rises was not deep, maybe even more than TDK, but I connected a lot more to the thematic with the dynamic between the Joker and Batman or Dent's Journey to Villany.

For me the themes of TDKR were more deep than the previous two films. Easily...actually.

Batfan175 wrote:i think TDKR had a deeper villain. the joker is a great theatric liar but since he's an unreliable narrator i cannot take anything he says seriously. so when he says he's an anarchist i call BS because five minutes later he says "everyone left here plays by my rules", which is the complete opposite of anarchist philosphy; you try to live in harmony together by choosing to respect other around you by your own free will, not try to impose your views on others. the joker and batman also don't seem that similar because while both work outside of acceptable social norms, the joker kills like a hundred people a day whereas batman never crosses that line (ok he struggles but that does not mean they're similar). they're different solutions to the same problem, which is random criminality. bane and batman seem like two sides of the same coin; both are legendary fighters disguising their true identity; both represent authoritative responses to socio-political problems but where batman seems conflicted bane is completely in love with his own power and both try to motivate the apathetic masses and ultimately both succeed in their own way but the difference is that bane is being dishonest, while denouncing the hypocrisy of the american society, which makes him the bigges hypocrite ever. Also, his mask relieves him of the pain (in a literal sense of course) whereas batman's pain is emotional as opposed to physical and so his mask is not his ultimate undoing because he's not bound to it. whereas batman's legend is built on truth mostly, bane takes credit for someone else's deeds and can only function with the help of his anasthetic. the joker is just that tempting devil (which is great but ultimately it's what you'd expect from the joker). the dark knight rises also accounts for the fact that the world of superheros and money are not separate and that it does matter because the disenfranchised will not take it forever and in the form of catwoman and bane we have two disenfranchised people using extreme methods against a society they perceive to be extremely corrupt and hypocritical, just as batman does. the dark knight is a metaphor on the abuse of civil liberties in light of extreme violence, whereas the dark knight rises is about leadership and the different forms it can take: bane's revolution is a lie and is only designed to get himself into power until he cannot physically own gotham anymore. if anything, tdkr did that nietzschean thing about "the abyss looks back through you" even more so than TDK. If that's not deep i don't know what is.

Perhaps you're an age where you grew up and intellectually matured between when the dark knight and dark knight rises came out? (that's not a shot I'm at that age, I've just went back to TDK all the time to dig up it's depth). I say this because you seem so in tune with the depth of dark knight rises, to your credit, and yet pretty hugely out of step with the dark knight, and especially the joker, I think you've misunderstood the Joker pretty profoundly.

For starters your definition of anarchy is A definition of anarchy, but not the only one, anarchy is often, perhaps most often considered a violent concept, it simply means to live without governing body or law, or in more adaptable terms rules, that's all, that peaceful definition of anarchy is in no way what the joker claims to be. The Joker is a liar but all in the service of telling one key truth, control is a lie, and thus is civilization, which is innately based in establishing social and political control. The Joker lies about his past not because he's trying to create a lie, but because he's toying with people's wish to assign blame and understanding to how he can be the way he is. He's a liar so that he can make himself an absolute, a pure agent of chaos, no back-story and origin moment to comfort people, no way to right him off as a victim, he simply is. He lies so that there is no undermining what he represents, the presence of chaos. In terms of similarity, the Joker and Batman are the most inextricably tied together of any villain with Batman. I'll give you that Bane is more similar and tied to Bruce, as TDK simply isn't about Bruce, but the Joker is and always has been Batman's reverse, his evil mirror, his archenemy. They are similar in that they have devoted their lives to representing absolutes, absolutes in order to effect how the citizens see the world. They are both freaks, completely distant with their sense of humanity, and thus outside civilization. But it's there that their relationship is the deepest of all, it's all about order vs. anarchy, they represent the exact opposite things. Batman that there can be order and criminality/chaos can be done away with, the Joker that order is a lie and a delusion and that control and social order are in truth pathetically vulnerable, completely shattered with the simple application of violence, of chaos.

