WARNING: The following contains spoilers for The Joker #2 by James Tynion IV, Guillem March, Arif Prianto & Tom Napolitano, on sale now.
Former Gotham City police commissioner Jim Gordon has a lot of reasons to want Joker dead, but throughout his life, he has held back, kept his morals and has always done the right thing when confronting the Clown Prince of Crime. That might be changing, and Gordon just has to betray Batman to kill the Joker.
Gordon is retired from the Gotham City Police Department, and he seems ready to put that life behind him. When Joker possibly set off a dirty bomb attack in Arkham Asylum and killed hundreds of facility members and criminal patients, Jim rejected the opportunity to become the city's Joker czar, coordinating with the police. Instead, Gordon worked with Batman and tried to help, using his brains and instincts under the radar to help find and stop Joker. However, that is when Gordon got a deal that he might not be able to pass up.
A woman named Cressida offered Gordon information about Joker. She told Gordon that the people she represents have tired of Joker raining terror down on Gotham City, and they want him taken off the board. She mentioned Joker hurt no one more than Jim Gordon, and she wants him to hunt down Joker and kill the villain. She even offered to pay him $25 million to retire in peace and security. Gordon went to Batman and got him to agree to help him figure out who is hiring him and be there on call if Gordon needed to talk. Batman trusted Gordon and gave him everything he needed, including access to the Batcomputer. However, Jim didn't tell Batman he was asked to kill Joker.
Gordon told his daughter about the deal, though, and while he said he wasn't considering it, he seemed like he was very much thinking about it. Barbara mentioned that her fixed spine was not going to last forever, and she was starting to work as Oracle again rather than Batgirl. All the pain Joker brought to Jim's family rushed back again. However, Gordon isn't the only person gunning for Joker, as other crime families have put out a hit on him. What is worse is that Cressida is part of the Court of Owls, and if Gordon kills Joker, he will be doing so on behalf of Batman's greatest enemies.
Joker, for years, tried to break Jim Gordon. In The Killing Joke, he shot Barbara, paralyzing her. Jim still wouldn't kill Joker when he had the chance. Joker killed Gordon's wife Sarah during the "No Man's Land" storyline. Gordon responded by catching Joker and shooting him in the leg, rather than killing him. While that was pre-Flashpoint, it was still a moment where Gordon wouldn't take that drastic leap of finishing off Joker once and for all.
However, it was Jim's son James that might have finally pushed Gordon over the edge. With some prodding from the Joker, James developed a split personality, with one side a murderer and the other a man trying to find and stop that murderer. When he finally learned he was the killer, he took his own life. Gordon lashed out and blamed Barbara, knowing she was Batgirl, but he said he really blamed himself for failing his son.
As Gordon states here, he's haunted by all of these memories, But now, Gordon finally has a chance to put the villain who haunts him down for good, and he only has to completely destroy the trust of Batman to do it.
0 Comments