I’m ready to be angry… Rewatching the first Joker is a trip! Because I’m a supporter of the notion that knowing nothing about the Joker’s origin story is best, but Todd Phillps and Joaquin Phoenix also made a great movie. The talk show finale with Robert De Niro is what brings it all together, and I admire how the movie subtly presents a duality that hints that what Fleck is thinking is wrong, while you also get where he’s coming from. I like how the movie also tries to define how and why the Joker finds hilarity in the mayhem too; interpreting conditions that hold him back into strengths. But I didn’t out-and-out love Joker, for a few choices, particularly spoon-feeding us the fact that Zazie Beetz’s Sophie hadn’t been galivanting around with Arthur, although it was obvious through the context. And I’m still not sold on the use of Bruce Wayne. But the reviews for Joker: Folie à Deux make it seem like I’m in for a world of hurt, if I even watch this movie. I know nothing structurally yet, but I also don’t know why Joker even needed a sequel; I would’ve been more impressed if Phillips had put a focus into creating other Batman adjacent origin stories, like “Two-Face” and “Freeze” – the Rogues Origin Universe, I’d call it (or ROU for short.)
The first twenty minutes of this movie is brilliant – the story it seems to set up, but also the cast. You have Joaquin Phoenix, willing to do anything – one of the world’s most perfect chameleons, and it’s ultimately unfair that the movie doesn’t match him. Lady Gaga is fantastic too, throwing herself in passionately at anything she does 👍 Warner Bros. cartoons have always depicted law enforcement as plump Irishmen, and Joker: Folie à Deux has got the 1A prime-cut example of such a thing in Brendan Gleeson, raring to go 😄 I really loved the relationship being built between Jackie (Brendan Gleeson) and Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix), where Jackie had grown to be amused by Arthur, and underestimate him, so long as he stayed subdued, allowing Fleck to check outside the lines at times when convenient. But the movie also has Catherine Keener, another amazing choice to play Fleck’s lawyer, Maryanne Stewart, in a serious, yet somewhat sympathetic characterisation, who presents with a bit of heft. What more could you ask for in terms of aces in places?
The story seems to be that Joker has repented; he has sunken back, beaten down again by being restrained heavily at the heart of the system, imprisoned for his murders from the previous movie. And it makes sense, because whilst it’s easy to find one outburst of passion and identity, it doesn’t mean it takes root in your personality without repeated performances 😈 But unlike before, where the system ignored Arthur and his problems, the system is obsessed with him now, with a TV movie, lawyers, psychologists, reporters, and prison guards all wanting a pound of flesh from the Arthur Fleck story. The previous movie did a really great job of showing how the governmental support network was strained and ineffective, right before it snapped completely, resulting in riots; and this movie had a real opportunity to continue with that, showing how a bunch of do-gooders and opportunists had emerged to fix it or capitalise in the ruins. Because in the Batman universe, we’re always told that Gotham is a picturesque hellscape of violence and corruption, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen how it got there. My favourite early scene is with the psychiatrist, who is clearly pushing her case for Fleck’s split personality theory unprofessionally, while Arthur could care less and just wants a cigarette. Along the lines of the talk show setting from the first movie, which had to be inspired by the famous Joker appearance in the comic book The Dark Knight Returns, we now have the psychiatrist and lawyer underestimating Joker’s corrosive capabilities, giving him an inch. But I kept waiting for the Joker to reveal his guile, or turn the tables on an opportunity, but as the movie plays out, we now know that it was never Joker: Folie à Deux’s intention to deliver on that. If anything, the movie we get gives Lee (Lady Gaga) all the agency, pushing the cause for Arthur Fleck, and that’s just not Joker. What works for me is how these suits wish to make sense of Joker, and their own place in the system, while little do they realise that although Joker has identified a societal problem that they can all now see, it doesn’t mean he wants to help rebuild, rather than atomize it. The Joker is an agent of chaos, detached now from a subservient right and wrong, and while all the suits invertedly want something from Joker, it’s Lee that’s the only one giving him something, and something he wants – the spark to return the colour and the freedom. As this movie goes, I don’t think the early shot of the Joker being transported through the rain, where the police umbrellas transform to colour, makes any sense in the end, since the movie doesn’t follow through on my outlined premise. For this movie, it’s like Arthur Fleck found his voice through the Joker persona, and he’s the only one who didn’t realise it 😕 Wholistically, through this movie’s attention to detail and caliber of performance, I would say the movie is doing about eight of twelve things masterfully, only one of those dodgier pistons just happens to be the movie’s intentionality. And therefore, watching this movie, is like someone threw a split bag of a dozen delicious donuts at Todd Phillips, and we watch him fumble the contents, as they all fall to ground.
