Joker (DCAU)

**The Joker**is Batman's archenemy and supervillain who tried every descipable trick to take over Gotham City, make a profit and ruin the Dark Knight's life emotionally and physically.

## Biography

### Origins

The Joker was originally an unidentifiable criminal with a checkered past, who started out as both a hitman and a chaffeur under the employ of the Valestra mob. One of his last known jobs took place in Europe on the Mediterranean Coast. His target was businessman Carl Beaumont after mob bosses Salvatore Valestra, Buzz Bronski and Chuckie Sol discovered he had embezzled them. Andrea Beumont returned home from grocery shopping to find the thug walking out of her house and her father murdered in cold blood.

Returning to Gotham City, the hitman formed his own gang and staged a robbery at the Ace Chemical Plant, which was thwarted by Batman. Either because Batman pushed him or he stumbled after getting punched, the thug fell off a catwalk and fell into a vat of chemical waste that washed him out into the river, changing his life forever. The chemicals had an adverse effect on him: they dyed his hair green, bleaching his skin white and his lips were permanently stained red. Vowing to show the world of his comic genius, the career of the Joker began, one of the world's most dangerous and intelligent psychopaths.

### Criminal Career

A frequent inmate of Arkham Asylum, the Joker was often psycho-analyzed at one point by Dr. Harleen Quinzel. After one session, Joker fooled Quinzel as he painted himself as a misunderstood soul crying out for the world to accept him as Quinzel later found herself in love with Joker and broke him out of Arkham. However, a combination of Joker's ego and Harley Quinn's lack of humor tends to push Joker's buttons. More often than not, Joker abuses and throws Quinn onto the streets until he decides he wants her again.

The Joker's plans have little prejudice and although he has shown particular delight in playing jokes on the most ordinary and innocent of victims like mild-mannered salaryman Charlie Collins, he is just as dangerous to Gotham City's highest level official Commissioner James Gordon or Mayor Hamilton Hill. But Joker has had his share of provocations, being one of the three villains to travel to Yucca Springs on an invite from Hugo Strange claiming to know the identity of Batman. Ex-businessman Cameron Kaiser deliberately made his casino resemble Joker's appearance to draw the villain out as a means to trick Joker into wrecking the casino so he'd get away with the insurance, although this plan ultimately backfired when Joker, thanks to information revealed by Batman on the plot, decided to instead kill Kaiser and then manage the casino from behind the scenes.

Depending on the joke, the Joker's plans can range from small-scale to global. On one occasion, he tried to con his way to a local comedy trophy, that he was denied in disguise on account that he registered late by using the Mad Hatter's mind control chips on the event's judges. Another time, Joker stole a nuclear warhead and almost successfully set it off on Hill's residence. One of his most infamous schemes involved infecting all the fish in Gotham Harbor with his signature toxin, then demanding a copyright for them. When refused this, he went on a killing spree, infecting several bureaucrats of the Gotham Copyright Office with his Joker Venom.

Some time later, the Joker was hunted by Phantasm due to his former ties to the Valestra mob and also ended up disposing of Valestra after the latter foolishly requested to help in stopping Phantasm. He also injected Arthur Reeves with his Joker Toxin and finally confronted both Batman and Phantasm at the World of Tomorrow. At one point, he discovered his former gang's executioner is actually the daughter of the man whom he murdered a long time ago. He nearly kills her, but is ultimately stopped by Batman. When defeated by the Caped Crusader and at the Phantasm's mercy while the theme park was burning to the ground. Joker couldn't help but laugh, which eventually made Phantasm let him go after seeing that he simply wasn't sane anymore.

Batman shut down the Joker's criminal operations in Gotham City on a routine basis however the Joker really did go bankrupt on a few occasions. One such instance caused him to move to Metropolis, where he briefly allied himself with Lex Luthor to kill Superman for one billion dollars. Luthor scoffed at Joker, claiming he was overconfident in his ability to kill a superpowered Kryptonian when he struggled with a "mortal in a Halloween costume", but agreed to pay if he should succeed. Joker planned to use the statuette Laughing Dragon actually made of Kryptonite. Joker's plans fell apart when Batman deduced what the antique was made of and head to Metropolis, reluctantly coorperating with Superman to defeat the villain. Fearing Joker's failures were exposing him, Luthor called the deal off. Consolidating his losses, the Ace of Knaves kidnapped Luthor and hijacked the experimental Lexwing assault vehicle, planning to destroy everything Luthor had built for fun. The plan backfired when, in an engagement with Batman, Joker's exploding marbles fell across the plane. While Batman and Superman rescued Luthor and Harley Quinn, Joker was helpless on the crashing plane, laughing maniacally as it exploded in the river.

The Joker returned to Gotham City a month later, still bankrupt. He unwittingly received a $250 million inheritance from his former ganglord rival Edward "King" Barlowe. Joker immediately spent the first million on various pursuits such as hiring a defense team to wipe his criminal record clean and even trying to buy Nightwing and Batgirl off however Joker was duped. The majority of the money was counterfeit and the IRS was claiming it's dues, which Joker could not dispute without an embarrassing admission that he'd been tricked, thus making him the laughingstock of the Gotham criminal underworld. Desperate, Joker tried to steal a routine money dispersal from the Gotham Mint without using any of his trademarks until Batman intervened again. Trying to jump over the ship again, Joker was stopped from doing so by Batgirl as it would be pointless to go after the money that went over board. However, it was implied Joker was sad enough to commit suicide, wanting to go with the money, but was returned to Arkham with a little pay back from Harley on the way.

