BATMAN: THE MAN WHO LAUGHS 
 

(ONE SHOT SPECIAL) 
 

Reviewed by Gabe Alba 
 
 

CREATIVE TEAM:

Ed Brubaker (Writer)

Doug Mahnke (Artist)

Rob Leigh (Letterer)

David Baron (Colorist) 
 

PLOT:

A modern day retelling of the 1940’s Batman #1, in which the Batman first encountered the Joker!

(SIDE NOTE): The title for the book comes from the old 1928 movie of he same name “The Man Who Laughs”, which served as a source of inspiration for Bob Kane in creating the Joker. 
 

Pgs. 1-5 
 

      At 4 a.m. on a cold rainy Gotham morning Captain Gordon is called to a grisly crime scene at an old abandoned factory. On arrival Gordon walks pass two veteran officers that appear to be some what disturbed by something that they have seen. Gordon reaches the medical personal and sees that one of the EMT’s is sick to his stomach. Gordon lifts the sheet up from the body lying on the stretcher, revealing a disfigured body whose face has been contorted into a ghastly grin, its hair is green, its skin a pale gray almost white, with eyes peering out into unnatural directions. Gordon walks into the abandoned factory, standing on a catwalk; Gordon sees more horribly disfigured bodies laid out across the factory floor down below. Gordon has never seen anything like this.

      This experience makes Gordon reflect back to how much the city has changed in the last year. Batman appeared in the city for the first time, helping Gordon in bringing down crooked cops and loosening the grip the mob had on the city (see Batman Year One). He contemplates how someone fool in a costume known as the Red Hood made a couple of robberies a few months back, before disappearing after an encounter with Batman. He knows that it is only a matter of time before similar weirdoes make an appearance. Could these grisly bodies be the work of one of them? He knows that the world that he lives in has become a world of super heroes and freaks.

      As Gordon is lost in thought, Batman appears from out of the shadows. Gordon tells him that he is relieved that he came, and asks Batman for his early assumption of the scene. Batman looks at Gordon and tells him that it does not look good. Batman says the bodies appear to have been dead for months and that it also looks like someone was practicing on them.  Batman tells Gordon, “It’s only the beginning”. 
 

Pgs. 6-11 
 

      Bruce Wayne is attending a dinner at the Gotham Gentlemen’s Club with Henry Claridge. Bruce finds the evening a bore as Claridge is trying to convince Bruce to use Wayne Industries to help finance a joint venture with Claridge’s own corporation for a new chemical processing factory. Bruce just tells Henry that he is just the company figure head and that he will run it by the board first chance that he gets. This is a brush off. Bruce knows all about Henry’s fraud with securities and sees Claridge as a man that has been handed everything in his life only to make poor people poorer. Bruce pretends to listen as he goes over last night’s crime scene in his mind and wonders what kind of mind could have committed such atrocities. In the background of their conversation a television set is on displaying a news reporter’s coverage of the soon to be reopening of the newly renovated Arkham Asylum. The female report begins to cough uncontrollably has she is covering the story. This uncontrolled coughing catches Bruce’s attention, he watches as the reporter’s coughs turn into laughter. Bruce watches as the reporters face has turned in to a large ruby grin, and her skin a bone flesh white, and her hair a bright green. As the report falls to the ground a figure steps out from the shadows behind her. Stepping from the shadows is a man dressed all in purple. He removes his hat revealing a face similar to the unconscious reporter who had just fallen to the ground. Pointing a revolver to the camera, the man dressed in purple address the TV viewing audience saying hello then goodbye and proclaims that they are all going to die. He then laughs hysterically. The man stops laughing and claiming that before he starts his whole sale destruction, he will pick a few of Gotham’s favorite sons. He points his revolver to the cameras and states that Henry Claridge will die at midnight. Claridge stares frightened at the television screen. The man fires the gun at the television screen. The gun he fired is a prop gun merely revealing a banner stating BANG. The man apologizes tossing his first gun aside and pulls out another and laughing hysterically once again, fires. The TV in the gentlemen’s club fizzles to static. Claridge is left standing in the middle of the room. All the other people in the club stare at Claridge as he asks Wayne for his opinion on what has just transpired. Bruce is no where to be seen. Bruce has ditched the party and is falling down an air duct to a parking garage. He knows that the lunatic he just saw on the TV screen will be gone by the time he gets to the crime seen. Yet he knows that with his newly supped up car he can get there before Gordon’s men can disturb any evidence. 
 

