I just finished watching Batman: the Killing Joke in a theater. Right away, I want to state that it is a great vindication to have a DC animated movie finally in theaters. DC animation has been very strong over the years. It's missed occasionally. Justice League: War and Son of Batman weren't particularly strong, but even for those low points, they still delivered as well as any live-action movie did. The last time this happened was for Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, which was ok in its own right, but it was really a movie of its time for what superheroes were back then. Mask of the Phantasm was a bit of an adolescence of animated movie superheroes. It acknowledged that it had grown, but it still kept itself appropriate for young audiences. With the rise of superhero movies in live-action becoming really a whole new monster now and the quality of the Arkham games, we've seen the maturity level of superheroes in the media truly grow. Netflix's Daredevil and Jessica Jones basically took us right to the height of what people can handle, though I would argue they go more the way of torture porn to shock us.
I say that so that it can really show the context of this movie's place. This is the first R rated Batman animated movie. To my knowledge, it's probably the first R rated superhero film at all, let alone animated for Batman. This was pretty much the source of all the marketing for Killing Joke. The story has existed for a long time before now, so it's not much in the way of spoilers at this point. When I think of R rated superheroes, I'm bracing for Daredevil. Daredevil pretty much already is what I would envision Batman to really be, and I only watched the first season. To think of what it would be like to include Punisher in that, it'd just be too much. Killing Joke is definitely not that. It does earn its R rating for the violence. People get shot on camera a lot in that movie. Honestly, I was expecting some nudity in here, but the sexual content is still mostly on that teenage level. This simultaneously disappoints and satisfies me. It disappoints me because, when it's marketed so highly as the R rating being a big deal, I'm thinking it's on the level of Daredevil and Deadpool (which I admit I have not seen). The Dark Knight Returns is rated PG-13, and it has a scene with a man getting his head bloodily ground in the gears of a roller coaster, much to Robin's horror. I was expecting to see much more shock value, which is why it satisfies me. It shows that, for Batman, they're not going to allow themselves to submit to shock for the sake of shock. They'll do it for the sake of the story. Now, I'll admit Daredevil did it too, but it was still a bit much.
As for the content, I'll keep a bit light on the spoilers, because I never actually read the Killing Joke. I heard there were things included in the movie that weren't in the book, so I'll be a bit careful. Killing Joke is basically as much about Batgirl (Barbara Gordon) as it is about the Joker. This feature in the theater had 2 documentaries, one before and one after, that more or less focused on the Joker's role in all of this. It really tried to cement that this was a psychological horror story. To be honest with you, I never really got that. I think this is the first time I can say Mark Hamill was a bad casting choice for the Joker. Mark Hamill does play the Joker very well, no question. In the documentary focused on him, he made a point of complimenting the various takes on all the different actors that have played Joker over the years, primarily the voice actors for animated movies. Mark Hamill's Joker is probably one of the more jovial ones. He was the star player in the 90's animated series, and even though it did have depth for a kids' show, it was still for children. It rarely allowed itself to dive into any true psychological horror, if at all. I think I probably would've gotten much more out of it had I actually read the book, because it's more about the words than the delivery. I'd say I got much more horror out of Arkham Asylum. Listening to Oracle read the email exchange between "Jack White" and Dr. Young definitely played up the horror aspect well, and Batman really was subjected to a house of horrors throughout that island, all directed by the Joker. The house of horrors aspect is still the driving force here, but it's in a much happier mood. Joker as depicted here is that level of insanity where you simply have no conscience whatsoever, that you take the same level of pleasure from cruelty and twisting reality that anyone else would from listening to a stand-up comic. This has its own interesting level of depth to it when you think about it, but I never really felt anything throughout. Maybe I'm just personally nutty, that these thoughts don't actually impact me anymore, but it just never made an impact on me. There were so many angles that could've been explored better, but they were just left to rot.
However, the story of Batgirl is much more interesting. Batgirl's story here is very similar to the kind of storytelling I've expected to see from DC animation. It mostly focuses on the nephew of a crime lord having the hots for Batgirl and psychologically manipulating her. This guy basically becomes her kind of Joker, but while there's always been an undercurrent of homosexual tension between Batman & the Joker, the heterosexuality here is right on the surface. He wants to own her body, and he'll twist her mind to get it. Meanwhile, she's confronting her romantic interest in Batman, which confuses a young'un like me that had been taught she was interested in Nightwing (who himself is also shown in Teen Titans as being interested in Starfire). Maybe the scene was different at the time Killing Joke was originally written, I don't know, but it threw me. Honestly, it's one of the more unusual love triangles I've seen, and I say that as a fan of Ranma 1/2!