What also doesn’t work is the tact of the love story. It’s too bold, needing to be subtle. Why would either Lee or Joker want their captors to know of their private intense partnership? But this could’ve been mended through minor changes to the dialogue. Like, at the first courtroom scene, when asked what he’s doing, Arthur says, “I’m looking for someone”, when he could’ve said, “I’m looking through my people”, which his lawyer could take as vanity, while we’d know the truth. Same goes for the TV interview; it would be more powerful if Arthur’s words were indirect, and we’d know that he’s been inspired by Lee, but his many admirers watching on could also interpret that he was talking about them, recharging their cause in his image. It makes sense too, because you want the car bomb at the end to be set up from somewhere, whilst still coming as a complete surprise. It can remain that Lee blasts Maryanne in front of the cameras outside court – in fact, that scene was fire – but it would still work if Maryanne was naïve to the fact that Lee was uniquely special to Joker, while Lee becomes a person of interest to authorities as her notoriety grows above the rest of Joker’s looney constituents.
Next, going hand in hand with the themes of love, are the songs. Now, I don’t mind the movie being a musical; it might find a struggle to appeal to the average macho DC comic book fan, but if the movie wants to go there, then I won’t complain. And I love the song choices, and their chosen style, nearly as cleanly as I do the first, with Frank Sinatra’s “That’s Life” being used as such a flippant and nihilistic upbeat purveyor throughout both movies. But the musical numbers need to fit the grander scheme of the overall product. Do they? I’m not convinced. I know the movie really can’t make up its mind as to whether the musical acts are diegetic in the story, or only there for the audience, Joker, and Lee, and that’s confusing. I was dumbfounded when the TV reporter said that Lee was reportedly singing on her escape, and when Joker is seen to sing in his TV interview, after we’d just seen him sing in the prison mess hall, before the scene goes back to normal. I just don’t think the movie succinctly has it both ways. Yet, taking a step back, this movie is so very much alike Chicago, it’s crazy – a person is on trial for murder, while secretly viewing the system as a circus and that they are a star. Chicago is an exceptional movie, and interprets the musical numbers as imaginations taking place in the main character’s mind. You can have one or two outside protocol – like, I’d keep it in that the prisoners start singing “When the Saints Go Marching In” in defiance, but then maybe it morphs into a grander musical number in the Joker’s eyes (that ends with a sharp shocking dip in tone back to reality as Jackie is beating an inmate to death). This clear and concrete interpretation of the musical numbers would work as an extension of what has already been established in the first movie too, as Arthur is an unreliable narrator, who dreams about scenarios he likes. And Lee is of the same soul.