Pgs. 12-14 
 

      Gordon reaches the Arkham Asylum crime seen and can tell that Batman has already been there. Gordon is glad that Batman is helping he knows that this psychotic killer must be stopped, not only for the sake of his wife and daughter but for Gotham. Gordon tells one of his officers that he is going to take a look inside. Well inside, knowing that Batman is standing in the shadows he asks if he has found anything. Batman tells Gordon that he has not found enough evidence, but has found something else that causes worry.  Batman leads Gordon to a cell with writing scribbled on the wall, and says that the man in purple must have written it before the TV crew arrived. The message states “One by one they’ll hear my call, then this town will follow my fall”. Gordon makes a quirk “great he’s a poet”, but Batman assures him that this man in purple is a murderer. Gordon counters by saying that they both know that he is worse then a murderer, reminding him about last night and that he just killed a reporter and a camera man simply to get a message out. Gordon asks Batman if he knows what this madman wants. Batman tells Gordon that he wanted the TV crew’s mobile transmitter van. With a few minor adjustments the van could be used to broadcast live anytime. Gordon realizes that if this madman does kill Claridge, then the city is going to go crazy. 
 

Pgs. 15-16 
 

      The mayor of Gotham holds a press conference in front of the Gotham Central Police Station, to try and calm the city down. The mayor assures the press that the GCPD will bring this madman to justice swiftly, he has personally appointed James Gordon, Gotham City’s Hero Cop (see Batman Year One), on the case. The mayor calls Gordon to the podium mike. Gordon doesn’t play politics and tells the press he can not comment on the ongoing case and can not make any guarantees when the press asks if Claridge will be safe. He can only assure them that he will do his best. The press asks him if it is true that the police have dubbed the madman the Joker. Gordon tells them that he has not heard that but that the name does fit. From this point on in the story the madman in purple is known as the Joker. Gordon tells the press no more questions and leaves the podium. He knows that the Commissioner will have his head. Gordon does not care; he has a killer to catch.

Pgs. 17-20 
 

      Claridge refuses to go into custody so Gordon is forced to secure Claridge’s building. Claridge also refuses to wear a bullet proof vest and sees the threat on his life as a joke. Gordon tells him to stay away from the windows, but Claridge doesn’t see why and begins to chuckle, almost after every sentence. Gordon then receives a call from a S.W.A.T. member, telling Gordon that they have found a photographer in one of the buildings air shafts. Gordon takes no chances and has the photographer taken downtown. At this time Claridge notices that the time is 12 o’clock midnight. Claridge’s chuckle turns into laughter. Unknown to the police and Gordon below, Batman is spying from the skylight above. Batman sees Claridge’s laughter turn hysterical and crashes through the skylight landing on top of Claridge. The S.W.A.T. turns there guns to Batman, but Gordon yells for them to hold their fire. Claridge face is a grisly smile. Batman turns to Gordon telling him that Claridge is dead, he never had a chance. The S.W.A.T. continue to point their guns towards Batman, as they begin to ask Gordon if they should fire (Batman is wanted by the police: see Batman Year One, geez!). Gordon tells them to put their guns down and that what none of this should leave the room. Batman turns to Gordon knowing that he has placed Gordon in a compromising position and tells him that he should go. Just as Batman is about to go, a S.W.A.T. officer hands a phone out to Gordon and tells him that there’s another situation.  
 

