History Fridge / TheKillingJoke

*** Idealist: Batman has suffered a lot during his life, from the deaths of his parents to all the crap he deals with fighting the Joker and all the other freaks he deals with. Yet he's so strong willed, he hasn't fallen into insanity despite all of that and is hopeful enough to keep fighting crime in the WretchedHive that is Gotham City and believe that people like the Joker can be reformed. But like the Joker, he can't convince the other guy to agreed with him; while the Joker considers trying to accept Batman's help to rehabilitate him, he rejects it, believing that today's events show that he's so fucked up that he can't be fixed.

* The Joker's final... [[BuffySpeak joke]]... takes on a whole other level when you realize the two mental patients are supposed to be Batman and Joker, with a level ambiguity thrown in depending on which patient is which, depending on where you stand on the SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism:

** Idealist: Batman has suffered a lot during his life, from the deaths of his parents to all the crap he deals with fighting the Joker and all the other freaks he deals with. Yet he's so strong willed, he hasn't fallen into insanity despite all of that and is hopeful enough to keep fighting crime in the WretchedHive that is Gotham City and believe that people like the Joker can be reformed. But like the Joker, he can't convince the other guy to agreed with him; while the Joker considers trying to accept Batman's help to rehabilitate him, he rejects it, believing that today's events show that he's so fucked up that he can't be fixed.

*** Cynic: The man who would become the Joker chose to jump in the vat of chemicals (symbolizing insanity) because in his view, it was better than trying to stay sane after everything that had happened or was going to happen to him (becoming poor after quitting his job to follow his dream, which failed, then losing his wife and child in a accident, and finally being forced to take the fall for the Red Hood heist after it goes to shit); The Joker's trying to get Batman to become insane with him by proving that anyone can be driven insane like him through one bad day. But he fails when James Gordon stays sane after his ordeal and Batman tears his philosophy to shreds, saying that the Joker is the only one to blame for his actions, whether or not he had one bad day.
** Idealist: Batman has suffered alot during his life, from the deaths of his parents to all the crap he deals with fighting the Joker and all the other freaks he deals with. Yet he's so strong willed, he hasn't fallen into insanity despite all of that and is hopeful to enough to keep fighting crime in the WretchedHive that is Gotham City and believe that people like the Joker can be reformed. But like the Joker, he can't convince the other guy to agreed with him; while the Joker considers trying to accept Batman's help to rehabilitate him, he rejects it, believing that today's events show that he's so fucked up that he can't be fixed.

[[AC:Fridge Horror]]
* Several stories Post-Crisis hinted that [[ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} Kara]]'s ghost wandered over New-Earth. What if she saw everything that happened to her best friend Barbara?

[[AC:Fridge Logic]].

** Idealist: Batman has suffered alot during his life, from the deaths of his parents to all the crap he deals with fighting the Joker and all the other freaks he deals with. Yet he's so strong willed, he hasn't fallen into insanity despite all of that and is hopeful to enough to keep fighting crime in the WretchedHive that is Gotham City and believe that people like the Joker can be reformed. But like the Joker, he can't convince the other guy to agreed with him; while the Joker considers trying to accept Batman's help to rehabilitate him, he rejects it, believing that today's events show that he's so fucked up that he can't be fixed.

** If You're an idealist, then the patient who jumps is Batman, breaking free of the madness and retaining his sanity, and the patient who stays is the Joker, left to wallow in his madness.

** The [[WatsonianVersusDoylist Doylist]] answer is probably that Moore didn't put much effort into the plot to begin with, and just recycled this particular resolution from [[spoiler:''[[ComicBook/VForVendetta]]'', where it was much better foreshadowed]].

** Potentially from only having one bullet in it, which he used on Barbara? Or his last bullet was used on Barbara BEFORE the comic.

* The Joker's final... [[BuffySpeak joke]]... takes on a whole other level when you realize the two mental patients are supposed to be Batman and Joker, with a level ambiguity thrown in depending on which patient is which, depending on where you stand on [[TheSlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism]]:

[[AC:Fridge Logic]]. How is Joker's gun empty at the end? He never fires it through the entire fight and the ''only'' time he uses it through the whole book is the one bullet at Barbara.

* Were does Joker get his trademark playing card an name? Well, in this version of the backstory, Joker was going with the mob to a ''playing card factory''.

* Many people were pissed over Moore's DisposableWoman treatment of Barbara Gordon in ''ComicBook/TheKillingJoke'', me included. [[http://lovedatjoker.livejournal.com/2402.html This review]] of the story, however, made me realize something important: ''that was what The Joker wanted''. Barbara is a young, athletic woman, and has probably done her fair share of community work (and not just as Batgirl). Joker, however, had probably hoped to make everyone in Gotham (not to mention the audience) remember her as "that poor girl that was shot by Joker", and nothing more (much like Sarah Essen Gordon). But, thanks to one John Ostrander and one Kim Yale, he failed at that - Barbara's more well-known than ever as Oracle.

** There is much to praise in Brian Bolland's art. In each panel Joker is in, he is fully capable of smirking maliciously. But when he smiles, ''[[SadClown it never reaches his eyes.]]''

* Many people were pissed over Moore's DisposableWoman treatment of Barbara Gordon in ''TheKillingJoke'', me included. [[http://lovedatjoker.livejournal.com/2402.html This review]] of the story, however, made me realize something important: ''that was what The Joker wanted''. Barbara is a young, athletic woman, and has probably done her fair share of community work (and not just as Batgirl). Joker, however, had probably hoped to make everyone in Gotham (not to mention the audience) remember her as "that poor girl that was shot by Joker", and nothing more (much like Sarah Essen Gordon). But, thanks to one John Ostrander and one Kim Yale, he failed at that - Barbara's more well-known than ever as Oracle.