My Time in Calormen

I wind up talking about personal experience in the Middle East–and partially defending how C.S. Lewis portrayed Calormen.

Travis Perry on Feb 13, 2020 · 45 comments

Most readers of Speculative Faith will immediately recognize “Calomen” as the fictional land portrayed by C.S. Lewis in the Chronicles of Narnia. A desert land south of both Archenland and Narnia, with exaggerated Middle Eastern customs, polytheism that has the vicious god Tash at the head of its pantheon, rigid social classes, strong divisions between genders, and slavery (here, if you aren’t familiar, the linked Wikipedia article summarizes it pretty well). At the time Lewis wrote it, some elements of the descriptions of Calormen clearly seemed intended to be humorous–but people of modern times are mostly not amused. It’s now broadly and routinely claimed that C.S. Lewis grew up in an overtly racist era and he was overtly racist himself. That his racism shines forth in his criticisms of the brown people of Calormen–and perhaps in some other ways as well, such as by portraying dark-skinned dwarfs (like Nikabrik) worse than lighter-skinned dwarfs (like Trumpkin).

I have of course never been to Calomen–how could I have been? It’s a fictional place. Where I have been instead (in order of my time there) is the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Qatar, Afghanistan, Bahrain, and Djibouti. These countries have many differences among them–they aren’t even in the same region, because Djibouti is part of the Horn of Africa and Afghanistan is in Central Asia and the rest are in the “Middle East” (or “Near East,” some people say). But one thing they all share in common is all of these nations are Islamic-majority nations. And I’m going to assert in this article that they really do have some things in common with fictional Calormen, drawing especially from my first experience in the UAE.

I’m here to tell my own story, but as I tell it, bear in mind my experiences point in a certain direction. Perhaps Lewis can rightly be accused of preferring Europe over the Middle East without really understanding it–which would be ethnocentrism and not racism per se. Or perhaps there were elements of actual racism in his thinking–I don’t know, because I can’t say for sure I know what he was thinking (certainly he had no trouble portraying pale-skinned villains, re: the White Witch). And certainly by modern standards some of his jokes may seem unfunny, like “may he live forever” called out every time the Tisroc is mentioned. But I wish to point out that included within all of that potentially negative motivation from Lewis comes some legitimate criticism of Islamic culture and deliberate contrasts with it and the aristocracy that Lewis believed in and praised in his portrayals of Narnia and Archenland.

The Tisroc, may he live forever!

So in 1989 I enlisted in the US Army Reserve (USAR). There’s a backstory of why I did that which includes the death of premature twin boys that put my wife (now ex-wife) and I into debt and me seeking college money, money provided by the Reserve GI Bill of the period. Now isn’t the time to tell that other story in full, but my enlistment in the USAR was in an entirely different context in 1989 than what it became.

In 1989, Reservists hadn’t been called up in significant numbers since WWII and none at all since the Vietnam War. When I went through Army Basic Training and medical training in the Military Occupational Specialty (MOS) I chose–“Cardiac Specialist,” which at the time was a glorified EKG tech with some elements of Army combat medicine thrown in–my expectation was to put in eight years in the Reserves, then boom, I’d be done. If there was going to be a war, all the talk among Reservists at the time was if World War III happened we’d be pressed into service. I was in the 5502nd US Army Hospital in Aurora, Colorado when my training was complete and we always talked about getting “called up” if nuclear weapons fell on the USA and Fitzsimons Army Medical Center in Aurora were somehow still standing, then we’d be helping take care of massive casualties. A nightmare scenario that nobody could really plan for and we didn’t even seriously try, though we did get practice phone calls for mobilization to see if we’d reply to the calls on short notice.

But then on the 2nd of August, 1990 (just 7 months after I finished my Cardiac Specialist training), the dictator of Iraq, Saddam Hussein, decided to send his military into the neighboring oil-rich country of Kuwait. Saudi Arabia, who at the time had a minuscule, poorly-trained military, got very nervous that Iraq could roll right through and conquer them as well. And militarily, they could have. In fact, at the time, the Iraqis probably had the military capacity to conquer the entire Arabian peninsula if they’d wanted. So the Saudis called for help–and the United Nations authorized an international response.

