The New Joker

Karl Hungus

Indeed it is.

Here's a little comparison I found:

monkeyfudge

How about Brad Dourif or Jeffery Combs?

although... wasn't Combs the voice of the Scarecrow in the cartoon series?

Joeface

i have read all of these posts now and even had my one reply in earlier,and I thing to many ppl are looking at the comic book and tim burton's batman and the
cartoon series for the Joker Character.With how batman was protrade this time I just can see them havin the Joker as clown painted (and yes i know its his skin)
Some of the names been mentioned here are perfect for the role in a Batman , comic book kind of way and most of them even look the part with out the make up, I just see Chris Nolan picking someone on a darker side of acting,
Sean Penn could do it if the stories he is been chased for the role are true. still dont think he is dark enough though,


heres a silly one just keep the names coming .. Gaberial Byrne, has played satan the joker should be a walk in the park

Goodshape

His skin has to be white. I can't imagine how or why they'd change that... it's just as explainable as the scarecrows fear gas in Begins and also pretty much the whole reason he goes crazy in the first place (chemicals = white skin + crazy making).

Those pictures of Crispin Glover look great.

monkeyfudge

haha.. Just a thought... what if he continues the trend of using Irish actors for the parts of villians and goes with Colin Farrell as the Joker?

fitz

Please God no.
Not Farrell.
Someone tall creepy, and menacing, thin and almost unhealthy looking.
Crispin Glover pic above lookes absolutely perfect I reckon, and I'm betting will be far closer to what Chris Nolan goes for than the whole clown look...

Karl Hungus

fitz wrote:

Crispin Glover pic above lookes absolutely perfect I reckon, and I'm betting will be far closer to what Chris Nolan goes for than the whole clown look...

Indeed I can imagine Nolan would go for that kind of look, but after seeing Batman Begins and how he left it open for the Joker in the next film, I can't say I like where he's already headed with the character:

"Take this guy... armed robbery, double homicide... Got a taste for theatrics, like you... Leaves a calling card." Sorry, but he sounds like nothing but a petty thug. Absolute fodder, and nowhere near main villian material. Maybe I'll blame Goyer?

'scuse me if this sounds fanboyish or nerdy, but I had already been writing about the Character of The Joker. My take on him was to avoid making him a criminal altogether, and instead go for a much darker, twisted character that mirrors Batman. Picture stand-up comedian Jack Napier, desperatly trying to pay off his heavy debts to the mob so he can marry his beautiful fiance in the proper ceremony she desrves, after a night of heavy drinking he takes a huge chance gambling and loses everything. Unable pay up to the mob, he is made an example of when is tortured and mutilated infront of an audience as a warning, one such mutilation is a "Chelsea Smile"; having his cheeks sliced open ear to ear, putting a permanant grin on his face. He's then dumped and left for dead in the Gotham chemical plant. Dragging himself out of a vat of chemicals, plant workers find him slumped on the floor in the morning and quickly call an ambulance which takes him in for emergency surgery.

Utterly catatonic from his experience, he's admitted to Arkham Asylum as a John Doe, where staff nickname him the Joker. After a year, he comes around and is released only to find that his fiance had been murdered too. Consumed by rage he goes on a murderous spree of vengeance, mutilating his victims with a switchblade in the same fashion that was done to him.

He's a serial killer out for revenge, so in a sense, he's almost a mirror of Batman, he's not a petty criminal. I think it's very important to emphasize the human element here, he's utterly grief stricken, but has only the one facial expression. In much the same way as Batman uses fear to intimidate his enemies, the Joker user humour to disarm his victims. Bleh, anyway, that's my whole take on the Joker, feel free to ignore.

evad_lhorg

well seeing as the scarecrow made everyone insane twith his spray he is proabbly already white skinned and what have ya cause he probably jumped into toxic waste for the laugh(we have all been a bit mad when drunk or stoned )

Stevee

Micheal Keaton. Keaton would make a great joker. Think Beetlejucie

fitz

Karl, I like you're idea, would work quite well.
Perhaps they could do the Jokers backstory in flashback?
The flashbacks were extremely well done in Begins...

koneko

One of the rumours I heard was that Justin Timberlake was being considered for the role of Harvey Dent aka Two-Face. Not sure how accurate that rumour is.
I think they're generally looking to cast much younger people for these films, so I don't think they'd go for people like Michael Keaton or Mark Hamill.

Vincent Cassel though? I dig it. He could do the crazy thing. It'll be hard to top Jack Nicholson anyway, he's the man.

monkeyfudge

I just had a read of the Joker's entry in Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joker_%28comics%29

It's well worth a read if you want the full background on the character.

I'd never read the Killing Joke, so I was only really familiar with the Red Hood story. But I like the way they tied that in as well.

He has a wonderful line in The Killing Joke "I'm not exactly sure what happened. Sometimes I remember it one way, sometimes another... If I'm going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice!"

Which I think allows him to nicely have lots of different origins, as so far all his origin stories have pretty much been recounted by himself.

And just looking over Wikipedia's list of contenders for the roll and the name Tim Roth stands out as an interesting one that I hadn't thought of...

Necronomicon

koneko wrote:

One of the rumours I heard was that Justin Timberlake was being considered for the role of Harvey Dent aka Two-Face.

:eek:

I read an interview with Christopher Nolan saying he was considering bringing back the Riddler/Two-Face combination....is this definately going ahead??

BlitzKrieg

in similar fashion to Kalr i believe we should be talking less about who is playing the joker but how he is going to be done...


my 2 cents

yes it should be Cispian Glover.

but i believe taking the whole premise of batman begins and reversing it for the sequel. Batman is winning his war against crime because he is striking fear into the criminal underworld, but this mysterious joker shows up and he is simply NOT AFRAID, the effect is more devestating then you would expect if you think about it. Joker wouldnt be afraid of Batman he would laugh at him, have those disturrbing jokes he would lash out at him. Develope Gordon's link to batman by having him investigate Joker's past. Revealing a life of a man who was always afraid always pushed down and ignored despite his attempts at comedy or something...who by somee series of events becomes the Joker.

Having Joker as the only character simply not afraid of Batman and bringing Gordon more into the plot (which is like the comics as Joker is as much Gordon's nemesis as is Batman's) will really bring out a visually dynamic character who clearly symbolises the sort of criminal or villian Batman did not anticipate when he started his crusade.

flogen

Playboy wrote:

ofc he is supposed to be scary .. he is a homicdal maniac and a sadist. If that isnt scary then I dont know what is. Maybe you are not familiar with the more modern view of him in many of the graphic novels and comic books.

I'm not expert, and I haven't really read much in the way of comics, but The Joker has always hit me as sinister rather than scary. I mean, sinister is still threatening, eerie, unnerving and terrorising, but it's a much more methodical, considered and heartless type of scariness, if you know what I mean. Scary is a very 2D word for a villian like The Joker.

Larianne

What about Benico Del Toro? Just saw him in Sin City.Think he'd be good. Although I've only seen him in S.C. and Snatch I think he has the face.