Even though the Batman who Laughs has gotten increasingly ridiculous, I thought he was really effective in this story. I had no idea how Batman was going to win, which added a lot of tension throughout.
@@firetarrasque4667he's the type of character where the less you see of him the scarier he is. His visual character design is shocking the first time you see it but then starts to be comical the more you see it. And now he is a caricature of himself without being satisfyingly developed. In my opinion of course.
A few points: TBWL didn’t trick Batman into killing joker. Joker willingly came to Bruce and committed suicide since he abhors the concept of the Batman who laughs and knew that the only way Bruce could beat him was to become partially jokerised. In the final fight in the cemetery Bruce reveals that the reason he hasn’t become fully jokerised even when he should be is because the joker deliberately weakened the gas before hand to ensure that Bruce could never go all the way
Okay.. I’m following what you’re saying, just why would the joker commit to the plan so much to the point of killing himself? He hates TBWL so much, Walt simultaneously seen him as an unstoppable force? This just feels off to me
@@angelkohlman7068 I haven’t read it in a while, but IIRC he literally goes to the bat cave and tries to kill himself right in front of Bruce to ensure that Bruce gets infected. Maybe he was also counting on Bruce saving his life as well?
@@angelkohlman7068 The Joker was dying in that story line. The chemicals that made him The Joker were eating him from the inside. He knew that he didn't have much longer, so he stopped fucking around and tried to push Bruce to the point of him breaking his "No Kill Rule", to infect him with the Joker Toxin as his "final Joke".
Without a doubt, the most confusing Batman story ever written is "All-Star Batman & Robin". Literaly, every single scene feels like Frank Miller was high af on weeb when he wrote them
How is it confusing? It has a pretty easy to follow narrative, Utilitarian Extremist Batman drafts orphan Dick Grayson into the war for Gotham. Batman is a Psychopathic Dick, & Dick is learning to be a hero from said psychopath. Comic Book wackiness ensuse.
Comics Tropes made a great point that the story is most likely supposed to be over the top. It actually makes way more sense to think Frank Miller was making a joke comic rather than a serious comic. Especially since he is literally the man who made Batman who he is today. With Dark Knight Returns and Year One.
Just screenshotted your comment ( also can't stop laughing 🤣 ). If I ever reached a stage to talk about comics, I'll surely quote you when the time comes my friend.
in some ttrpg groups, we call this writing “skeleton king” how the story goes is there was a 7 year old brother who was dming because the normal dms mom said he should. this 7 year old creates this character called “the skeleton king” who randomly shows up for every bit of the story, and breaks peoples legs theres more to the story, but it’s been years
5:20 "shoot and kill people and be edgy" lol you kinda just described this whole storyline in a single sentence. Shoots the Bat-Family, kills everyone, dresses in edgy clothes to be like Batman's version of Shadow the Hedgehog. Proceeds to become god and shoot or kill everyone some more before dying.
My favorite "Batman becomes The Joker" story is from Batman: White Knight. I think that story and universe as a whole has a bunch of problems that will make it not for everyone, but the way they inversed Batman and The Jokers dynamic was pretty smart in my opinion. Rather than Bruce getting injected with the silly juice, they focused on Batman's obsession with what he does, and the possibility that if The Joker DID get better how would Batman be able to take it. Not a perfect story by any means but one I found really interesting and one that I always think back on as a good page turner. Also nice vid! I like these rant-esque style of videos, and I agree with you that while its a confusing story, the art is really dope. (The shot of Joker with his heart taken out goes so hard)
I think that Batman Who Laughs should be like a gritty dark story of Batman with mind of Joker and tactical skill of Batman rather than a multiversal story.
Honestly? They should’ve just left The BWL in the Dark Multiverse Plotline. He was such a cool concept in that run who just kind of exists now. Like bring him back every once in a while for a Dark Multiverse thing again (maybe a whole comic series out of it) but just leave him out of the main story.
the story of the kid reminds me of when I would play rock paper scissors with some friends and they would go all "rock paper BAZOOKA!" And I would be all yeah sure whatever
For my analysis, the whole story explores how Batman who laughs wanted to corrupt the whole multiverse outside from the dark version of it. And aside from that I agree, it is a mess, they made so much complex plot things and it went from one plan to the other. I enjoyed the final act although the end of that was funny too😂
"The batman who chuckles" Now I can't see him as anything more than "The Fuckle who Chuckles" Also, the whole part of him taking out Dr.Manhattan's brain and putting his own in to take control of his body made me roll my eyes. That's not even how Dr.Manhattan's powers work. His body isn't the source of them at all.
I’m glad someone said it. I’m a very casual comic enjoyer and love this channel for the quick nuggets of lore. I just see nonstop on recommended channels how the Batman who laughs is phenomenal and I just don’t get it. I’ve watched hours long analyses and it makes absolutely zero sense, it’s so convoluted for what should be a simple storyline
Batman Who Laughs was an interesting idea that was executed poorly and then became horrifically oversaturated and also somehow every story he was involved in managed to be progressively worse than the one before until eventually we got the fucking Doctor Manhattan Who Laughs, which will I sincerely believe will go down in history as one of the worst choices to come out of DC. Genuinely, the only reason I can think of for why the fuck they did that was if DC was trying to get Alan Moore to kill himself.
