Justice League International Annual #2 (1988)

[ebailey140]

12 pages out of 38

A lot of us preferred the old pre-The Killing Joke Joker of the 70s and most of the 80s. Unlike the version since, there was so much variety in the types of stories you could do with him. You could do dark. You could do comedy. You could do dark comedy. It was whatever the writers felt like doing, that day.

Here's a story that was published the same day as The Killing Joke. The Joker has been contracted to kill the JLI. As this is the BWAHAHA era of the Justice League, you can guess how well that's going to go.




A cold, hard look into the terror and violence of insanity. Or something.


Scott and Barda are hosting a picnic. Bruce chooses not to attend, but the rest of the League will be there.

Some have some errands to run first, though. The Joker's contact has told him Rocket Red is at a bar with someone (a disguised J'onn). The Joker arrives, only to find the place too crowded.


Blue Beetle and Booster Gold are raiding a warehouse that's a front for the criminal organization The 1000 to repo a tank. It's got something called a "whisper drive," so the bad guys won't even hear them as they drive it off. This works until Beetle accidentally fires the cannon.




Next targets: Fire & Ice.



He learns about the picnic and where it will be. So, he'll be able to get them all at once.









 

Comments

[drtechnobabel]

I can't stop laughing at the fact that Batman's reaction to the Joker in a tank is essentially, 'Nope'.

[sagrada]

Wow it is WEIRD to see the seeds of the coming decades of storytelling in this innocuous little gem. But it's all there, just needng a little slanting, a little change of light and tone.

[lyricalswagger]

I love how the Batmobile is just like a car painted dark blue.

[sagrada]

It is the absolute best when Batman's cars just look like regular cars that have been customized by a really weird guy with a thing for bats. Around then the fantasy pretty much busts through the surface.

[reveen]

He's going to say, "I need the Bat-Mobile Containment Unit!" and it's just a Winnebago with bars on the windows.

[althechi]

....and then having failed to get Batman's attention, he proceeded to steal a nuke and sell it to Middle Eastern terrorists, stopping off in Ethiopia...

[arilou_skiff]

Ah, this is good stuff.

[yvonmukluk]

I love that Barda decides to avenge her neighbour's house. Scott & Barda seem like they'd be great neighbours (clowns in tanks notwithstanding).

I guess you'd have to worry about Darkseid chilling on your couch by mistake, though.

[jlroberson]

That is NEVER a mistake. You only think they're your couches, like the insects you are. You cannot comprehend Darkseid's mastery and possession of ALL your couches.

That's why at the end of every July, people leave offerings on the street for him. Because DARKSEID SITS.

[alicemacher]

I wonder if a certain wiki would accept Darkseid Sits on Couches as a trope. :-)

[jlroberson]

Well, there's already this:
http://darkseidchillingonacouch.tumblr.com/

[rdfox]

"Oh, come on. Look, Mr. Seid, I know we said you were always welcome to come over after last time, and that you said you loved the scotch I keep, and we've had fascinating discussions every time you visit, but... seriously, this is the fourth time this month. Could you at least call and let us know you're coming by instead of just showing up on our couch?"
"...I will keep that in mind for next time. Do you know if the Frees are home? I have... business... to discuss with them."

[reveen]

I love it when Joker is shown treating being an insane criminal mastermind as a career, that he takes pride in. Instead of just being all Id all the time.

[thereddouglas]

Indeed. This story shows that even when he's murderous you can still do different kinds of stories with him rather than non-stop Grand Guigol.

Also this is a nice one-off story. I admit my fondness of it is affected by having read it at a tender age and having strong memories of it. However, it's nice to see how it holds up as piece of comic-book storytelling.

[bradygirl_12]

Batman driving off at the end is too funny. :)

[lego_joker]

I've long held (semi-seriously) that this is actually a direct prequel to the events of TKJ. This is one of the few times the Joker's been so traumatized, after all.

But for the record: I think you're rather overstating how much variety Joker stories in the '70s and '80s had. IMO, most of them were cookie-cutter hero-vs-villain plots, with the only real variable being how deadly Joker was allowed to be. "The Laughing Fish" aside, I can't remember a single one where he was particularly funny *or* scary.

(I say this as a guy who HATES "A Death in the Family" and Snyder's current God!Joker, mind you.)

This is a rare exception, but JLI was always famed for breaking every rule of superhero stories up till then. Giffen and DeMatteis remain one of those Dream Teams of superhero comedy.

[icon_uk]

"Dreadful Birthday Dear Joker" in Batman 321

Batman and the Joker team up to investigate the murder of the Penguin in Brave and the Bold 191.

Superman and the Joker teaming up to deal with the Prankster in DC Comics Presents 41

I was partial to the concept of the story where the villains all claimed to have killed Batman, the execution not so much.

[lego_joker]

I've read all three of those, but the former isn't much more than an episode of a Saturday morning cartoon given some teeth, the middle one had only one memorable line (the very last one), and the last one I remember absolutely none of.

Maybe it's time I re-read them, though...