When the joker says my town, my rules, you have to remember what he said to Batman, that the only sensible way to live is without rules and so he's going to make him break his one rule. The Joker is being playful, his rule is that there are no rules (a common saying), all this is Joker's sadistic way of saying that it's Marshall law now. More importantly, that people are going to have to break their rules, see this is the joker's plan, he has no plan as pertains to himself and his world, his plan is simply to flip people's rules on themselves. Notice, right after he says my town now, he sets up the boat situation (thou shall not kill is the most innate human rule/law) he's making a situation impossibly illogical to not murder in, and thus showing how quickly people will break their rules when their life is at stake and control is gone. (only, of course, he loses the boat bet). Again with the imposing your views thing as well, The Joker is dealing with people, a society, that's highly bureaucratic and system-ed, what he's imposing is anarchy, he's proving it's reign, as violent anarchy often does, respecting others point of view is again tied to the progressive concept of anarchy, but that has nothing to do with the joker. But more to the point, he's not taking away their free will, he's letting it out. These people are living, in his mind, in boxes of society, smothered by rules they accept in exchange for safety and comfort, the Joker's goal is to liberate all of these people to set them free of all these rules via violent examples, the opposite of what the Batman wishes to do (reinforce the rules via a honorable example). Also you say the joker and batman are different solutions to the same problem of random criminality? That's profoundly incorrect, the joker is promoting random criminality, he IS it.

Watch the Joker's scene with Harvey in the hospital closely, and several times, the depth of his perspective is all in that scene. He proclaims himself a dog chasing a car, there's nothing he wants for himself he just wants to cause havoc, and he's be without purpose if he got what he wanted, that's why he won't kill Batman, because Batman gives him a sparring partner to play with. The joker only knows how to be an agent of chaos, not a fulfilled concept, he needs batman in order to exist (you, complete, me. A line that always gets a laugh but is completely sincere in actuality) or else there will be no one else crazy and committed and capable enough to fight this fight with him. Thus his final scene, when he praises Batman's true incorruptibility, proclaims Batman to be his true equal (an unstoppable force and an unmovable object). The Joker minds sadistic pleasure in that there battle is everlasting, Batman can't kill him or else the joker wins (gets him to break his rule) and the joker won't kill the batman because he'd be bored and unchallenged without him, so they're meant to do this forever. The Joker and Batman are more tied together then Bane and Batman by far, the Joker and Batman are an essential god and lucifer of gotham, they exist only in reference to each other.

Which finally, brings out one of the deepest most interesting parts of the joker, that he exists purely as a response to the batman. His very existence is tied to Batman in a dark and deep way, asking if Batman is doing more harm then good. Before Batman, crime that was within society's walls (money based) ruled, because batman stomped them out they had to turn to the only person/thing that Batman wouldn't be effective against out of pure survival. The Joker's rise to power simply never happens if Batman doesn't force the mobb to that desperate play, and many of gotham's citizens know this and blame batman in the movie. So they're not only similar and key to each other, they exist because of and in reference to each other.

Bane is a great character, his relationship with Bruce is quite fascinating, but he has no relationship with Batman. There's only one villain that defines the Batman and is most deeply one with his story, and it's always been the joker, no more so then in this interpretation.

dustbust5 wrote:

Batfan175 wrote:i think TDKR had a deeper villain. the joker is a great theatric liar but since he's an unreliable narrator i cannot take anything he says seriously. so when he says he's an anarchist i call BS because five minutes later he says "everyone left here plays by my rules", which is the complete opposite of anarchist philosphy; you try to live in harmony together by choosing to respect other around you by your own free will, not try to impose your views on others. the joker and batman also don't seem that similar because while both work outside of acceptable social norms, the joker kills like a hundred people a day whereas batman never crosses that line (ok he struggles but that does not mean they're similar). they're different solutions to the same problem, which is random criminality. bane and batman seem like two sides of the same coin; both are legendary fighters disguising their true identity; both represent authoritative responses to socio-political problems but where batman seems conflicted bane is completely in love with his own power and both try to motivate the apathetic masses and ultimately both succeed in their own way but the difference is that bane is being dishonest, while denouncing the hypocrisy of the american society, which makes him the bigges hypocrite ever. Also, his mask relieves him of the pain (in a literal sense of course) whereas batman's pain is emotional as opposed to physical and so his mask is not his ultimate undoing because he's not bound to it. whereas batman's legend is built on truth mostly, bane takes credit for someone else's deeds and can only function with the help of his anasthetic. the joker is just that tempting devil (which is great but ultimately it's what you'd expect from the joker). the dark knight rises also accounts for the fact that the world of superheros and money are not separate and that it does matter because the disenfranchised will not take it forever and in the form of catwoman and bane we have two disenfranchised people using extreme methods against a society they perceive to be extremely corrupt and hypocritical, just as batman does. the dark knight is a metaphor on the abuse of civil liberties in light of extreme violence, whereas the dark knight rises is about leadership and the different forms it can take: bane's revolution is a lie and is only designed to get himself into power until he cannot physically own gotham anymore. if anything, tdkr did that nietzschean thing about "the abyss looks back through you" even more so than TDK. If that's not deep i don't know what is.