But get out your pens and paper, because now I’m suggesting the biggest change of all 📝 Seriously, about halfway through this movie I wanted to press pause and fix it in real time, working towards a goal that came to me as an epiphany. Because Joker: Folie à Deux is really only a few swipes away from actually being a masterpiece. Here’s how I would change this movie’s ending, combining the theme of love and musical framework to inform the movie. I’m stating the songs are clearly, and nearly all, in Lee and Arthur’s head, until the very end when I’ll have them sing together on the biggest stage. What if instead of Lee remarking that her and Joker would “build a mountain” for a blandly flat second time whilst in the courthouse scene, she just randomly defiantly answers with “we’d film a Christmas special”. Yes, the critically acclaimed Batman: The Animated Series’ first appearance of Joker involves him filming a Christmas special for Gotham City, and I can’t believe I’d ever pitch that for a live-action movie. But we also see in Joker and Batman (1989) how Joker has a flair for the camera, and I imagine an ending where Joker and Lee escape the courthouse as seen, reunite at Murray Franklin’s refurbished studio, figure out how to broadcast live – perhaps through their cronies – and finally bring their fantasies and dance to life, announcing their love to the world. The white-collar authorities are resoundingly left in the dust, while their groundswell of clown supporters would lap it up, like it’s said they did with the TV movie. And perhaps at the Christmas show, which is mostly just song and dance, we must mix beauty and violence, so we find Maryanne tied up for public execution; partly for being a bore to Joker, and facing Lee’s scorn for once getting in between her and her puddin’. Maryanne repeats the sentiment, “we would’ve won, you sicko!”. And Joker says, “isn’t that the problem?” to which even Maryanne, maddened by her own predicament, must see the funny side in her own irony. She is shot by Joker and Lee while the pair also share a passionate kiss to camera 💋💥 And while you judge me, another thing to realise about presenting the Joker/Batman dynamic, is how Joker is always happy. Sure, Batman may save the day, but he goes home miserable. Joker ends up in a straitjacket, and has a great time! He laughs his ass off. So the very idea of a sad Joker movie is just absolutely ridiculous 🙃
But we’ll talk about the actual ending, and like Lee and Joker’s other supporters in the courtroom, I felt the air deflate from the balloon as soon as Arthur said he didn’t want to be Joker anymore. Because that’s not Joker; that’s a complete betrayal of the character. I liked the opening cartoon, playing on separating Joker from his shadow, but didn’t like the pedestrian metaphor it then led to with Arthur literally running away from himself, in the streets of Gotham 🙄 I thought there was enough in the cartoon, if you think of the authorities wanting to decipher and extract Arthur from the Joker persona, and not realising they are one and the same. As for Joker dying, and a new fella cutting his face into scars, I don’t think it dampens the Heath Ledger legacy of The Dark Knight, for these are two different franchises, and it’s only a strong reference as indication of how iconic Ledger’s Joker continues to be. And so someone else is Joker now… and his supporters fail to realise that Arthur dies clean, seeing his empire as a dead end he’s happy to relinquish. It’s all very artsy and underwhelming to me.
So what’s the message? What does Joker: Folie à Deux mean to say? There’s a lot of psychos out there, and they will latch onto any figure they can transmute into their savior, even the mentally ill? Well, great 🙄 I don’t think that is anything unusual that can’t be said to have been happening since the beginning of time. So if this is supposed to be another “powerful and important” anti-Trump reaction, then we already have them in the thousands 😕 How is DC ever going to make another Suicide Squad movie ever again if having any understanding of where a villain might be coming from makes you the bad guy? This movie is like a father showing his son his porn collection, and straight away scalding him thereafter, because he shouldn’t be looking at anything so filthy. It’s like, YOU’RE THE ONE WHO SHOWED IT TO ME!! DC and Todd Phillips, you made Joker, and now it’s like you deem it too dangerous. And who are these people emboldened to claw down the system because they saw Joker? All I seem to remember from the fallout of Joker was an Oscar, and many people replicating Joker’s dance on the staircase 😄 So I’d say this movie is a reaction akin to jumping at shadows, concerned about the potential potential, instead of actual reality. Gosh, I wonder if Martin Scorsese made Taxi Driver and fretted most people would want to be Travis Bickle. I don’t think so. Imagine the new Planet of the Apes franchise looking at Ceasar and saying, “well, we’re humans. So we can’t really depict the apes winning. We must be on the human side”. Give me a break 🙄 The fact that this movie is too frightened by the prospect of presenting a charismatic anarchist character, and doesn’t trust the masses to explore thoughts to werewolf without implementing them, just makes me feel the need to rebel more. A bad movie makes me want to rebel more. Todd Phillips is a guy who complained after making Joker about how he feels he can’t make comedies anymore, because everyone is too sensitive; but now he makes Joker: Folie à Deux, to signify that he’s too sensitive about a misguided interpretation of his first movie. I don’t like to get too personal, but the distain for this movie, combined with the mutual mistrust between audience and creator, should be a career killer in my eyes. I’m very interested to see what people will be in line for his next production.
