Cover -- THE JOKER -- Title -- Copyright -- CONTENTS -- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS -- FOREWORD -- INTRODUCTION -- I. THE CHANGEABLE TRICKSTER -- SHIFTING MAKEUPS: The Joker as Performance Style from Romero to Ledger -- DOES THE JOKER HAVE SIX-INCH TEETH? -- LADY HAHA: Performativity, Super-sanity, and the Mutability of Identity -- EPISODES OF MADNESS: Representations of the Joker in Television and Animation -- II. THE JOKER AND THE POLITICAL -- THE OBAMA-JOKER: Assembling a Populist Monster -- KISS WITH A FIST: The Gendered Power Struggle of the Joker and Harley Quinn -- MORE THAN THE HOOD WAS RED: The Joker as Marxist -- III. THE DIGITAL JOKER -- NEVER GIVE 'EM WHAT THEY EXPECT: The Joker Ethos as the Zeitgeist of Contemporary Digital Subcultural Transgression -- PLAYING (WITH) THE VILLAIN: Critical Play and the Joker-as-Guide in Batman: Arkham Asylum -- "WHY SO SERIOUS?": Warner Bros.' Use of the Joker in Marketing The Dark Knight -- IV. JOKER THEORY -- RICTUS GRINS AND GLASGOW SMILES: The Joker as Satirical Discourse -- THE JOKER, CLOWN PRINCE OF NOBILITY: The "Master" Criminal, Nietzsche, and the Rise of the Superman -- THE JOKER PLAYS THE KING: Archetypes of the Underworld in Grant Morrison and Dave McKean's Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth -- MAKING SENSE SQUARED: Iteration and Synthesis in Grant Morrison's Joker -- "YOU COMPLETE ME": The Joker as Symptom -- AFTERWORD -- CONTRIBUTORS -- INDEX.