Perhaps you're an age where you grew up and intellectually matured between when the dark knight and dark knight rises came out? (that's not a shot I'm at that age, I've just went back to TDK all the time to dig up it's depth). I say this because you seem so in tune with the depth of dark knight rises, to your credit, and yet pretty hugely out of step with the dark knight, and especially the joker, I think you've misunderstood the Joker pretty profoundly.

For starters your definition of anarchy is A definition of anarchy, but not the only one, anarchy is often, perhaps most often considered a violent concept, it simply means to live without governing body or law, or in more adaptable terms rules, that's all, that peaceful definition of anarchy is in no way what the joker claims to be. The Joker is a liar but all in the service of telling one key truth, control is a lie, and thus is civilization, which is innately based in establishing social and political control. The Joker lies about his past not because he's trying to create a lie, but because he's toying with people's wish to assign blame and understanding to how he can be the way he is. He's a liar so that he can make himself an absolute, a pure agent of chaos, no back-story and origin moment to comfort people, no way to right him off as a victim, he simply is. He lies so that there is no undermining what he represents, the presence of chaos. In terms of similarity, the Joker and Batman are the most inextricably tied together of any villain with Batman. I'll give you that Bane is more similar and tied to Bruce, as TDK simply isn't about Bruce, but the Joker is and always has been Batman's reverse, his evil mirror, his archenemy. They are similar in that they have devoted their lives to representing absolutes, absolutes in order to effect how the citizens see the world. They are both freaks, completely distant with their sense of humanity, and thus outside civilization. But it's there that their relationship is the deepest of all, it's all about order vs. anarchy, they represent the exact opposite things. Batman that there can be order and criminality/chaos can be done away with, the Joker that order is a lie and a delusion and that control and social order are in truth pathetically vulnerable, completely shattered with the simple application of violence, of chaos.

When the joker says my town, my rules, you have to remember what he said to Batman, that the only sensible way to live is without rules and so he's going to make him break his one rule. The Joker is being playful, his rule is that there are no rules (a common saying), all this is Joker's sadistic way of saying that it's Marshall law now. More importantly, that people are going to have to break their rules, see this is the joker's plan, he has no plan as pertains to himself and his world, his plan is simply to flip people's rules on themselves. Notice, right after he says my town now, he sets up the boat situation (thou shall not kill is the most innate human rule/law) he's making a situation impossibly illogical to not murder in, and thus showing how quickly people will break their rules when their life is at stake and control is gone. (only, of course, he loses the boat bet). Again with the imposing your views thing as well, The Joker is dealing with people, a society, that's highly bureaucratic and system-ed, what he's imposing is anarchy, he's proving it's reign, as violent anarchy often does, respecting others point of view is again tied to the progressive concept of anarchy, but that has nothing to do with the joker. But more to the point, he's not taking away their free will, he's letting it out. These people are living, in his mind, in boxes of society, smothered by rules they accept in exchange for safety and comfort, the Joker's goal is to liberate all of these people to set them free of all these rules via violent examples, the opposite of what the Batman wishes to do (reinforce the rules via a honorable example). Also you say the joker and batman are different solutions to the same problem of random criminality? That's profoundly incorrect, the joker is promoting random criminality, he IS it.

