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Walter, Aiyanna, Heather and Bryan discuss Batman: The Killing Joke.
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It really is a shame about the movie in general. I think they’d have done better to use an older Batgirl comic storyline and grafted it onto the movie rather than the fanfic we got. That’s the worst part of this whole thing.
I don’t mind what they did with the Killing Joke part; it’s a cartoon and movie, there will be differences with the comic.
Yeah, this is what I’ve been hearing from every other critic as well. I never read the original Killing Joke so I have no interest in seeing this one. Also, Bryan makes me laugh, even when I don’t agree with him. Although, many characters (both men and women) are used as story devices so that wouldn’t really bother me if I did see this movie.
The movie sucked!! This is surprising. Since DC’s animated efforts are usually really good. However, this was just boring and ended in a very underwhelming way. All build-up and no payoff.
I honestly don’t understand the desire to see Bruce Wayne and Barbara Gordon “gettin’ it on”. It’s creepy as hell! Even if you overlook the fact that Bruce is old enough to be Barbara’s dad, there’s still the fact that Babs is Bruce’s best friend’s daughter as well as the one time girlfriend of his surrogate son! That’s all kinds of “Eeeeww!!”.
Even Mark Hamill’s awesome Joker voice couldn’t save this movie! 🙁
Okay, I’m going to be blunt here, I do not think any of Alan Moore’s work were meant for adaptations. Not that I mind the idea though, however there is context to his work that either shouldn’t be altered or isn’t intended to be translated into cinema; and that’s particularly the case when creative teams take their own liberties to the film and do things that only hurt the story.
Another chip that’s been bugging me, DC seems to have this very obsessive love affair with the story, as well as Batman Year One, The Dark Knight Returns, and even Watchmen. It’s always those particular entities that they keep glorifying and milking for how “Deep and Edgy” they are, when there is a full library of other stories in the mainstream DCU they can be working from.
And even then, if the Killing Joke is such a super duper awesome comic… then I really wouldn’t or shouldn’t actually care for a movie! I mean don’t get me wrong, I love seeing superhero stories adapted into other forms of media, especially in animation; but that doesn’t mean I sit with baited breath just to see if Kevin Conroy is voicing Batman again in an adaptation of something like, Batman: Fortunate Son or whatever.
The Killing Joke already exists and I enjoy reading it in the medium it was made for. Short, simple, but right on point.
Again I don’t object to an animated adaptation, but we all know the story: The Joker’s one bad day drove him nuts, a plausible origin, and he assaults Barbara Gordon (Batgirl/Oracle) and tried driving Jim Gordon nuts to prove his point, got it! I mean, most of us practically read the damn book, since Kindergarten! And frankly I think a lot of people don’t seem to understand what the real problem with the original graphic novel was, and that was the purpose of Barbara herself!
It was a prime example of, ‘Women in Refrigerators’ something which Alan Moore himself regretted but DC apparently was all for it (Even outright telling the guy to, “Cripple The B!+(#!” (Yeah I have this quirk to censor myself, kind of a habit but whatever.)
And to anyone who thinks this was what made Oracle… well, that’s true in one way… but false in another. It’s the same thing as crediting Rob Liefeld for creating Deadpool, he may have made up the character initially, but if it wasn’t for people who wrote stories with the character afterwards we really wouldn’t have the definitive Deadpool we have today; and the same goes for Oracle, because since the Killing Joke it was, it was Kim Yale and John Ostrander, a husband and wife team who build upon Barbara’s new entity as Oracle, and other writers since then continued building up on it from then on, but not the intent of Alan Moore! It was intended to be a solo piece, but since it was a success of course DC sought to treat it as though it were canon.
It was a double-edged sword frankly. On one hand it was a prime case of “Frigging” but on the other hand it built the character of Oracle afterwards, setting a more positive example of not only feminism, but also how people who generally lost their ability to do something in life can still came out on top and make a positive difference in other ways. Plus it also further developed character for the rest of the bat family, as well as Jim, the Birds of Prey and other characters in the DCU, pave introduction to the Cassandra Cain Batgirl, followed by Stephanie Brown, and it also taught readers another important lesson on how certain characters aren’t always going to be the same character. (Exceptions aside)
And I get what they did, they want to establish Babs’ position as Batgirl, prior to her latter involvement in the middle, and even build closure and resolution with her more prominent entity; and it did so… but in a misguided direction, especially considering the controversial Bat-Sex thing, which convulsed the character’s position when confronted with the Joker,and only made it even more of a frigging. Two twists don’t make a straight line!
Plus, this movie should have just been rated PG-13. I know the Killing Joke is more adult, but frankly having seen the film, it really isn’t very R-rated.
But as is, the movie was okay. I just wish DC can stop praising the ever loving crap out of it, as well as the other aforementioned stories, thus giving them credit for something they didn’t really deserve and focus elsewhere.
He DOESN’T ship Barbara and Bruce, doesn’t he… I hadn’t thought about it, but they were even together in the Bay woman movie no one saw, except me, and they had a history in Batman Beyond. Dude seriously wants them together.
I know as far as the official DCAU (all of the shared continuity shows between BTAS and GLAS) Batman and Batgirl WERE a thing, but I’m pretty sure it was a brief affair at best. Like, based on a conversation old Barbara has with Terry in Batman Beyond they definitely had a real physical relationship, but it took place between the end of the Batman cartoon and the beginning of the Justice League cartoon, which I doubt is more than a few years. That being said, this REALLY didn’t need to be shoehorned into the beginning of the Killing Joke, a classic and beloved story.
Oh, though I think the whole thing might have still been able to fit in DCAU continuity, like, Joker shoots Batgirl, she spends a few years as Oracle, then advanced medical technology restores her ability to walk (like that guy who had his spine replaced after he got mauled by a leopard in Batman Beyond) and she eventually becomes police commissioner…EXCEPT the Batman Beyond Movie “Return of the Joker” invalidates that because it showed Joker’s death took place while Barbara was still Batgirl, so that is a missed opportunity.