What Is The Joker’s Real Name?

Some answers are hard to find. Other answers, perhaps, shouldn’t be found at all. During the?Darkseid?War?story arc,?Batman?sits down in the Mobius Chair under the protective watch of Hal Jordan, the?Green Lantern. This chair is a vehicle of sorts that has access to all of the knowledge in the Multiverse. Batman is the greatest detective in the Justice League, so he has more than his fair share of practice asking questions. Not just good questions, but the?right?questions. He needed to know that the Mobius Chair could?reliably?answer one burning question in his mind, so he conducted a quick test.

First, he asked the Mobius Chair who killed his parents. The Mobius Chair correctly answered “Joe Chill.” Satisfied with its ability to discern such a minuscule secret within a multiverse of information,?Batman?asks perhaps the biggest mystery in all of DC Comics.

Strap in, as this blog will serve as your own personal Mobius Chair, while we ask the same question that?Batman?asked many years ago:?What is?The Joker‘s true name?

The answer might be more complicated than it seems. After all, the Mobius Chair did insist that there were?three?Jokers.

Jack Napier

In the prime universe?DC Comics, no official name has ever been given for?The Joker. However, DC did debut an alternate universe series called?Batman: Curse of the White Knight. It was one of the first graphic novels published under their Black Label imprint, which tells stories that are stand-alone and made for mature audiences. That’s why?Batman: Curse of the White Knight?opens with such a dark moment for?Batman.

The Joker was meandering through the city, and Batman chased him with a vengeance. When he found Joker, he cornered him into an alley and beat him to a pulp.?Batgirl?and?Nightwing?tried to stop him, or at least calm him down. He was ruthless. He was frightening. And he was moments from crossing the line and killing The Joker.

Surprisingly, The Joker didn’t fight back. He simply insisted that Batman was the true villain of Gotham. The Joker would be the?real?hero of Gotham if he only took his medication! When?Joker?held up a bottle of medicine, Batman didn’t hesitate to force feed him the pills and whisk him away to Arkham Asylum.

With the whole interaction secretly caught on camera and leaked to the media, the GCPD decided that?Batman?was officially too dangerous to be free, and he was arrested. The Joker, suddenly medicated and sane, was able to convince the GCPD that he was wrongfully imprisoned as he was beaten by a vigilante. He also revealed his real name: Jack Napier.

Napier spent all of his efforts revealing how Batman’s false heroics actually only lead to greater corruption in Gotham City. He worked diligently to save Gotham from its turmoil until the effects of the pills finally wore off, and he became?The Joker?once again.

Arthur Fleck

In Todd Phillips’ 2019 film?Joker, we get to see the award-winning performance of Joaquin Phoenix as Arthur Fleck. Audiences saw the troubled comedian wannabe unravel as he simply tried to hold on to reality. Along the way, we learned that his mother, Penny Fleck, believed that she had a love affair with her old employer, Thomas Wayne. She believed that Thomas Wayne was Arthur’s father.

Was her fantasy true? It’s uncertain. What?is?certain is that after her grand claims, she was taken to a mental institution. Arthur Fleck also suffered for years in an institution just like it. When his therapy sessions ended, it seemed he was more and more unstable. He tried to break into Wayne Manor, and even met a young Bruce Wayne. All throughout the film, it seemed that he was on the verge of snapping.

Instead of reverse-discovering Joker’s identity, we watched Arthur Fleck discover and form his new identity as?The Joker. Perhaps Arthur Fleck?is?his real name. Or perhaps The Joker is just one of the many people who were inspired by Arthur. After all, at the end of the film, it seems everyone is smiling along with him!

Jerome and Jeremiah Valeska

The TV series?Gotham?explored the origins of Bruce Wayne and all of his Rogues Gallery. The show was keen on revealing the shift of power. Eventually, the Falcone and Maroni mob families gave way to villains like?The Riddler,?The Penguin,?Poison Ivy,?Catwoman, and others. And yet, the most interesting characters of all appeared to play different interpretations of the fan-favorite villain,?The Joker.

Jerome and Jeremiah Valeska were twins who grew up in a circus, not unlike Dick Grayson. But where Jeremiah wanted to pursue science, it seemed that Jerome was more interested in pursuing violence. Jerome was perfectly chaotic and terrible, and even went out of his way to bond with Bruce Wayne. After all, who wouldn’t want to meet the richest boy in town?

Jerome brought havoc upon Gotham for quite some time before poisoning Jeremiah with his own special toxin that turned him completely insane. Then, even more intelligent and even more dangerous, Jeremiah found a way to tear Gotham apart from the inside out.

The twins were both played by the same actor, Cameron Monaghan. Fans loved seeing so many different versions of?The Joker?on one show, as each interpretation offered something novel. Both Jerome and Jeremiah were their own special brand of terrifying.

No One Can Ever Know

The followup to the?Darkseid War?story arc was the series?Batman: Three Jokers. It implied that there was always more than one Clown Prince of Crime. It seemed that one of The Jokers actually created the other two! Unfortunately, it never revealed which was which.

What it?did?reveal is that Batman has actually always known the real name of The Joker. He learned it after a week. He learned it when he found out that?The Joker?had a family and so, in order to keep his family safe, he helped them fake their deaths. And to make sure that they could live their life in peace, he keeps The Joker’s name a secret.

He wouldn’t even tell Alfred. It seems that?that?is a secret that Batman will take to the grave.

With the?recent introduction?of The Joker (Barry Keoghan) in Matt Reeves’?The Batman, it would seem that the Caped Crusader and the Clown Prince of Crime will continue to dance around each other under the pale moonlight.

What do you think?The Joker‘s real name is? Have you heard any other theories? Do you believe his backstory or do you prefer an origin that’s multiple choice? Let us know in the comments, and don’t forget to Let Your Geek Sideshow!