# How would you solve the Joker problem? (Gotham) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 23, 2006, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-solve-the-joker-problem-gotham/361810 "2006-06-23T01:41:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Roland\_Orzabal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c2a13f/32.png) [@Roland\_Orzabal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roland_Orzabal)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2006, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-solve-the-joker-problem-gotham/361810/61 "2006-06-24T17:03:41Z")
[QUOTE=Happy Clam] If anybody else is as lost as I just was… [/QUOTE] Sorry about that. The bit I’m referencing goes as follows. Barbara: Y’know, I found that Catwoman scrapbook you said was missing. It was behind the wardrobe. Some day you ought to let me work out a proper filing system, like we used at the library. Gordon: Hmm. Barbara: Urrggh, look, you used too much paste! It’s all squidging under the edges of the clipping! You’re going to get it on your pants… Gordon: Barbara, you’re fussier than your mother was. ---
**Author:** ![bubastis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/d07c76/32.png) [@bubastis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bubastis)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2006, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-solve-the-joker-problem-gotham/361810/62 "2006-06-24T19:21:10Z")
Quite like th’ Joker myself. Frankly, though, I would have killed him long ago. He has no super-power… very killable. If not by Bats, then any street level thug. Check out my Joker gallery [here.](http://--The-Joker--.bebo.com) ---
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2006, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-solve-the-joker-problem-gotham/361810/63 "2006-06-24T23:01:38Z")
[QUOTE=Happy Clam] -Exile him to the future. DC has time travel: maybe in 30 000 years time they’ll be able to cure him, or at least afford a lock. [/QUOTE] **Judge Dredd** shares some continuity with **Batman** , so just ping him forward a couple of hundred years to Mega-City One. There’s a _reason_ they don’t have costumed super-villains there, what with routinely tranquilising large sections of the population, compulsory lobotomies for repeat offenders and a quasi-fascist police force with large guns, the power of life and death, and a bad attitude: “Hee-hee-ho-ho-ho-hoo-hoo-ha-ha!” \ “Dredd to Control. Just wasted some green-haired creep dressed like a clown for violating noise ordinances. Better send some clean-up.” ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2006, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-solve-the-joker-problem-gotham/361810/64 "2006-06-25T00:57:29Z")
[QUOTE=Happy Clam] As if the universe had decided that if there is a Batman, there must be a Joker to combat him. [/QUOTE] By that logic, if we could destroy Batman…he could be replaced by a new, stronger, more skilled Batman! One that would be so powerful, existing adversaries would never stand a chance—We’d be safe forever! Gentlemen, our course of action is clear…we most NOT allow…an archetype gap! 😃 [QUOTE=ululate] IIRC, you’re misremembering; it’s that, as with every such trial of the Joker, there’s a question of fact as to whether he’s legally sane – and this particular jury found that he was. (The verdict was quite a surprise, as most folks expected him to as usual be sentenced to medical treatment in an asylum.) [/QUOTE] Obviously, after so many rampages, the Joker is completely unable to get an unbiased jury and thus fair trial in Gotham. I suggest a change of venue. To Texas. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2006, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-solve-the-joker-problem-gotham/361810/65 "2006-06-25T13:50:35Z")
[QUOTE=Chronos] Sheesh, what message board is this? Nobody’s noticed that the OP proposed passing a Bill of Attainder, which is explicitly prohibited by the Constitution. [/QUOTE] Not to mention that even in the DCU it’s unlikely that individual cities would have the power to create capital crimes. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2006, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-solve-the-joker-problem-gotham/361810/66 "2006-06-25T15:26:53Z")
[QUOTE=Otto] Not to mention that even in the DCU it’s unlikely that individual cities would have the power to create capital crimes. [/QUOTE] What is Gotham’s legal status? There was that whole arc where after the earthquake the government cordoned off Gotham and simply washed it’s hands of the whole mess, leaving Gotham a lawless territory. (I can’t even imagine the lawsuits if that ever [e.g. New Orleans] happened in real life.) I kinow they don’t want to explicitly say that Gotham is in such and such a state, but I don’t recall any story ever mentioning state-level government- the governor, the state attorney general, etc. It’s almost as if Gotham is a federal district like D.C.; in a couple of Elseworlds, it was explicitly made an independent city-state. ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2006, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-solve-the-joker-problem-gotham/361810/67 "2006-06-25T15:44:44Z")
[QUOTE=Lumpy] I kinow they don’t want to explicitly say that Gotham is in such and such a state [/QUOTE] They already have. It’s in southern New Jersey. Cite: Legion of Superheroes, Giffen series, #11. Archaeologists dig up the Batcave in ‘the Jersey sector of Metropolis’ (which, by this time, had engulfed much of the East coast of the US, and probably part of Eastern Canada.). More recent supporting evidence (and also specifically locating it in the Southern half of the state) - Birds of Prey, #16, Joker states that Arkham Asylum is 200 miles away from Times Square (ie, Gotham is 200 miles from New York). Since he’s saying he’s out of range of the bomb that was going to go off in NYC, he’s obviously talking as the crow flies. Since Gotham is a coastal city, this restricts where it can be - and it can only be in Southern Jersey, or the middle of the Rhode Island coast. (Also, the Mayfair Games Atlas of the DCU, which isn’t official canon, but agrees with it on most counts, out and out says it’s in New Jersey.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-you-solve-the-joker-problem-gotham/361810.md?page=3)