To be honest I was very skeptical at first but after this trailer my hopes have been raised a little bit, it’s clear that Joaquin Phoenix was taking most of his inspiration from heath ledger’s joker. I wasn’t the biggest fan of heath ledger’s joker, but not because of heath ledger’s acting, I think he did a perfect job of carrying out Christopher Nolan’s vision of the joker. But I’m much more into the Joker that’s both Hammy and Cruel at the same time like in the comics and animated shows, heath ledger was more dark and serious in the dark night than I liked. The joker that I love always seems to be having a blast playing a game of catch me if you can with Batman and always attempts to push Batman over the edge to go against his beliefs. I believe that the Dark Knight got this aspect right with the “Hit me” scene where joker taunts Batman to try and get Batman to try and run him over, clearly throwing his own safety out the window because it’s all a mind game to him. Dark Knight had a few scenes where heath ledger really did capture the classic joker like the scene I just mentioned, the interrogation scene, and of course “Why so serious?”, especially the interrogation scene for me, because Heath Ledger asked Christian Bale to actually hit him as hard as he can, and it’s just so wild and disturbing how authentic the scene is with Batman wailing on the Joker and the Joker just seems to laugh like it’s the best Joke he’s heard all year. It looks like Joaquin Phoenix is somewhere in between these two portrayals but it definitely has its own unique feel, I like that they’re going with what looks to be a unique spin of the red hood origin where joker is a failed comedian who’s had “one bad day”. The face paint is the only part of the look that doesn’t appeal to me. I always liked the sad irony of the joker falling into chemicals and having his hair and skin pigmentation resemble clown face paint and him going insane because of it. The rest of his look is good the purple suit and slicked back dark green hair. I think this will be a movie that strays from what a lot of what we think about the joker with some similarities but yet may still be entertaining. It’s hard to have the joker without Batman though, their character contrast and conflict is always a huge appeal, just because most of the clashing actually revolves around the Joker playing psychotic mind games with Batman. I think we can all agree this looks much better than Suicide Squads joker, though. That was just awful. They made joker look look like a thug attempting to be the joker. The tattoos and metal teeth don’t work. And his lines were just performed so badly. The big problem with DC recently is that it seems like they have the Superhero’s actors down perfectly, but they have little understanding of the villains. They made Lex Luthor appear like an over enthusiastic twerp. Lex Luthor is supposed to have an imposing presence, unhealthy obsession with Superman, and a huge self centered ego, while still being dangerously intelligent, his downfall is usually his underestimation of his enemies and not due to his lack of competence or skill.

Heath Ledger is better

I'm cautiously optimistic, I like thst they specifically namedropped Gotham but at the same time I'm not sure if doing a Joker story without batman is a good idea. I hope the movie isn't as humorless as he presents itself, anything branded with the Jokers name must be at least a little bit funny