Dark knight who is the joker

He still has the last laugh. David Crow DCrowsNest. David Crow is the movies editor at Den of Geek. He has long been proud of his geek credentials. Raised on cinema classics that ranged from…. Skip to main content area. Photo: Warner Bros.

Not the Joker. Join our mailing list Get the best of Den of Geek delivered right to your inbox! Nestor Carbonell Mayor as Mayor. Eric Roberts Maroni as Maroni. Ritchie Coster Chechen as Chechen.

Anthony Michael Hall Engel as Engel. Keith Szarabajka Stephens as Stephens. Colin McFarlane Loeb as Loeb. Joshua Harto Reese as Reese. Christopher Nolan. More like this. Watch options. Storyline Edit. Set within a year after the events of Batman Begins , Batman, Lieutenant James Gordon, and new District Attorney Harvey Dent successfully begin to round up the criminals that plague Gotham City, until a mysterious and sadistic criminal mastermind known only as "The Joker" appears in Gotham, creating a new wave of chaos.

Batman's struggle against The Joker becomes deeply personal, forcing him to "confront everything he believes" and improve his technology to stop him.

Why So Serious? Action Crime Drama Thriller. Rated PG for intense sequences of violence and some menace. Did you know Edit. He could be funny and make you laugh. Heath's gone in a completely different direction to Jack, he's like a really scary psychopath. He's a lovely guy and his Joker is going to be a hell of a revelation in this picture. He'd never met Ledger before, so when Ledger arrived and performed, he gave Caine such a fright, he forgot his lines.

Goofs It is said that all of the license plates seen on cars in the film are Illinois plates. In fact, they're not: they are actually plates for the fictional Gotham, although they resemble Illinois plates. The "Gotham" plates that were created by film makers were made to look like Illinois plates, just in case some slipped through in background shots during filming in Chicago. Quotes The Chechen : [During a private sit down meeting with the gangsters] What do you propose?

The Joker then laughed hysterically as he fell to his death, but Batman, who refused to kill him, instead caught him with his Grapple Gun and left him hanging for the GCPD to capture.

With that act, Joker acknowledged that Batman really was incorruptible but that Harvey was no longer the "White Knight;": Joker had unleashed the scarred man on the city. Joker then stated that Harvey was his "ace in the hole" in his plan to show the people of Gotham that everyone was corruptible and thus, undo Harvey's work before his transformation into Two-Face. Batman then angrily left the Joker dangling helplessly as he laughed maniacally and was then approached by the SWAT Team at gunpoint.

Though the Joker was neither seen nor mentioned, his prediction of the citizens of Gotham was proven correct as Gotham shunned Batman in the wake of Harvey's death. Joker's prediction about civilized people's code being a 'bad joke' was also proven true, as Gotham fell into chaos in the wake of Bane 's 'liberation', and the citizens 'eat each other' as he had predicted, by way of homes being looted and Scarecrow's Kangaroo Court. The Joker was nothing more or less than the ultimate personification of chaos, anarchy, death, destruction, madness, and psychopathy.

However, the Joker himself claimed to not be insane, but rather "just ahead of the curve". This proved to be at least partially true, as the Joker was a competent strategist who could easily get inside people's heads, predict their actions, and plan accordingly.

He was able to plan out the events of The Dark Knight and also improvised when he needed to, showing a high level of intellect and knowledge. He had no problems getting underneath people's skin, and could easily manipulate people into corruption. In addition to that, Joker was also skilled at appealing to mentally unstable people whom he used as free help and for sections of his plans that required expendable assets and manipulated them with promises that he would make their mental problems go away.

For example, when Joker planted a bomb inside the stomach of Kilson, he told him that he would "make the voices go away and replace them with bright lights, like Christmas" 'bright lights' being a metaphor for the bomb Joker buried in Kilson's stomach. That extreme scenario of cruelty, sadism, and precision proved that this Joker was more in the realm of a sociopath than insanity as he was neither delusional nor did he lose his grip on reality. On a related note, Joker also had some irritation when he was referred to as a "freak" or another term that implied that he's deficient, which was best demonstrated twice, both times with members of the Mob: The first time was with Gambol, where, when he called Joker a "freak" in response to his remark about "a guy like me" during his speech, which Joker ended up expressing some irritation before he got to his point quickly, and the second time was with the Chechen, where Joker was angered enough at the Chechen's reference to him as such that he promptly had him ordered cut up and fed to his own dogs in response upon taking over his criminal organization.

Despite that, however, Joker had a little problem acknowledging that he was crazy upon being defeated by Batman, in-so-far as his belief in him and Batman not being much different from Gotham itself in terms of sanity or lack thereof. Joker also seemed to have some awareness about his lacking a sense of humor, as when he arrived at the Mob summit and saw that their plan was a bad idea:" Joker subscribed to a morally nihilistic mindset he even briefly paraphrased German Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche when he stated to the Bank Manager what he "believed" in and was obsessed with the limits of morality, while he also was described as having "zero empathy;" the two may have came together that reflected the Joker's doubts about the depths of human morality, based on his belief that "When the chips are down; these civilized people, they'll eat each other.

