Joker has already been played in live action movies by Caesar Romero, Jack Nicholson, Heath Ledger and Jared Leto, but Joaquin Phoenix’s turn as the cackling villain marks the first time that the character is the center of attention on the big screen.
The Joker has been antagonizing Batman since 1940, and nearly 80 years later, one could argue that The Clown Prince of Crime is equal in popularity to the Caped Crusader.
Leto is still holding down the fort as The Joker within the DCEU (though when he’ll return hasn’t been officially been revealed yet), but now we’re getting to see what a one-off telling of his rise to power looks like outside of the confines of a massive franchise.