US troops started moving to Saudi Arabia as early as August, which steamrolled into a massive buildup of US troops and troops from other nations. Still, mostly whole units were being called and we were assured the nature of our unit was such that it most likely would not be activated. Deployment was not our mission (we had too many diverse medical specialties designed for stateside medical care).

So when on December 22nd, 1990 when I got a phone call at the security desk of the high-rise building in downtown Denver where I worked, the first thing the administrator from my unit told me was, “You’d better sit down.” I sat and he gave me news that I didn’t completely absorb until later–I was one of only 10 out of around 500 unit members who had been mobilized. I was the only person in my MOS from my unit with activation orders. Oh, you had a baby at home, born on December 18th, just four days previously? “Sorry.” You have orders to report in Bismark, North Dakota on the 27th of December at your new unit, the 311th Evacuation Hospital. In just five days.

And by the way, “Merry Christmas!”

I didn’t even know the Army could pull people from other units to fill missions at will back then. Now it’s something that happens all the time, but then it was so rare I’d never heard of it.

Of course it was forty below zero in Bismark when I arrived, but those details are not part of this story. Nor is the trudging around waist-deep snow at the WWII-era barracks at Fort McCoy, Wisconsin, part of this story either. Nor is Private First Class Perry shoveling coal into the stoves that kept us warm (before being made a driver) included in the tale. I’m not even going to give detail to the fact the unit went overseas but I had to go back to Denver, because I was a witness at a murder trial and had to testify (that’s a story for another time).

My unit was already in country when I flew in the back of a US Air Force C-141 Starlifter cargo plane from the United States to an air base outside of Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates. From the airbase, a truck took me and two other late additions to the unit to Mafraq Hospital, a hospital that the UAE government had built at a crossroads in an area ten kilometers from the city outskirts, in case of major emergencies and flooding along the coast (today a search for the old site on Google Maps shows the area is full of new buildings).

Unlike pretty much every other US Army medical unit that went to Saudi Arabia and a few other countries like the UAE, our military hospital unit was to share the same facility as a civilian hospital already in place. We were there in case of an overflow of US casualties (which never happened). We helped threat the regular civilian patients that would have come to that hospital anyway.

Our military hospital camped in tents by the hospital compound, though towards the end the UAE government provided us trailers. Because the UAE never expelled the Iraqi nationals who lived there, unlike Saudi Arabia, we were on full lock-down and couldn’t leave the compound and we in fact went to work in civilian clothing under the cover us of being “Red Crescent Volunteers” rather than US military. (Though we had to protect our compound with lower-ranking people like me pulling guard duty, wearing US military uniforms then and packing M16s–so I don’t think we were fooling anyone.)(One time I thought I would have to shoot someone while I was on guard duty, which was something I never believed I would have to do as a medic–but that’s not part of this story.)

Not my unit, but the same kind of tent and same uniforms from another USAR hospital during Desert Storm. Image source: Army Medical History

I wasn’t there quite three months before the unit got moved to Saudi Arabia in preparation for being sent back to the USA, but every day I worked with professionals at a hospital run to Middle Eastern standards, with Arab patients. Of course, most of the professionals were not from the UAE, only a very few were. The majority of the nurses were from the Philippines though many were Palestinian. Some were Arabs from other countries, mostly Egypt. Quite a few Pakistanis worked there, as did some Europeans, including Eastern Europeans (recall this was still during the Cold War, at the end, yes, but still). And poor guys from Bangladesh and India (especially Tamils) swept the floor and cleaned bathrooms.

I’d grown up in rural and small-town Montana. No exaggeration, I rode a horse to school in first and second grade and lived in a house that was half log cabin and had “outdoor plumbing” part of the time. But I’d also taken an interest in foreign language in high school and had been an exchange student to France for a summer. I spoke some French and Spanish and had studied New Testament Greek back in Montana and was just finishing my first semester of Hebrew at Colorado Christian University. So I wasn’t totally unfamiliar with foreign places and travel, but the Middle East was unlike anything I’d ever experienced before.

First, slavery. Outright slavery is illegal, but the countries on the Arabian side of the Gulf routinely bring workers from poor countries, house them in poor conditions, and work them hard. They send most of the money back home–this is not the same thing as slavery of course, they can’t be bought and sold and while they are sometimes physically abused, it isn’t as routine as what enslaved people faced in the history of US slavery. Still, they are pretty close to being slaves.