For this next bit, I can't explore it without spoiling a bit, so here's your warning. According to one of the documentaries, it does exist in the source material, but still, you might not have read that, either. If you plan on seeing it spoiler-free, skip on to the next section now. You've been warned. In 3... 2... 1... there's a song. Yes, there's a lyrical song in Killing Joke. It feels really out of place. I couldn't help but laugh inside and the ridiculousness of it. Joker sings about what it's like to go insane, and when you just focus on the words, yeah, it's pretty twisted. As it's delivered though, the song is just the happiest thing I've ever seen come out of Batman! There are carnival freaks dancing around him like it's coming out of freaking Beauty & the Beast! Like I said, this is the kind of scene that probably needs to be seen twice to fully appreciate what's going on. He's singing about such dark things of madness, yet he's delivering it like there's birthday cake being served with it. It's in here that I definitely see some of myself. I too like to corrupt things, to twist them in a totally opposite direction from what is expected. Whenever I played Cards Against Humanity, I've given some of the most awful things that have been read at the table, so perhaps I'm not the best one to judge the true terror that may be going on here. Of course, it really hits home near the end of the song, but for most of it, the whole thing just doesn't fit right.
Ok, back to casting. Like I said, I don't think Mark Hamill was the right pick for this performance. He did a great job on Arkham Asylum, but there the horror also came from the things he was doing. Because this is much more about psychology, it would've been more appropriate to have someone treat it with the darkness it commands, yet can also throw in a punchline. I would honestly say John Dimaggio would be best here, having seen his performance in Under the Red Hood. Then again, if it's entirely the intent to have him treat the macabre as just another good time, Mark Hamill delivers that performance very well. It just doesn't come across on the initial viewing. Then again, I also hated the Dark Knight at first, so it could be that this is just going to be par for the course. Maybe the Joker isn't meant to be understood in the slightest. Mark Hamill treats Joker like John DeLancie treats Q and Discord.
On some other minor points. This story goes into the origin of the Joker, which fans probably already know a bit from Arkham Origins with the Red Hood. Other than the typical trope of "science goo works random miracles," it's an interesting enough story. It would seem to conflict a bit with the fairly recent unveiling that there are actually at least 3 Jokers, but maybe that's simply a trait specific to that New 52 stuff. The ending also really drops the ball. There's barely any resolution to it, and what's there doesn't feel like real resolution. I'll spare you the details, even though it's one of the most well-known parts of that story, but I get the impression the audience in general was just as let down as I was. When the credits rolled, everyone in the theater couldn't get out of their seats fast enough. It was actually very amusing to me that just enough time had passed for some people to legitimately leave the theater before it showed a little extra: introducing Oracle. I'm sure there's a lot there for actual book fans to get than I understood, but it was still fitting. I've always loved Barbara's character and Tara Strong's portrayal of her (seriously, she just can't fail a role).
Now, for the TL,DR portion: is it worth the price of admission? Honestly, I don't really know. It definitely didn't blow me away like the Dark Knight Returns did, but neither did Dark Knight at first(for clarity, Dark Knight Returns is not Dark Knight Rises). I very much get the impression that this thing has to be seen multiple times to really get it. It's not quite the traditional face of Joker, so maybe it'll be better understood when you go in with that new mindset. The Batgirl part of the story was definitely stellar, but I really can't recommend the Joker half. I'd probably go with it on that front. If you like to see more character development out of Batgirl, this is going to be your movie. If you like Batman more for the psychology than the action, then sure, this will probably feed you, but it could've done so much more on that front. This is probably a cost of sticking with the source material, but it's still a fault. If you want to see Joker put Batman in a bunch of wacky traps with a lot of tricks, well, you'll get them, but it probably won't be your bag.
Honestly, Batgirl alone sells this pretty hard for me, but I can't justify buying the whole movie just for a good half. I think Akira's a great movie for the second half, but you've got to sit through a gratuitous blood orgy in the first half to get there. With that in mind, I give Batman: the Killing Joke a solid rating of "eh...?" I wouldn't mind watching it with a friend, but it's not worth the full price. I was more fascinated by Son of Batman than this. Again, that's not to say it's bad, but it has so much wasted potential.
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