Sandbox / Gotham - Jerome Valeska

Main Character Page

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Jerome Valeska

"You ain't seen nothing yet!"

^{Click here to see Jerome pre-scars}

^{Click here to see Jerome with his face stapled on}

Played By: Cameron Monaghan

"You’re all prisoners. What you call sanity, it’s just a prison in your minds that stops you from seeing that you’re just tiny little cogs in a giant absurd machine. Wake up! Why be a cog? Be free like us. Just remember, smile."

A male teenager who lives in the circus and is responsible for his mother's death. He seems innocent, kind, and timid... until he starts laughing. Following a breakout with other inmates by Theo Galavan, Jerome became the leader of The Maniax, was betrayed and killed by Galavan only to return and create more chaos upon the city of Gotham.

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Tropes A-K

• Ambition Is Evil: After Galavan recruits him and gives him a taste of the spotlight, Jerome is put on a neverending quest to be "the star" and have all eyes in Gotham on him.
• Arc Villain: Due to the fact the character was regularly Commuting on a Bus due to Cameron Monaghan's other commitments, this meant that Jerome tended to be this, showing up as the main villain of a 3-4 episode arc from season 2 onward before making way for other villains like Theo Galavan, the Court of Owls or (by his own design) his brother Jeremiah.
• Arch-Enemy: Not surprisingly, considering whom he's based on, he ends up as this to Bruce Wayne, trying to kill him in season 2 as part of Galavan's plan, then becoming obsessed with finishing the job once he comes Back from the Dead in season 3. Tellingly, he's the one that solidifies Bruce's Thou Shalt Not Kill rule after Bruce almost goes too far in giving the clownish psycho a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown. After his death he ensures the role passes to his brother Jeremiah, who takes the trope in a different direction through his warped obsession with Bruce as his best friend.
• As Long as There Is Evil: Before he dies, he claims that he will live on "in the shadows of Gotham's discontent".
• Asshole Victim: His constant vile deeds can make it difficult to sympathize with him when others abuse him even when he didn't provoke it (Galavan's betrayal and murder of him, his uncle torturing him with scalding soup, etc.).
• Attention Whore: He loves gaining Gotham's attention and only holds back on killing Bruce Wayne because Bruce makes him realise he needs an audience to watch him kill Gotham's innocent son. Tellingly in that instance, he admits he knows Bruce is stalling for time for Gordon to come rescue him - but goes with his suggestion anyway because of his compulsive need to show off.
• Ax-Crazy: The show's outstanding example - not many other villains display such a lack of scruples or brutal penchant for killing on a whim. He even used one during the murder of his mother.
• Back from the Dead: Perhaps not surprisingly, he comes back in Season 3 after being killed at the start of Season 2.
• Bad Boss: After gaining a literal cult following, Jerome doesn't hesitate to casually kill his loyalists for a cheap laugh. In season 4 he straight-up kills one for the sole purpose of making him feel better after one of his schemes goes to pot.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: Sports a natty white ensemble for his final appearances in the latter half of season 4.
• The Bad Guy Wins: In season 4, while his plan to gas the whole city fell through, his backup plan to infect his brother and create a successor seemingly worked like a charm.
• Bait-and-Switch: His psychosis, mannerisms and background indicate he will become the Joker. But then he died on-screen in his fourth appearance making it look he wasn't the Joker after all ...until he comes back from the dead. He manages to make a good run of it before he dies for good a second time - but thanks to him his twin brother Jeremiah inherits the role!
• Bastard Bastard: He was conceived when Lila the snake dancer had an affair with Paul the blind soothsayer. He ends up becoming a vicious homicidal maniac.
• Beard of Evil: He wears a menacing beard as part of his disguise while attacking a charity ball during "The Last Laugh".
• Berserk Button: Anything to do with his mother or father will quickly make his Faux Affably Evil act give way to genuine anger.
  • Also, never step on his punch line or interrupt him. He will shoot you immediately.
• Beware the Silly Ones: He's constantly making jokes and pulling silly poses. He's still one of the most dangerous men in Gotham's history.
• Big Bad: Upon revival, he's the lead villain in the final episodes of Mad City in Season 3, replacing the Mad Hatter, as well as the latter half of Dark Knight in Season 4 when he creates the Legion of Horribles - although he dies before season's end, he ensures that Jeremiah will become a Superior Successor.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: When we first meet him, he seems like an innocent young boy mourning the recent death of his mother. However, once it's revealed that he killed his mother and that Paul Cicero is his father, he reveals his true nature as a sociopathic maniac.
• Blatant Lies: When chasing Bruce through his twisted carnival, he promises that he won't hurt Bruce... while holding a gun and having just tried to fire a cannonball into Bruce two minutes ago.
• Body Horror: His face becomes a huge deformity after getting it slashed off by Dwight. Now Jerome has to work hard at making sure his face doesn't fall off.
• Boring, but Practical: He'd probably flip out if described as this, but it's worth noting that to plunge Gotham into madness the Court of Owls have to recruit Hugo Strange, steal Alice Tetch's body and build a bomb to infect hundreds (if not thousands) of people with a weaponised form of her insanity-causing blood. Jerome is able to cause equal, if not greater, chaos earlier in the season simply by going on TV and appealing to people to unleash their inner craziness and kill whoever they want.
• Boring Insult: When he and Oswald both end up in Arkham, Jerome finds Oswald much less fun than expected, even calling Oswald's reasons staying in the asylum boring. This leads to Jerome tormenting Oswald remorselessly in order to get him to "lighten up".
• Breakout Character: Originally intended as a one-off Joker Red Herring, Cameron Monaghan's charisma combined with his popularity in the fanbase rocketed Jerome to a recurring Arc Villain in his own right for multiple seasons.
• The Bully: When he and Oswald are both locked in Arkham, Jerome uses his control over the guards and other inmates to torment Oswald ceaselessly. He also may have been this to Jeremiah when they were children, but Jeremiah's paranoia and tendency to lie as a child makes it uncertain.