Plus, there’s the trade in brides. With the UAE being oil-rich and its citizens getting a stipend from oil sales (before you ask, becoming a UAE citizen is hard), lots of people who at that time had been poor just a generation previous suddenly had unexpected riches. Since Islam allows men who can financially support their wives to have four of them (like Jacob in the Bible did), many UAE men wanted to have four wives. But there weren’t enough native-born women in the UAE to allow that. So, where do they come from? Bride brokers that go to small, poor villages, mostly in Pakistan but also Muslim parts of India and other places. And pay parents and village elders for beautiful young women, where they are married off. That isn’t technically slavery, either, but it’s quite close.

Social divisions? Enormous. Sure, there are huge social divisions in certain places in the West as well, but there is a massive difference between the opulence for an Emir (basically a king) of an Emirate and being the Bangladeshi guy who sweeps the floor. Plus many steps in between (nurses from the Philippines seems to occupy their own rung). The difference in opulence, rights, privileges (including the top guys in UAE society totally ignoring the four-wife-limit and having as many women as they want) and power is massive. Such a difference does not exist to the same degree anywhere in North America or Europe.

If you are a Western woman living in the UAE or neighboring countries, life isn’t too bad. In fact, being a wife of a wealthy UAE guy is certainly luxurious. But there are some massive gender differences. Of course, pretty much everyone realizes that. It’s possible to overstate the differences between Middle Eastern society and ours and the difference is bigger in some places than others, but still. The difference is, in general, huge.

The hospital I worked in, for example, had male and female wards and separation of staff. Only a few male staff were allowed to go to female wards, though women could work on the male side.

Elaborate formality? Traditionally, yes, though those influenced by Western culture are not that way so much. But there are certain polite greetings commonly used and accepted for a wide variety of situations. Nothing I know of is as elaborately formal as Calormen as Lewis described it. Some aspects of Calormen sound like Herotodus’s description of the Persian Empire (Lewis was trained in classics like Herotodus) more than the modern Middle East. Still, there remain echoes of the ancient past in that part of the world. Some things are said almost as a ritual, including saying “inshalla” (if God wills) whenever talking about the future.

Religion is an interesting topic. Perhaps I will surprise you here.

As a young guy who eagerly studied foreign languages, I was anxious to try to learn Arabic. It was hard for me (Arabic is hard for Arabic speakers because it’s so diverse from country to country) but I picked up quite a few phrases. I talked to people. I asked questions. I was curious about them and their lives. And I talked to everyone. Even the Tamil guys (who often spoke English), who kept looking around worried, like they could get in trouble (eventually I figured that out and stopped talking to them).

I also was (and remain) something of a Christian zealot. My father drank heavily and was abusive at times (saying he was “alcoholic” would imply he was seeking treatment and at that time, he wasn’t), my mother was more abusive and when my parents divorced, that’s who I lived with (though she mellowed over time to a degree). I stopped going to church around age 11 and got immersed into the atheistic sub-culture of hard science fiction a-la Isaac Asimov and Robert A. Heinlein (while my older sister took the deep dive into fantasy that eventually led to her anti-Christian Pagan-friendliness) and loads of other lovely experiences–early exposure to pornography, plus other events like tragic accidents such as losing a finger in a woodcutting accident when I was seven and witnessing a gun accident in which a cousin shot my younger sister in the face when I was nine (my father was in charge when both these accidents took place). For me all of those experience I associated with “the world” and saw in Christ something better. The sin that drives the world I saw in sharp contrast with all that Christ can and will bring into the life of those who follow Him.

So for me, you might think I would have no patience with Islam. But what in fact happened is I saw a culture in which the idea of God really mattered, even if only in formality. A culture that eschews alcohol, which had caused so many problems in my family (though they do other drugs). A culture that prays publicly and formally from minarets with the Islamic call to prayer. In fact, I would often be up early, reading the Bible, when the first call to prayer would sound loud over the desert. My fellow soldiers would curse the noise it made, but I felt I had something in common with the person in the tower singing out in Arabic, “God is great.”

My positive impression of Islam was helped by one Dr. Namaan Baat (I’m not sure I’m spelling that right). He was a Pakistani cardiologist who worked I worked with frequently–oh, if you’re wondering why I was the only one in my MOS activated from my Reserve unit, it’s because this particular hospital had a cardiology department and they wanted a soldier who would be able to work there. (Plus I was in other ways more “deployable” than other people in my MOS–in good physical shape, good at my job). He and I had many discussions about Islam versus Christianity and I perceived him to be someone with genuine devotion to God and real love for people.

