The Killing Joke

My reaction to the story is sort of sadder then I expected to be. I could connect to The Jokers nihilism and loss of faith in humanity, but I didn't want to have any sympathy or agree at all with someone so terrible. At the same time I agreed with Batman, that even if the world is often fucked up and terrible all you can do in it is try to make a positive impact and make a change. He seemed tired of fighting, but not ready to resort to giving in. I think a lot of people can relate to that right now. 

If I were to adapt this to another medium I think I would use animation. I think it might be translated well even into something like claymation where the uncanny valley and disturbing imagery is easy to achieve. Not that other media can't do this, but I feel like a lot of claymation captures that tone I get from the killing joke.

I am used to marvel super heroes more then DC, so this could be coming from a place of ignorance but to me I expect a super hero story to be less genuinely scary and sad, and a lot more upbeat. Even though of course the other super hero comic's I have read have had their serious moments, usually even in those issues there is plenty of jokes and areas more focused on showing off powers and technology. Most of the time I don't notice hero stories taking themselves all too seriously, and this was pretty serious.