During his seven-year anniversary of his transformation into the Joker, the Gotham Insider made a live report from Ace Chemical Plant. The Clown Prince of Crime made an appearance and attacked the news crew. Jack Ryder was doused with Joker Venom and then shoved into a drainage vat, transforming him as well but the combination of the chemicals and the laughing gas pushed Ryder further, giving him an energetically maniac yet still basically conscientious personality. Fashioning himself into the crazed vigilante known as the Creeper, he went on a rampage to get revenge on Joker. As a result, Joker found himself in the bizarrely terrifying situation of being relentlessly pursued by this new insane superhero of his own inadvertent creation. Although Creeper's mania is benign, his methods are so extremely wild and frantic that he even practically begged Batman to arrest him, clutching Batman's cape. Batman then cuffs Joker while somewhere along the line, Joker was saved and Batman sedated Creeper.

### Other Schemes

In another routine shut out, the Joker was forced to move his enterprises outside of Gotham City. This time he chose the Midwestern town of Dakota. Joker planned on forming a metahuman gang. However, Batman, Robin and Static teamed up and escaped Joker's death trap, arresting the Clown Prince of Crime in the process.

Some time later, the Joker wound up in Metropolis again. He was just in time to meet Lex Luthor's Injustice Gang. Lex, remembering his past alliance with Joker years earlier, simply ordered him to leave. But after some convincing, he conned his way into staying by providing his expertise on Batman. His one condition was this: after the Justice League was successfully destroyed, Joker was promised Batman. Joker began attempting to convince Luthor in killing the Dark Knight whilst they had the chance but Luthor refuses. Joker is later seen with Ultra-Humanite and Lex as they try to deactivate the defensive system on Batman's utility belt which they do successfully and find a communicator and key to the Justice League's space station. Luthor then sends the other Injustice Gang members to the space station, which was being guarded by only Martian Manhunter, to plant a bomb on the headquarters and call them back. However, the Justice League survived and eventually defeated the Injustice Gang. Deciding to cut his losses, Joker attempted to execute Batman but it seemed the Caped Crusader had manipulated the situation throughout the entire endeavor. Batman easily knocked out Joker to end the conflict.

Continuing to cause more chaos, the Joker discovered and entered the secret compound Section 12. Since the compound was under the supervision of a secret initiative, he took some of their technology for later uses. Joker then freed the compound's prisoners and fashioned them as a card deck hand metahuman gang. Next, he purchased air time on several networks under the moniker "Gwynplaine Entertainment" and broadcast a live feed of Las Vegas. Joker secretly planted several dozen high explosives all throughout the city and despite the Justice League managed to disarm the bombs, the bomb stunt was merely to attract viewers throughout the world. The real plan was to use the powers of his gang's fifth member, Ace, and transmit her thought waves across the air to render everyone under a mass psychosis. When Batman confronted Joker alone, the Dark Knight managed to reveal to Ace that the Joker held on to a special headband used to nullify Ace's powers. Ace, in turn, used her powers on the Joker and temporarily incapacitated him.

### Final Joke

As he was deciding the "game" between him and Batman was growing old, the Joker devised one final scheme directed at Batman's "family". After Dick Grayson left for Bludhaven, Joker and Harley Quinn kidnapped Tim Drake, Dick's replacement as Robin while the Boy Wonder was alone on patrol, unaware that it is a trap. In the former partially demolished Arkham Asylum, Joker systematically tortured Robin for three weeks. After several serum injections and electric shocks, Robin revealed all of his secrets to the Clown Prince of Crime, including the fact that Batman was actually Bruce Wayne. Joker then completed the "makeover" by splicing their DNA together, resulting in his victim's face contorting to a Joker-like smile and then dressed a crude version of himself known as "Joker Junior" (or J.J. for short), much to the horror of Batman and Batgirl. Joker even went far enough to document the torture to show Batman in the operating theater as the "Our Family Memories" video. While succeeding in enraging Batman, Joker delivered a knife to his knee, crippling his nemesis. However, not even Joker could fully turn J.J., and rather then shoot Batman and "deliver the punchline", J.J. instead shot and killed the Joker. Then Tim Drake suffers a mental breakdown and Batgirl comforts him.

### Legacy

Though buried beneath Arkham Asylum's remains, the villain's last bid tainted the trio and engineered the end of the Bat Family. Despite his death, the Joker's criminal mastermind and homicidal legacy would live on for years. Whilst the people of Gotham City were free of the crazed clown, several street gangs were formed to honor the Ace of Knaves' destructive legacy.

## Personality

The Joker is a psychopath even prior to his transformation and harbored little remorse to any murders he committed, also intending to start his own gang. After being dunked into a vat of chemicals, his insanity increased and the Joker was born as one of the most dangerous criminals in Gotham City, attempting to commit mass murder for all the sake of jokes. He also has little to none regard for his own life or safety, even laughing manically in instances where his own death was seemingly inevitable such as when facing the Phantasm's preperations to kill him and his reaction to his explosive marbles rolling towards him in the doomed LexWing. Once, the Joker even aimed a gunturret on an airplane he planned to escape with a nuclear explosion from, fully acknowledging he would most likely die just to prevent Batman from disarming the bomb. His lack of regard for his survival is shown when he tried to provoke Batman into killing him after torturing Tim Drake but in the end he admitted he despised Bruce. He was described by Bruce as "a psychopath, a monster".

## Powers and Abilities

### Abilities

* **Genius Level Intellect:**
* **Chemistry:**
* **Basic Combatant:**

## Equipment

* **Joker Venom:**
* **Joy Buzzer:**