I hated how the did the same damn cliffhanger with every issue with Batman getting corrupted fully. Like almost every time the corruption is complete, then they shift the goalpost. I know comics need a hook but come on man.
i liked the whole concept of “The Batman Who Laughs” together with the Darkest Knights because it reflected Bruce’s very real fears, just like the “Tower of Babel” story dealth with them, but idk. I feel like ever since The New 52 there has been a need to have a “Batman vs. Evil Batman” thing all the time. I know characters like Prometheus or Azrael are like, also that, but Snyder has a hyperfixation on it that harms the concept by overplaying it. BWL and Omega are his “big bads” in his Batman story and they’re just evil versions of bruce that destroyed the world through like, haxx and plot armor and shit
the thing is that his design is pretty cool-looking (despite being essentially just "The Mouth of Sauron" from the LOTR movies), and the kinda dumb stories don't really bother me, EXCEPT, that this dude completely overshadowed Dawnbreaker which to me, is such an amazing idea for a true threat and an interesting character
I’ve always hated the Batman who laughs, especially his backstory. It felt so tryhard and edgy. “The joker kills everyone and then starts TURNING KIDS TO ORPHANS IN FRONT OF BATMAN” like you couldn’t think of a actually interesting conflict so you just turned the joker into Evilpants Mcgee
That childhood game sounds fun within the rules. I like that you got to pick whoever you were, and you could use a special ability but only once. It’s a way to make a game of regular tag much more fun😊
Duuude! That video was suuuper cool. Like. I looove watching your vids while eating dinner and stuff. The rant format is great, dont worry about that. It would be cool if you could do more vids like that. Cheers mate!
This story felt like a writer combining the "batman with time can beat anything" and "what's the most 90's, edgiest batman design we can sell comics with" and smooshed them together. It's a series of great panels and moments, but no connective tissue.
Omg MMC I just love how your just trying to explain 1 part of this larger confusing story please talk more about this please bc I love this type of vid its different and this was funny
4:31 the mental gymnastics this man’s brain has to do to make the electrical pulses fire at the right times to differentiate “who laughs” and “who chuckles” has me laughing. Even better was the sorry before he could even mess it up. Love you bro you’re doing great. Subbing rn.
Its like you put a little bit too much of every ingredient in the soup pot. It may taste great, but in the end you're gonna have a mess. Too many "gotcha" moments, like Batman who Chuckles never gets any fuckin time to recoup or "prep" which makes him so unique as a character and not a walking plot device. We never see the machinations of the Batman who Laughs either, so in the end it truly is like that game you played as a kid
I used to play a game called superheroes at recess too. It was less tag and more so a game of pretend. My buddy Zach was always Spider-Man and I played as my Gary Stu of an OC, Arsenal. (yes, I stole the name from the actual arsenal.) It was a lot of fun, though, and I hold it responsible for my current love of role-playing and story-telling.
0:01 holy shit I thought I made that game up when I was a kid! We called it superhero tag where at the beginning of recess they would tell me the character and I would make their abilitys. Also we didn’t just play with superheroes we also played with villains and even celebrities. Damn I miss those days
i read this story, i barely remember anything about it, but i remember that the batman who chuckles was chosen because he was the worst batman in all the multiverse, and the punchline was that the worst batman beat the batman who laughs, or something like that
Not going to lie, I liked the Batman Who Laughs for a while, but they tried way too hard to make him the villain in every series that was happening at the time. Like he was even the villain in the Batman Fortnite crossover comic... because of course he was
I remember this mini, I bought it every month and it was still confusing to read. This is peak late run Batman by Scott Snyder, with Batman variants everywhere and a confusing story brimming with exposition dumps and monologues.
Is there a lore reason Man is Jonkling? Is he stupid? All jokes aside, this story actually got me back into reading comics after not reading them for years, and for that, it has a special place on my Batman shelf.
This is the closest this channel get to telling comic book stories in comic book store while checking new stuff. Only thing missing is "Dude, that's sick!" or smth like that 😅
Like, there's literally only one concept that I could come up with to explain why the bat who laughs won in his own series, and it's the most stupid, unapologetically unnecessary ability you can give a character that's falls into that one friend who just makes up powers that overcome everyone else you make. A real 1-up man ability tbh.
Holy shit the beginning story you told reminds me of this unique game me and a few mates used to play in primary school. It was called 'A' (as in Capital A) Game (it's pronounced A game, not a game - uh game). Basically it was you name a character you think of (it was usually DC caus we enjoyed the darker stories), then it increasingly got more obscure, getting into characters like this Singaporean butcher man (whom I still don't know) and Dog Welder Man.
...pretty much. Man, there are some very cool things in comics that these creators milk to DEATH. The Phoenix Force: How many Marvel characters are gonna become the Phoenix before they finally give it a rest? The Phoenix Force, at this point, is just, "Hey, I wanna do a What If story about Shanna the She-Devil becoming the Phoenix! Wouldn't that be cool? Except in mainstream continuity." And the editors are just like, "Do you, holmes." Krakoa: Why are the mutants still on Krakoa? I'm assuming they still are, but I stopped reading a couple years ago. The Krakoa storyline was a very good, Age of Apocalypse-type event that would have had really great reverberations throughout the X-books, what with Moira's new powers discovered, and the future of mutants in doubt (so, business as usual). It should've lasted, like, a year, year-and-a-half, at most. Instead, the mutants moved to Krakoa, called themselves the new gods of the earth, Franklin Richards is a fake-mutant, and it's STILL happening (I think it ended a couple months ago, but point still stands). The Batman Who Laughs: What a cool freakin' character. When I first saw him at the end of that Dark Metal issue, I was like, oh that's awesome. And he was cool. Edgy as hell, but whatever. I've been reading comics a long time, so I'm down with anything to freshen things up a bit. But I guess all the other writers at DC thought he was super-cool, too, because they all decided to use him as the ultimate villain for, like, three years straight. Less is more, guys - kill your darlings, you know? He is def that kid who is obnoxiously invincible. Good analogy.