[ebailey140]

There were several comedy oriented Joker stories through the 70s and well into the 80s. That was the era of the Jokermobile and the Ha-Ha-Hacienda, remember. He'd even sometimes go entire stories without killing anyone.

[lego_joker]

True, but that doesn't automatically made said stories *funny* or even comedy-oriented. Gimmicky vehicles and hideouts, remember, were a trademark of everyone from Batman to Killer Moth back then.

That said, I do recall that his invitation to Jim Gordon in "Dreadful Birthday" was pretty hilarious.

[icon_uk]

It is! "Attendance mandatory, funny hats optional"

Also the most fun Robin kidnapping in a good while.

[philippos42]

I giggled at a lot of this, but I still think the Joker himself is a tedious piece of filth in it.

Or maybe it's Giffen trying write a murderous psycho for laughs that's tedious.

[s0mnambulance]

This was the Joker I encountered when I first began reading comics. As much as I enjoy Morrison's Batman run and his take on the character, I think my favorite incarnation can be summed up by that delicious issue of... was it Batman, or Robin? where Joker abducts Tim and takes him through a drive-thru, shooting the cashier and ultimately getting distracted by a Marx brothers reference.

Maybe because my prime comic years were in the 80s, when camp was on the way out, but it irks me to see the Joker talking about contracts like an assassin. With the added realism readers expect of Batman now, the only Joker that really complements the character is the vicious psychopath. 'The force of nature' Joker can be written in a number of ways, but I do agree that he's a narrower character to write for than in previous eras.

Ironic, considering who he is. He's batshit crazy (pun intended), the living embodiment of chaos (Snyder's run is having fun with this concept, from what I've seen), but he's bound to the tone of the protagonist. Personally, I don't appreciate the lighthearted Batman. I don't like losing sight of the fact that he's a deranged man in a deranged world, at least partly of his own making--that question of whether Batman combats the insanity of Gotham any more than he invites it fascinates me. As I prefer to think of it, Joker is what Batman compromises to avoid becoming. The Zur-En-Arhh Batman fighting the Joker almost came off as a crazy face-off--Joker had to literally fork his tongue to outdo unhinged crystal-meth Batman's delusional ramblings.

Speaking of delusional rambling--I should shut up now. Caffeine is a hell of a drug.

[bewareofgeek]

DETECTIVE #826:

http://scans-daily.dreamwidth.org/1373850.html

[s0mnambulance]

This is the one. Thanks--had forgotten how much I liked the art too. Love the Joker's face this issue.

[icon_uk]

There's a reason I own two pages of art from that story :).

The Joker really does look crazed and scary!

[halloweenjack]

One thing that struck me upon re-reading it was how the scenes of them riding around together reminded me of the infamous "I'm the goddamn Batman" scene from ASBAR.

[ebailey140]

Thing is, I don't see how the current torture porn/slasher movie Joker is more realistic than the old gangster one. Realistic is more the current versions of Catwoman and Penguin.

There was always a method to the madness with the old Joker. He was a psychotic killer, but his insane schemes always turned out to be part of a plan to get whatever he was after, like money or revenge. He wasn't just killing people for the sake of it, as much as he clearly enjoyed it. The classic 40s & 70s versions of the Joker were a lot like the psychotic Irish gangster archetype, driven even crazier by that chemical dip. These men were violent, strangely charismatic, and unpredictably chaotic. The 1989 Batman film and the animated series made him literally that archetype.

Of course, I also have a different view of Batman than you describe. I see him as someone inspired by the deaths of his parents to make the world a better place, to protect the innocent, the knight fighting back the darkness, especially in Gotham. He's not just beating up bad guys, but helping Gotham through the Wayne Foundation and other charities.

[halloweenjack]

Semi-obligatory Alan Moore apologia: I really think that you have to date grimdark Batman back to The Dark Knight Returns--you know, the one in which not only was Joker someone who piled the body count up by the hundreds (but didn't keep count--he left that to Bruce) but, in Miller's original version, raped Jason before killing him (DC took that part out), and set up the infamous 900-number "A Death in the Family" storyline. I think that TKJ gets the grief that it does because a) even Moore regrets it now, while Miller doesn't seem to give a shit, and b) Barbara.

[alicemacher]

Also, TDKR was the first work in which Superman and Batman represented two supposedly irreconcilable approaches to crimefighting, with Clark falling on the idealistic, minimally violent, rule-following side and Bruce on the cynical, brutally violent (short of killing), screw-the-rules side. It was also the first (I think) to make Batman's motivation more disturbing and (even though Miller himself would later deny this) pathological, in that it's not just his parents' death, not just Gotham's continued decay, but an inner Bat-voice that pushes him back into crimefighting ("You know it in your soul...for I am your soul...").

In short: I agree that grimdark Batman (the Modern Age one, not the original Golden Age, gun-wielding "Death...to Doctor Death" one) has its origin in TDKR.

[jlroberson]

Willingham (I assume over Giffen layouts) does one very disturbing little thing with the Joker. When he's strangling the fellow. The panel in the very center. Rendered in this light and somewhat whimsical style, that moment takes on even creepier connotations than it might have with some more serious style.