Watch the Joker's scene with Harvey in the hospital closely, and several times, the depth of his perspective is all in that scene. He proclaims himself a dog chasing a car, there's nothing he wants for himself he just wants to cause havoc, and he's be without purpose if he got what he wanted, that's why he won't kill Batman, because Batman gives him a sparring partner to play with. The joker only knows how to be an agent of chaos, not a fulfilled concept, he needs batman in order to exist (you, complete, me. A line that always gets a laugh but is completely sincere in actuality) or else there will be no one else crazy and committed and capable enough to fight this fight with him. Thus his final scene, when he praises Batman's true incorruptibility, proclaims Batman to be his true equal (an unstoppable force and an unmovable object). The Joker minds sadistic pleasure in that there battle is everlasting, Batman can't kill him or else the joker wins (gets him to break his rule) and the joker won't kill the batman because he'd be bored and unchallenged without him, so they're meant to do this forever. The Joker and Batman are more tied together then Bane and Batman by far, the Joker and Batman are an essential god and lucifer of gotham, they exist only in reference to each other.

Which finally, brings out one of the deepest most interesting parts of the joker, that he exists purely as a response to the batman. His very existence is tied to Batman in a dark and deep way, asking if Batman is doing more harm then good. Before Batman, crime that was within society's walls (money based) ruled, because batman stomped them out they had to turn to the only person/thing that Batman wouldn't be effective against out of pure survival. The Joker's rise to power simply never happens if Batman doesn't force the mobb to that desperate play, and many of gotham's citizens know this and blame batman in the movie. So they're not only similar and key to each other, they exist because of and in reference to each other.

Bane is a great character, his relationship with Bruce is quite fascinating, but he has no relationship with Batman. There's only one villain that defines the Batman and is most deeply one with his story, and it's always been the joker, no more so then in this interpretation.

I'm saying that the Joker and batman are different solutions to the same problem because it is true. They both have different responses to the question of how to react to random violence: the joker says it's ok to become crazy when everything becomes too overbearing, whereas batman chooses to help others, albeit in a strange (and easy) way because it is much easier to beat up criminals than to deal with the actual causes of criminality and that would requie less action and more academic study. I think I find bane more interesting in that, at his core, he is the anti-batman, which is why I was behind the choice for this villain right from the start. He is everything bruce wayne could have been had he chosen to make himself the focus of everything (you know in the sense of this is my problem, my woes, my pain and everybody needs to acknowledge my problem and pay attention to me). Bane is obsessed with his own persona and his own strength and since he had to fight for everything his whole life he feels he's owed everything, whereas batman is almost about the total abdication of personality and all worldly possessions for a greater purpose. Both use corecion to get what they want (Bane obviously for selfish reasons and batman to help out other people but that dies not change the fact that they are both repressive forces).

I guess I just cannot believe the Joker when he says "by killing me you are just like me" because that would imply that batman kills hundreds of people for no reason whatsoever, which is morally impossible for Bruce Wayne to do, no matter how much the joker tempts him and even if the Joker were to accomplish his goal this would not mean that batman suddenly is joker 2.0. So the idea that he'll eventually crack and randomly kill innocents is impossible for the joker to achieve at this point, in which case their relationship becomes quite redundant after a while. Maybe the Joker is satisfied with batman killing out of necessity because that still means compromising his principles but he can never dream of making batman into a psychotic mass murderer. i guess the fact that the Joker is too aware of that relationship does not make it beliveable to me. bane actually resembles batman in many ways and challenges him without thinking about their similarities, which i find more compelling because at that point it's just a fight for surival and noone has the moral highground (because can all say who should drive societal change: batman or the Joker but between batman and bane the lines become blurry because the end result is pretty much the same).

At least we can agree that anarchism (which is not synonymous with anarchy) is not in itself violent but that often it is being painted that way because the state needs a reason to exist and when it cannot deal with all the modern problems of our society then it becomes quite tempting for people to ask "why do we need you?", in which case the state sees a need to point out the violence of stateless societies as a boogeyman. it might well be that some anarchists are violent but the reason people think all anarchists are bombthrowers is because the people exercising peaceful civil disobendience (which is essential to arnarchism by the way)don't attract media attention as much as violent guerrilla groups. it is also false to say that anarchism knows no form of social order: it is just that hierarchical structures are not part of that society.