An Egyptian doctor whose face reminds me of Dr. Baat. Image source: pariscongress.com

Like Emeth, the one good guy from Calomen accepted into heaven according to C.S. Lewis in The Last Battle.

Note that I would not say I believe Dr. Baat is going to heaven. No, sometimes I wish it were not so, but the Gospel message in the New Testament is clear enough about the need for personal faith in Jesus the Messiah. But I would say he seemed to me to be sincerely interested in God and sincerely seeking to please Him. Unlike many of my fellow Americans, who mock and hate the very idea of the God of the Bible–people like Robert A. Heinlein.

So in spite of a recognition of genuine problems in the Islamic world, I walked away empathetic with it from my time in the UAE, with a sense that I as a devout Christian have more in common with Muslims than I do with Americans and other Westerners for whom faith has no meaning.

Though I’d return to the Middle East after that first trip. I entered Iraq on the exact same day, January 17th, that I’d flown into the UAE in 1991. Only seventeen years later. In Iraq, I met a few Muslims who seemed very sincere in their faith, but a lot who seemed to not care at all about it. There’s lots of whiskey-drinking going on in Iraq, which definitely left a negative personal impression on me, based on my own past. And that’s not all of course–there was lots of womanizing among some of the high-ranking Iraqi officers I worked with, loads and loads of that and other flavors of “ordinary” sin. Plus the “inshalla,” whose habitual use I’d appreciated, often was uttered not as a habit of acknowledging the importance of God’s will, but as a dodge to avoid making a commitment. (Though that’s not how they use it in Afghanistan.) Plus, I met Christian Iraqis afraid of persecution–a persecution that came upon many Christians as ISIS took over parts of the country after the US withdrawal from there in 2011.

The people you happen to run into randomly in life don’t qualify as a scientific sampling. But what you observe at least indicates some of what’s possible.

What I’ve seen is that the products of culture influenced by Christianity is in many ways better (of course, in my own evaluation of “better”) than what is found in Islamic culture. And I would say C.S. Lewis saw that, too. Probably not in the same way I did, but likely through things he’d read and perhaps via people he’d met.

I think there’s another possible element in Lewis’s focus on Calormen. That is, I think he may have received some criticism as being against individual liberty because he had warm feelings for royalty as in King Peter, King Edmund, Queen Susan, and Queen Lucy. By showing Calormen, it may be he meant to say, “Yes, I support the idea of royalty. But not the most vicious and authoritarian kind.”

So why did I write this? Not just because I thought talking about my past would make for a short, easy article (Ha! How wrong I was!). But because I also wanted to defend Lewis a bit, to say that criticism of a region of the world based on things they actually do isn’t the same as racism. In my case, while I may criticize “Calormen,” believe me, I have plenty of criticism for my own nation!

Parts of the Near East do have certain things in common with Calormen. Though it’s true Lewis exaggerated and got a bit silly (in part by trying to be funny) and used stereotypes. But thankfully Lewis did not show all Calormene people as cookie-cutter villains. He also showed Emeth.

So what are your thoughts on Calormen, readers? Do you have any pertinent personal experiences you’d like to share?

Not Always Popular

Today we are going to discuss three distinctly Christian subgenres of speculative fiction and why they are not always popular.

Shannon McDermott on Feb 12, 2020 · 13 comments

Today we are going to discuss three distinctly Christian subgenres of speculative fiction and why they are not always popular with Christian readers of speculative fiction – such as myself, and possibly you. Feel free to share.

First, a disclaimer is in order. I am not, in principle, opposed to any of these genres, and as a reader I have at least dabbled in all of them. I am certain that each one boasts some truly fine books. I am not saying that there is anything inherently inferior about such stories – let alone inherently wrong. It’s simply that I – playing the odds of what I am most likely to enjoy – don’t choose to read them anymore.