A few further things to muse over, that may be personal preferences to me. I don’t like how Gotham City has colour TV. I’m pretty sure, for how colourful the Murray Franklin Show was in reality in Joker, whenever we saw it on TV in the Fleck home, it was black and white, just as TV was always in Batman: The Animated Series. I feel like the black and white helps give the universe a golden era vibe, plus a disassociated surrealism in that the comic world is different to ours. It also helps transfix the comic universe in time 🤓 I also don’t like that Zazie Beetz returns, because I thought Joker left it ambiguous as to whether she lived or died, so why ruin that? But then she had to have been interviewed for the TV movie, so Lee could know to connect with Joker through the gun-to-the-head hand action 🤷♂️ So I suppose I’m half a dozen of one, and six of the other on that – I can take Beetz or leave her. The Gary Puddles (Leigh Gill) scene is electric, but of course, it feels half-finished. That scene seems to be the perfect time for Joker to turn a would-be enemy around, turning Puddles fear and pain into something that makes him second guess being a believer. Because the Joker is a master manipulator! The Joker is cunning. Where is it? I kept waiting for Fleck to demand everyone stop laughing at Puddles, because he is his friend, and it would’ve even worked better after Joker had spent five minutes ridiculing Puddles for his name to begin with. Because Joker is deranged, and he can flip on a dime, seemingly only making sense unto himself. A massive, missed opportunity.
And then, like, are we supposed to be impressed by the mere presence of Harvey Dent (Harry Lawtey)? Instead, show how he’s rash, out of a pious morality. Give him some character! I reimage Dent as a studious Assistant District Attorney, under another figure (oh, let’s say actor Tracy Lets) as the lead DA, who concedes to Maryanne how he’s really only pushing for the death penalty because his assistant believes there’s a win there, while it will only draw more attention to the court proceedings, and jail time for murder would be much easier to pass. Perhaps it’s only through the call for the death penalty that directly leads to a court proceedings where Joker can exploit his use of antics; make-up as his own attorney, direct sermons to the camera, and a reigniting of the Joker’s fanbase, which Dent didn’t foresee. And then when the courthouse blows up, Joker escapes, Lets is killed, and Dent has to pick himself up out of the rubble, that would certainly lend itself to an internal frustration to bubble into Two-Face later on. I refuse to believe Dent’s face gets half-blown off in this moment, because it’s so inconsequential 😐 I also don’t understand moments where the movie does not capitalise on celebrating Joker and Harley Quinn’s lore. Usually I get shitty over too much fan service 😄 But like, when Joker pulls out an oversized gavel from atop the judge’s desk in one of the song scenes; what a perfect opportunity to make that a mallet for Lee, to get in on the violent action, like she might have in her iconic history. I don’t know why you’d want to have Harley Quinn in your movie and not use all the bells and whistles; especially when you have a format that lets you have your cake and eat it too, in telling a gritty story, while allowing indulgent theatrics in the musical fantasies. It’s mind-boggling. And then, lastly, I’ll say what we were all thinking – it was very confronting the first moment we see Fleck shirtless, considering Phoenix is even skinnier in this movie than he was in the last. If I’m impressed by how people can transform their body into muscle, can I say I’m unimpressed when an actor goes to these lengths to be skinny? It sure had the desired affect though; it is confronting. It actually fits so well for the Joker too, in that the Joker is so violently antagonistic, but so physically frail, so where beating him up just feels wrong because it would be too easy to do serious damage. Phoenix being that thin and throwing himself downstairs, feels like a death defying stunt aligned with what the Jackass boys would do 😬
