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He/she who controls the origin has the power.

Apparently Geoff Johns won’t give up the Flashpoint timeline, and now he’s using it (if theories are to be believed) to give the Joker a name. Fully embracing the above statement, Johns has altered the origin for Barry Allen’s Flash, 90s clone Superboy, Billy “he’ll always be Captain Marvel to me, not Shazam” Batson, and even the Green Lantern Corp. Am I the only one realizing Johns is slowly remaking the DC universe backstory his own creation?

So in the Flashpoint timeline it’s Bruce who dies. Thomas Wayne becomes Batman while Martha goes crazy and become that reality’s version of the Joker. In a recent story from Flashpoint Beyond, aka we won’t let this event that rewrote the DC universe for Dan DiDio’s Darker DC die already, Martha meets a guy in Arkham who in the proper course of events would have become the Joker, and he has a name. That name… might as well be Jimmy Crackcorn because I don’t CARE!

Giving the Joker a “real name” is not something new to Johns the origin absorber (if I come off too harsh I’m not feeling good and I’m close to crunch time so my apologies) mind you. Alan Moore in The Killing Joke, Tim Burton in his first Batman movie, and Todd Philips in his anti-comic book “Joker” film all tried to give the clown prince of crime an origin and real name. None of them are the same name mind you but that doesn’t matter because any attempt to give the Joker a name besides The Joker is showing a total lack of understanding of how the Joker works narratively. In short: the Joker shouldn’t have a “real name” at all.

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