A similar display of his masochistic nature and his immunity to pain was demonstrated when Rachel Dawes, in an attempt to defend herself shortly after Joker gave his second "scar story," gave him a quick knee-jab into his groin, he laughed it off and then admitted that he "liked" the fact that she had a "little fight" in her while he approached her.

Joker did not care for the people who worked for him; when one of his minions got electrocuted in his attempt at removing Batman's Mask, Joker laughed hysterically and then kicked him. Joker then mocked him by making noises similar to that of someone being electrocuted, before he spit on him and resorted to his attempt at removing Batman's Mask himself.

That, along with the same henchman, who was later revealed to have had a wired bomb that was surgically implanted inside him, showed that Joker had no problems inflicting pain upon people who worked for him.

Along with being extremely sadistic through psychological torture, physical pain, and intimidation, the Joker also seemed to have no care for his own safety or survival, such as when he was told Batman to run him over with the Batpod as well as briefly cursed under his breath when Batman decided to crash the Batpod instead of running him over , and when Batman threw him off the skyscraper to his supposed death and did nothing but laugh both was due to the Joker believing that he would 'win' by provoking Batman into proving him right by forcing the Dark Knight to commit murder.

Joker seemed genuinely upset when Batman didn't kill him, to the point where he admitted his defeat and referred to Batman as "incorruptible" after their last fight.

Similarly, when Gambol attempted to have the Joker killed during a Mob meeting, Joker revealed that he had wired himself with explosives and anticipated the possibility that he'd be gunned down during that meeting. During his interrogation at the hands of Batman, while he taunted him about how the latter had "nothing" at his disposal to break him, Joker strongly implied that Batman's only option for dealing with him was to murder him. That proved that Joker absolutely didn't care about himself and his life at all, only his desire to spread chaos and anarchy and proving that all men could be corrupted if they were pushed hard enough.

The most notable example in his utter lack of self-preservation was when, at the hospital, when Joker gave Harvey a gun, forcibly pointed it at his head, and gambled his life on the chance that Harvey would adopt his philosophy of anarchy. Though, subtly, Joker kept his finger in front of the hammer of the gun, which kept it from firing prematurely. It was most likely that Joker would remove his finger when Harvey would have fired the gun as Joker was shown on multiple occasions that he did not care about himself at all.

In addition, when Harvey gave Joker the coin's options and told him that he would die if the coin landed on the bad side, Joker said: "now we're talking!

Joker exhibited various symptoms of an antisocial personality and blatantly disregarded laws and social norms far beyond standard deviant behavior.

The Joker also had a low level of inhibition and a relentless drive to disturb the status quo: He was driven by something other than greed, as he complained that the criminals of the Mob were just seeking a profit and that the city deserved "a better class of criminal," namely himself it was heavily implied, especially with his declaration that he intended to spread the message that "everything burns," that his motivation and idea for a better class of criminal was to cause chaos simply for the sake of chaos itself.

While Joker attempted to take control of the city by recruiting Mob henchmen, he appeared to hold his philosophy of chaos higher than himself: he described himself as merely an "agent" of chaos in his speech to convince Harvey to let go of his beliefs so that he could prove in his ultimate plan that even the noblest of men could sink down to the Joker's level.

Despite the fact that Joker never cared about money as evidenced by his burning of the Mob's money that he earned to recover Lau from the MCU and stated that his actions weren't "about money. When Batman interrogated him, Joker casually said that without Batman he'd have to "go back to ripping off mob dealers," which showed how little he actually cared about them.

Joker was also shown to be very literal in his word usage, which allowed him to carry out his crimes and even betrayed his minions while, at the same time, he technically kept his word.

The last trait was especially evident when Joker turned on the Mob after he retrieved their money: When the Chechen angrily told him that Joker himself was a man of his word when Joker revealed that he planned to set the cash on fire, Joker confirmed that he indeed was that and made it clear that he only intended to burn the half of the money that he got from retrieving Lau.

Joker did it often enough that his trademark was claiming that he was "a man of his word. Joker has a facial tic where he repeatedly makes chewing motions with his mouth with some licking, presumably caused by his glasgow scars. The Joker was a quite tall young man though his hunched posture made him appear slightly shorter than Batman , who was dressed in a custom-tailored purple suit that consisted of an elegant, purple coat and matching pin-stripe pants that were kept up by suspenders rather than a belt.