Pgs. 21-26 
 

      The situation is six blocks away from Claridge’s building. Batman knows that the Joker has played them for a fool. Two men with guns from the Williams Medical Center a block away are terrorizing downtown Gotham. Batman arrives on the scene. He counts two dead and eight injured. He knows that the two mentally men are not responsible for there actions but Batman doesn’t care. In the middle of traffic, Batman takes out the smaller man with the gun first. Batman then turns his attention the much larger man that is about to crush a women’s head with his bare hands. Batman makes short work of this man and hearing screaming another block down heads in that direction, wondering how many psychos escaped while he and Gordon waited for Claridge to die.

      Gordon has arrived at the Williams Medical Center to find that the doors were blown out with C4. An officer recounts to Gordon an eyewitness’s statement that a man matching the madman’s description came in with guns blazing killing all the guards and an orderly. The officer tells Gordon how the madman then kicks open the doors to the psycho ward dorm and toss out a bunch of loaded weapons, asking them to join him for a night out on the town. Gordon asks the officer how many inmates are missing, the officer replies sixteen most in for homicide. 
 

Pgs. 27-31  
 

      It is the early morning and Batman has returned to Wayne Manor. We learn that he was only able to capture six of the men that Joker had helped to escape. There are still ten out on the loose. While inside the manor Bruce changes into a robe and hands Alfred his bat suit. Alfred asks Bruce if he will be getting any sleep this morning, Bruce replies with a no, telling Alfred that he has work to do. Alfred suggests to Bruce that he should at least try to get ten minutes of sleep and meditation, before going out this evening as Batman. Bruce heads down to the Batcave and tries to analyze the Joker’s poison, from the blood samples that he had taken from the news reporter and Claridge. Bruce ponders the possibility of their being to variations of the poison. One he believes is fast-acting and the other is slow-acting. Bruce has a hunch that Claridge had already been exposed to the poison before the Joker made his announcement. Just as Bruce is lost in thought, all the monitors in the Batcave flash on revealing the Jokers demonic grin. The Joker revels in lasts nights murder and the mentally ill patients that he released, that Hero Cop James Gordon was unable to stop. The Joker also states that he is fond of the new name that the press has given him. Joker makes another announcement, this time claiming that Gotham millionaire Jay W. Wilde will die at midnight. Joker promises further surprise entertainment that will cause the public to die laughing. Bruce begins to run a search on Wilde and Claridge, finding a link in business activity.

      By three o’clock in the afternoon the people of Gotham are in a panic, the bridges leading outside of the city are flooded with traffic. Gordon is being chewed out by Commissioner Gorgan, blaming him for the paranoia; Gordon feels that Gorgan is wasting precious time. As Gordon leaves the Commissioners office, he returns to his own office to find a letter that Batman has left. The letter tells Gordon that Claridge was killed with time released poison and that he should run a blood test on Wilde ASAP. 
 

Pgs 32-38 
 

      Gordon and his security team have Wilde secured at his home, just outside the city. Wilde had undergone blood tests earlier in the day, no poison is found, the test only comes up with Wilde having high cholesterol. Wilde had flown into town from the west coast a few hours earlier in the day just to hear The Joker’s threat. Because The Joker could not have gotten to Wilde earlier in the day, Gordon feels that The Joker will be trying to make a direct assault on the house. Gordon looks at his watch frustrated with the news copters over head. Batman waits outside in the shadows for The Joker to arrive. Cops all throughout Gotham are working double shifts in order to keep the streets safe, even though most have already fled the city. Gordon tells Wilde who is lounging on a chair that he should really but his gas mask on. As Gordon and an S.W.A.T. officer argue on whether it is midnight, the search light of a helicopter shines in to the house grabbing Gordon’s attention. As Gordon approaches the window he sees a helicopter cashing to the ground. The lights in the house go off, leaving Wilde, Gordon and his S.W.A.T. team in utter darkness. The helicopter that has just crash landed explodes into a ball of flame killing many of the surrounding cops in the yard, at the same time, four smoke bombs fall into the house through the chimney, filling the room with smoke.

