I can sympathize with your disenchantment. I too was okey with Ledger at first, but in the 4 months that followed, I reread every comic had with the Joker in it & boughts some more, & the more I read, the less impressed I was with the movie.
I hated Nicholson's Joker, & I hate Ledger's Joker. Since I have to put up with Ledger's angsty fans, I probably hate his Joker more than I should, but things as simple as not trying to sounding like Mark Hamill, lip-smacking constantly, & looking like Beetlejuice outshadow his performance. I know, I should be blaming the director, the makeup artists, & the costume designer & yes, I'm shallow like that. I demand continuity & character perfection, but instead I have to deal with cosplaying Marty-Stews in acted-out fanfics. & while that other guy made an awesome Two-Face, Nolan fucking-up the origin story & adding Racheal into the mix wasn't exactly forgivable either. In the end, I was more impressed with "Batman Confidential: Lovers & Madmen" which came out afterwards, & it had no actors at all.
My opinion on Nicholson's Joker also came after the big reread. While he looked like the Joker very much, he was totaly out-of-character, unless you look back to the Silver Age. The things I remember the most were that he thought of Batman as little more than an annoying fly in his ointment & he was interested in a woman. In the comics, he commits mayhem as a means to invite Batman to a brawl after f**king with his head & raising his blood-pressure though the roof, & he's just not flirtatious, I've seen him sucker-punch several women after telling them they're pretty, like saying a painting is lovely & then spray painting over it. He also seemed too reliant on his henchmen, like he actualy expected them to accomplish something. In the comics, the henchmen are like little exposable playing pieces or resurved jokes to be tolds at a latter time.
The only Joker I really like is Mark Hamill. Grew up with him for 10 years & now he's back, even if his voice has aged & even if it's only for a little while.
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