The Joker Returns!!: Holmes's Real Life Adventure Movie

[skip fox]

It seems more and more likely that Holmes had a narrative he was following, especially with the discovery of a package in which his plans were sent to a professor (though un-delivered).

Each action seems to be part of a script he may be still writing:

1. The Joker prepares, gathers equipment over months.
2. The Joker gives a detailed warning to authorities.
3. The Joker carries out his evil deed.
4. The joker is captured and plays mental chess with the detectives, letting
them see his brilliance in how he booby-trapped his apartment,
5. The Joker is sentenced to death.
6. The Joker escapes from death-row by inventing a metal melting ray in hie cell.
7. The Joker builds his brilliant-evil Armageddon machine.
8. ???????

(see http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021019324 for #2.)

[skip fox]

1. Nobody buys this? It explains all of the bizarre actions. Even his appearance in court

might be explained as an intital set of scenes in #5:

#5. The Joker confounds the courtroom with his bizarre acts and appearance, yet he is sentenced to death.

Such a scenario might also have him taking the stand and giving his evil laugh with crazy-evil-bizarre responses to the prosecutor, the judge and the world. I know his lawyers won't let him do it, but the above narrative suggests he might want to take the stand.

[LisaL]

11. I totally buy it.

Makes a lot of sense to me.

[skip fox]

21. Attend the posts of flamingdem. He or she really has something

Putting the two sets of ideas together (they are not mutually exclusive) can be useful in our understanding as well. He melded the idea of adventure movie and video game.


His problem? No reset button at hand. Our problem, well, you know . . .

[flamingdem]

23. Thanks! You're encouraging me to look further and I found this:

PS flamingdem is female

What Possessed James Holmes (post is from someone in the RPG community)

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/standingonmyhead/2012/07/what-possessed-james-holmes.html

I am deleting this after the point was made that it can't be the same guy he'd be just 9 years old.

[skip fox]

24. I'm sure both sides in court will want this information.

And it's good that the public gets it as well in terms of our understanding ourselves as a culture where an imbalance might take these forms.

We said nothing, as you know, about banning video games or anything else.

Trying to understand instead of simply throwing up our hands and saying "inexplicable" in ten-thousand-thousand ways.

[DefenseLawyer]

14. As a side note, his lawyers can't keep him from taking the stand

They can advise him against it, but he has an absolute right to testify and it's not a call his lawyers can make for him.

[skip fox]

18. I knew that in a loose way, but didn't want qualifications standing in the way of making a point

they at least slightly detracted from.

[flamingdem]

2. He was addicted to role playing games

This leads me to believe that he had various narratives built in to his story and the package was a way to change the outcome.

This was not a linear narrative, there could be many outcomes, this would cover the idea of the trip-wired apartment. Meaning, if the theater shooting didn't go off at least he'd have that conclusion. Since he achieved the climax to a narrative strand he had devised he was no longer in need of the apartment climax ending. So he gave himself up.

I know those games. There's always a big payoff at the end of a labyrinthine journey.

[skip fox]

3. Very nice. A type of hypertext. The reader (or in this case what happens) chooses

different trails, but the outcome is always a climax (as well it should be in fantasy land).

[flamingdem]

4. I heard one of his friends say he was addicted to RPG games

Now I'm wondering which ones. They are super engaging and people spend days on them. I think there are cases in Japan where people disconnect from reality and become reclusive.

They might be more compelling than real life especially if he didn't have any close friends who were grounding him, and if he had an academic situation where he knew he'd lose.

This way he could win.

[skip fox]

5. A game turned stupidly and deadly real.

[flamingdem]

7. CNN is covering the story about the package

so it's not a rumor they say.

[backscatter712]

12. Christ. This could bring freaks like Jack Thompson or Patricia Pulling out of the woodwork...

Just what we need - another moral panic over role-playing games and everything geeky, so politicians can duck our country's real issues by moving to ban books, movies and games to pander to the panicked-mother vote...

[flamingdem]

16. Not at all! RPG's are less violent, the point is that this might be his thought process

and could lead to some understanding of inexplicable behaviors.

