The real identity of The Joker has always been a murky thing in the Batman comics. Maybe he was a stand-up comedian who cracked. Maybe his name was Jack. Maybe he’s an immortal force of chaos. Maybe not. Like the Joker himself has said, “If I’m going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice!”
Well, Joker may not get his druthers much longer, because DC Comics plans to make his identity significantly less multiple choice, at least in one multiverse.
At a DC Comics event at WonderCon, the writer and artist of the Justice League comic (Geoff Johns and Jason Fabok, respectively) announced Joker’s identity will be revealed in Justice League #50 on May 25. We already knew this was likely coming. In Justice League #42, Batman gained access to the Mobius chair, which knows all. To test it, he asked who killed his parents; it answered correctly: Joe Chill. He then asked for Joker’s real name.
It appears to have been someone Batman knows. We won’t find out until May 25, but it’ll be interesting to see which type of Joker this version ends up being. We’ve already seen Cesar Romero’s frenetic campiness, Jack Nicholson’s manic aged gangster cruelness, Mark Hamill’s ridiculously good voice-acted version, Heath Ledger’s smirking inevitability (which Christian Bale was awed by), and a little bit of Jared Leto’s mostly-unseen performance which Suicide Squad director David Ayer described as world-stopping and lush with pageantry. And then there are the hints at the Joker on Fox’s bonkers Gotham series, like whatever Lori Petty is doing and proto-Joker Jerome Valeska (who may not be done yet). And then there are the numerous comic book versions over the years, some stranger than others. Remember the time when Alfred was the Joker? And the time when Batman’s mom became the Joker? Comics are weird.
Geoff Johns dropped a hint in an interview with IGN. He said, “The answer probably won’t be an answer people predict.”
Well, in that case, I’ll foolishly predict it’s going to go Gotham bonkers and say his name is Jerome Valeska (it won’t be), just so it’s in keeping with the theme of ORPHAN FIGHTS.
