TheMightyEthan Posted July 12, 2015 Report Share Posted July 12, 2015 Why are they upset about it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mister Jack Posted July 12, 2015 Report Share Posted July 12, 2015 I'm pretty sure most people probably know what happens in the Killing Joke by now but just in case I'll put it in spoilers. Â Â They're mad because Joker shoots Barbara Gordon in the spine to paralyze her, then rips her clothes off and takes pictures to torment Jim Gordon with. It's a horrible act, but the whole point is that it fails to break either one of them, thus disproving Joker's belief that all it takes to turn someone into him is "one bad day." Â But all these people care about is the fact that Barbara Gordon gets victimized, which I find super hypocritical. Nobody gave a shit when Joker beat the ever-loving shit out of Jason Todd with a crowbar and then blew him up with dynamite. Â 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 12, 2015 Author Report Share Posted July 12, 2015 In case you're curious on match up of trailer with Man of Steel http://fat.gfycat.com/MatureWealthyAndeancondor.mp4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 Â Â The reason that Jason Todd's death is not as controversial as Barbara Gordon's paralysis is that men in fiction almost always have agency. That makes the Jason Todds outliers, exceptions to the rule, it breaks a stereotype of the hero being saved or saving themselves at the last minute. Â Barbara Gordon's capture and torture on the other hand reinforces an existing stereotype that women are plot devices to be captured, tortured, killed and abused in order to give the men in the story something to do. Â You can't take the two stories in isolation and say "This happens to a girl and this happens to a guy so we're even." you have to take the whole of literary history into account. Â Â Â For an amusing breakdown of why there is racism / sexism but there is not "reverse racism / sexism": Â 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 Okay, I see now.  I haven't read the Killing Joke (I was aware of the plot developments, just wasn't aware KJ was where they happened), so I don't know about this one specifically, but I feel like for stuff like that you have to look at the work on its own and see how it's handled, otherwise you end up with a situation where a woman can't ever be a victim, and that's really limiting.  If Jack's right, and the point is that even though this terrible thing happens it doesn't break her and cause her to assume the victim mindset, then it sounds like it's handled fine.  But again, I haven't read it.  Arkham Knight spoilers:   I haven't finished the game yet, so don't tell me anything about what might happen later, but I found the whole thing with Oracle being kidnapped by Scarecrow and then made to to kill herself to be really off-putting and unnecessary.  I'm still not 100% convinced she's really dead though, so it might still be turned on its head.  Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 If it isn't obvious by now, I'm anti remaking/animating Killing Joke.    I agree that the trope doesn't mean that a woman should never be kidnapped however, in Barbara's case she is kidnapped, tortured, shot, paralysed, stripped naked and photographed. None of this is done because of who Barbara is in relation to herself, it's all done for the benefit of Jim Gordon  whom Joker is trying to drive insane by showing him images of his daughter, beaten, shot and naked and the Batman to whom Joker wants to prove that everyone would be like the Joker given the right push. It's an absolute orgy of dehumanisation and it's not even really targeted at the victim, she's just a tool to get to Jim and the Batman. The outcome is that the Batman is strong enough to not kill Joker, Jim is strong enough to not go mad and Barbara has been humiliated, tortured and left paralysed. IIRC the last you see of Barbara is when she is in a hospital bed helpless, crying and asking the Batman to save her father.  Bear in mind that the Killing Joke is a one off story. Years later a couple of other writers went back and turned Barbara into Oracle following her paralysis so you can't write it off as her back story, or character development or whatever. She was originally intended to be a disposable plot device.    I agree that you should take the work as a whole and in isolation. But you also have to look at it through the lens of history. In this instance it doesn't stand up well in my opinion. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 Aha! So you dispute Jack's interpretation! Â This can only be settled with a duel. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 Yeah, or he could mutilate a girl I know to teach me a lesson? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. GOH! Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 I haven't read it in ages, but I recall thinking that the Killing Joke was kind of lazy in its depiction of the Joker acting out his belief that "one bad day" could make anybody insane (or evil). I didn't like Moore's origin story for the Joker very much, as it was too neatly similar to Batman's and was obviously written to justify the book's plot rather than as an interesting origin story of Batman's greatest nemesis. I also didn't like the way Barbara was treated like a prop rather than a fully human and independent person.  Beyond its misogyny, I think the book fundamentally misunderstands the Joker/Batman mirror-image dynamic. I think it works much better if Joker has no real origin story and has been totally subsumed into his clown prince of crime persona, which is outwardly cheerful and manic but built upon a sincere belief in a cynical and cruel strain of nihilism; the Joker is, at heart, a cynic and pessimist who believes the worst in people regardless of external circumstances, while Batman is outwardly dark and cynical but truly an optimist and believer in the essential decency of humanity despite the cruelty and madness that is rife in Gotham. I think this contrast works better when the writer doesn't manufacture vindication for Batman's beliefs, as Moore does in TKJ and Nolan did in TDK. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mister Jack Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 (edited) No, you really don't have to take "the whole of literary history" into account when you're trying to write a story.  In fact, that should be the furthest thing from your mind.  Your one and only concern should be trying to write a good story with good characters, and if the story you want to write requires something bad to happen to a female character at some point, the last thing you should do is censor yourself because you're afraid of offending people.  Joker's actions are SUPPOSED to be shocking.  The whole story hinges on the fact that he crossed a line.  Of course it's dehumanizing.  This is the Joker we're talking about here.  He's a monster.  You can say that what he did was horrifying or that it has no place in print (though I would strongly disagree with that last part), but what you definitely can't say is that it's out of character for him.  If you can't stomach seeing him at his worst, then I suppose Killing Joke just isn't a story for you, but I believe that you can't truly see the good guys at their best until they have been put through the bad guys at their worst.  Jim didn't break. Bruce didn't break.  Barbara didn't break.  I do admit that we don't actually see Barbara's aftermath until a different book later on, but I get the feeling Timm's version will include that part.  Just because he's adapting the Killing Joke specifically doesn't mean he can't pull material from other books to round the movie out a bit.  Now, I do agree that the damsel in distress/women in refrigerators trope can be done lazily and be poorly written, but I don't think that's the case here and I certainly don't think female characters should be placed under glass, shielded from the same harm that visits the male characters.  If female characters, especially superheroes, are to be taken seriously than they have to be taking the same risks that their male counterparts are taking.  That's not so much an argument against Thursday's point as it is against the people who cry "misogyny" every time a female character is hurt or killed.  Speaking of which, Mr. GOH...   Misogyny means hatred, dislike, or mistrust of women.  Show me a single page in that book that implies Alan Moore hates, dislikes, or distrusts women.  If you absolutely must use a label, then saying it's sexist would be closer to what you probably meant.  I would disagree, but at least that argument would make sense.   Putting that aside, I think you misinterpreted the "Joker's backstory" part of the book.  Even within the context of the book itself, the Red Hood story isn't meant to be taken as Joker's origin, but as a possible origin.  He thinks about it as he looks in the mirror, but later on even he admits to Batman "Sometimes I remember it one way, sometimes another.  If I'm going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice!"  Even he doesn't remember what exactly made him the way he is, but what he is convinced of is that something happened to crush his spirit because the world is a cruel, awful, pointless place. Edited July 13, 2015 by Mister Jack Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 It's not that what was done was horrible. It was that it was done to a woman purely to motivate a man. Â You mentioned Robin by way of comparison. Note that Robin is an adversary of Joker as well as an ally of the Batman. Barbara Gordon (to Joker's knowledge) was just a tool to use to get to Jim and the Batman. Â Nobody is saying that female superheroes can't be harmed. Just that when they are it should be for reasons other than that someone else will be upset that their woman was damaged. Â Finally, if we are taking the work on its own then you have to accept the Barbara was tortured, shot, stripped, photographed and had those images shown purely to break her father. Then she was dumped in a hospital and forgotten about. Given that Oracle wasn't even conceived of for years later you don't get to call it her "origin story" or say that she didn't break as the last we see of her is a woman crying on a hospital bed begging a man for help. Â It may be an entertaining story, but that doesn't mean it isn't sexist. Â You can enjoy problematic stuff and enjoy it, but you should at least recognise that it is problematic. Â Now, that said, maybe the animated feature will take the opportunity to correct the wrongs. Give Barbara some agency and some dignity and make the story more about her as an individual. In that case I'm all for it. But as it stands I just can't get behind the idea. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 And Jack, I don't think the anyone was saying it was out of character for the Joker to do those things, they're criticizing the way the story handled Barbara's involvement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TCP Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 (edited) Speaking of bad DC movies: Â Edited July 13, 2015 by The Cowboy Poet Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hot Heart Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 (edited) Hrmph. Â I'm not fond of that version of "I Started A Joke". Edited July 13, 2015 by Hot Heart Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mister Jack Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 Oh god, that's the worst looking Joker I've seen since the one with the dreadlocks. Â I was willing to think "Hey, maybe it won't look so shitty in the actual movie" but NOPE. Â I know the Joker has lots of interpretations, but this just plain does not look like Joker to me. Â He looks like...Okay, do you guys remember Batman Beyond? Â Remember that biker gang called the Jokerz where a bunch of teenage brats dressed up in clown makeup to do petty crimes and Terry would take them out in one punch? Â Yeeeeeah. