Whether or not Gotham will ever get the Joker on the show, they have Jerome, and that’s more than enough for most fans, as actor Cameron Monaghan absolutely owns the role. In his prototypical Joker, the actor plays Jerome almost as a “greatest hits” of all the Jokers that have come before him – it’s an interesting bit of revese engineering; you can see how every Joker story could come out of this particular character.
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And so, Jerome came back officially on tonight’s episode – and while Jerome is more than enough Joker for this Gotham City to deal with, there were some fun teases to the Joker proper in the episode.
A guy walks into a bar with no face…
Jerome’s face was removed and worn by Dwight like a mask in the episode, only to eventually put it back on – with a freaking staple gun. Yes, it was as hardcore and gruesome as it sounds, and it’s also inspired directly by recent stories from DC Comics. In Detective Comics #1 from the New 52 reboot, Joker cut off his own face. In the pages of Batman by Greg Capullo and Scott Snyder, which has been borrowed from heavily for this show, Joker would wear his own face like a mask, holding it to his face even more gruesomely – with brackets and belt straps.
A familiar smile, a funny looking J
This smile made out of HAHAHAs has been used in DC Comics, too. But more notable here is the J used as grafitti in the top right picture. The J? Nearly identical to the one tattooed to the Joker’s face in Suicide Squad, as played by Jared Leto.
Joker’s Wild
Finally the most obvious one here: A Joker card being played with when the Jerome cult goes to steal his body out of storage. The Joker ominously has blood spilt across it, and is very intentionally zoomed in on. If Jerome is not in fact the Joker, well, Gotham producers sure want you to think he is for now.