• Cain and Abel: Jerome wants to kill his brother, though not before driving him insane. While the former never comes to pass, the latter does, leaving Jeremiah as a worse threat to the city than his brother ever was. Given the pre-planned circumstances of unleashing Jeremiah's insanity, with recording and everything, it's also possible Jerome never actually wanted to kill Jeremiah.
• Can't Kill You, Still Need You: Jerome doesn't kill Jeremiah when he has his brother at his mercy. At the time it looks to be so he can follow through on his threat of driving Jeremiah mad before killing him - but later episodes show that as he wasn't planning on surviving, he had something much worse in mind...
• Card-Carrying Villain: Jerome is very open about how all he wants to do is "paint the town crazy", and sneers at the suggestion that he must have some humanity in him. He also names his Villain Team-Up "the Legion of Horribles".
• Chaos Is Evil: He loves the idea of his actions causing normal people to free themselves from the shackles of humanity, and is directly opposed to Gordon, the biggest believer in order in the series. Most prominently seen in his police massacre speech (his page quote) in season 2, and the anarchy he inspires following his resurrection in season 3. In season 4 he plans to help the process along a bit with the first Joker Gas.
  Bruce: Is there a plan for all this madness?
  Jerome: These people don't want a plan. They want an excuse. A mother who dreams of strangling her child. A husband who wants to stab his wife. All they want is someone to tell them, "Do it. Kill them. It doesn't matter." It doesn't.
• The Chessmaster: While he tends to be more sporadic and chaotic, in Season 4 he's able to perfectly manipulate the rest of the cast to exactly where he wants them for his big final scheme, with none of them realizing until it's nearly too late.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: If you work with or for Jerome, odds are he will stab you in the back sooner or later, possibly literally.
  • After he and Paul Cicero work together to hide Lila's body, as soon as they're found out Jerome turns on Paul and later is happy to kill him.
  • While he played the role of Richard Sionis's loyal underling in Arkham, when Tabitha kills Sionis all Jerome does is laugh.
  • While he and Greenwood are supposed to be working together, Jerome murders Greenwood simply for stepping on his line.
  • He pretends to forgive Dwight for cutting off his face while he was still dead, only to tie him to him to explosives and leave him to get blown up while he saying that he doesn't forgive Dwight for the face.
  • After Jerome gains a cult, he frequently maims or kills members no matter how loyal they have been in the past. The reasons for this range from "being too loud when Jerome was trying to talk" to "just for the hell of it".
  • When Bruce saves Jerome from torture and probable death by his Uncle Zack, how does Jerome repay him? By sitting back and laughing while Zack's henchman attacks Bruce. Although he only does this after Bruce yells at him to not kill the henchman.
  • In more of a double-double-cross, or a mutual double-cross, when Jerome forms the Legion of Horribles he anticipates Penguin betraying him, which Penguin does indeed do, so he preemptively tells the other members to gang up on Penguin when the time comes.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: While he usually moves around too fast to take the time for this, killing his victims quickly, he definitely still appreciates it. He has his minions set up a carnival full of games that torture random civilians, and he later relishes physically and psychologically assaulting Oswald when they're both in Arkham.
• Combat Pragmatist: He'll pretend to fight fair while concealing a hidden weapon, and he won't hesitate to run away if he needs to.
• Combat Sadomasochist:
  • He takes it to a gross degree with Sarah Essen in season 2, when she spits in his face/mouth and he says that it was “strangely pleasant” and asks her to do it again. He also seems pretty excited when she headbutts him and he starts bleeding.
  • He enjoys it a little too much when Bruce beats him up and prepares to kill him.
  Jerome: That's it! Let it out!
  • He's delighted when Penguin's "joke" in Arkham results in Oswald giving him a pretty severe beatdown, describing it later as "the laugh of the century".
  • Describes the smell of soup his uncle made by shoving his hand in a boiling pot of chicken stock as "mouth-watering".
• Comic-Book Fantasy Casting: Cameron Monaghan seems to be channeling Mark Hamill for all his portrayals of Jerome, with the voice getting similar to Heath Ledger due to Jerome's wound in the throat.
• The Comically Serious: Even when he's being serious, his delivery can't help but make him come across as this.
  Jerome: ^note  berating an Arkham inmate for serving the future Rogues' Gallery with the wrong cutlery. USE THE TONGS, CARL!
• Commuting on a Bus: Due to the fact Cameron Monaghan was juggling his appearances on Gotham with his role on Shameless (US) at the same time, Jerome tended to get this a lot. He's put in Arkham after his only season 1 appearance, killed after his appearances in early season 2, caught and put in Arkham again after his season 3 resurrection and only appears in the latter half of season 4 after escaping Arkham once more.
• Composite Character: He shares traits and elements with different portrayals of the Joker in past media, such as Jack Nicholson, Mark Hamill and Heath Ledger. His actor has described the character as a tribute to past Jokers.
  • Like Nicholson's Joker, Jerome describes himself as an artist, plays a role in forming Bruce into Batman (albeit a much less direct role), and dies in a fall from a building, leaving a staring corpse with big smile.
  • Like Hamill's Joker, Jerome has different laughs for different moods, inspires a gang of evil clowns after his death, and takes over said clown gang after he comes back to life.
  • Like Ledger's Joker, Jerome ends up with scars that form a smile pattern on his face, is a Psycho Knife Nut and Mad Bomber, broadcasts threatening video messages to the city, pontificates about a nihilistic worldview where humans are inherently violent killers, and laughs while plummeting to his death.
• Cop Killer: He becomes this as of "Knock, Knock," partaking in the massacre at GCPD headquarters and killing Essen. Kills many, many more over the following seasons.
• The Corrupter: During both of his lives, he influenced many people into evil and madness, most notably his brother Jeremiah, who gets a face full of Joker gas that brings his own insanity to the forefront and turns him into a bleach-skinned maniac who eventually ends up becoming The Joker.