Saying batman and the Joker are like god and lucifer is like saying the joker is absolute evil (which he cannot be since he's a mentally ill person, who by definition doesn't act out of evil intentions, unless he were a psychopath in which case he could not be declared criminally insane and be sent to arkham all the time because psychopaths aren't criminally insane; they just don't feel empathy and remorse) and that batman is absolutely good, which he isn't (he is a very obsessed man who would defend a police state, if it just meant greater security, as The Dark Knight Returns clearly shows). Batman is a control freak in many ways and just because we don't get to see the consequence of his violence on the offenders he beats to an inch of their lives does not mean that he does not ruin the lives of many stupid and misguided people who could have turned their forces to do good with just the right incentive. Also, batman stands behind law and order absolutely, no matter what the laws say (if they are unjust or not does not matter to him or else he'd speak out against them as Bruce Wayne). he also puts children in danger who are too young to fully understand the consequences of getting involved in his fight and he never learns from these mistakes: Jason Todd gets beaten to death in the comics but instead of having that leave a lasting mental scar it just gets forgotten after a while thanks to a cop-out (thank you very much, Red Hood) and he's training new Robins. i guess that's what we'd call reckless. The only reason that we're not outraged by this fascist side is because he's being given his one noble rule of not killing.

Batfan175 wrote:

dustbust5 wrote:
Perhaps you're an age where you grew up and intellectually matured between when the dark knight and dark knight rises came out? (that's not a shot I'm at that age, I've just went back to TDK all the time to dig up it's depth). I say this because you seem so in tune with the depth of dark knight rises, to your credit, and yet pretty hugely out of step with the dark knight, and especially the joker, I think you've misunderstood the Joker pretty profoundly.

For starters your definition of anarchy is A definition of anarchy, but not the only one, anarchy is often, perhaps most often considered a violent concept, it simply means to live without governing body or law, or in more adaptable terms rules, that's all, that peaceful definition of anarchy is in no way what the joker claims to be. The Joker is a liar but all in the service of telling one key truth, control is a lie, and thus is civilization, which is innately based in establishing social and political control. The Joker lies about his past not because he's trying to create a lie, but because he's toying with people's wish to assign blame and understanding to how he can be the way he is. He's a liar so that he can make himself an absolute, a pure agent of chaos, no back-story and origin moment to comfort people, no way to right him off as a victim, he simply is. He lies so that there is no undermining what he represents, the presence of chaos. In terms of similarity, the Joker and Batman are the most inextricably tied together of any villain with Batman. I'll give you that Bane is more similar and tied to Bruce, as TDK simply isn't about Bruce, but the Joker is and always has been Batman's reverse, his evil mirror, his archenemy. They are similar in that they have devoted their lives to representing absolutes, absolutes in order to effect how the citizens see the world. They are both freaks, completely distant with their sense of humanity, and thus outside civilization. But it's there that their relationship is the deepest of all, it's all about order vs. anarchy, they represent the exact opposite things. Batman that there can be order and criminality/chaos can be done away with, the Joker that order is a lie and a delusion and that control and social order are in truth pathetically vulnerable, completely shattered with the simple application of violence, of chaos.

When the joker says my town, my rules, you have to remember what he said to Batman, that the only sensible way to live is without rules and so he's going to make him break his one rule. The Joker is being playful, his rule is that there are no rules (a common saying), all this is Joker's sadistic way of saying that it's Marshall law now. More importantly, that people are going to have to break their rules, see this is the joker's plan, he has no plan as pertains to himself and his world, his plan is simply to flip people's rules on themselves. Notice, right after he says my town now, he sets up the boat situation (thou shall not kill is the most innate human rule/law) he's making a situation impossibly illogical to not murder in, and thus showing how quickly people will break their rules when their life is at stake and control is gone. (only, of course, he loses the boat bet). Again with the imposing your views thing as well, The Joker is dealing with people, a society, that's highly bureaucratic and system-ed, what he's imposing is anarchy, he's proving it's reign, as violent anarchy often does, respecting others point of view is again tied to the progressive concept of anarchy, but that has nothing to do with the joker. But more to the point, he's not taking away their free will, he's letting it out. These people are living, in his mind, in boxes of society, smothered by rules they accept in exchange for safety and comfort, the Joker's goal is to liberate all of these people to set them free of all these rules via violent examples, the opposite of what the Batman wishes to do (reinforce the rules via a honorable example). Also you say the joker and batman are different solutions to the same problem of random criminality? That's profoundly incorrect, the joker is promoting random criminality, he IS it.

