Ben Wan
- Jun 13, 2022
- 3 min read

The Unmade RETURN of Jack Nicholson's Joker

Updated: Jun 14, 2022

Did you know Jack Nicholson's Joker could have returned for Batman Returns? On the 30th anniversary of the Batman sequel, we cover the MULTIPLE attempts to bring Jack Nicholson’s Joker back from the dead, from Sam Hamm’s pitch for the opening of Batman 2 to hallucinations in Batman Forever & the unmade Batman Unchained to a project...by Charlie Kaufman and Spike Jonze?

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Chapters

0:00 Introduction

Thumbnail by Arron Quinn! Check out Arron's IG here: https://www.instagram.com/arronquinnproductions/?hl=en

2:07 The Decision to Kill Joker in Batman 1989

The article revealing that Ray Liotta and Willem Dafoe were Sam Hamm's choices for Joker comes from here: http://www.1989batman.com/2013/12/vintage-magazine-article-comics-scene.html

You can read Sam Hamm's original Batman draft here, in which Joker was the same age as Batman, did not kill Bruce's parents, and died from his fall from the cathedral, while seeing the helicopter explode from Batman's bomb.

We covered the Batman newspaper strip here:

You can read it here: https://batman-daily.tumblr.com/

David Goyer's full quote about how killing off the Joker was a mistake comes from an interview with Premiere magazine:

"The next one would have Batman enlisting the aid of Gordon and Dent in bringing down The Joker...but not killing him, which is a mistake they made in the first one," Batwriter David Goyer tells the latest issue of U.S. movie magazine PREMIERE. "In the third, the Joker would go on trial, scarring Dent in the process."

14:02 Sam Hamm's Pitch to Resurrect the Joker for Batman 2

Sam Hamm's recent interview, revealing his pitch to bring him back in the opening of Batman 2:

https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/batman-89-writer-reveals-original-two-face-sequel-plan/

Logan Wood provided the fan art of the Joker's trial from the Sam Hamm pitch:

Check out his Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/shanehelms121/

19:41 Sam Hamm's Batman 2: Why Jack Napier Killed The Waynes

We covered the unmade Sam Hamm Batman 2 script here:

You can read it for yourself here: https://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/batman-returns_unproduced.html

25:56 The Joker's Cut References & Cameo in Batman Forever

We covered the Batman Forever script here:

You can read the draft with Joker references here: http://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/batman_forever.html

And we covered the Batman Forever novelization here:

34:07 The Joker in Arkham?: Joker's Cut Reference in Batman & Robin

We covered the Batman & Robin script originally here:

Before we covered an even earlier draft, which also mentioned Joker here:

You can read the later draft here, which has the reference: https://sfy.ru/?script=batman_and_robin

35:03 Break

Check out our link for Barkbox here.

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41:21 Joker Returns in the Video Game- Batman: Return of the Joker

We covered the retro video games here:

42:42 Joker Through the Fear Gas- Mark Protosevich's Batman Unchained

We covered the plans for Batman Unchained here:

You can check out the Batman Enigma fan comic here:

https://twitter.com/EnigmaBatman

43:51 The History of Joker's Resurrections in the Comics

We covered the different Joker resurrections in the Golden Age (as well as the possibility of the Joker being supernatural) here:

57:05 Joker Resurrected?- Ian Mansfield's Batman: The Joker's Revenge

Cal Slayton's fan art of Jack Nicholson's Joker and Michael Keaton's Batman in Batman 251- The Joker's Five Way Revenge comes from here:

https://batmannotes.com/post/173231352283/batman-1989251-cover-mashup-by-cal-slayton

Details about Ian Mansfield's Batman: The Joker's Revenge came from translations here:

http://www.batcave.com.pl/old/index2.php?id=zawieszone_batmanrotj

The details about Ian's Batman collection (and Clayface being part of the script) come from here:

http://www.toymania.com/news/messages/6622.shtml

1:04:20 Jack Nicholson's Desire to Return

The quote from Jack Nicholson comes from this tweet:

https://twitter.com/BatmanAnthology/status/1528839105827991553

Original tweet from Bats from the Belfry (@Stitche09370990) who found this article.

1:06:20 Cloning the Joker- Batman Vs Superman

We covered the unmade Batman vs Superman script here:

You can read the draft for yourself here:

1:07:23 Old Man Joker?- The Joker in Evening

The details on Kaufman's pitch for The Joker in Evening came from this podcast cliip:

1:09:43 The Joker Returned?- Crisis on Infinite Earths

We found the images of the Organ Grinder deleted scene from here:

https://batman.fandom.com/wiki/Organ_Grinder

1:20:36 Fan Comments

1:32:54 Closing: Fan Shout outs and Social Media Promotion

Big thanks to our research assistant Dan Yamat for providing the visuals for this YouTube experience, as well as the usual QC and chapter time codes.

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