And now, enough disclaiming and onto the point. The three distinctly Christian subgenres are …

The End Times. Again: some fine books belong to each of these categories. Evan Angler’s excellent (and sadly discontinued) Swipe series is a shining illustration of the point. In the main, however, I don’t enjoy novels about the End Times. On the one hand, I find it dreary to read about relentless loss, tribulation, and cataclysm, culminating in the Anti-Christ’s conquest of the entire Earth; on the other hand, I find it predictable. It’s just mapping Revelation prophecies to the inevitable conclusion. I loved Angler’s End Times series, but I wasn’t sure it was an End Times series until the second book. Until then, I thought it might have been a dystopia flavored by apocalyptic prophecy – and hoped that it was.

The Nephilim. My instinctive response to the Nephilim subgenre is neutrality. I am not offended by the angel/human concept, and if you recast the essential idea in a sci-fi form – members of an incorporeal species assume physical bodies to interact with humanity, and interact to the point of reproducing – it’s actually pretty intriguing. (Question: In such a scenario, would the offspring really be hybrid? Because for reproduction to be possible, wouldn’t the assumed bodies have to be genetically human, perhaps with minor variations from the norm …?)

But – and how can I put this kindly? – novels about the Nephilim often take an extreme left turn into strangeness. UFOs, Roswell, tinfoil government conspiracies, monsters, aliens – sometimes all in the same book (I know – I read it). It’s all too much. The Nephilim subgenre also gives too much play to false readings of Scripture: one, that it was because of the Nephilim that God sent the Flood; two, that the Nephilim are somehow connected to the End Times. (In a cheap intellectual sleight of hand, some quote Jesus, “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be in the days of the Son of Man” – leaving off the rest of the passage, where Christ explains in what way the days of the Son of Man will be like the days of Noah, and it isn’t the Nephilim.)

Angels v. Demons. I don’t question the poetic triumph of Paradise Lost, or the shrewd, sharp effectiveness of The Screwtape Letters. And it isn’t only the classics. This Present Darkness was one of my first loves in Christian speculative fiction. But over the years I cooled toward stories that give center stage to angels and demons. I admit, the last couple books I read in the genre did much of the cooling. Yet I think it is a general – not, of course, a universal – weakness of such stories to make angels too … human. I want a bit of grandeur or otherworldliness, a flavor of heaven or hell. It’s a tall order, and harder the larger the role. Even now, I think that angels (good and bad) can be well-used in fantastic fiction – but especially in roles that are somewhat marginal, or mysterious.

In my earlier years of reading, I wandered through these subgenres and ended at the conclusion that they are Not My Thing. It’s curious how easily they overlap. Somewhere, I know, they have converged entirely into an End Times novel where the Nephilim fight with demons against angels …

Our New Podcast Episode Covers the Top Seven Ongoing Fantasy Debates

In our newest Fantastical Truth podcast episode, we survey seven debates Christian fans followed in 2019.

E. Stephen Burnett on Feb 11, 2020 · 5 comments

We’ve just hit four episodes at the Fantastical Truth podcast, and episode four explores the top seven debates from last year.

Of course, these topics could (and likely will) continue in some form into this year.

All of these are based on my article, These Are the Top Ten Most-Read SpecFaith Articles in 2019.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

You can download the full episode here. Or visit the podcast archive to listen to all four episodes thus far.

Of course, you can also search Fantastical Truth on any podcast player (Apple, Google, Spotify, the works) to listen and subscribe.

Which of these debate topics would you like to explore more about? Let us know here. It’ll help us plan our next episodes.

Also: share with us how you first discovered fantastical stories! We’re planning to explore these personal journeys in episode 6.

Godspeed!

Stephen

E. Stephen Burnett, signature

What’s Going On With Christian Speculative Fiction

I can’t pretend to know what all has come out within the year in the category of Christian speculative fiction, or which books are about to be released. But I can alert you to a couple things.

Rebecca LuElla Miller on Feb 10, 2020 · 2 comments

Honestly, with the boom of self-published books, I can’t pretend to know what all has come out within the year in the category of Christian speculative fiction, or which books are about to be released. But I can alert you to a couple things.

First, Realm Makers, the premier organization for authors and readers of Christian speculative fiction, is in the judging phase of two of their contests. The Realm Awards and the Parable Award closed submissions in January. However, the process for the Alliance Award, which is a Readers award, doesn’t start until March 1. Here are the details you might want to know:

The Alliance Award

Submissions open March 1st.

Readers have their say in what speculative fiction novels they loved the most from the previous calendar year.