Watch the Joker's scene with Harvey in the hospital closely, and several times, the depth of his perspective is all in that scene. He proclaims himself a dog chasing a car, there's nothing he wants for himself he just wants to cause havoc, and he's be without purpose if he got what he wanted, that's why he won't kill Batman, because Batman gives him a sparring partner to play with. The joker only knows how to be an agent of chaos, not a fulfilled concept, he needs batman in order to exist (you, complete, me. A line that always gets a laugh but is completely sincere in actuality) or else there will be no one else crazy and committed and capable enough to fight this fight with him. Thus his final scene, when he praises Batman's true incorruptibility, proclaims Batman to be his true equal (an unstoppable force and an unmovable object). The Joker minds sadistic pleasure in that there battle is everlasting, Batman can't kill him or else the joker wins (gets him to break his rule) and the joker won't kill the batman because he'd be bored and unchallenged without him, so they're meant to do this forever. The Joker and Batman are more tied together then Bane and Batman by far, the Joker and Batman are an essential god and lucifer of gotham, they exist only in reference to each other.

Which finally, brings out one of the deepest most interesting parts of the joker, that he exists purely as a response to the batman. His very existence is tied to Batman in a dark and deep way, asking if Batman is doing more harm then good. Before Batman, crime that was within society's walls (money based) ruled, because batman stomped them out they had to turn to the only person/thing that Batman wouldn't be effective against out of pure survival. The Joker's rise to power simply never happens if Batman doesn't force the mobb to that desperate play, and many of gotham's citizens know this and blame batman in the movie. So they're not only similar and key to each other, they exist because of and in reference to each other.

Bane is a great character, his relationship with Bruce is quite fascinating, but he has no relationship with Batman. There's only one villain that defines the Batman and is most deeply one with his story, and it's always been the joker, no more so then in this interpretation.

I'm saying that the Joker and batman are different solutions to the same problem because it is true. They both have different responses to the question of how to react to random violence: the joker says it's ok to become crazy when everything becomes too overbearing, whereas batman chooses to help others, albeit in a strange (and easy) way because it is much easier to beat up criminals than to deal with the actual causes of criminality and that would requie less action and more academic study. I think I find bane more interesting in that, at his core, he is the anti-batman, which is why I was behind the choice for this villain right from the start. He is everything bruce wayne could have been had he chosen to make himself the focus of everything (you know in the sense of this is my problem, my woes, my pain and everybody needs to acknowledge my problem and pay attention to me). Bane is obsessed with his own persona and his own strength and since he had to fight for everything his whole life he feels he's owed everything, whereas batman is almost about the total abdication of personality and all worldly possessions for a greater purpose. Both use corecion to get what they want (Bane obviously for selfish reasons and batman to help out other people but that dies not change the fact that they are both repressive forces).

I guess I just cannot believe the Joker when he says "by killing me you are just like me" because that would imply that batman kills hundreds of people for no reason whatsoever, which is morally impossible for Bruce Wayne to do, no matter how much the joker tempts him and even if the Joker were to accomplish his goal this would not mean that batman suddenly is joker 2.0. So the idea that he'll eventually crack and randomly kill innocents is impossible for the joker to achieve at this point, in which case their relationship becomes quite redundant after a while. Maybe the Joker is satisfied with batman killing out of necessity because that still means compromising his principles but he can never dream of making batman into a psychotic mass murderer. i guess the fact that the Joker is too aware of that relationship does not make it beliveable to me. bane actually resembles batman in many ways and challenges him without thinking about their similarities, which i find more compelling because at that point it's just a fight for surival and noone has the moral highground (because can all say who should drive societal change: batman or the Joker but between batman and bane the lines become blurry because the end result is pretty much the same).

At least we can agree that anarchism (which is not synonymous with anarchy) is not in itself violent but that often it is being painted that way because the state needs a reason to exist and when it cannot deal with all the modern problems of our society then it becomes quite tempting for people to ask "why do we need you?", in which case the state sees a need to point out the violence of stateless societies as a boogeyman. it might well be that some anarchists are violent but the reason people think all anarchists are bombthrowers is because the people exercising peaceful civil disobendience (which is essential to arnarchism by the way)don't attract media attention as much as violent guerrilla groups. it is also false to say that anarchism knows no form of social order: it is just that hierarchical structures are not part of that society.