      Someone yells that The Joker is in the house. Batman who is also already in the wearing a gas mask, knows that the Joker was smart to have created the chaos outside and to have cut the power at the same time. Batman anticipates the Joker to rush into the room wearing night goggles. Gordon wearing a gas mask, tells his men not to panic, for that would only give the Joker what he wants. The Joker does rush into the room with guns blazing, but Batman plans a surprise of his own by through a flash bomb out into the center of the room. The flash throws the Joker off balance giving Batman time to tackle him. Joker fires off a shot just missing Batman’s head. This shot throws Batman off and the Joker knocks Batman in the face with his gun. Batman falls to the floor trying to catch his breath, the S.W.A.T. team sees the Joker, and open fire. Gordon yells for them to stop knowing that they may hit Batman. The Joker makes a break for the window; Batman tosses a roped Batarang at the Joker, which raps around his face. Batman pulls him down to the floor. The Joker cracks about Batman being an Urban Legend, and Batman mistakes the laughter echoing through the house as the Jokers but in fact it is Wilde’s. Batman is distracted by this and the Joker head butts Batman. Joker fires his gun and Batman dives for cover. The Joker jumps from the window grabbing a ladder that is tangling from a helicopter that is hovering above. Wilde inside is dead with a ruby smile, Batman knows that he has failed, but hopes not completely. 
 

Pgs 39-46 
 

      The next morning through Gordon and the coroner Bruce finds that Wilde was killed by one of the Jokers bullets that was laced with poison. Bruce also finds that the bug he planted on the Joker is not transmitting. So Batman is left to follow the only lead that he has; Claridge and Wilde were both investors of Ace Chemical Processing Plant, 20 years ago. Which three months earlier was the same place that Batman fought the Red Hood (see Batman: The Killing Joke). Batman goes undercover as reporter. While interviewing the plant manager, Batman sees a plant worker with white stains on his face. Batman asks the man if he doesn’t mind telling him how he got the stains on his face. The man tell him that some of the chemicals splashed on him in an accident a while back and that another co-worker who had come into contact with the chemicals, had all the hair on his arm turn green. Batman leaves wondering if the Red Hood who had fallen into the chemicals three months ago and the Joker are the same person. While in the car Batman still disguised as a report gets a call from Alfred, who tells him that the transmitter that he had planted on the Joker is now transmitting and that he will send the location through the car’s computer. Batman morphs the car into the Batmobile and heads to the coordinates. The device leads Batman to an old Survey and Planning office. There are maps of the Gotham sewer system. Batman now in his crime fighting gear, decides to check the sewers, but finds nothing.

      Back in the Batcave, Bruce continues to try to find an antidote to the Joker’s poison. Bruce begins to think that the Joker and the Red Hood are truly one and the same, yet can not make out what the Joker’s poem back at the asylum was trying to say. As Bruce is pondering the Joker’s poem, Alfred comes from behind and tells Bruce to turn on the monitor’s. On the screen is the Joker who announces that he is not only going to kill one of Gotham’s social elite at midnight but two, Judge Thomas Lake and Bruce Wayne.  
 

