How the Joker style changed
There are many versions of the birth of the villain, but the original canon comic Batman: The Killing Joke says that even the Joker himself does not really remember the details of his past. It is known that once he went for a robbery of card factory, met Batman there and trying to run away fell into a tub of chemicals. After that, his skin became white, his hair became green forever and an unnatural frightening smile froze on his face. Joker himself went crazy, gave a birth to recognizable extravagant character. He put on a purple suit with a slightly elongated jacket, a green shirt to match the color of his hair, and complemented fashion with an orange vest.
In the Joker dress purple violently clash with green. In fact, it is a confrontation between the regularity of dark tones and the chaos of bright, incompatible colors. In addition, since purple is the darkest secondary color, it makes it especially popular for Marvel and DC comic villains.
Purple, green, orange — this basic combination emphasize Joker over gray, gloomy Gotham and set him against Batman, who is always in black. This contrast break the traditional idea that light is good and darkness is bad.
The TV series «Batman». Cesar Romero played the first screen Joker, which turned out not to be especially evil, but rather cheerful and sometimes silly. In part this happen because of too bright colors and a make-up made on top of a mustache that Cesar refused to shave. At all in those days, the acting was closer to the theatrical, as well as the costumes of the heroes. As a result, the color of the Joker outfit changed from purple to pink, and the same Batman appeared in fashionable satin shorts over tights.
The Movie «Batman» (1989). Jack Nicholson in the role of the Joker, together with restyling character design in the comics, also allowed himself some stylistic elements, like a silk bow around his neck, hat or cane.
The film «The Dark Knight» (2008). Perhaps the most horrible Joker. From the original villain, he also got the main colors: green hair, the same green vest, makeup and a purple coat. All colors look dirty, faded, and quite realistic. Heath Ledger practically nothing left. From the former character theatricality. It is known that the filmmaker of «The Dark Knight” — Christopher Nolan, was inspired by the paintings of expressionist Francis Bacon and the masochist Alex from «A Clockwork Orange» by Stanley Kubrick. Hereof the shabby make-up as if the Joker had not washed it off for the second week, and dirty hair dyed in green.
The film «Suicide Squad» (2016). This film returned to the Joker the classic juicy green hair. Jared Leto Joker is still dressed in original colors, but metallic shades is complete his suit with and a frozen smile disappeared from his face. Jared Leto doesn’t have much screen time in the film, so about five costumes were made in a classic «joker» gamut, but completely in different style: there is a purple coat in crocodile leather, sweatpants, a silver jacket and a large number of hip-hop jewelry. Together with tattoos and make-up, all this looks scary.
The Joker Movie (2019). The joker played by Joaquin Phoenix turned out to be perhaps the most realistic and unusual.The filmmakers made the maximum effort to make their villain differs from the comic Joker. To begin with, the Joker himself in the film is not canonical. Director Todd Phillips showed his own, free interpretation of the story, which has little cross with the comic`s original. This is an attempt to show how society can turn a person with mental disorders into a real maniac.
The main character of the film Arthur Fleck, barely make ends meet working as a clown. He wears faded, unremarkable clothes in everyday life, but as his despair progresses, more extravagant shades appears in Arthur’s wardrobe. He puts on a burgundy suit at his first performance in the stand-up club, but closer to the finale he dyes his hair in green, made the well-known makeup, and puts on a red suit, a green shirt and an orange vest. His main aim is to become memorable, and he reached it absolutely. So, red jacket (in this case tomato red) is quite in harmony with: yellow, green, brown and blue which we have identified with the application Live Palettes.
Starting from 1940, when the Joker made his debut in the new Batman comic strip, and until 2019, when the film about the origin of the villain with Joaquin Phoenix in the main role released, the appearance and even the story of the main “joker” changed several times. All this time, main colors remained basic, making his image truly recognizable. All this time, only basic colors remained, making his character truly recognizable.