Matthew Rosenberg and Carmine Di Giandomenico’s twelve-issue maxiseries The Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing featuring two Jokers comes to an end this week. The series has been positively littered with clever dual Joker backup stories while the main story has kept readers on their toes. Can they stick the landing, will they offer answers as to how there are two Jokers, and will they insert another masterful joke into the captions?
As far as the last issues go, there’s a lot to love here. We’ve got two Jokers enacting a master plan that is filled with action, tense dramatic moments, and tons of danger. Gotham is at risk as one Joker hurtles a train filled with Joker gas into the heart of the city. The other Joker wants to make a statement, ballooning in to stop him. All the while, Red Hood runs amock, killing at free will and, unfortunately for him, being weaponized by a Joker.
This book has always been good for big dramatic page turns complete with overly large location text ala big budget superhero movies. A lot of pieces need to come into place to make the Joker plans make sense, and they make sense. That makes them feel earned, even if the Joker characters are loony and all over the place.
Poor Jason.
Credit: DC Comics
The name of the game is anticipation in this issue, and Rosenberg certainly makes a statement. I wager many won’t love the ending–especially since there seem to be multiple Jokers running around in Zdarksy’s main book–but it’s a pretty brave move, to say the least. In fact, I’d argue the final caption is as bold as comics can get. We turn the page and expect splashy art, big thoughtful reveals in a caption, or dramatic shifts in the story. At the end of this issue, we get something entirely different. That was exciting, speaking as someone who reads so many comics. Maybe it’s even a statement by Rosenberg that any answer concerning why there are two Jokers wouldn’t suffice. Do I wish there was more to it? Yeah, but then that’s kind of how this ending works at all. Defying expectations.
You can also add this issue and the series as a whole as another fantastic example of Rosenberg writing Red Hood-defining comics. The Jokers were the main characters, of course, but Jason gets his moments in this issue as well.
The Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing #12 comes to an end not with a whimper, but with a bang. It’s as big and action-packed as any blockbuster in Hollywood today, yet refuses to utilize Gotham’s biggest character as it makes its point. This series has always been about punchlines and payoffs, anticipation and course-correcting twists, and with its ending as bold as it is, it’s hard not to respect it.
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