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TCP Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 Yeah, and it definitely doesn't help that the definitive live action version of the Joker was only 7 years ago. This trailer matches up with Man of Steel and Batman v Superman..... I still don't understand, if they're going with a dark and gritty relatively grounded world, why not use the Dark Knight trilogy as your starting point, keep Bale (or at least the Nolan history if Bale doesn't want to come back), and build from there?? I understand the reason to reboot Spider-Man (this time), especially since the Amazing Spider-Man 2 was a steaming pile of garbage, but why the fuck are the rebooting Batman and co again after the BEST onscreen version of these characters!! Booo, DC, BOOO!!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 Well I think you kind of have to reboot Batman after TDKR... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TCP Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 Was it that bad though? Was it worse than Man of Steel?? I don't think so. Well the "oh you should use your real name... Robin" line was awful. All I'm saying is you could have easily had Bale-Bat come out of retirement after Man of Steel. Nolan tried very hard to keep The Dark Knight trilogy grounded, and the general concept of Batman v Superman is what happens if a figure like Superman popped up in the real world... or at least a world that's relatively close to the real world unlike, say, the comics or Smallville, or anything like that. You could have easily linked those worlds up. Everything's riding on BvS being a huge hit with audiences, but I'm thinking, while it will likely make money, people could very easily leave the theatre disappointed and uninterested in future DCU films. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 I thought the Nolan trilogy basically left it wide open Gordon Levit to take up the mantle. Â If rather have seen JGL be the Batman, or someone else take over his role than this bs Afleck reboot. It's like DC don't get what a franchise is. You have to keep building on it. Like Marvel are doing with Avengers. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mister Jack Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 I fully expect Batman v Superman to be a complete train wreck that makes a ton of money. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. GOH! Posted July 13, 2015 Report Share Posted July 13, 2015 No, I used the word I meant to use and used it correctly, Jack. Â Also, ugh to SS and BvS. But, yeah, I think BvS will make buckets of money. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 14, 2015 Author Report Share Posted July 14, 2015 It's Batman v Superman. The original super hero versus the worlds greatest detective. It is an event never before put to film. If Marvel can make billions off b-listers like Iron Man and Thor, then of course DC are going to make money off the three quarter century old comic book heroes who are essentially this generations Jesus (in case you weren't paying close attentions to Snyder's high school symbolism in Man of Steel)  The only problem is if fatigue starts to set in, and if folks are a bit wary of what'll be the 2nd film Batman in less than 10 years, in the same year as the 2nd reboot of Spiderman in just under 15. Oh and a wee little film called Captain America: The Avengers Age of Ultron: Part 2: Civil War around the corner from it. In general though it's trending well. I'm skeptical but I'm still gonna go fucking watch it.  Suicide Squad less so. Still looks poopy. Warner Bros' reaction to it is equally poopy  Warner Bros. Pictures and our anti-piracy team have worked tirelessly over the last 48 hours to contain the Suicide Squad footage that was pirated from Hall H on Saturday. We have been unable to achieve that goal. Today we will release the same footage that has been illegally circulating on the web, in the form it was created and high quality with which it was intended to be enjoyed. We regret this decision as it was our intention to keep the footage as a unique experience for the Comic Con crowd, but we cannot continue to allow the film to be represented by the poor quality of the pirated footage stolen from our presentation.  Corporate Corporate.  Meanwhile on planet "our films allow us to buy our own planet, no hulks allowed": https://twitter.com/Marvel/status/525071656306626560  Fucking "pirate" a trailer. They should take Harley's baseball bat out their arses. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 14, 2015 Report Share Posted July 14, 2015 it was our intention to keep the footage as a unique experience for the Comic Con crowd roflmao, did they actually think that was possible in this year of our Lord two thousand and fifteen? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 14, 2015 Report Share Posted July 14, 2015 If rather have seen JGL be the Batman I mentioned this suggestion to my wife, who has absolutely no interest in BvS, and her response was "I would totally go see that." I think this would have been a winner. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted July 14, 2015 Report Share Posted July 14, 2015 (edited) Curses, now my typo has been immortalised in a quote! Â EDIT: Honestly, it's a bit ridiculous to not do it. The whole thing was wrapped up neatly in a bow. Bale's Bruce flies off into the sunset with Selena, JGL's Robin spelunks into the Batcave, becomes the Batman carries on the legend. Â You can bring in a new director, a change to the man behind the cowl means you can completely revamp the style of everything, the car, the suit, the gadgets, the attitude. Â I just don't get why you would reboot when you could continue a winning formula. *shrug* Edited July 14, 2015 by Thursday Next 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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