Joker and the untethered shadow
I took a lot of time before writing this out because I know ‘Joker’ is drawing a lot of attention for all the wrong reasons. The feeling that I had when I finished watching however left me with so many questions. I’m familiar with the Joker being Batman’s nemesis for a long time. I was raised on Batman The Animated Series in the early 90s and how ‘The Crown Prince of Crime’ always had ways of getting under Batman’s skin, always pushing him to the limit. Be aware there’s SPOILERS for Joker in the blog by the way.
Batman and Joker have always been linked as two examples of how to deal with deep, personal trauma. In this case, towards the end of this movie they’re now linked with the death of Martha and Thomas Wayne happening during the riot where the Joker is ‘born’ into the villain we all know. Batman uses his trauma at the death of his parents to take his own fears and become something greater. Some would say he becomes a sociopath through this, splitting into Bruce Wayne and Batman and I would agree, but its not as bad as what Joker chooses to do.
Joker (or prior to this Arthur Fleck) is a down on his luck party clown looking after his mother in Gotham. He suffers from a condition where instead of crying or becoming upset, he laughs even though you can see the very real pain on his face. We know he’s on ‘seven different types of medication’ and getting counselling in some basic form. As the movie dives deeper into his psyche, you see all the cracks and delusions set into place. Ultimately leading to killing several people close to him and a TV show host he deeply admired for a long time. A lot of people seem to think that watching this movie is unacceptable, however many forget that those who are marginalised, deprived and forced to the edges of society live in their own darker, desperate and anxious place which those in it consider absolutely normal.
Joker is in my opinion is about embracing the untethered shadow and unlike Batman who has a moral code to keep him falling into darkness, Joker is all about submitting to the shadow, rather than integrating it. I can accept Joker being a highly broken person, subject to abuse in many ways leading to a shattered psyche and many issues. What separates him from just being broken and a villain is where he takes all the pain, horror and rage. He blames all of it on the world around him and continues to brew in this narcissistic chaos that can only create a psychopath.
If anything, this should be a cautionary tale of how such conditions can create such individuals, even with no iconic names and archetypes attached to them. However this is being ignored and even as someone who deals with people for a living, its painfully obvious how its being swept under the rug and not being discussed. I doubt it really will be looked into because unfortunately a lot of people can’t look into the shadows of their own hearts to see their own dark underbelly.
Until next time, #embraceinfinity
