Murdering Jason Todd may be the worst thing the Joker has ever done, but it might have prevented him from meeting his own gruesome end. An old interview sheds light on why “Death in the Family” is probably the best thing to happen to the Joker.
As Batman’s oldest adversary, the Clown Prince of Crime has reinvented himself more than any other villain in the Dark Knight’s rogues gallery. From a deadly serial killer to a garishly-colored nuisance, the Joker seems to change with every era of comics, becoming whatever sort of threat he needs to be to better reflect the times. If comic fans didn’t know before, the Joker’s brutal beatdown and murder of Jason Todd was a sign that the modern age of comics was here.
The “Death in the Family” storyline was one of the most explosive comic book arcs of the eighties. And while the Joker’s killing of a minor was shocking, writer Neil Gaiman shows that it may have been a good thing for the clowning criminal. In an interview with Chip Kidd on the 20th anniversary of Gaiman’s lauded work, The Sandman, the writer discusses why his comic phased out its use of DC Universe characters. Around the 57:31 mark, Gaiman reveals that it was harder to work DC characters into his story because they needed approval and the events of The Sandman needed to fit with DC’s continuity. He cites an example of how he wanted the Joker to hang himself as an April Fool’s gag in The Sandman #5. Though he initially received approval and wrote the sequence, he was stopped at the last minute and informed the Joker had just died and could no longer be used.
The Sandman #5 was published in May 1989. Four months earlier, Batman #429, which served as the concluding chapter of “Death in the Family,” was released. While Gaiman never explicitly calls out what comic the Joker “died” in, Batman #429 ended with the character seemingly perishing after a helicopter crash. When looking at everything laid out like this, it’s amazing to see how narrowly the Joker avoided hanging himself on page for readers everywhere to see. The “Death in the Family” arc was a radical change to the Batman franchise, and is one of the most well-known assaults on the Bat-Family the Joker has ever done. The story is also notable for allowing fans to be the ones to decide Jason Todd’s fate. Gaiman revealing that the event stopped him from penning a canonical scene where the Joker hangs himself adds a new layer to a story that already has one of the most infamous reputations in comics.
Of course, Gaiman does say that the Joker scene was the character’s April Fool’s gag, so it’s likely it would have been more of a shocking stunt than an actual suicide. But knowing the Joker’s sick sense of humor, he may very well have hung himself had editorial not saved him for another story.
Source: 92nd Street Y
