The highly anticipated sequal Joker: Folie à Deux, could have been a triumph, but instead it collapses under the weight of abysmal storytelling and identity crisis. The film constantly flip-flops between tired gimmicks, half-hearted Batman references, and utterly pointless musical numbers that only serve to pad out the runtime to an agonising 2 hours and 18 minutes.
Now, before we dive into the details, a fair spoiler warning: if you’re still holding onto hope for this film and don’t want the ending spoiled, you might want to stop reading. But with nearly half of my screening’s audience walking out midway, I doubt most people were clamouring to see the conclusion anyway. For those curious about what they missed: not much. Despite some truly stunning visuals, including some brilliant colour grading and cinematography that beautifully conveys the fractured personalities of Arthur Fleck and Joker, those brief flashes of brilliance are fleeting and wasted in a sea of mediocrity.
Joaquin Phoenix is, as expected, excellent. His portrayal of the Joker remains deeply unsettling, with every twitch and mannerism revealing a mastery of the character that few actors could achieve. I didn’t see Phoenix acting; I saw the Joker himself. Lady Gaga is also impressive as Harley Quinn, delivering a subtle performance that doesn’t need the glitter Margot Robbie’s portrayal did. However, the question I keep asking myself is: why on earth does she have to sing? Sure, Gaga’s voice is incredible, but can we please give her roles where she doesn’t need to belt out a tune every five minutes?
The film kicks off with a completely irrelevant cartoon of the Joker fighting his own shadow. This leads into the main plot where Joker’s legal team are trying to push a plea of insanity. But the biggest problem? This film has zero momentum. Every time the tension starts to build, it’s obliterated by boring exposition-heavy dialogue or broken by a random musical number. Seriously, all the musical numbers begin with someone whispering the opening lines in an eerie voice before launching into song. It’s repetitive, dull, and honestly feels like watching a bad jukebox musical that somehow wandered into a DC movie. The songs do nothing to advance the plot, advance the character, and they’re not good enough to be entertaining!
Beneath the layers of filler, there’s the skeleton of an interesting story. Arthur Fleck and Harley Quinn’s romance could have been a fascinating exploration of love between two highly unstable individuals, and their escape from Arkham Asylum has real potential. There’s even a decent courtroom subplot that digs into the Joker’s mental illness while introducing Harvey Dent, aka Two-Face. By the end, Dent gets half his face burned off in a predictably explosive scene that hints at his transformation. But here’s the kicker: none of these plot lines are fully explored. The romance between Fleck and Quinn barely gets off the ground because they’re too busy singing at each other, and then it abruptly ends with Harley calling it quits — that’s it! Is this some kind of joke? Gaga’s Harley Quinn often feels like a glorified cameo, rolled in and out whenever the writer remembered she exists.
As for Harvey Dent, his introduction feels like a tease for a third Joker film. But after this train wreck, I can’t imagine anyone would want to see that green-lit. And do we really need more backstory on Joker’s mental health? For the entirety of the court hearing Todd Phillips retreads old ground from the first film without offering anything new or substantial. It is a complete waste of time, and makes the already slow moving story ground to a halt as the audience are treated like idiots — like we can’t remember who the Joker is!
And then there’s the ending. Oh boy, the ending. Killing off the Joker is the laziest, most uninspired way to close this film. Is this supposed to shock us? Or did Phillips just run out of ideas? If the film was gripping, this would feel like a bold and devastating choice. But after two hours of dull exposition and half-baked story lines scattered between dreary musical numbers, I was just left wondering, “why should I care?”
It’s a crying shame that such a talented cast and a brilliant cinematography team were dragged through this mess. The storytelling lacked any real development, and it’s clear that nobody had the guts to tell the writer/director that the audience isn’t stupid. We don’t need everything spelled out again. Fans of the first film came in expecting a worthy sequel, not a chaotic musical masquerading as a psychological thriller. The artistic integrity that made Joker such as stand out film is entirely missing in this middled attempt to cash in on the IP.
The real tragedy? People are going to blame this wet mess of a film on Phoenix and Gaga, when in reality, it was them who deserved a better story to tell.
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