The Joker Thing

[Thaluikhain]

You'd think by around major-cause-of-anguish number 200 or something, some law-man around at his capture would fail his Gullibility check and put a bullet in his head before someone can protest, but maybe Batman's lack of willingness to kill is just infectious enough to cause everyone else in a 10-mile radius to hesitate just long enough for Joker to escape again...?

Never mind his capture, police snipers exist for a reason. If he is endangering people's lives in some way, like he always is, they are allowed to kill him to end the threat.

Failing that, and assuming the US authorities don't want to execute him for some reason, there'd be a meeting at Cabinet Office Briefing Room A, and he'd be picked off by Her Majesty's SAS, assuming they got there before agents from almost anywhere in the rest of the world did.

...

Ok, I get how he's too popular to kill and all, but keeping him round for decades without an explanation of why he hasn't been killed ruins the character, IMHO.

 

[mikeybuthge]

because the batman and joker keep each other balanced, one through trying to force order, the other forcing chaos, also, the legally insane comment above and the belief through all arkham psychiatrists that they can understand and cure the joker keep him alive

 

[shrekfan246]

Well, the thing is heroes and villains in comic books never stay dead even when they're killed off, probably because the writers are afraid of some miniscule but extremely vocal group of people who start whinging about it. EDIT: Oh yeah, and if they killed them off, they'd need to create new enemies. Heaven forbid! :END EDIT. If they killed the Joker, arguably one of the most iconic Batman villains ever created, he'd probably return to life a year later in some form of ret-con.

Hell, wasn't Batman himself killed back in 2009 or something? Take that with a pretty massive grain of salt, though, because I don't actually read comics.

nope he got shot with a time gun (well thats the gist of it at least, which resulted in this travesty happening)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/75/Return_of_Bruce_Wayne_1_art.jpg

Long version is that he "died" (explosion unresolved till later issues) in batman R.I.P. (which is a damn good story and a great finale which should of been the way to kill him off. BUT DC needed batman for their big final crisis event (terrible) where he gets zapped by darkseid's (lame villains) omega beams (whatever they are) which somehow both leave a corpse.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_wpPLG-yJpJw/ShN0gWBsMWI/AAAAAAAAC58/hCZKivEY7IQ/s200/batman_dead_final_crisis_6.jpg
AND send him back in time (for some reason). Its just a load of gibberish really. Which is how he "survived" via travelling forward in time to now. Although i think the new "reboot" nullifies 90% percent of this :/

. . . So basically he should have died but because of the magic of the DC Universe and Deus Ex Machina he didn't. I'm pretty sure your entire spoiler'd section there explains the exact reasons why I don't read comics.

 

[Thaluikhain]

I didn't mind the Batman in time thing, as a standalone, TBH.

Actually, the Joker works well as a standalone too. One or two times, he can get away with not being offed. Any individual story might be ok, but when you line them all up, problems arise.

 

[shrekfan246]

Yeah pretty much but you have to bear in mind comic quality can jump hugely on an arc to arc basis (this is why buying in trade format is cost effective) there are some fantastic things in comics but you really do have to tread lightly, its probably why there is a big market for comic reviews nowadays because the variance in quality is so massive.

Taken as a standalone product (and the actual death of batman (imagine) R.I.P is nothing less than fantastic, its all about picking and choosing, which i understand is more effort than most people want to put into researching a passtime (hello avatar and transformer films profits).

I'm a bit too tired to form a coherent and debatable response, so I'll simply say I agree completely, and that I believe it's no different than most other entertainment mediums such as television, film, music, books, and video games.

 

[keideki]

Generally speaking, the insane are not held accountable for what they do. No state executes the criminally insane. Thus Joker goes to the funny farm to break free shortly after.

 

[Aprilgold]

Because Batman won't kill as that makes him no better than the villains ( I think that's why he doesn't I may be wrong). Besides, when you have a character as interesting and important as the Joker you can't kill him off! That's no fun.

You know, hes right B man, Mr J can't die because your stupid or something, I always forget. Well B man, I have to go and meet Mr J's needs so BYE!

Ok, the real answer is right here.

Generally speaking, the insane are not held accountable for what they do. No state executes the criminally insane. Thus Joker goes to the funny farm to break free shortly after.

 

[Astoria]

Because Batman won't kill as that makes him no better than the villains ( I think that's why he doesn't I may be wrong). Besides, when you have a character as interesting and important as the Joker you can't kill him off! That's no fun.

You know, hes right B man, Mr J can't die because your stupid or something, I always forget. Well B man, I have to go and meet Mr J's needs so BYE!

Ummm what? Was that calling me stupid or making a joke out of my avatar? I'm confused.

 

[The Pinray]

Because capital punishment is illegal in Gotham, of course!

 

[similar.squirrel]

They're superhero comics. Reality doesn't so much take a back seat as fall out of its hiding-place in the trunk midway through the journey. Besides, the Joker is the most compelling villain in the DC Universe. Wouldn't make sense to kill him off, especially since there are still many interesting interpretations of the character left.

 

[WolfThomas]

It's called Joker immunity, there's no more stories if he's killed off.

In Kingdom Come, Magog killed the Joker while he was being taken away in handcuffs, after he killed 70 something people at the Daily Planet (including Lois Lane), this and the public's support of Magog is what causes Superman to retire.

Also this is the DC universe, death is cheap, you kill the Joker off and then in 6months he's back as a Demon-lord invading the earth. It's easier to break every bone in his body and lock him up. He'll break free eventually but for the moemnt everyone is safe. It's an unfortunately reactive strategy.

