The anticipation is getting deadly in The Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing, which is closing in on its big finish. The big mystery is that there are two Jokers, but we have no idea which one is real, nor do we know why there are two. Matthew Rosenberg has kept up our interest with Los Angeles battling, the rise in power of a Joker with nothing to his name, and Red Hood getting all kinds of violent to put an end to the giggling supervillain. In issue #10, Joker begins to lose his patience as he tries to figure out what is going on with…the other Joker.
This issue is highly entertaining, with great scenes with Ventriloquist, Black Mask, and a return of a familiar character Joker bonded with in a previous issue. I will say the delay in answers continues, however, and on some scale, it reads like we’re just waiting for the inevitable satisfying answer, but it’s about the journey, as they say.
The Black Mask scene involves Joker poisoning a whole bunch of people as he presses Black Mask for answers. Rosenberg, paired with artist Carmine Di Giandomenico, hammers home Joker’s insane and chaotic nature. The colors capture the Joker toxin well in a tight room. Meanwhile, there are some great shadow effects with Ventriloquist, who gets jumped by Red Hood. Again, Rosenberg nails the insanity of this man, and in this case, we see it through how Red Hood handles things.
Previous issues hinted at Joker forming an army of supervillains, and there’s a nice payoff in this issue. A great montage shows all sorts of villainy in the streets of Gotham. Joker wants to find his doppelgänger, and people and property are going up in smoke to get answers. There’s also a nice appearance of a group of heroes, which most definitely promises some major fight scenes and conflicts in the next issue.
This scene is tops.
Credit: DC Comics
This series continues to house great backup one-shot tales. Francesco Francavilla returns to the series, drawing and coloring the backup, which features another iteration of a Joker clone. In this case, Joker discovers a goon doesn’t die from Joker toxin, which is something only he usually can survive. There’s a nice connection to the main story, given the Joker toxin used in the main story. Francavilla has been crushing these backups with his colorful and highly unique style, having tons of fun with the chaos and lunacy of Joker.
One of the best moments in the backup is a great combo of Rosenberg and Francavilla. In a gorgeous double-page layout, we see this new Joker’s antics in Gotham involving multiple villains. We get to see a slightly more rational but just as evil Joker doing his thing. A massive extreme closeup of his head creates symmetry on the page, and there’s a great use of color, creating a two-face-like visage.
More and more, it’s obvious The Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing will be a great story in the collected format. Each issue offers something a little different while hammering home the chaos and silly fun Joker can bring. The backups continue to find new ways of telling the two-Joker story while the main story edges closer to answers. While my patience is thin on this series, my anticipation grows stronger.
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