The joke's on us

Since I mentioned The Killing Joke in my previous post, it only seems right that I discuss my favorite Gotham villain as well. Joker will forever be the bane of Batman's existence. They are polar opposites and yet continue to be foils for each other in the strangest of ways.

 Batman claims to have one rule, to never kill, yet because of Joker we see that he holds to a set of standards much more rigid than any normal person adheres to. Here is this man, without a name, without a face, without any sort of identity other than that of a clown. He is the definition of madness and chaos and he makes Bruce Wayne's life hell at every turn. 

He killed one partner, paralyzed another and come dangerously close to bringing down Gotham time and time again for no other reason than because he wanted to and had the means to do so. In past continuities Batman actually has broken his one rule to eliminate Joker for good. In my opinion Joker is the only villain who could pull the bat so far down that he would do this.

Who runs the Justice League? Oracle - Lian Harper

Barbara Gordon, in my opinion was one of the strongest characters in the DC universe. She started out as Batgirl but had to quit after she was shot in the spine by Joker and paralyzed from the waist down. She quickly overcame this and took on the name Oracle, working behind the scenes. She worked mainly from her computer but was an invaluable source of information to not only Batman but the Justice League and the Birds of Prey, a group of female heroes which she helped lead. Not only did her mental strength come in handy but she proved her physical strength many times over. She was able to take out League of Assassin members single handedly and stop criminals breaking into her home

She held this role for nearly 20 years until the reboot stripped her from all the strength she had acquired since The Killing Joke. She has now regained the use of her legs almost miraculously, was never a mentor to the two Batgirl's since her, and never led strong teams. She is a child again. This is why I refuse to give my money to support DC's decision to remove not only the strongest female in their line-up but one of the only handicapped characters.

OH HEY LOOK AT MY PRETTY LEG I CAN USE IT AGAIN! YOU SEE IT? RIGHT THERE! MY LEG! (this is pretty much the first three issues of the new Batgirl series in a nutshell just to save you some time and money)

--I would however like to point out that I did love Barbara Gordon as the original Batgirl. She was great in the role but now it's just different. She is not the same Batgirl she once was and I feel the reboot was detrimental to her.

When the dead walk

Now I'm going to change paces a little bit to discuss my current obsession, zombies. I spent the better half of last week reading the entirety of The Walking Dead series and then watching all the episodes of the show based off of it. After spending so much time focused on heroics and villains it's nice to take a step back and enjoy something completely different. The Walking Dead makes great use of realism and horror to pull you in and hooks you on the last page of every issue so it's hard to put the series down. The television show also does a fantastic job of this. Everyone can relate to at least one of the survivors which makes the series so enticing. For me the characters take on a life of their own and it's especially hard when they are trapped in a post apocalyptic world where they could die at any second. If you've ever wanted to get into comic books but find that superheroes aren't so much your thing then I would more than recommend you give The Walking Dead a try. The books are released once a month and the television show airs every Sunday on AMC. If you are just tuning in the entire first season is on Netflix instant and the second season will come back from mid-season break in February (I CAN'T WAIT THIS LONG)