• Create Your Own Hero: His attacks on Bruce turn out to play a vital role in shaping Bruce into the hero he's destined to be.
• Creepy High-Pitched Voice: His voice tends to squeak when he's particularly animated, but it doesn't make him any less menacing.
• Crocodile Tears: Season 1.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: He specializes in these. Trapping people in torturous carnival games, attempting to blast someone in the face with a cannon, tampering with shock treatment to render someone brain-dead... and of course his infamous Laughing Toxin.
• Cult of Personality: After the Maniax burn out, an underground movement starts that idolizes them, especially Jerome. Bruce once visits a club themed around them. By season 3, a cult has formed across the city that is dedicated solely to Jerome and is devoted to bringing him back.
• The Cynic: Behind his wide grin lies a depressed doomsayer.
• Dark Messiah: Downplayed. According to his father's last vision, he will influence Gotham with evil and madness, eventually creating the worst curse upon Gotham. Played straight in Mad City. He even goes so far as referring to himself as one to his followers. He finally unleashes said worse curse... by turning his brother Jeremiah into a Superior Successor - a bleach-skinned maniac with all of Jerome's insanity and (according to Jeremiah) more intelligence and potential for destruction.
  Jerome: Tonight, Gotham, in the darkness, there are no rules. So Gotham, tonight, do what you want. Kill who you want. And when morning comes, you too shall be reborn.
• Darker and Edgier: He was already an unrepentant mass murderer before dying, but after coming back to life he somehow becomes even darker. His pretty boy looks have been marred by Body Horror, his destruction is now city-wide, his admired mentor (Theo Galavan) is dead after betrayal, he has become a full Dark Messiah to a cult, and he embraces a nihilistic philosophy that goes deeper than the mere twisted sense of fun that motivated him before.
• Deadpan Snarker: When he's not being a Large Ham, he's making sarcastic asides.
  Gordon: "You son of a bitch!"
  Jerome: "True, but not the point."
• Decomposite Character: As the show isn't allowed to use the Joker name (at least initially), this is how the show handled the Clown Prince.
  • Jerome is the one who first establishes the Evil Laugh, the sick sense of humor, the theatricality and need for an audience, cheating death, the permanent smile, and the laughing gas. Despite this, he never actually becomes the Joker.
  • When Jeremiah gets his brother's Joker gas in the face he brings in the rest of the major traits: the bleached skin and green hair (thought the latter is very downplayed), purple suit, the Evil Genius tendencies, master planner abilities, obsession with Bruce as his opposite and the relationship with Ecco doubling for Harley.
• Determinator: When Jerome wants to do something, he will do it no matter how much he has to physically endure. Beat him within an inch of his life? He'll just laugh. Torture him? He'll grab the first opportunity to turn the tables. Cut off his face? He'll just staple it right back up and move on.
• Devilish Hair Horns: It's subtle, but in many of his more violent scenes, the tips of his red hair are sticking up, making him look even more like the devil incarnate.
• Didn't See That Coming: It never occurred to him that Galavan would dispose of him eventually.
• Dies Wide Open: Both times that he dies, his eyes remain creepily visible.
• Disc-One Final Boss: Of the second half of Season 4. He breaks out of Arkham Asylum and plans to drive Gotham insane with laughing gas, but once this plan fails, he willingly falls to his death and posthumously gives Jeremiah, his brother, special laughing gas that transforms him into something far, far worse than he ever was.
• Disney Villain Death: His self-inflicted second death.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Well, he is based on the Joker after all. He's killed members of his own gang several times for jumping on his line, offed his mother for nagging him to do the dishes and killed one of the Legion of Horribles for serving food with the wrong implements.
• Doing It for the Art: In-universe. The more distant he becomes from his old life, the less he cares about conventional criminal goals like wealth or power. He describes himself as an artist who simply wants to "paint the town crazy".
• The Dreaded: His Fortune Teller father's final prophecy describes him as this, with most of Gotham fearing him. It comes to pass, with Gordon listing Jerome as being on the same level as Fish Mooney in terms of "staying power" in regards to being remembered by Gotham's citizens. At one point his identical brother Jeremiah walking into the GCPD HQ with Gordon is enough to render everyone in the building totally silent.
  • Amusingly subverted when he meets his brother's assistant Ecco: he's visibly baffled she isn't scared of him, shortly before she beats the crap out of him.
• Drives Like Crazy: He cares little about running over civilians when he's on the road.
• Due to the Dead: After Jerome is buried, his followers perform some sort of twisted ritual over his grave - as it turns out, at the behest of his brother.
• Establishing Character Moment: Two in different seasons.
  • The Reveal of him being his mother's killer, with him suddenly displaying the Laughing Mad tendencies and evil grin that instantly established him as a fan-favourite choice for the future-Joker.
  • The Russian roulette scene in season 2, where he demonstrates Nerves of Steel in taking three tries in a row with the one-bullet gun, intimidating his rival Greenwood into backing away from leadership of the Maniax - establishing that underneath the boyish exterior he's way more than just another garden-variety psycho and actually has the Villainous Virtues he claims he does.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: He thinks Bruce's relationship with Alfred is weird, questioning how a master and servant can be so close.
• Evil Counterpart: To Bruce Wayne. Both were orphaned late into their lives, both were associated with shady organizations, and both are on opposing sides of the law. While Bruce's parents were gunned down by a hired thug, traumatizing him, Jerome happily murdered his parents with no ill effect on him. Contrasting Bruce's great working relationship with Gordon, Jerome has tried to kill him on several occasions. Taken to larger levels after Jerome's resurrection, and their eventual confrontation. While Jerome has a vast cult at his beck and call, Bruce only has Alfred and Gordon at that point to rely on. In the funhouse of mirrors, Jerome uses a gun and some underhanded tactics such as a Blade Below the Shoulder while Bruce uses Good Old Fisticuffs. Before said confrontation, Jerome had given Bruce a rough "sad clown" design on his face, while Jerome's face remained ever-grinning due to the way his face was, reflecting their ideologies of order (Bruce) and anarchy (Jerome). After the whole ordeal, Bruce began to adopt his iconic Thou Shalt Not Kill way of thinking while Jerome remains a murderous sociopath.
