It takes a lot for a graphic novel to still have staying power after nearly thirty years. There are so many different comic books and comics-related media out there that it can be quite challenging to tell a story that stands out from the rest, but British writer Alan Moore’s seminal and controversial graphic novel, Batman: The Killing Joke has done just that since its original publication in 1988.
In the years since, many different portrayals of the Joker, both live-action and animated, have come and gone but almost all of them have elements rooted in The Killing Joke. With the book itself having finally gotten its own animated adaptation this year, was it able to live up to the literary uniqueness of its original much-buzzed-about source material?