You hear the likes of Quentin Tarantino talking about how it’s a repressive time again in Hollywood, and I don’t know – I always defend it, finding a lot of good stuff each year. But if there’s any clear indication, where a dark movie deliberately mishandles its subject matter, then I feel it now. Bloody Batman Beyond was able to contend with the fact that there are Joker loyalists out there; not ideally, but accept it. And that was a cartoon! Defensively, I may seem like I’m in a groove for what I feel like this movie should be a little more comfortably than some people might find happily, but I really don’t feel it would be any different if we had a poor Spider-Man movie, or poor Batman movie; I just want movies to be good. But they are different characters, of different flavours, and so the message they preach would deserve an alternate trajectory. If you don’t want to explore the Joker’s motus operandi, then don’t make a Joker movie 💁♂️ And I have been directing a lot of my heat at Todd Phillips throughout this expose, but as the fallout becomes clear, I saw rumours that it’s also Phoenix who had a large say in the momentum of this movie, and the ending to his character. And if that’s true, if he needed a sequel to set the record straight because he’s ashamed by his portrayal of Arthur, does that mean he should also give the Oscar back? Is that how this works? Adam Driver was pretty damn great in Marriage Story, also from that year, and I don’t see him backing over his character with a semi-trailer; so should we give it to him? The shame in Joker: Folie à Deux is that it doesn’t realise how good it could be. It’s totally well made, but it’s a house facing the wrong direction. Watching this movie, I felt like a hungry man frantically peeling a potato, and only finding more and more brown enclaves that also needed to be shaved away, until I was left with next to nothing. I’m so disappointed in that I feel tantalized, but the server has underdelivered. I’m glad I was prepped. But sometimes I watch a movie, and leave dejected, feeling like I’ve been left at the station while a train full of happy people has bolted, like with Scream VI, but Joker: Folie à Deux feels like I’m travelling in the same cable car, that’s just turned right, and I’m in there screaming, “go left, go left, go left!” But it is what it is, and we should’ve seen it coming. The Hollywood sheen has taken over Todd Phillip’s Joker, and we should’ve seen it coming.
2.5
P.S. So my brain was on fire after watching this movie, and I feel like my proposed ending lends itself to a third movie, where I’ve already spent too much time thinking about it as well. Care to indulge me? I would set it for over a decade in the future, where half the city shows how Joker’s rioters have run wild, and this is where Batman makes the scene 🦇 Lee is back in Arkham Asylum, for real this time, where she befriends an older Pamela Isley, A.K.A Poison Ivy (Jean Smart), and reminisces about how Joker and herself dazzled together before he outgrew her, for Joker’s number of supporters swelled his ego so big, that she became just another one. Struggling with her identity, near the end, Lee sings a mesmerizing ballad through the asylum, deftly kisses Pamela on the lips, and remarks how she’s “still got it”. Meanwhile, the movie starts with Joker setting up a Saw-like trap for a crowd of his loyalists, feeling like there’s too many of them, and undervaluing their generosity, like he used to. Perhaps there’s a series of rooms rigged to blow, and the only doors that are safe are labelled “Murray Franklin” and “Penny Fleck”, rewarding those loyalists who have been with Joker since the start, and know his origins. This beginning shows that Joker has become a full megalomaniac, completely contrasting his beginnings, in Joker and Joker: Folie à Deux, where he withered. But he’s still loyal to his closest circle, and those who have mastered hydraulics or helicopter piloting, for instance; those who are useful to him. His driving force and biggest fear is that he’s done everything – the city is in ruins, and any effort is meaningless. He’s mad that through his revolution, he will still get no recognition from the system, and those with power who want to plough ahead. Until along comes Batman, who presents a challenge as a striking image with plans to straighten up the damage. (I imagine my Batman in a silverish suit, clean and jagged, somewhat like one Clooney would wear. I think it contrasts how this Joker presents with an analog-relevant design, where Batman is tech, and new age. Plus to evoke anything Clooney only emphasizes Batman as a bit of a joke). About halfway through the movie, after an initial encounter, Joker unmasked Batman to discover he’s a brooding Bruce Wayne, and finds that the funniest joke of all. The orphan that he made on the first night of public anarchy, has dedicated his life to cleaning up the mess that he’s made; and in a costume like him, no less. Joker then realises that no matter what happens, whenever he’s gone, and if his name is dashed from every history book, his legacy will continue without heed because of people like Batman. It leads to this speech.