• Evil Has a Bad Sense of Humor: While he's quick with clever one-liners, he also laughs at things that are violent and deadly simply because they're violent and deadly.
• Evil Is Petty: He likes to make fun of people as much as to hurt and kill them.
• Evil Laugh: Well, look who he's based on. His actor has mentioned in interviews he's subscribed to the Hamill method of having different laughs for Jerome's different moods - just look at the results.
  Theo Galavan: The laugh is fabulous. Use that.
• Evil Makes You Ugly: Over the course of the series, his monstrous actions lead to his face being cut off and deformed, leaving him with discolored skin and nasty scars by the time of his death.
• Evil Plan: He normally leans more towards chaos for chaos's sake, but in season 4 he concocts a complex scheme to infect the entire city with laughing gas. Which will then give him chaos for chaos's sake.
• Evil Redhead: A natural redhead, and one of the show's most out-and-out evil characters.
• Evil Sounds Raspy: Justified. Galavan kills Jerome by stabbing him in the throat, so naturally when Jerome comes back to life his voice has more of a raspy element from the damage.
• Evil Twin: Played with to an extent. Jerome is certainly evil, but if Jeremiah's post-transformation belief that he was always as dangerous and murderous as he proves in the last few episodes of season 4 is true, and it seems true as he deliberately made a plan to hurt his brother as a child by telling lies, along with the show's theme of "you can't bring out something that's not already there", it's likely there have never been a good twin in this relationship.
• Evil Versus Evil: He tells Bruce that there are no such things as heroes in Gotham City and mocks him for trying to act above everyone else. He argues that deep down, everyone's as ugly as he is.
• Explosive Leash: In Season 4 he abducts several city officials and straps exploding collars around their necks, so he can make their heads explode if his demand aren't met.
• Face Death with Dignity: Dignity might be the wrong word, but when he finally dies for good there's no pleading or begging as he willingly lets himself plummet to his death, as he's come around to the idea of what he represents as a symbol to the downtrodden and insane of Gotham. There's also the fact he knows his backup plan to turn his brother into something worse than he ever was is in motion regardless...
• Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: Looks like a handsome, innocent young boy, but is actually a psychotic madman who commits horrific crimes just for a laugh. Subverted in Season 3 onward, where he's just as ugly on the outside as he is on the inside, thanks to having his face cut off and stitched back on.
• Facial Horror: After one of his followers, Dwight, fails to resurrect him from the dead, he decides to slice his face off and wear it like a mask to morbidly symbolize Jerome's legacy living on through the maniacs he inspired. When it turns out that the resurrection was a success, Jerome not only gets his face back, he staples it back on^note in reference to the New 52 Joker, especially during Death of the Family. Needless to say, the results aren't pretty◊. Even less so when Gordon actually punches it off.
• Failed a Spot Check: Doesn't twig until too late that his uncle has set out three bowls of soup for just the two of them. Cue Lunkhead the Strongman beating him to a pulp.
• Faux Affably Evil: He can act quite chummy sometimes, as with his "chat" with Essen in series 2 - but it's clear the murderous sociopath is never far from the surface.
• For the Evulz: While Jerome might claim some petty reasons for some of his murders, for the most part he's shown killing people without any needed excuses at all, and cackling madly while doing so.
• Foreshadowing: Shortly before he kills a Defiant to the End Commissioner Essen, she tells him he'll be dead soon and that no-one will remember his name. The former comes to pass an episode later at the hands of Theo Galavan (though it doesn't stick), while by the finale the latter also happens by his own design, in favour of a far worse monster - his twin brother Jeremiah,aka the Joker.
• Freudian Excuse: He had a heavily abusive childhood, being frequently beaten by his mother and her various lovers as well as his uncle, who once shoved Jerome's hand in a deep fat fryer - and that was before Jeremiah managed to turn the rest of his family against him, as Jeremiah was only sent away when the twins were ten, and Jerome reminisces about their mother and her lovers beating him on his ninth birthday. Though, it has to be noted that the age Jeremiah gave is either another lie or a writing mistake, as it contradicts with their ages (season 2 establishes there's at least 5 year gap between them and Bruce, who just turns 18 at the end of season 4, making Jeremiah around 23, and Jerome says he waited 15 years for their reunion) and what Jerome said in their confrontation about how their mother gave up on him only AFTER she hid Jeremiah away. If this is not a continuity error, then given Jeremiah's tendency to lie about his twin, he was probably sent away before their ninth birthday. The series plays with but does not make it clear whether he was always off his rocker or not: in fact, it becomes a mystery once comes the last-minute deceptive twin brother. Before that, Jerome just had an abusive alcoholic mother and a bad father who sparked his nihilistic attitude with "the world doesn't care about you or anyone else" line. According to Jerome in his conversation with Cicero, that was the turning point. He also angrily remarks how it's "too late" for Cicero to be a good father, perhaps acknowledging that things could've been different. Simply put, nothing really suggested he was always crazy. Season 4 Jerome heavily implies Jeremiah lying and turning everyone Jerome has ever loved against him was his "one bad day". And even during the twin plot, we still get a story about the brothers seemingly being normal kids, playing and daring each other to steal sweets from uncle, and Jerome describing his childhood as helpless. Any evil details we hear come from Jeremiah, who is hinted to not be a fully reliable source. In contrast, Jerome's side of the story is usually either confirmed by other characters (Cicero, Jeremiah) or at least not denied (uncle Zack). Admittedly, there isn't anyone left to confirm or deny Jeremiah's words, except Jerome, but even in his own story their mother didn't believe him at first when he tried to convince her that Jerome has issues.
