Batman: The Killing Joke - Makes Ridiculous Changes To Great Material

"WHY AREN'T YOU LAUGHING!" 

This isn't as bad as I thought it would be basing it off on what I had heard but it's still not good though. This is some tricky material to adapt, all Alan Moore material is. Not only is it hard to adapt but it is one of the most, if not the most, important Batman stories out there. However, the things that are wrong with this movie are ridiculous. I could see many ways for this to go wrong and none of them were what went wrong here. This is a short hour and twenty-six-minute film and it didn't necessarily have to be. There's enough here to make this movie long and people we are going to see this are dedicated enough to the material to stick with it. Not only is this too short but they add <b>needless<b> things that detract from the film and the big one is Batgirl. I am confounded by all the needless backstory we get for Batgirl. People who have been watching the DCAU already have a connection with Batgirl and will understand the meaning of her passing. You can add a few additional scenes with her and Batgirl but the writers went way overboard. A sex scene?! What the heck?! I know that I'm not the first to bash this scene but there's no excuse for it. This dynamic between Batman and Batgirl is awful and simply should not exist. It damages both of the characters. None of these Batgirl scenes worked for me, if anything it damages the scene where she actually counts. The little "villain" they create for her is horrible as well. I couldn't stand it when he was on screen I was begging for him to be taken off. He's another heavy detriment to the film. Not only is this stuff bad but it takes up more of the runtime than what this story should actually be about. This should be called Batgirl: The Killing Joke. Now those major problems out of the way, I think the stuff that this movie should actually be about is good even great at times. Mark Hamill as Joker is one of the best voice acting performance out there and seeing him get to go darker is a lot of fun to watch. Kevin Conroy's Batman is great as well as deservedly iconic. The dynamic between these two they nail spot on. Batman and Joker are one of the best duos in pop culture and I think this movie captures that very well. Even the Joker backstory scenes play which I wasn't sure about going in. All the stuff actually from the Alan Moore comic is good. It's not enough though. There's more bad than good here just like there is more Batgirl than Batman here. The added scenes are straight-up bad, with nothing redeeming about them. The scenes with Conroy and Hamill are great but just not enough to keep this movie above water. 

4/10