Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Batman, Comics, dc, dc comics, entertainment, greg capullo, joker, scott snyder

The Joker As Your Essential Inner Voice Of Madness In Today's Batman #40 (SPOILERS)

Published Wed, 29 Apr 2015 07:30:13 -0500

Last updated Wed, 29 Apr 2015 07:38:42 -0500

Today's Batman #40 is a quite the chapter in the history of Batman and the Joker. It has the visceral intensity and closeness of foes of The Dark Knight Returns with the colour scheme bombast and introspection of The Killing Joke while even mirroring aspects of another Frank Miller battle, Batman/Spawn.

There's a lot of Batman history in this comic book. But while Alan Moore would criticise his own work on the The Killing Joke as being a story about nothing more than Batman and Joker rather than anything more meaningful, Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo are talking about the human condition.

There are some spoilers here, but not big ones. You should be okay.

Because this is the Joker.

Snyder has reinterpreted the Joker as the voice inside all of, that mocks us, that laughs at us, the one that says we are not worthy, that we are incompetent that asks how dare we even try to do what we do?

But it's also the voice that we have to fight. It's the voice that gives us purpose, the voice that we have to prove is wrong, sometimes by overcompensating and driving us to success. Sometimes that voice is outsourced to others, the famous line from an outgoing President, "you won't have Nixon to kick around any more".

That voice drives humanity to do better, to be better. But also to do terrible things on the way, and also bringing us crashing down into depression. And that is how Snyder and Capullo portray The Joker, as an essential piece of us, but one that can severely warp us if we are not careful….

Also, it's a hell of a cool superhero comic book.

Today's comics courtesy of Orbital Comics, London, launching a Music & Comics Gallery on Friday, 12 comic artists have been tasked with taking an album of their choosing, and creating a new piece of cover art for it, with proceeds going to Brain Tumour Research. And on Saturday are running a Free Comic Book Day that they say won't hand out random grab bags and won't run out by midday. Londoners know what they are getting at…