Batman Vs Joker

The Rivalry

Batman and Joker, this rivalry to me is a work of philosophy masquerading as a comic book series. There are several questions which are being answered by the actions and the conduct of the characters involved, some of them being - What is a good life? What is the right way to live? What’s better - anarchy, nihilism , destruction or order, having a code, living for something no matter how abstract the ideal may be.

Childhood Trauma

Bruce Wayne(Batman) and Arthur Fleck(Joker) both had terrible childhoods. The latter saw the rich getting richer , struggled with economic depression (and clinical too) and had an abusive father. The former saw his mom and dad gunned down in the middle of an alley in Gotham city. Being an only child, he had no-one except his butler.

When life kicked the shit out of both these iconic figures in different ways, their reactions were drastically different and this is where the commonalities end and their paths begin to diverge.

Response to tragedy

Joker went the nihilist and anarchist way, who was referred to as ‘The Agent of Chaos’ during the height of his notoriety in Gotham. His actions and deeds were devoid of any meaning whatsoever. Perhaps a case can be made for Joker having a code of sorts for the way he dealt with his life. But whatever this code was, it surely didn’t reflect a very positive outlook on life. Steeped into chaos and anarchy, the Joker didn’t leave any stone unturned in making sure that Gotham sees his full wrath. While it’s very easy to be judgemental about this and label Joker as the bad guy, if we step back for a bit and try to see things from his POV, maybe we can empathize with his stance.

For someone who saw nothing but crap all through their young and adult life, it makes sense to adopt a dim view of everything and lead a very bitter and resentful life. This is particularly true for a lot of adults who had gone through unspeakable horrors in their childhood. Their wounds(literal and metaphorical) are still fresh into adulthood as well. For Arthur Fleck, the answer to all this seems to be Chaos, unbridled and bare Chaos.

Bruce Wayne adopts a drastically different path. He doesn’t become a monster who goes around killing parents of other young kids who just wanted to spend a night at the theatre. Faced with the fears from his childhood, carrying this heavy baggage, Bruce spends several years traveling the world training in combat and immersing himself in the criminal underworld. He takes an oath that he won’t ever kill or wield weapons. He has a code, a set of values that he adheres to and believes in. The world gave him pain, misery, chaos and dead parents. He decides to set it right. To wreck the baddies and kick ass! Kapow! Kapow! Boom! Splash!

Impact Of Joker and Batman

It’s very likely that young people, especially teenagers were jumping on their seats when they saw that last scene in the 2019 movie ‘The Joker’ where the titular character played by Joaquin Phoenix drives everyone nuts, instigates a riot and turns Gotham into a land of lawlessness and anarchy. Joker is easy. Anyone can be a Joker. Wreck, riot, breaking, arson, loot and living without an iota of any values is easy! Joker has no code, values or any discernible sense at all! In a lot of ways, he’s just a lunatic who’s manipulating people to increase the net chaos in the world.

Bruce Wayne(or Batman) , on the contrary, is trying to restore order. He saw the world in a certain way, he knew that these were the cards that he was dealt and they weren’t a winning combination for sure! He adopted a code, disciplined himself to not let his emotions get the better of him(not killing the criminals committing heinous crimes, but handing them over to the police) , he didn’t turn into the monster that he saw in the alley that killed his parents. He chose Law over anarchy and order over chaos.

Conclusions

In the last decade or so, fans have been awestruck by the Joker, and he’s probably more popular than Batman. This reveals something deeply concerning about us. We would rather embrace anarchy and lawlessness in case the few loopholes in our system have been exposed.

The Joker is a symbol of unbridled angst and bitterment turning ugly. The Joker is what happens when the individual has been suffocated and frustrated by the circumstances of his being to such an extent that he sees only one way out: embracing total chaos and adding more tinder to the already burning fire of chaos.

Being Batman is not easy. After years of training under intense pain, both mental and psychological , Bruce Wayne overcame his fears and finally reconciled with the scars left from that unfortunate night when his parents were shot. But most importantly, he confronted his fear of bats and got that out of the way as well! Becoming Batman, requires a code, discipline, mental and physical strength and a conviction that no matter how battered we get in life, regardless of how exhausting and unfair life may seem , we can control it and shape it and hopefully there’ll be a little more order rather than chaos in this world when we leave it.