Why So Serious?
One thing that not all Man of Steel zealots still reveling in their extol of the Comic-Con crossover announcement may realize is that The Dark Knight Returns is, in many ways, a Joker story at its core. Not only that, but the animated nature of the film is such that it can get away with a genuinely alarming level of implied hateful and sexual undertone that gushes from every pore of this Joker’s wretched actuality.
Though it’s very possible that Joker won’t be in the crossover at all, removing him presents a number of issues plot-wise if Snyder is serious about following Frank Miller’s distinguished Batman chronicle. Firstly, there’s the reason Batman has come out of retirement to begin with: the emergence of the cruel and deadly gang known as the Mutants. By reappearing after years of remaining retired and underground, Batman not only draws attention to himself via the news and media, but reignites the “psychotic obsession” of villains like Harvey Dent and the Joker to reappear as well, and challenge him once more. Without Batman, those villains had nothing to live for. With his reappearance, their zeal for deadly cat-and-mouse is quickly reignited.
How does this all tie in with Superman and Snyder, then? Well, it’s not too complicated – the crossover needs a reason for Superman to be fighting Batman at all. In the comic and recent Returns adaptation, Batman begins drawing attention to himself when coming out of retirement to deal with the Mutants, then Dent, then Joker. The president of the USA — in effect Superman’s boss and main reason for Batman’s resentment of Superman — eventually instructs Superman to put the Bat down.
If he doesn’t include the Mutants and Joker at the very least, Snyder may have a hard time coming up with anything beyond a senseless, Avengers-style mashup where heroes collide for paperthin reasons. Don’t get me wrong, I love The Avengers, but when you’re DC and your animated films provide more intellectual incitement than the whole of Marvel’s film repertoire combined, you’d better make sure your big-screen counterparts are up to snuff. Without Returns’ obsessive and unnervingly bestial Joker, the new crossover would likely find difficulty in conveying the weight of Batman’s restored presence in Gotham. Which is why he should definitely be included.
Not to mention… do they really want to do another silver-screen story about Batman returning from retirement so soon after The Dark Knight Rises? And who could realistically succeed Heath Ledger as Joker, and do so successfully in the public eye? Snyder has his work cut out for him, so he best either tightly abide by his source material or abandon it completely.
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