In this case I do believe the guy would have latched onto other kinds of narratives, the game is not the cause, it was a vehicle for his crazy.

[backscatter712]

22. Maybe, but gamers have borne the brunt of moral panics in the past.

While I'd agree with you in that this is useful in figuring out what was in the killer's head, I'd say there are too many people out there looking for easy solutions to hard problem, and looking for scapegoats, which is why I'm worried.

[FSogol]

6. By referring to Holmes as Joker, you are giving him what he wants,

fame, notoriety, etc, etc. Unless, he is mentally ill and then your are just reinforcing his fantasizes/delusions.

[flamingdem]

8. That name is appropriate to the content of the post, imo

Also, it seems preferable to using his name over and over

[skip fox]

9. Always someone telling others how to feel, act, talk.

Exercising their confusions in the Commons.

On edit and not as abrasive:

Read my "New Rule" post of yesterday:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021012380

[FSogol]

10. Have fun glamorizing a murderer's delusions.

[skip fox]

15. You're right. It's better not to know or understand.

That way our confusion is so much more. . . more. . . je ne sais quoi."

[backscatter712]

13. And again, I must emphasize: Holmes got Joker's hair wrong!

The Joker's hair was GREEN, dammit!

[flamingdem]

17. Someone posted a comic book that has the Joker with orange hair

I can't imagine that he was incorrect about this, at least in his mind, orange was what he wanted.

mmm come to think of it green is difficult to come by ... and much more noticeable, hah he took caution by using orange.

[skip fox]

19. I think we're thinking well, discovering the motivation behind his methodology .

Last edited Wed Jul 25, 2012, 06:02 PM - Edit history (1)

(Imagine ignoring this!)

[LisaL]

20. In the last movie, joker did have red hair in one of the scenes.

I don't think red hair is a "mistake."

[backscatter712]

25. I don't remember that scene.

In The Dark Knight, I do remember that the Joker's hair was dyed green, though when he was captured by Batman and the Gotham PD, jailed, subjected to Batman's "enhanced interrogation", etc., that his makeup and hair dye started to wear off.

[Recovered Repug]

26. When the Joker was dressed as a nurse, he wore a red/orange wig.

It was when he talked with Harvey Dent and blew up the hospital.

[backscatter712]

27. Oh that's right, the nurse disguise!

Though as soon as he had a moment alone with Dent/Two Face, he took off the wig, revealing his usual green hair.

[skip fox]

28. It seems like you guys are just gabbing about pop-cultural trivia, but

such observations may hold substantive observations as to Holmes's thinking!

Great.

Will he attempt to (symbollically?) cast off his red hair in prison prior to trial? Etc.

[backscatter712]

30. Hard to say.

Maybe he's got that idea in his head, though chances are good that his attorney will insist on getting him a haircut and losing the red hair to make him look presentable for court.

I'd say wait until a qualified psychologist actually spends some quality time interviewing him and observing him, and see what he thinks.

[skip fox]

32. Of course. We're just doing it on the fly. Brainstorming as to the meaning of his method,

which is probably with normal reason.

But we're doing the types of things the psychiatrist will be exploring if he hits upon this line of reasoning: importance of action film-video game on Holmes's narrative, and it would seem negligent to avoid it.

[Recovered Repug]

31. Well then, the Batman character The Red Hood.

http://batman.wikia.com/wiki/Red_Hood

[backscatter712]

33. What do you think will happen when an aspiring psycho killer decides to emulate Two Face?

Will he take a blowtorch to the left side of his face?

[flamingdem]

34. This guy was hell bent on not getting hurt, note the crotch protector

knee protector and the rest of the armor he wore. He seems not to be into taking the brunt of anything

[white_wolf]

35. Someone posted pics of Joker from the 60's show with orange/red hair.

Though, that is the most non-violent incarnation of the Joker ever, so I highly doubt Holmes took any inspiration from that, though I question if he actually took any from Batman period.

[bluestateguy]

29. I think he really thought he was a Batman villian

and that he would soon have a confrontation with the Caped Crusader.

He probably was expecting to meet Chief O'Hara and Commissioner Gordon upon his arrest too.