• Glasgow Grin: The surgery performed to re-attach his face leaves him with a long rent on each side of his mouth.
• Giggling Villain: He's a frequent laugher, ranging from creepy giggles to full-on Evil Laugh.
• Gross-Up Close-Up: There are a number of times where we're treated to a grisly close-up of Jerome's deformed face, and an even more disturbing one when Gordon nails him with a right cross that actually tears his stapled face clean off.
• The Heavy: Of the opening three episodes of Season 2. He personally carries out the first part of Theo Galavan's evil plan.
• Humans Are Bastards: He thoroughly believes this, and couldn't be happier about it.
• "I Can't Look!" Gesture: During his magic show, when he's about to shoot an apple off of an audience member's head, he pretends to get scared and cover his eyes while he himself is shooting the gun. Fortunately for the victim, it's a water pistol.
• I Control My Minions Through...:
  • In the case of his cult, Fanatical Loyalty mixed with Power, specifically Sadism (when they take over the city, Jerome has his minions build a twisted carnival where they can torture and kill civilians to their heart's desire).
  • Material Benefits/Power, in the case of the various criminal members of the Legion of Horribles. Jerome promises them that they can do whatever they want with Gotham city after he's done gassing it.
• I Lied: He tells Dwight that, because Dwight brought him back to life, the little matter of cutting off Jerome's face when he was still dead is water under the bridge. Shortly after, Jerome abandons Dwight to get killed by the bombs they rigged up, saying on his way out that he actually didn't forgive Dwight for the face thing.
• I Was Quite the Looker: Before his death and subsequent resurrection, Jerome was rather boyishly handsome, despite being quite evil. Then he died, was resurrected, and a cult member removed Jerome's face, which Jerome himself later stapled back on. The results aren't pretty. He even lampshades that he used to be the handsome one when he meets Jeremiah again.
• Insane Equals Violent: He is frequently described as both.
• Institutional Apparel: He, along with the other Maniax, wear their striped Arkham uniforms when they're out committing terroism.
  • Shortly after his resurrection in Season 3, he dons a white jumpsuit that's reminiscent of a straightjacked with just a hint of bondage.
• Interim Villain: Unlike the other Big Bads of season 3 Jerome is the only one to not use the Tetch virus for his crimes. He appears right in the middle of the season after the GCPD finally arrest Jervis Tetch and cure the city of his virus but before the Court of Owls use said virus for their own nefarious plans. Justified, as the anarchy and chaos he unleashes is what convinces the Court to use the virus to destroy Gotham.
• It Amused Me: If he's not doing it for revenge or attention, than he's doing it solely for his own (usually twisted) amusement.
• It's All About Me: After his debut episode, where he's exposed as a murderer and villain, he fully embraces it and develops a constant desire to the center of attention.
• Jabba Table Manners: He has a tendency to talk with his mouth full and wipe his hands off on other people's clothes.
• Jerkass: He screws around with pretty much everybody he comes across, no matter how pointless it is, just because he thinks it's fun.
• Joker Immunity: In this universe, thanks to Hugo Strange, Death Is Cheap. Guess who's back...? Doesn't stick the second time though.
• Kick the Dog: He's unnecessarily and relentlessly cruel to his favorite victims, particularly Bruce and Penguin.
• Kubrick Stare: Once the jig is up, gone is the timid, innocent look of a sad teenager and in is the cold, bitter stare of a maniac.

Tropes L-Z

• Lack of Empathy: Where to begin? Perhaps the carnival he had his followers construct based around torturing and killing people. Or how he stabs one of his own followers for little reason and then says to "Shut up, ya big baby". Or the fact that he sits back and laughs as Bruce is about to be killed right after Bruce had saved Jerome himself from being tortured.
• Large Ham: As per the character he's based on, Jerome tends to dominate any scene he's in.
• Laughably Evil: He cracks jokes all the time, usually while doing something terrible.
• Laughing Mad: After The Reveal that he killed his mother, Jerome laughs maniacally.
• Legacy Character: Even after his death, his horrific actions have still left quite a mark on Gotham City. All the chaos and death that he spread had turned several citizens into laughing homicidal maniacs, who eventually band together to form an entire cult worshiping their Dark Messiah. Even if he doesn't end up being the Clown Prince of Crime, there's no doubt that he's at least responsible for creating him. Confirmed: Post-humously, he turns his own twin brother, Jeremiah, into his legacy - a far, far worse monster who ends up destroying half the city and turning it into No Man's Land.
  Cicero: You will be a curse upon Gotham. Children will wake from sleep, screaming at the thought of you. Your legacy will be death and madness.
• Light Is Not Good: His general aesthetic is based around colorful carnivals, smiles, and laughter. Of course, he makes all these things seem horrific.
• Mad Artist: By his own admission in "Mandatory Brunch Meeting". He describes himself as an artist who "wants to paint the town crazy."
• Mad Bomber: After he comes back from the dead, one of his first actions is to blow up Gotham's power plant. Later, he is waaaaay too excited at the idea of blowing up the city officials that he's kidnapped, even getting impatient and exploding one's head before his deadline.
• The Mad Hatter: Say that he's crazy, and he'll cheerfully agree (except in season 2 when he denies being crazy). Even more so than the character actually inspired by the Mad Hatter.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: At the end of "The Last Laugh" after Jerome's death, several people across Gotham start to become as maniacal and homicidal as he was. Is his spirit affecting people? Did Cicero actually cast a curse instead of prophesying one? Or did something in these people just snap upon seeing Jerome's horrific acts on television?
• Mask of Sanity: He pretends to be a quiet, normal boy in his debut episode while trying to escape blame for the murder of his mother. Once Jim accuses him, though, Jerome cheerfully throws the mask away and never looks back.