“I’m like a tumbleweed that’s left thistles all over this town, and you’re the streetcleaner that I’m also driving. You can’t kill me, because you don’t want to be me. And by not killing me, you’re the perfect upstanding reflection of me. Daddy’s left a Joker-sized hole in you, and I complete you! I’ve been aiming for my face on the one dollar bill, but it seems my legacy pertains to a silver bat in the sky!”
I imagine this movie to be more aligned with the fantastical of grounded comic book movies – a mix of Batman Forever and The Dark Knight – and I don’t see that as too drastic of an aesthetic shift, since with sequels we evolve, and these movies have already changed direction, with the first one embarking to be a thriller, and the second embracing the musical. And much like the first two movies, heavily influenced by The Killing Joke and The Dark Knight Returns, I also see this movie’s plot and finale lifting from the same, utilising an abandoned carnival setting, having Jim Gordan in pursuit with Batman to help take down Joker, and probably having Batman kill an old white-suit Joker in the final act 🤍 I’ve never felt such a strong desire to write my own comics before.
P.P.S So Fall Out Boy still own the best art with the suffix Folie a Deux, it seems? Surprisingly, I listened to that album again in the middle of writing this, and it fits in so well with Joker. Actually, probably not “surprisingly”; I just never noticed it before.
Continuing the Gary Puddles Courtroom Scene
Joker: Do you know how easy it would’ve been to kill you that day?
*Fleck, Puddles and Judge look over to the DA, expecting them to object, but they wave it off*
Puddles: Yes.
Joker: I wouldn’t have to listen to you testify against me, now would I, Puddles?
Puddles: No.
Joker: I spared you because I was the only one nice to you. You’re able to face me today – a face you deem scary – because you’ve been bullied your whole life, and you’re strong. My poor dear Puddles…
*someone in the crowd sniggers*
Judge: Order!
Joker: Who’s laughing?! I want that outburst stricken from the record!
Judge: You can’t do that, Mr. Fleck!
Joker: Well, I don’t want anyone to ever laugh at dear Puddles ever again! Anyone who even teeters at poor dear Puddles ever again will face a great wrath and vengeful fury! From God, I presume… It’s these people, Puddles. *pointing to the DA* These people have only brought you here today to wriggle in your pain. Do you think any of them will care once you leave here today? For I am the only one who ever took some of that pain away. No further questions, you’re honor.
Joker 3 Excerpt
Lee: What do they call you?
Pamela: Bio-eco-terrorist. I saw your Joker’s world going to hell in a handbasket and didn’t think the environment needed to go with it.
Lee: They call you “Poison Ivy”.
Pamela: Yeah, well, I left 10 people with permanent nerve damage, so… All men though, no that’s something… Anyway, aren’t you like, his Queen? We’re probably minutes away from the jail wall blowing open so we can all escape, so…
Lee: Not anymore. I don’t even think he knows I’m in here.
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