Joker (comics)

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Publication history

In his initial dozen or so appearances, starting with Batman #1 (1940), the Joker was a straightforward mass murderer, much like a typical Dick Tracy villain with a bizarre appearance modeled after the playing card, but with only comparatively mild eccentric behavior. He was a master thief who liked to leave smiling corpses in his wake. In these early appearances, he would steal any number of things, but he seemed to have a particular fondness for jewels. It is of note that in his second appearance ("The Joker Returns", also in Batman #1), the Joker was actually slated to be killed off, with the final page detailing the villain accidentally stabbing himself and lying dead as Batman and Robin run off into the night. Fortunately, Bob Kane, Bill Finger, and Jerry Robinson quickly changed their minds and added a panel implying that the Joker was still alive.

Related Topics:
Mass murder - Dick Tracy - Corpse - Bill Finger

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For the next several appearances, the Joker would often escape capture but suffer an apparent death (falling off a cliff, being caught in a burning building, etc.), from which there would be no body and thus he would quickly recover. In these first dozen adventures, the Joker killed close to three dozen people, which was impressive for a villain who didn't use giant robots, mutant monsters, space lasers, or the like. This was the status quo from 1940 till around 1942. Ironically, the turning point came in "Joker Walks the Last Mile" (Detective Comics #64), where the Joker was actually sentenced and executed via the electric chair, only to immediately come back to life. Alas, while the Joker was back, he was decidedly less deadly than ever. At that point, the editors decided that only one-shot villains should commit murder, so as to not make Batman look impotent in his inability to punish such recurring foes as the Joker or the Penguin. As the Batman comics as a whole softened their tone, the character's emphasis was soon turned to jokes and comedy-themed crimes, and the Joker became a harmless, cackling nuisance. He quickly became the most popular villain and was used almost constantly during the Golden Age of Comic Books. The use of the character lessened somewhat by the late 1950s and disappeared almost entirely when Julius Schwartz took over editorship of the Batman comics in 1964.

Related Topics:
Robot - Laser - 1940 - 1942 - Electric chair - The Penguin - Golden Age of Comic Books - 1950s - Julius Schwartz - 1964

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In 1973, the character was profoundly revised in the Batman comic stories by Dennis O'Neil and Neal Adams. Beginning in Batman #251 with the story "The Joker's Five Way Revenge", the Joker became a homicidal maniac who casually murdered people, even his own henchmen, on a whim, but enjoyed the battle of wits with Batman. This take on the character has been the predominant one since. Steve Englehart, in his short but well-received run on the book, added elements deepening the severity of the Joker's insanity with the Joker's desire to trademark fish subjected to his toxins.

Related Topics:
1973 - Dennis O'Neil - Neal Adams - Wit - Steve Englehart

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The character even had his own nine-issue series during the 1970s where he faced off against a variety of foes, both superheroes and supervillains. Although he was the hero of the series, certain issues had as high a body count as stories where he was the antagonist. Of the nine issues, he committed murder in seven of them.

Related Topics:
1970s - Superhero - Antagonist

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A major addition to the character was the introduction of Harley Quinn, an insane psychiatrist who fell hopelessly in love with the Joker in Arkham Asylum and now serves as his loyal, if daffy, sidekick costumed in a skintight harlequin suit. Their relationship often resembles that of an abusive domestic relationship, with Joker insulting, hurting, or even attempting to kill Quinn, who always comes back for more. That this sort of material actually made its debut in a cartoon intended for children (', which aired from September 1992 till October 1999) is particularly of note. The comic book story "Mad Love" from the Batman Adventures series (a book inspired by the '90s cartoon), a story that recounts Quinn's origin and shows her actually defeating and single handedly almost killing Batman (she's only stopped by an egotistical Joker, who nearly kills her, only to woo her back in the end), won several comic book awards and eventually became an episode in the cartoon. She was popular enough to be integrated into the comics in 1999 and even had her own sporadically successful comic series which only recently ended its run with 38 issues. A modified version of the character, less goofy but still criminally insane and utterly devoted to the Joker, was featured on the live-action TV series Birds of Prey which lasted only 13 episodes.

Related Topics:
Harley Quinn - Psychiatrist - Arkham Asylum - Sidekick - Harlequin - Abusive domestic relationship - 1992 - 1999 - Batman Adventures - '90s - Birds of Prey

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