Saying batman and the Joker are like god and lucifer is like saying the joker is absolute evil (which he cannot be since he's a mentally ill person, who by definition doesn't act out of evil intentions, unless he were a psychopath in which case he could not be declared criminally insane and be sent to arkham all the time because psychopaths aren't criminally insane; they just don't feel empathy and remorse) and that batman is absolutely good, which he isn't (he is a very obsessed man who would defend a police state, if it just meant greater security, as The Dark Knight Returns clearly shows). Batman is a control freak in many ways and just because we don't get to see the consequence of his violence on the offenders he beats to an inch of their lives does not mean that he does not ruin the lives of many stupid and misguided people who could have turned their forces to do good with just the right incentive. Also, batman stands behind law and order absolutely, no matter what the laws say (if they are unjust or not does not matter to him or else he'd speak out against them as Bruce Wayne). he also puts children in danger who are too young to fully understand the consequences of getting involved in his fight and he never learns from these mistakes: Jason Todd gets beaten to death in the comics but instead of having that leave a lasting mental scar it just gets forgotten after a while thanks to a cop-out (thank you very much, Red Hood) and he's training new Robins. i guess that's what we'd call reckless. The only reason that we're not outraged by this fascist side is because he's being given his one noble rule of not killing.

Thanks for the response, it was well thought out, much appreciated. I do think you've got the Joker a little backward, he's not a response to random criminality, he is random criminality, his goal isn't to say it's ok to go crazy in response, his goal is to show how quickly people will go crazy in response. He is violent to show how quickly civilization and "being civilized" collapses in response to violence, he's not asking people to go crazy he's just exposing that they will, it's all about exposing the facade of civilization and being civilized. But the Joker is simply not a response to random crime, he's a response to batman, he IS random crime, there isn't one moment in the film where he responds to random crime, he's either the crime himself or the one that lit the fuse. So not quite sure what you're talking about with that.

At no point in the film does the joker say by killing you are just like me, nor is that the spirit of what he says, his point is to simply show that people aren't as good and evolved as they believe they are, in times of crises they become animals, and this is what the joker exposes. That said, he does expose that with batman more by making batman loos his cool and control in the room, but he is not trying to turn batman into a murderer, per se, he does believe in batman's incorruptibility, that's why he's so fascinated by him. The point of what the joker is doing with backing Batman into the corner until he has to kill is the same thing he's doing with everyone else, shattering his sense of control and evolved/civilized nature. What Batman does is insane, it's an insane decision to dress up as a bat and fight crime, but it's also a paradox. Batman is restoring order outside of the system, he's a criminal, but what Batman does is he gives himself this one rule, this one line he won't cross, so that he can maintain belief that what he's doing is right and he's not abusing his power like criminals do. Batman protects himself from seeing himself as a criminal or being out of control of his own actions by giving himself this rule, that's what the joker means when he says the rule is a sense of self righteousness. So it's not that he's trying to prove that Batman is as bad as him, it's just that he's trying to shatter his sense of control by making him brake his only rule, thus braking Batman's moral superiority and proof of control. The Joker is an anarchist, he believes rules aren't sensible and get broken in a heartbeat when the chips are down, Batman is his most difficult subject but he still has one rule, so the joker's masterpiece is to get Batman to brake it simply by making choices, because he's not in control and can't save everyone. Just imagine a master thief is left with only the hardest museum in the world to brake into, so he makes that his focus if not obsession, that's what the joker is doing, Batman is the only person incorruptible enough to resist being pushed to brake his rules, so the joker makes it his obsession to make it happen. It's a game for the Joker, and this is his rival. But also his masterpiece, for if he can make Batman not only kill but eventually have to be treated unjustly just to protect the people's idol, then he's won, he made the batman kill and made the batman take on even more murders as a symbol in order to avoid defeat.

Whether the Joker is crazy is a matter of what you mean by crazy. I mean he's obviously a sociopath, that's without question, but if insanity insinuates a false vision of the world, then he simply isn't insane in this movie. That's the whole point of Harvey's fall, he proves the joker right, and sadly the joker is right, civilized people are as civilized as the world allows them to be, for the vast majority flip their world over and fill them with fear, and they'll attack their neighbor in a second. Anyway, I should have explained the God Lucifer thing better. Obviously, the joker is a real person despite his unknown past and we know Bruce's faults, they aren't gods. What the Dark Knight is is about their symbols, both of them portraying god like figures in order to inspire a reaction in a way a mere normal human can't. So what I was saying is their war in the film is as these god like figures they purposely created for themselves, both deciding that having their humanity exposed would weaken the image, and they're fighting for Gotham's soul. They're not literally gods, but their role in the city is as gods, absolutes, as a result of their own efforts to keep it that way. And this movie is these two god like figures battling for the city's soul, with Harvey Dent as the main playing ground of their battle, hence two face, cuz he has both honor and good and yet that corruptibility and anger in him. Our exposure to Bruce as a human is incidental to the larger story, from Gotham's perspective these two figures are god like, for better or worse, and the people do come to resent that moral authority when things go bad, enough to want to shatter the god image before Harvey saves it with his stunt.