Only READERS can nominate books into the contest. Anyone submitting nominations may choose up to three books.
NOMINATION PERIOD
The nomination period runs from midnight, March 1st to March 24th, also at midnight. Don’t wait to nominate!

Books must be in the genre of fantasy, science fiction, horror, or related subgenre, either traditionally or self-published. Only novel-length fiction please, no short stories, anthologies, or novellas.
ROUND TWO VOTING

The books that receive the top percentage of nominations will move onto the second round of voting, which runs from April 5th to April 22nd. We ask that voters only rate books that they’ve actually read. The voting runs on a star system, which we’ll explain in more detail when the round opens.
FINAL ROUND VOTING

On May 16th, it’s on to FINAL ROUND VOTING. We ask voters to participate only if they’ve read a minimum of two books on the finalist list. That’s why there’s a bit of a gap between the second and final rounds–we want you to have time to read the finalists if you haven’t already. Again, the star rating system will apply.

Final round voting concludes on June 4th.

There is no entry fee for this award. The winner of the Alliance Award will receive a certificate of recognition.

Second, the premier small press publisher for Christian speculative fiction, Enclave Publishing, has announced some of their new books/authors. If you aren’t on their mailing list, you might not be aware of the following:

The truth about Neverland is
far more dangerous than a fairy tale.

Claire Kenton believes the world is too dark for magic to be real—since her twin brother was stolen away as a child. Now Claire’s desperate search points to London… and a boy who shouldn’t exist.

Peter Pan is having a beastly time getting back to Neverland. Grounded in London and hunted by his own Lost Boys, Peter searches for the last hope of restoring his crumbling island: a lass with magic in her veins.

The girl who fears her own destiny is on a collision course with the boy who never wanted to grow up. The truth behind this fairy tale is about to unravel everything Claire thought she knew about Peter Pan—and herself.

Available July 2020 in a limited-run hardcover edition.

This book is available for pre-order now.

Also, from a long-time favorite fantasy author, Sharon Hinck:

The dancers of the Order direct their floating world
of Meriel with their movement…
but are they steering it toward destruction?

Calara spent her life learning dance patterns and seeking to become the perfect servant to her people. When she discovers the work of the Order is built on lies, she flees with a rough-edged herder, Brantley of Windswell. Pursued by soldiers, her journey through the suffering villages of the rim leads her to encounter a truth that sends ripples through her world—and through her soul.

As she seeks clues to her forgotten family, Calara discovers newfound courage in the face of danger, while her quest awakens a growing but forbidden affection for Brantley. Yet even his support can’t fully be trusted, since he’d rather destroy the Order than bring reform.

She is a lone woman facing opposition from rim villages and treachery from the all-powerful Order. Can she restore the dance to its true purpose and bring freedom and hope to her people?

This book may be ordered now.

Enclave has also announced that a new author is joining their group:

Enclave Publishing signs James R. Hannibal

We are thrilled to share that James R. Hannibal will be joining the Enclave Publishing family! An award-winning author who has written mystery, suspense, fantasy and thrillers, James tells stories of adventure in many different genres. In October 2021, Enclave will publish the first book in a brand-new fantasy trilogy set in the Lightraider fantasy world.

More info to come!

Finally, Enclave is making a sneak peek available of one of their up and coming young writers, Chawna Schroeder

Enclave Escape is ready to launch with The Vault Between Spaces, by Chawna Schroeder, and we couldn’t be more excited! Take a peek behind the curtain of the first release with this exclusive seven-chapter sneak peek.

Every legend must start somewhere…

Get the PDF and enjoy!

There’s more—the first ever audiobook put out by Enclave, sales of several series—and this is all from one publisher.

There are any number of other small presses and indie writers who also have new books out or on schedule to be released. Keep your ears open, and let us know here at Spec Faith (the comments section of this post is a good place) what books you’re excited about.

The Joker in Film: A Case Study in Evil

Joker, the movie, has 11 Oscar nominations. How does it compare with other portrayals of the Joker in film? Which is a “greater evil” and what real-world evil people are they most like?

Travis Perry on Feb 6, 2020 · 15 comments

Inspired by the nomination of the film Joker for eleven Oscars, including best film, best director, best adapted screenplay, best actor, and seven technical categories, this post will look at the Joker as a character as portrayed in major Hollywood films. Three films to be exact. The first, Joker itself, which may win big at the Oscars two days after this article posts. The second movie Joker we’ll examine will be from 1989’s Batman, directed by Tim Burton, starring Jack Nicholson, er, I mean, starring Micheal Keaton, with the Joker only playing a minor backup role ( 🙂 ). And lastly we’ll talk about the The Dark Knight and it’s Joker-figure, infamously portrayed by Heath Ledger.