• Master Actor: Very good at pretending to be innocent in his first appearance, despite being extremely unhinged. He not only fools Gordon with his act for most of the episode, but no one else in the circus even thinks of him as a suspect in his mother's murder, despite the fact that later episodes make clear that at least some of them witnessed the abuse his mother and uncle put him through, but did nothing to prevent it. This indicates that he might have put up a front around them, as well.
• Matricide: Murdered his mother after her physical abuse and nagging went a bit too far.
• Meaningful Name:
  • His name is just a "K" shy of having the word Joker hidden in it. His surname, Valeska, is a couple letters off from Valestra.
  • "Valeska" is Slavic for "Glorious Ruler". Fitting, isn't it?
• Might as Well Not Be in Prison at All: As Penguin discovers in season 4, he's got almost total control over the prisoner population of Arkham, as well as many of the guards.
• Monster Clown: Invoked fully during his circus torment of Bruce in season 3.
• Mood-Swinger: His demeanor can go from delightedly cheerful to murderously angry in a second.
• My Death Is Only The Beginning: He tells Jim that, even after plunging to his death, he will "live on in the shadows of Gotham's discontent".
• Mythology Gag: According to his actor, his whole portrayal is a "love letter" to the character of The Joker over the years. While he channels other Joker actors - namely Jack Nicholson and Heath Ledger - Monaghan says he was especially inspired by Mark Hamill. As a result, tonnes of jokes he makes reference the Joker:
  • After his delivery of "My father," just try not to mentally add "was a drinker and a fiend."
  • During the attack on the GCPD, Jerome makes a disturbing video very similar to one the Joker made in The Dark Knight.
  • The cult of psychos that worship Jerome in Season 3 sport white face paint and red lips, a clear reference to the Joker's iconic look.
  • The Season 3 episode "Smile Like You Mean It" opens with Jerome's cult breaking into a warehouse to retrieve their "savior's" body, killing a security guard (who was playing cards during his shift) in the process. The camera then zooms in on the guard's deck to reveal a Joker card.
  • Jerome inspires a future gang of clown anarchists exactly like the Jokerz.
  • Jerome gets his face hacked off and after getting it back he crudely attempts to reattach it while doing all he can to prevent it from falling off entirely, exactly like the New 52 Joker, especially during Death of the Family.
  • And a rather odd and subtle one in a completely different direction; Jerome was a young boy in a traveling circus until the death of his parents, after which he was taken in and trained by a wealthy but brooding and shadowy man who has a vision of improving Gotham City... have we heard this before?
  • Even his identical twin brother can be an obscure Joker reference: in Batman: Arkham City, the Joker, who was sick, had Clayface act as his body double. As of Episode 18 of Season 4, Jerome is dead, but Jeremiah might be keeping his legacy alive after all...
  • Jerome's death is almost a mirror image of the scene Heath Ledger's Joker went through, falling off a building while cackling madly. The only difference is, unlike Christian Bale, Jim Gordon didn't have a grappling hook gadget to pull the psychopath back up and keep him from falling to his death. And much like Jack Nicholson's Joker, the camera focuses on Jerome's corpse afterwards, mainly his lifeless smiling face.
  • When he and his cronies take over a concert, the riff they play while waiting for Gordon to arrive is suspiciously similar to the Adam West TV show theme.
• Narcissist: It's no secret that he wants to have an audience at all times. He thinks of himself so highly that when he discovers a cult has grown up around his legend, he takes it completely in stride and acts as if he's been a Dark Messiah all his life.
• Nerves of Steel: Displays them in season 2's Russian roulette scene, deliberately taking three tries in a row with the gun to intimidate Greenwood into dropping his claim to leadership of the Maniax, despite the risk of blowing his own head off. He doesn't even flinch as he pulls the trigger each time.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: His rivalry with Bruce plays a large part in forming Bruce's identity and code of ethics as Batman.
• Nightmare Face: After getting it cut off, Jerome goes to disturbing lengths to reattach his skinned face, resulting in a gruesome appearance.
• Nightmare Fetishist: He loves killing people and laughs whenever it happens.
• Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: Especially when he admitted to murdering his mother.
• No Sense of Personal Space: He is very touchy-feely which, given the rest of his behavior, his cast in a decidedly creepy light.
• Not Afraid to Die: One of the things that makes him so dangerous is how willing he is to risk his life to get what eh wants. First showcased when he asserts dominance to the other Maniax by playing Russian Roulette and pulling the trigger four times in a row. He also cares more about corrupting his enemies than his own survival, as seen by his eagerness for Bruce and later Jim to kill him in cold blood. When Jim doesn't take the bait, Jerome lets himself fall to his death with a laugh, knowing that his plans will come to fruition even with him gone.
• Obfuscating Insanity: He's clearly a lot smarter than his Laughably Evil tendencies would suggest, as shown when he engineers the Arkham breakout in season 4.
• Off with His Head!: This is the method of his offscreen takedown of Wayne Tower's security.
  Jerome (calling after fleeing receptionist): Don't bother going to security, they're all-
  Receptionst screams from the next room.
  Jerome: ...headless. (Shrugs and moves on.)
• Patricide: When he's recruited into the Maniax, one of his missions is to kill his father. He does it partly to help the Maniax by framing his father, and partly because he just really wants to.
• Pet the Dog: Played with. When Bruce saves him from being killed by his uncle, he actually looks set to save Bruce's life in turn by shooting his uncle's strongman henchman as he throttles Bruce. But Bruce is obviously against it, and he complies and decides it'd be funnier if the guy Bruce saved him from ends up killing Bruce. Jerome then just sits back and gleefully watches as Bruce struggles for his life.
• Polar Opposite Twins: His identical brother Jeremiah is a soft-spoken, reclusive architectural genius, Jerome is a nihilistic Large Ham psycho. Even as villains Jerome is mostly chaotic even when following his plans, with a penchant for theatricality. Jeremiah is a No-Nonsense Nemesis - methodical and precise even when destroying half the city.
• Pop-Cultured Badass: He's shown to be familiar with classic entertainers like Fred Astaire.
