Batman #25

[history79]

Comments

[janegray]

...What

Did Riddler... did he seriously expect Joker wouldn't kill him right there and then?

The scans of the previous issue made this series sound smart and interesting and really really good, but these scans here are pretty bad. Now I'm confused.

[owlbrigade1]

Well he wouldn't be a supervillain without a huge self-centered ego. However he should have considered the possibility, as the Joker is supposed to be random so for every time he could kill someone he lets them live and every time he needn't kill someone he can easily do it. Although I admit with a gun isn't really funny, I'm sure Joker could have come up with funnier deaths for him. That is the problem I've been seeing with the Joker for far too long now, he's just another violent thug who loves violence. The Joker is supposed to use violence to be funny.

[janegray]

In this one specific instance, I can excuse the gun in and of itself, since the whole point of the story seems to be that Joker has hit rock bottom and can't be funny anymore. Joker killing somebody in an unfunny way fits the tone of the story perfectly.

Though, in general, I definitely agree that the second biggest issue with the character is that they forgot he is supposed to be funny. They have him do more and more horrific things ("LOL remember that time I boiled a baby and forced the father to drink the soup!"), keep upping the body count to the thousands upon thousands, and in the end he is just bland and irritating.

(Which leads to the biggest problem with the character: how the eff has nobody killed him yet)

But seriously, huge self-centered ego or not, that's gotta be the equivalent of sticking a fork into an electric outlet. I just can't see Eddie being THAT dumb.

[glprime]

Agreed, just seeing the Joker revealed, I wanted to throw popcorn at my screen. "Boooooo! Boooooooo! You're not entertaining anymore! You're just a violent thug! You're just a thrillkiller for lazy writers to up the body count! Boooooooooooo!"

[goattoucher]

On one hand, the result was obvious from the beginning, but they did a fairly good job of building tension. By the end of Nygma's spiel, I wound myself wondering "Will he go for it?"

It's like how you know the protagonist in a book or film isn't going to die in the fight halfway through, but a good writer can still get you invested in the action.

[aperturedreams]

This is a flashback to the very beginning of their careers. No one really knows anything about the Joker yet.

[janegray]

Oh, that makes sense. Thanks!

[thosefew]

The first two pages made me hope Joker had somehow glued the index fingers of his gloves together and was trying to play it off as intimidating.

[locuatico]

"What did you do?"
"I asked Seinfeld to teach me comedy"
"Oh GOD, BRUCE!"
"Yeah... it turns out he wasn't that funny... luckily Gordon had Brooklyn nine-nine for me to binge watch"

[cyberghostface]

J/w how depraved or sadistic is Riddler? Because sometimes he comes off as one of the more harmless Batman villains and other times he's torturing someone.

[beeyo]

SPOILERS


Earlier in the issue he carves up a cop with a broken piece of glass, and then he uses personal information about all of the guard's children, who all seem scared enough of him to believe that he might do something horrible to let him walk right out of the precinct.

Also, this is about a year after he held the entire city hostage

[cyberghostface]

Yeah I'm just wondering if this is in character for him.

[locuatico]

As since his introduction into the Nu52? yes.
Pre-Flashpoint? no.

[shadowpsykie]

hmmm is the joker/riddle stuff taking place concurrently with the Bat/Cat stuff?

also.... mmmmm love fuzzy chested batman.... also I take it she said yes?

[locuatico]

I don't know about you, but if I was rejected, I wouldn't feel in the mood (or feel the need) to tell that person about that time two of my Exes decided to fight over me.

[shadowpsykie]

Selina: So... wait.... you SLEPT with Joker and Riddler?

Bruce: It was for JUSTICE... Joker thought it would be funny, Riddler thought the only way to solve the "Riddle that is batman" would be through my heart... Joker just ended up crying and Riddler just began questioning himself...

Selina: Well I guess it's fair... I once slept with Harley and Ivy....Harley wanted cuddles and Ivy wanted me to see her venus fly trap... i didn't know it was a euphemism...

[shadadukal]

Now you've got me imagining ways in which she didn't say "yes" but they still ended up in bed together.

Like

Bruce: Marry me.
Selina: I don't know. Can we have sex to help me decide?

[john_wyatt]

He proposed at the end of #24 (on a rooftop?). 25 starts with a voiceover and flashback to the Joker/Riddler story. The flashback story is the whole issue. It's not until the last page of 25 that it's 100% clear Bruce is telling this story to Selina (post-coital). We haven't seen an answer.

[thanekos]

It's the Joker being the Joker, but it doesn't feel gratuitous and tedious.

It feels like somebody read The Killing Joke and remembered the parts where he was morose as well as the parts where he was zany, for once.

(Or that somebody read TDKR and remembered " What kind of bombs? " as much as they did " Batman.. darling. ")

[beeyo]

Capullo might be the artist I look forward to seeing the most, besides Capullo, though he does tend to draw people all with the same bodily proportions. There were issues of Grayson where Bruce, Tim, Dick, and Jason all seemed to have the same hwight, weight, and hair. Riddles here looks super brolic, though I guess he has been in jail for a year.

[beeyo]

That first name should've been Janin.

[doctor_spanky]

The way he draws the Riddler in some of those panels up there looks like he's trying to stay on model with Greg Capullo's version or he just likes it or something

[beeyo]

Capullo's version wasn't jacked to the max (look at them swoll as shoulders) but, again, a year in prison equals a lot of push-ups

[remial]

I have to admit, when the Joker shot the Riddler, I laughed

[starwolf_oakley]

The Joker frowning with his fingers "steepled" might be a shout out to his first appearance in BATMAN #1 in 1940.

[caivu]

King confirmed that it is.

[beeyo]

Something I just thought of: are we supposed to be asking which one of the three Jokers this is?