Just as the Oscars have categories, so will this post. Er, well, no, not “just as.” More like shooting off on my own tangent, but you’ll see in a second.

We’ll look at these different visions of the same character and evaluate them in the following categories: Realism, Origin, Justification, Creepiness, Lethality, Leadership, Film Message, and Evil Influence. How do the different jokers rate versus one another? Then, we’ll conclude each section with a well-known real-world human being whom I judge to have things many things in common with each version of the Joker.

Note this post is not a detailed review of the movie Joker but instead discusses it with a presumption that you’ve already seen it if you wanted to. Some spoilers follow.

The Joker in Joker

Image copyright: Warner Bros. Pictures, DC Films, and Joint Effort

Realism: This film will get the, er, “Speckie” award for realism. A story about a mentally ill guy who is downtrodden and oppressed and who flips a switch at some point into becoming a merciless killer certainly feels realistic. The movie spends a lot of time showing the Joker’s sufferings and makes him into the primary object of the audience’s feeling of sympathy for the protagonist.

However, in some ways the film offers a very good imitation of realism rather than realism itself. Can someone who has been beaten down in life and who has suffered “flip a switch” and become a cold-blooded killer? Er, actually it’s more common for someone with such emotional turmoil to become a hot-blooded killer, who kills in rage, or even one who positively enjoys killing. So the Joker’s cold-bloodedness in this film is not actually realistic, even though it feels realistic. And the fact that this Joker’s actions inspire widespread imitation is a stretch of realism and is more a reflection of how the society is portrayed in the film than anything strictly realistic. Plus, the fact that this version of the Joker escapes arrest is a bit unbelievable.

Origin: Since the entire movie, which really is more of a commentary on society than a superhero tale, is supposedly about the origin of the Joker, what it is that makes him who he is, you might also expect me to hand out a “Speckie” to Joker. But I won’t. As a story about some poor suffering guy who then turns bad, Joker pretty much works (with a few objections I’ve given in the paragraph above). But as a story for the origin of the super-villain “the Joker,” the film does poorly. Arthur Fleck is a dangerous man at the end of the film, not someone you’d want to accidentally splash with your car as you drove by–but he isn’t any kind of genius and certainly not a criminal genius. So as the origin story of the super-villain Joker, I judge Joker to be the worst origin story of the three we’re looking at.

Justification: Joker shows over and over again how powerless Arthur Fleck feels in life. His walk into evil comes because shooting people down gives him a sense of power. Though I would object that suffering actually makes some people more empathetic rather than less, it’s certainly true others take out their suffering on everyone else. The film Joker spends the most time establishing its justification for the Joker’s actions, thus is a strong contender for this “Speckie” I’m handing out. Still, because the film shows him becoming more of a cold-blooded killer than a passionate one (though we could say he is “coolly passionate”), I think the justification provided this character doesn’t quite match his actual actions. No Speckie.

Creepiness: The one and only scene with the Joker and Bruce Wayne together in Joker features Arthur Fleck reaching through the bars of the mansion gate and reaching for young Bruce Wayne’s mouth, inserting his fingers into the corners, and pushing the mouth into a smile. Very creepy. Among other creepy scenes. Yes, Heath Ledger’s Joker continually seeks to be disturbing, but due to the strength of Joaquin Phoenix’s acting, his Joker wins the Speckie for the creepiest portrayal.

Lethality: This version of the Joker shoots some people, totally without any detailed plan. And basically gets away with it multiple times. Yeah, real people do this often enough, but (thank God) they usually get caught. This “joker” would soon wind up in a prison or a mental institution. So while deadly, this joker is in a sense the least lethal of the three.

Leadership: The Joker in Joker is also by far the worst leader. In fact, while his actions inspire some imitation, the notion that this person could deliberately lead anyone to do anything would make the other two Jokers collapse into fits of laughter.