Long version is that he "died" (explosion unresolved till later issues) in batman R.I.P. (which is a damn good story and a great finale which should of been the way to kill him off. BUT DC needed batman for their big final crisis event (terrible) where he gets zapped by darkseid's (lame villains) omega beams (whatever they are) which somehow both leave a corpse.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_wpPLG-yJpJw/ShN0gWBsMWI/AAAAAAAAC58/hCZKivEY7IQ/s200/batman_dead_final_crisis_6.jpg
AND send him back in time (for some reason). Its just a load of gibberish really. Which is how he "survived" via travelling forward in time to now. Although i think the new "reboot" nullifies 90% percent of this :/

I think Final Crisis and the Return of Bruce Wayne works a lot better when collected than as weeklys. Everything ties together more tightly.

Spoiler: For example Dr Simon Hurt

being Thomas Wayne an ancestor of the Waynes, possessed/tainted by the Adapter from the future that contained the Darkseid essence that would have killed Batman and everyone, which in turn made him both immortal and insane. Who was then breifly adopted by the Waynes's as their son, which actually ties into a golden-age story where Batman had an older brother.

I also love the reasoning behind Batman using a gun.

The root of the Batman mythos is the gun and the bullet that created Batman. So, Batman himself is finally standing there to complete that big mythical circle and to have the image of Batman up against the actual personification of evil and now he's got the gun and he's got the bullet. It seemed to me to work. -- Grant Morrison

Never mind his capture, police snipers exist for a reason. If he is endangering people's lives in some way, like he always is, they are allowed to kill him to end the threat.

Unfortunately if someone was that smart to do that in the comic, it would be subverted by the joker dressing a hostage up to look like him.

 

[Aurgelmir]

As i been reading through Batman comics there has been something that's been bothering me About the joker. Why hasn't this man been executed. no seriously the joker is one of the most murderous, completely psychotic, and Severely detached from reality human being in comic book history.he's killed almost a good thousands of people and either crippled or drove insane many others. but they never execute him they just keep sending him back to arkham where he escapes almost every time.

And even by comic book logic it does not really make sense. they always attempt to execute him and he finds a way out of it but when they catch him again they just lock him up in arkham.

But am i missing something here

Think Robot Chicken made a joke about that.

 

[Shiftygiant]

Because he's insane. In america, you legally can't put someone to death on insanity grounds, and because the joker see's the world as he does, he uses the insanity defense as his ace in the hole.

Does that answer you question Alik?

 

[Queen Michael]

Well, the thing is heroes and villains in comic books never stay dead even when they're killed off, probably because the writers are afraid of some miniscule but extremely vocal group of people who start whinging about it. EDIT: Oh yeah, and if they killed them off, they'd need to create new enemies. Heaven forbid! :END EDIT. If they killed the Joker, arguably one of the most iconic Batman villains ever created, he'd probably return to life a year later in some form of ret-con.

Hell, wasn't Batman himself killed back in 2009 or something? Take that with a pretty massive grain of salt, though, because I don't actually read comics.

nope he got shot with a time gun (well thats the gist of it at least, which resulted in this travesty happening)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/75/Return_of_Bruce_Wayne_1_art.jpg

Long version is that he "died" (explosion unresolved till later issues) in batman R.I.P. (which is a damn good story and a great finale which should of been the way to kill him off. BUT DC needed batman for their big final crisis event (terrible) where he gets zapped by darkseid's (lame villains) omega beams (whatever they are) which somehow both leave a corpse.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_wpPLG-yJpJw/ShN0gWBsMWI/AAAAAAAAC58/hCZKivEY7IQ/s200/batman_dead_final_crisis_6.jpg
AND send him back in time (for some reason). Its just a load of gibberish really. Which is how he "survived" via travelling forward in time to now. Although i think the new "reboot" nullifies 90% percent of this :/

If that's a travesty, then it's the most awesome travesty in the world.

 

[WolfThomas]

just two words make the whole thing silly to me
time bullet. I don't mind far fetched ideas, but its lazy writing as a way to bring him back. Hell i prefer clones to that BS, not to mention that DC had 2 valid ways to bring him back (blackest night, the lazarus pit). Final crisis may be an alright read (its nothing spectacular, 52,infinite crisis (both), sinestro corps war, and blackest night were all superior.

I don't know why everyone blames the time bullet (Captain America Returns had time bullets and they were genuinely stupid). It was the Omega Sanction that sent him back in time, not the bullet. A time-traveling radion bullet was just what killed Orion (and stopped Darkseid), and it's not too weird for the DC universe.

The act of sending him through time creates this loop, where Bruce Wayne inspires all the Bat mythology in the Gotham area and creates Dr Hurt as a villain. I thought that was all pretty neat.

Now yes Final Crisi wasn't that good, nor was return of Bruce Wayne. But Batman Inc and Batman and Robin those have been some good reads.

 

[Shinomori]

I can't say this with certainty, but perhaps gotham does not believe in the death penalty...Please correct if wrong.

 

[holographicman]

The reason he hasn't been sentenced to death us because he is legally insane, thus he is not responsible for himself. That's why he gets sent to Arkham Asylum while his goons get sent to Blackgate Prison. As to why he's still alive, other than the courts, Batman doesn't kill(At least mainstream Batman doesn't. Flashpoint Batman and several others, like the multiverse guys, do. Earth 1 Batman has a strict no kill poilcy)

id love to see who the joker's lawyer is.

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

because the comic gods will not allow him to die

DING DING DING

He's just too much fun as a villain to be killed off. Also nobody in Gotham besides the comish and his daughter, Alfred and Bruce himself seems to realize how much of a threat he really is. Not to mention the fact that he will escape anything with time.