• Practically Joker: A very deliberate example due to it being done by a DC-sanctioned take on Batman, so the show was constrained by Warner Brothers' insistence that the Joker be used specifically in their DCU films. Jerome ends up being the Joker in all but name, having his characterization derived from several different versions of the Joker and being explicitly said to be a tribute to the Clown Prince of Crime. Though originally created as a one-off possible identity of the Joker^note alongside the Red Hood gang and a morbid comedian working for Fish. However, Monaghan's performance proved so popular that Jerome was promoted to this, becoming essentially the show's take on the Joker for the first four seasons and, as mentioned in the Decomposite Character section, taking on many of the iconic Joker traits. Fittingly, he's was responsible for giving rise to the real Joker of Gotham.
• Predecessor Villain: If he isn't the Joker, then he definitely had a hand in inspiring him. Confirmed in Season 4, where he transforms his twin brother Jeremiah into the show's take on the Joker.
• Psycho for Hire: Being recruited into the Maniax means that Theo Galavan rewards Jerome for what he loves to do anyway: hurting people and causing chaos.
• Psychopathic Manchild: He practically bounces around like a hyper little kid and frequently makes corny jokes and silly faces. Not that this every lessens his appetite for destruction and death.
• Psychotic Smirk: Whenever he's about to do something heinous, if he's not laughing, he's smirking.
• Put the "Laughter" in "Slaughter": Often laughs at all the pain and death that he causes, special mention going to his hysterics while driving away from a school bus full of teenagers that he just tried to burn.
• Rage Breaking Point: He claimed that his mom kept "pushing" and that he killed her because she told him to do the dishes.
• Red Herring: Though his character was pretty heavily based on the Joker, it turns out he wasn't "Joker before he was Joker" in keeping with the general theme of the series, rather someone who will later inspire the Joker in-universe. Hilariously for a red herring, he has red hair. A possibly Subverted Trope, once he got resurrected. Losing his face and trying to stick it back on further solidifies the possibility.
  • The show just LOVES to play with his fans. He's dead for real this time... Luckily for him, he had a twin brother to inherit his villainous legacy!
• Repulsive Ringmaster: In season 3, he dresses up like a ringmaster for the execution of Bruce Wayne, which is staged like a circus stunt.
• The Reveal: He was the one who murdered his mother after all.
• Sadist: Oh yes. So much so that he had his cult set up a carnival filled with games and rides based around torturing and killing innocent victims, and proceeded to have the time of his life in it.
• Self-Made Orphan: We meet him after he kills his mother. A ways into season two, he kills his father.
• Sharp-Dressed Man: When he bbreaks out of Arkham in series 4, one of the first things he does is trade out his prison uniform for a snazzy white suit.
• Shipper on Deck: Insanely, is one for Gordon and Lee: upon his resurrection he enquires about the state of their relationship and seems genuinely disappointed it didn't work out, telling Lee "I really liked you guys."
• Shout-Out: In "The Gentle Art of Making Enemies", Jerome wears a white straitjacket and pants with a hat that makes him look a lot like Alex DeLarge.
• Sibling Rivalry: While the details are unclear, it seems that Jerome and Jeremiah had a troubled relationship as children.
• Sinister Sweet Tooth: He professes a love of Chunky Monkey ice cream.
• Slashed Throat: How he dies. It doesn't last. The first time, anyway.
• Slasher Smile: Jerome's got a nasty one.
• Sliding Scale of Villain Threat: Jerome is a City Threat. His plots revolve around driving Gotham City into madness.
• Small Role, Big Impact: Even though he met his demise, his chaotic crimes influence many others to follow in his footsteps. And then he returns from the dead, still making him a prime candidate for being the Joker after all... Only to die again, but not before leaving a little gift for his twin brother...
• Snarky Villain, Earnest Hero: He jokes around far more than any of the heroes he comes up against, especially Bruce.
• The Sociopath: He shows shades of being one, including no empathy, highly impulsive and erratic behaviour, excessive risk taking and manipulating others.
• Son of a Whore: Jerome told Jim Gordon that his mother had many "lovers". After the reveal that he killed her, he said she was "nagging, drunken whore".
• Spanner in the Works: His season 3 return and subsequent rampage are this for the Court of Owls, as his nearly killing Bruce appears to be what goads at least some of them into deciding Gotham has fallen ill and trying to destroy it with the Tetch virus.
• Straw Nihilist: His general philosophy is that it doesn't matter who you hurt or kill, so you should go ahead and do all the hurting and killing you want. The seed of this seems to have been planted by his father.
• Surprisingly Creepy Moment: When he finally reveals his true nature, by God it's disturbing.
• Technician Versus Performer: The performer to his brother's technician. Intensely theatrical and showy, he's highly intelligent, but prefers to see chaos and anarchy spin out of the acts he commits rather than follow a master plan.
• Teens Are Monsters: He's so monstrous that Gordon has no qualms about beating him into unconsciousness.
• Theme Twin Naming: Jerome and Jeremiah.
• Then Let Me Be Evil: Claims that he embraced this as a result of Jeremiah telling lies to make him look unstable as a child.
• They Look Just Like Everyone Else!: A very creepy version. Jerome looked like a normal everyday young man, working the circus with his mother. His confession of his murder of her makes it all the more nightmarish.
  • Somewhat subverted by Season Two, where Jerome has visibly embraced his madness, and has wilder hair and paler skin.
  • By Season 3, he most certainly does not look normal anymore; losing your face then stapling it back on will do that to you. By season 4 the surgery to reattach his face his left him with a permanent Glasgow grin and scarring round the outline of the cuts, making him look even more nightmarish.
• To Create a Playground for Evil: Post-resurrection (and no longer working for Galavan), whatever he's currently doing, his ultimate goal is to completely demolish Gotham's society and reduce everyone in it to murderous animals.