Underneath it, Joker wore a light grey jacket, a green vest, and a light grey patterned shirt. Joker was almost always seen wearing chalk-white makeup on his face, which consisted of dark face-paint that blackened the spaces around his leering brown eyes, green hair-dye that was spread all over unkempt greasy brown hair, and a red slash of lipstick that was smeared all over a thin mouth with two gruesome scars that were lined at the corners that resembled a Glasgow Smile, which further implied his unstable psyche.

According to Happy and Dopey, Joker's use of clown makeup was meant for use in psychological warfare akin to warpaint, and that was at least one reason why he was given the moniker of "The Joker.

Obviously, Joker's extremely poor groomed appearance was linked to his nonexistent care for himself and his life. The Joker was a genius at planning and improvising criminal activities: He was incredibly intelligent and calculating and always stayed one step ahead of everyone else, including Batman and the GCPD. Joker's unique if rather disturbed worldview, as well as the complete mystery that surrounded his identity also gave him something of an edge.

Having no connections, friends, former identities or family to be traced back to made Joker very difficult to predict, track down, or even understand. Joker was also shown to be a fearless, and unpredictable fighter, who took on Mob henchmen and cops with ease and showed how lethal he was with many forms of weaponry such as shotguns, RPGs, machine pistols, handguns, explosives, and knives.

While he used guns on many occasions, the Joker expressed his preference for knives because "guns are too quick" according to him. The Joker was even capable of holding his own against Batman and trapped him near the climax of the film although he had assistance on both occasions when he fought Batman. One explanation for his fighting skills might have to do with his sadomasochist personality: Joker didn't really fear physical damage to himself like a normal person did, and, even when brutally injured, laughed at his own pain.

His casual insensitivity to pain, and his extreme fearlessness, let Joker take risks that a normal person couldn't even attempt, and most people just didn't see his attacks coming, i.

The Joker's obliviousness to danger made him invulnerable to what was usually Batman's greatest weapon in combat: his ability to frighten low-level thugs. The Joker's attack on the bank was mentioned in the final Gotham Tonight special episode. With the Dent Act , the insanity plea was thrown out for the most part, with felons who were predominantly imprisoned, rather than institutionalized. Therefore, most inmates were moved to Blackgate Prison. However, the Joker was not found there, which lead some in Gotham to speculate that he was one of, if not the only, inmate at Arkham Asylum.

The Joker's whereabouts were never publicized, which left the possibility that he had escaped by the time of Bane's revolution: "The worst of the worst were sent to Blackgate, except for the Joker, who, rumor had it, was locked away as Arkham's sole remaining inmate. Or perhaps he escaped. Nobody was really sure.

The origins of the Joker were left deliberately ambiguous in The Dark Knight. He closes the video with these ominous words before laughing maniacally, while his victim begins screaming in the background.

It's a haunting recording that forces Batman to finally take the Joker seriously. This was one villain that was completely unlike anything he'd faced before. One of the greatest and most problematic things about the Joker has always been the lack of a definite origin story.

Even in the comic books, there's still some doubt as to which version of the character's past is the correct one. In The Dark Knight , this is hinted at several times when the Joker references the story behind his facial scars.

The version he tells Rachel involves his ex-wife being mangled by loan sharks, prompting him to cut his own face so she won't feel alone. It was no doubt a lie, but it did attempt to give some reason as to why the Joker viewed life with such flippant disregard. To him, the chaotic nature of his own life was reason enough to be happy, and smile a lot more. One of the Joker's best tactics was to gaslight and troll his foes into making a mistake.

This gave others the impression that he was in control of every situation, regardless of who appeared to hold the upper hand. After failing to crack under Gordon's interrogation, he was then given over to Batman, who proceeded to beat him. The intimidation tactics didn't work, as evidenced by this quote.

Even more chilling was the Joker's ability to refrain from showing anything in the way of true pain. Like everything else in life, agony was a joke unto itself, and he took it in stride. It's what arguably makes the Joker the best of Batman's enemies. Among other things, the Joker was first and foremost a cold-blooded killer. However, he took great delight in making others kill on his behalf, with a little prodding. This was demonstrated early on when he snaps a pool cue in half, and forces two mob henchmen to fight to the death in order to save their own lives.

Later, this action would be repeated on a much bigger scale when the Joker rigs two boats with explosives, and leaves detonators on board both ships. This quote summed up the Joker's fatalistic and nihilistic view of a world where everyone was out for their own survival, rather than showing solidarity with their fellow human. All he has is violence, which is the Joker's playground on any given day.

His complete lack of fear towards death is another frightening aspect of the character, signaling his unpredictability. Everything that seemed random to the Joker was actually an integral part of his grand scheme, even if the manner in which he did it was wrought with risk. This villain wasn't afraid to play Russian Roulette with his own plans, if it meant a bigger payoff at the end.

It's exactly what he needs to gain the upper hand, escape his cell, and trigger a bomb that blows up half the police precinct in the process.