PORTLAND, Ore. — From Jack Nicholson's Black-Dahliaesque Joker to the iconic portrayal of the madman by Heath Ledger in the Dark Knight series, the Joker has clocked in hours of silver screen time.
In this newest iteration, Joaquin Phoenix will be playing Gotham's favorite sociopath in a standalone film simply titled "Joker".
From what little is known about the movie the plot doesn't appear to be taking the route where a performance artist falls into a vat of goo and becomes obsessed with the idea of hunting a man who runs around dressed as a bat.
In fact, as far as the audience is aware, there is no mention of Batman anywhere.
The cast of the film is pretty star-studded. Zazie Beetz is coming over from her Marvel gig as Domino, to play a character named Sophie Dumond. We'll also see Robert De Niro and Marc Maron.
The cast isn't necessarily comprised of people you expect to see associated with a comic film which may hint at the fact that this movie is reaching for a wider crowd.
It looks promising that we will get a dark, slightly less hysterical, look at the Joker. Jared Leto's Joker may be quaking in his bad tattoos.
"Joker" is set to premiere October 4.
Destiny Johnson is a digital investigative reporter and also reviews comics once a week on YouTube. She likes to chat on Twitter but mostly posts pictures of her dog.
