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| Jack Nicholson as the Joker. |
The Joker.
The Joker from Batman is probably
the most known trickster of all time. He follows no rules but his own and makes
a point that everybody knows it. The Joker behaves in the exact opposite of any
social norm. He thrives off of chaos and because of this Gotham city is the
perfect place for him. He mocks societies values by giving them exactly what
they want. When he threw money at the citizens of Gotham and messed up the
cosmetics he was citing what a materialistic state the citizens live in. not
only do the tricksters in Burtons films oppose culture in their setting, but
also in the real world. Similarly to
Betelgeuse, he sees death as a joke. This theme seems to be a reoccurring one
throughout Burton’s movies, how the different tricksters deal with death. The
Joker is casual and thinks it is a joke.
He is psychotic and takes pleasure in other peoples pain. But in all
this chaos he still has one goal, defeat Batman. His entire drive throughout
the movie is to aggravate Batman and try to make him tick. With this goal in
mind he does anything he possibly can to get Batman’s attention, completely
careless to anyone around him. Stopping at nothing to get what he wants. Tim
Burton’s favoritism toward the trickster is prominent in this film. Jack Nicholson’s name is shown first in
the credits, and there is much more emphasis on the Jokers character
development compared to Batman’s. Throughout most of the film he appears to
have no real emotion except for one scene when a slither of embarrassment and
true sadness is shown. When the Jokers makeup is washed away by water thrown on
him by Vicki Vale he screams and covers his face. Some could see this as the
Joker being sarcastic, since he is to insane to have feelings, but I don’t think
that is the point. Tim Burton undermines one of the Jokers major components of
his trickster personality, his inhumaneness.
He is the ultimate criminal, and ultimate trickster.
