Batman #0

@PsychoKnights: I knew all you said about Red Hood. Didn't pick up on the fact that it could be or is Joker but makes sense. I however was stating how it could be confusing if they had more from the Red Hood gang in the future (present). I agree with the origin of the Joker being open as well. That any or none of them could be true and no one but he would know.

Good review.

I'm guessing based on your review that you did not pick up on the implication that the Red Hood gang was led by Joker. Sorry if you know this already, but it did not sound as if you were aware, and I thought you would be interested.

There have been several bad guys who have used the moniker Red Hood over the years, but the most famous was Joker which I believe was first told in "The Killing Joke," the plot line where Barbara Gordon was famously shot. In the Killing Joke, Joker's origin story is told, and he it turns out that he was a struggling stand-up comedian with a wife and child. He agreed to help some gangsters rip off his old employer at a Chemical warehouse. The gang dressed up in masks and they gave the Joker, whose former name is unknown, a Red Hood so that he would be labeled as the mastermind if they were caught. Before they could start the job, Joker got word that his wife had died in a house fire. He did not want to go through with it, but the other gangsters pressured him, and he relented.

The job went poorly. The police and Batman showed up almost immediately after the break-in. The police shot the gangsters and Batman inadvertently knocked Red Hood into a vat of chemicals. The Red Hood was washed out of the chemical system in some sort of water drainage system, and when he pulled off the Hood, he found that his face was bleached white, his hair had turned green, and his lips were ruby red. He started laughing, and he has been laughing ever since.

Of course, there have been many different tales of Joker's origin, and thus far, none have been made "official," but this is the most well-known. Personally, I picture all these stories circulating in the underworld of Gotham with nobody, even Batman, knowing which is Joker's real origin.

When Jason showed up, he used the guise of the Red Hood as a way of adopting the appearance and in many ways the methodology of his killer, Joker. In my opinion, it is Jason's way to show that he is neither hero nor villain. He is mixture of them both.