New Dark Knight promo pics....

[Dr Mordrid]

[Mehen]

Do you know if theres any back story on the Joker in this one? (Jack Napier stuff...) Or was the whole Axis Chemicals story created for the 1989 Batman only?

[Dr Mordrid]

The 1989 backstory was a very loose creation based on story fragments from early comics and a whole lot pulled straight from the writers arse.

The name "Jack Napier" was created for the film and used a couple of times in the 1990's animated series. In the animated series and "Batman: Mask of the Phantasm" Jack Napier was a driver & enforcer for mob boss Sal Valestra. Jack never was part of the original Joker backstory and he didn't kill Bruce Waynes parents; Batman Begins was spot-on by assigning that crime to a hood named Joe Chill.

BTW: Bruce Wayne's name came from Scot king Robert Bruce and Colonial General "Mad Anthony" Wayne of the Revolutionary War.

Truth be told the best, and I do mean BEST, Joker backstory is in the 1988 graphic novel "Batman: The Killing Joke" which has just recently been re-issued in hardcover.

TKJ was written by Alan Moore, who also wrote the graphic novels "V for Vendetta" and "The Watchmen", the latter being named to Time Magazines 2005 list of "100 best English language novels of the 20th century". The Watchmen film is to be released March 9, 2009.

In TKJ Joker starts as a failed stand-up comic with a pregnant wife & no money and things go straight to hell from there. This version evolves into a vicious homicidal psychopath of the first order and is where Heath Ledger drew his portrayal in Dark Knight. I won't go into details, but by the end Joker has done despicable things to those Batman cares for. No "kiddie comic" this one.

Joker before his accident & with his wife from TKJ



Joker after his metamorphosis;