But, read again what you wrote about that they can't be god and lucifer. Whether or not the joker is insane, what the hell is the devil? The Devil personifies psychopathy, his mission is to inflict pain and agony and torture, by that definition I don't see how the joker's insanity separates him from Lucifer.

And guess what, ditto for god with what you said about Batman! Ever read the bible? You wanna see fascism, look at the sedistic punishments that fucker hands out in that book, not to mention the even more fucked up tests he puts Jobe and Abraham through. If Batman being a control freak who puts people in danger makes him not like god, I want to meet the god you're talking about.

Your in-depth discussion on the Joker made me wonder what the Joker would have (or did ) think of Bane and his take-over of Gotham. He didn't want to see Batman killed, so would he have actually gone against Bane (no doubt in a subversive way, not an overt one)?

Just something fun to ponder...

Baniac wrote:Your in-depth discussion on the Joker made me wonder what the Joker would have (or did ) think of Bane and his take-over of Gotham. He didn't want to see Batman killed, so would he have actually gone against Bane (no doubt in a subversive way, not an overt one)?

Just something fun to ponder...

I always thought that the Joker would be as fascinated with antagonizing Bane or Ra's as he would with Batman.

nolannolanchrischris wrote:

Baniac wrote:Your in-depth discussion on the Joker made me wonder what the Joker would have (or did ) think of Bane and his take-over of Gotham. He didn't want to see Batman killed, so would he have actually gone against Bane (no doubt in a subversive way, not an overt one)?

Just something fun to ponder...

I always thought that the Joker would be as fascinated with antagonizing Bane or Ra's as he would with Batman.

Baniac wrote:Your in-depth discussion on the Joker made me wonder what the Joker would have (or did ) think of Bane and his take-over of Gotham. He didn't want to see Batman killed, so would he have actually gone against Bane (no doubt in a subversive way, not an overt one)?

Just something fun to ponder...

Well I've always divided it up as Joker being truly opposite Batman, where Bane and Ra's are similar just with a darker point of view on how to get to the same place. So, I think one thing we know for sure is that Bane has a plan, and the Joker wouldn't like that. I also think he would not have as much fun with Bane, because Bane is outside the concept of social good, he already wallows in the pit of humanities faults, so there just isn't as much to do with Bane. What can he battle with him about? It's Batman's self righteousness that makes him so perfect for the Joker, makes them such enduring adversaries, Joker and Bane just don't fit.

Watching from a far, I think the Joker would have enjoyed the martial law and the kangaroo courts and such, he would have liked that. I think he'd enjoy as well that everyone is running around under the belief that they can keep this bomb at bay, all while the bomb is going to off no matter what, that's very Joker. I guess the Joker would have enjoyed watching Bane's havoc, but he still couldn't get behind the league of shadows at the end of the day, they're plan based, they have a vision that is rooted in restored control and balance.

Apparently, and I'm not a comic reader, but there's a comic book where Joker is in Arkham and a villain is taking over the city like Bane did in this (or maybe it just is Bane in the comic book) and Batman goes to Joker for help, ala silence of the lambs. NO way the nolan's would so directly take from silence of the lambs so that probably wouldn't have been, but it's fun to think about, especially since I feel like the Joker would kind of root for batman if it's not himself that Batman is trying to stop. The Joker doesn't care about end game, only having fun and causing havoc, so losing Batman and the city being pure evil would almost give the joker nothing to do, he'd be bored as hell, and he essentially says as much in TDK when he says how boring Gotham was when the mob was successful and running the city. He needs Batman, so at the end of the day I'd think he'd help Batman out of pure selfishness, he wants him to himself.

Is there a precedent for that in the comics? I know there's a precedent for the joker not killing batman when he has a chance because he needs their relationship too much, right?