Joker: Folie á Deux 2024

This movie falls into a weird space in the DC films continuity. It was released well over a year after James Gunn was hired as the head of the DC films division and a year before the first fully James Gunn produced DC movie Superman, but it’s not a part of either the DCEU or the DCU, instead it’s an Elseworlds movie following the outside of continuity Joker movie from five years earlier. And this movie even goes further from that premise, shifting from inspired by Taxi Driver and the King of Comedy into something that keeps that same tone but throws in a musical reality into the mix. It’s something that’s really bizarre to describe that doesn’t seem to be catering to the fans of either genre. The musical numbers don’t fit very well with fans of the dark and gritty style of movie, and the dark and gritty style of the majority of the film doesn’t mesh well with typically bright and cheery musicals. I found the film rather fascinating, especially with the thought in my mind that it’s pretty much impossible to find the line between what’s actually happening in the world of the movie and what’s happening entirely in Arthur Fleck’s imagination.