Pgs. 47-57 
 

      Bruce pretends to know anything about the death threat as the police arrive at his house. He is being protected by a GCPD detective. He is thankful for he knows that Gordon, who is protecting Judge Lake is much to smart for what Bruce has planned. He knows that he must be free to act as Batman, so Bruce has Alfred along with two of his own doctors standing by. Bruce walks over to the mantle and as the detective is talking to Gordon over the phone, Bruce begins to laugh uncontrollably; his face is now in a ruby grin. Gordon on the other line puts the phone down; the time is only 11:30 p.m, he knows that it is not making sense for Bruce Wayne to have been already killed before 12. A S.W.A.T. officer calls Gordon to the window, Gordon looks out to see two clowns driving a car straight towards the house with guns blazing. Gordon dives for cover. The story cuts back to Wayne Manor as the officers are struggling to subdue Bruce. We find that Bruce has injected himself with the Joker poison, and Bruce starts to have delusions of his parent’s death. Bruce is trying to gain some control of his body as Alfred injects him with a needle containing the antidote. Alfred smacks Bruce awake and Bruce now finds that he an Alfred are in the back of an ambulance. Bruce’s plan has worked. Alfred tells Bruce that the ambulance is under attack. Bruce changes into his Batman suit and tells Alfred that he knows what the Joker has planed. He feels that the Joker poison has placed him in the Joker’s own mind set and knows that the two attempted murders were all a diversion. Batman leaps form out of the ambulance and engages the clown gang that has been firing on the ambulance and the police escort. Batman makes short work of the clowns, and Alfred tells Batman that the injured officer will be okay. Batman hopes on a police motorcycle.  Batman picks up the motorcycles police radio and calls Gordon. Gordon asks Batman where has he been all night. He tells him that he was under heavy fire and that Bruce Wayne is dead. Batman assures Gordon that Wayne is still alive and that his ambulance was attacked on its why to the hospital. As Gordon is about to ask Batman how he knows this, Batman cuts Gordon off telling him to call the Gotham City reservoir and have them cut the water off from the city. Gordon asks why and Batman tells Gordon that the Joker is planning on killing the whole city by pumping poison into the cities water system. Gordon asks Batman how he knows and Batman replies that the Joker was looking at maps of the old reservoir bypass system, and that he did not put it together until now. Gordon says alright and calls the reservoir, telling Batman that there is no answer. Batman knows that he is forced to do things the hard way. 
 

Pgs. 58-62 
 

      Batman arrives at the reservoir five minutes later before Gordon and his men have arrived. Joker’s goons are in the process of poison the reservoir and Batman take them out one by one. Batman sneaks up behind the Joker who is standing over the level that will release the poison into the city. Batman tells Joker to give it up it’s over. Joker tells Batman to stay where he is, not to come any closer or Gotham City dies.  Batman tells the Joker that he cant let him do that. The Joker begins to pull the lever, asking Batman how he plans to stop him. Holding some type of remote device Batman replies like this, pressing a button on the device an explosion near the reservoir goes off. The Joker turns to Batman asking him what he just did, Batman replies that he has destroyed the viaduct. Batman rigged C4 before arriving to the reservoir. The Joker is furious, telling Batman that he has just cut the water off from the city for weeks; Batman replies better weeks then dead. The Joker rants about how all his planning has gone to waste and catches Batman off guard with his speed, hitting Batman to the floor with a hammer. As Batman is catching his breath the Joker lunges at him. In that second Batman knows that he could simply through the Joker in to the poisoned what, killing him. Yet Batman can not he catches the Jokers hand, throwing him to the floor beating him unconscious until the police arrive. 
 

Pgs. 63-64 
 

      The story ends with the Joker locked up in Arkham Asylum. His finger prints do not show up in any database so Gordon knows that the Jokers true identity may never be known. Gordon tells how the city calmed back down from the hysteria caused by the Joker, and how Bruce Wayne showed how happy he was still alive donating some of his money to rebuilt the viaduct.

      Standing together a top GCPD central, Gordon asks Batman how he feels. Batman replies that he’s been better. Batman feels responsible for creating the Joker by allowing the Red Hood to fall into the vat of chemicals those few months passed. Gordon tells Batman not to blame himself for all the dead people. He did not place the hood on his head or the gun in his hand. Batman saved an entire city and deserves a pat on the back. Batman just replies that he will take it into consideration. The final panel is Gordon revealing the Bat Signal to Batman, telling him that it was the mayor’s idea. Batman can not help but smile. Gordon knows that they have both one a small victory.