Warning: this article contains spoilers for Batman #142-144!How does an ordinary man become the scourge of Gotham City? That’s a question writer Chip Zdarsky and artists Giuseppe Camuncoli and Andrea Sorrentino set out to answer in The Joker: Year One. This storyline flashes back to just after the newly reborn Joker emerged from the pit of acid, exploring his earliest days as a costumed supervillain and how he was molded into the inhuman force of nature he is today.Needless to say, The Joker: Year One has revealed some surprising new details about this iconic villain’s origin. That includes the twist that he was trained by one of Batman’s own mentors and a major retcon of the Three Jokers storyline. Now that this story has wrapped, let’s break down the three biggest reveals and how this flashback storyline will impact the Batman franchise going forward.Joker’s Secret MentorThe Joker: Year One isn’t an origin story in the sense that it doesn’t offer a new retelling of how Joker originally fell into that vat of acid. Instead, the story serves as a follow-up to both 1986’s Batman: The Killing Joke and 2013’s Batman: Zero Year. It specifically covers the weeks immediately after Joker emerges from the waters outside Ace Chemical.However, the biggest takeaway from this storyline is that Joker didn’t claw his way out as a fully formed villain. He still had a long, painful process of evolution to undergo before becoming the Clown Prince of Crime. That’s where Daniel Captio comes in.Captio is a character introduced in writer Chip Zdarsky’s previous Batman project, The Knight. The Knight traces Bruce Wayne’s journey across the world as he seeks out teachers to help mold him into a one-man, crime-fighting army. Captio is one of those teachers, a mentalist with absolute control over his bodily functions. Captio teaches Bruce how to ignore pain and suppress fear, treating his body like a machine where these sensations can simply be switched off.Art by Giuseppe Camuncoli. (Image Credit: DC)Unfortunately for Bruce, Captio now harbors a grudge against him for the way their partnership ended in Batman: The Knight. Hearing rumors about the Joker’s emergence, Captio travels to the city and offers his services to the budding supervillain. Captio teaches Joker how to completely master his inner fears and block out pain. Sensing the raw potential in Joker, Captio molds him into a deadly, unpredictable fighter capable of going toe-to-toe with the Batman. More than ever, it’s clear how Batman and Joker are two sides of the same coin. However, stories about Joker’s past tend to work best with an element of mystery and ambiguity to them. Joker proves to be such a quick study that Captio wonders if his new pupil has merely been toying with him the entire time. Does Joker actually need a teacher to become who he’s meant to be?Unfortunately for Captio, he underestimates just how bloodthirsty his new pupil has become. Joker rewards his mentor by stabbing him and leaving him to bleed out. Captio dies with the knowledge that he’s just created the perfect antithesis to Batman. The Truth About the Three JokersZdarsky’s Batman series is notable for frequently referencing the existence of the Three Jokers, a plot point largely ignored by DC’s other Batman comics outside of 2020’s Batman: Three Jokers series. According to that book, there are actually three versions of the Joker operating in Gotham City. One is the Joker depicted in The Killing Joke, known as The Comedian. Another is the Joker from the early Golden Age Batman comics, known as The Criminal. And the third is the campier Joker from DC’s Silver Age Batman comics, known as The Clown.Batman: Three Jokers ends with The Criminal and The Clown being killed and The Comedian emerging as the sole remaining Joker. However, that series is part of DC’s Black Label line, which normally focuses on out-of-continuity stories. It’s never been firmly established whether the events of Three Jokers happened in DC’s main comic book universe. As The Joker Year One finally reveals, they didn’t. Art by Giuseppe Camuncoli. (Image Credit: DC)Year One puts its own spin on the Three Jokers concept. Early in the story, Joker is attacked by his doppelgangers when he crawls out of the waters at Ace Chemical. In true Joker fashion, that scene is framed ambiguously, leaving it unclear whether Joker is actually fighting his other selves or is merely hallucinating. Later, we learn the latter is true. There aren’t actually three Jokers in the DC Universe. The Criminal, The Comedian and the Clown are merely fragments of Joker’s tortured, disfigured mind in conflict with itself. As part of their training together, Captio teaches Joker to harness his mind and mold those pieces into distinct personalities. Just as Batman created a backup personality called Zur-En-Arrh, Joker creates multiple personalities for himself he can switch between at will.This Three Jokers retcon seems aimed at reviving writer Grant Morrison’s depiction of the Joker. Morrison established that the Joker isn’t insane, but rather “super-sane.” His mind routinely switches from one personality to the next, explaining why over the years he’s shifted from being a scheming criminal mastermind to a goofy prankster to an anarchic super-terrorist. Joker’s mind is always in flux, and now we know why.Joker’s Final Joke to BatmanWhile the majority of The Joker: Year One takes place in the past, the story also features a flash-forward subplot set in the DCU’s near future. In this future, Joker escapes Arkham after being imprisoned in a mind trap of Batman’s design. He leaves behind clues for Batman to parse, like a disintegrating GCPD ring and two red halves of a pill capsule, reminiscent of the Red Hood’s helmet.The hunt for Joker is given special urgency because the entire world has become infected by Joker’s latest virus. Spread by laughter, the virus transforms everyone who hears it into cackling doppelgangers of Joker himself. Not even Batman’s sidekicks are immune. It’s a virus Joker perfected by testing it on the corrupt former Commissioner Matthew McLeod, hence the disintegrating GCPD ring. Joker himself leads Batman to the final clue, a German laughing bag called a lachsack. The bag sends out an echolocation signal that summons a bat. The sound of the bat screeching instantly cures Jason Todd of the virus. Batman realizes that while laughter is the vector, bats are the cure.Art by Andrea Sorrentino. (Image Credit: DC)Why did Joker create a problem and give Batman the solution? As Joker himself explains, he loves Batman. That’s why he’s let Batman live through all their years of feuding. Joker hints that he could have beaten Batman years ago, but allows the Dark Knight to win because of that love. Batman is left to process that revelation and begin curing the infected citizens of Gotham.Even as the city slowly returns to normal, Batman is haunted by the thought that Joker may be correct. He could have ended their rivalry at any point. What happens when Joker finally stops playing and decides to end Batman for good? That may be a story for another day.For more on what’s happening in the comic book world, find out how Blood Hunt will introduce the Vampire Avengers and get an exclusive new look at TMNT: The Last Ronin II. Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.