• Tom the Dark Lord: As opposed to his main inspiration, as well as most other big Gotham villains, Jerome only goes by his normal-sounding real name, despite being the most feared monster in Gotham.
• Too Kinky to Torture: Tends to break into gleeful laughter every time he manages to make someone snap enough to give him a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown. Seems to go hand in hand with his need to corrupt people to prove that anyone can become as insane as him if they have one bad day.
• Took a Level in Badass: Hugely; when he's first banged up he's Richard Sionis' lackey, and as much carnage as he subsequently causes with the Maniax, he's an Unwitting Pawn in Theo Galavan's grand scheme. Fast forward a few years and he practically runs Arkham when he's in, and makes even psychopaths like the Penguin and Riddler pale in comparison when he isn't, to the point virtually every other villain's arc is sidelined during his final spree in season 4. The only villain in the show's five year run who could be considered worse? His twin brother Jeremiah, the future Joker.
• Trailers Always Lie: With the mass advertising for the show, you'd think that he was the real Joker. Unfortunately he's not, as evidenced by his death, but then he comes back. This further supports the idea that he might become the Joker after all. And then he dies again, permanently this time, but posthumously transforms his twin brother Jeremiah into the true Clown Prince Of Crime.
• Trailers Always Spoil: The trailers for his debut episode made absolutely no secret of the fact he was the villain of the episode, or that he had some sort of connection to the Joker.
• Troll: If he runs across somebody which he either can't or won't assault, he'll just make fun of them and screw around with their heads instead.
• The Unfavorite: His mother definitely favored his identical twin brother Jeremiah.
• The Unfettered: Being very impulsive and spontaneous, Jerome will generally do whatever comes to his mind unless he has a really strong reason to hold off on it.
• Ungrateful Bastard:
  • He naturally "thanks" Dwight for bringing him Back from the Dead by killing him in an enormous explosion. To be totally fair, it's made clear he was pretty pissed at Dwight for cutting off his face and wearing it.
  • After Bruce saves his life from Lunkhead the strongman, Jerome seemingly changes his mind about shooting the thug to return the favor after Bruce shouts "no!" and proceeds to let him struggle for his life with the thug - because letting the man who saved his life get killed by the guy who would have killed him otherwise is more funny.
• The Unsmile: Even before his cheeks get scarred to look like he's always grinning, he's no strange to the mocking smirks or the Slasher Smile.
• Villainous Crush: Shades of one with Lee. During a moment of forgetfulness, he asks if he and Lee ever slept together, and is disappointed when she says no.
  Jerome: Redheads not your type?
• Villainous Friendship: He seems to genuinely get along with Jervis Tetch and Jonathan Crane, despite the occasional squabbling, inasmuch as he can get along with anyone. Even after Jervis says that they will no doubt all stab each other in the back later, they never actually do. This has even led fans to dub them the "J-Squad".
• Villainous Legacy:
  • It's he who transforms Jeremiah into first a monster who almost destroys the city - with Jeremiah's descent into evil eventually turning him into the Joker.
  • In season 2 he also hits on the idea of using Russian Roulette to prove himself worthy of Maniax leadership - something Jeremiah later uses to see who gets into his cult, meaning Jerome is indirectly responsible for Ecco becoming the warped Harley Quinn figure we see in season 5 after she tries it.
• Villainous Virtues: Claims in his "pitch" to originally lead the Maniax to have vision, ambition and brains - all of which prove to be true over the following episodes and seasons.
• Villain Song: After he hijacks a concert, he sings about how he can't wait to kill somebody, very briefly and very badly (although at least one audience member seems to be getting into it).
• Visionary Villain: By the end of season 4 he's grasped it doesn't matter whether he lives on or dies. What he represents - the chaos, anarchy and disregard for life's rules - will live on in the shadows and discontent of Gotham. Particularly if he has a brilliant twin brother he can "corrupt" into helping things along...
• Walking Spoiler: Jerome's practically taken care of by Galavan after the third episode of the second season, but it is his lasting repercussions AND him being resurrected in mid-season 3 where he becomes this trope. And there's really no getting round the fact that his death in the fourth season leads to the creation of the real Joker in his brother Jeremiah.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: Invoked by Bruce. When Jerome finds him at Wayne manor, Jerome is about to just stab him, when Bruce exploits Jerome's need to have an audience and manipulates Jerome into taking him someplace else to be publicly executed, buying himself more time. Interestingly enough, Jerome knows that Bruce is just stalling time to escape, but his cimpulsion for attention is so strong that he goes along with it anyway.
• Would Hit a Girl: He has zero reluctance to fight women, as Ecco will attest. And then there's stuff like happily trying to burn a bus full of cheerleaders alive...
• Would Hurt a Child: Immediately after coming back from the dead, Jerome's first order of business is to murder Bruce Wayne, mainly because that was his mission given to him by Galavan beforehand, and Jerome wants to see the job done (with his usual theatrical flair).
• Xanatos Gambit: His final plan. Either he drives the city insane with a blimp full of Joker gas and simultaneously gets revenge on Bruce and Jeremiah, or his parting gift drives his brother mad and ensures his legacy will carry on even after his death.
• You Cannot Kill An Idea: Before his second death, he uses his last words to declare this of himself. As for how true this is, see all of the above tropes.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: His employer kills him when he's no longer required for his future plans for Gotham. Unlike most deaths, it doesn't stick for more than a year.
• You Wouldn't Shoot Me: A rare villain example. Jerome tries to hold his brother Jeremiah at hostage to get Gordon to back off. But Gordon calls his bluff, knowing Jerome wouldn't kill Jeremiah as if he wanted to he would have done so already. Jerome admits Gordon is right, then turns the gun back on Gordon before fleeing.
• Your Head A-Splode: After he kidnaps the mayor and other city bigwigs, he fits them with exploding collars that he will activate if Gordon and others don't give him what he wants. He actually kills two of them this way before getting thwarted.
• You're Insane!: Jeremiah says this to him, and his response is a casual "Yeah".

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