Film Message: Joker comes on strong with a message about the downtrodden and how we as a society should treat them better–lest, you know, general neglect of mental health services and men being super mean to other men they see as weak (as in genuine toxic masculinity) will cause lots of people to flip over to evil. The film also portrays wealthy people, including Thomas Wayne, Bruce Wayne’s father, as lacking empathy and in general causing regular people to suffer. A general revolt against the wealthy is a feature of this film. Does the film actually justify killing the rich or does it simply predict that if rich people remain as the movie portrays them, then “this is what you can expect”? I’m not sure–though I’d say the film can legitimately been seen either way.

Note how the death of Bruce Wayne’s parents right in front of young Bruce Wayne, such a key moment in the origin of Batman, becomes totally different in Joker. Instead of being the work of an inherently dangerous sociopath (1989’s Batman), the Waynes are shot during a general unrest inspired by the Joker’s actions in part but even more by how awful inequality is portrayed in the film and how terrible wealthy people are according to the story. So it’s almost a justified killing. Not justified as in, “killing people is okay,” but rather “what do you expect under the circumstances?”

This message, which supports the way a lot of people feel about our society, even though it has dubious moral value, is such a major feature of the Joker that I’m reluctantly handing it the Speckie for this category.

Evil Influence: Both inside and outside the story world, how much influence does this version of the Joker have?

In the story, for “reasons,” many people find his actions inspirational. A riot against the wealthy ensues. NOTE that criminal gangs and general lawlessness, a primary concern in the other movies this post looks at, is totally different in his film. There is no evidence of general lawlessness–just a response to oppression.

I’m more interested in the evil influence outside the story–could this tale put in someone’s mind that inequality and general nastiness on the part of some wealthy people justifies killing them? Actually, I think yes, the story could inspire someone to think that way. Though of course the vast majority of people who watch the film won’t think that at all.

And of course this movie contains “strong bloody violence, disturbing behavior, language and brief sexual images” as per its rating. Which isn’t that noteworthy nowadays in and of itself, but people strongly associate this kind of content with realism. Making it harder to realistically portray events without using these elements. Which I would call a minor evil influence.

In addition, this movie makes a perhaps-unintended commentary on the nature of evil–that evil comes from circumstances of dysfunction. That evil is a treatable mental condition, in effect. For me, this clearly fails to account for actual things people do and the reality of sin. So for that reason, I’m not giving my fictional “Speckie” award to Joker in this category.

Famous Real Evil Person Most Like: If we were to search public records of murderers, most likely we could find someone who matches Arthur Fleck better than the person I’m about to name. Which is appropriate in a way, because Joker functions better as a biography of some murderer you’ve never heard of than a story about someone infamous for super-villainy. But still, to make a comparison, I think I need need to pick someone famous, even if the comparison is flawed.

The Joker in Joker is most like John Wayne Gacy.

John Wayne Gacy in clown costume. Source: AP

For those who don’t recall the name, Gacy was a serial killer in the Chicago area who captured teenage boys and young men, had sex with them, tortured them and killed them, and buried them under his house. This happened in the 70s and he had 33 known victims.

As a sexual predator and serial killer, Gacy is inherently different from the Joker as portrayed by Joaquin Phoenix. Granted their differences, including Gacy having almost no known justification for the things he did, they do share some traits in common. Both are solitary killers who gained a degree of notoriety. Both worked as clowns, though Gacy did so as a volunteer and that was Arthur Fleck’s job. Both killed for strictly personal reasons. Neither had any master plan or deliberately lead any kind of movement. Both would be potentially very dangerous to a certain group of people, but not everyone (Arthur Fleck spares the life of a midget he’d worked with, even as he callously murdered another former colleague right in front of him).

The most important point of this comparison is to show that even though Joker portrays someone who becomes villainous, he is no leader, no criminal mastermind. Just dangerous to the wrong person who runs into him at the wrong time. Like John Wayne Gacy.

The Joker in Tim Burton’s Batman

The Joker as an art lover and leader. Image copyright: Warner Brothers and DC Comics.

Realism: While in some aspects I think the Joker in Batman does parallel real-life people, the overall tenor of this movie is not realistic and the portrayal of the Joker in some aspects doesn’t even try to be realistic. The Joker is a larger-than-life figure, that’s how Batman shows him. Lots of details are not realistic at all, including the vat of chemicals Jack Napier falling into supposedly permanently damaging the nerves to his mouth (but no other nerves), the giant pistol the Joker uses to shoot down the Batwing, the impossible heights of the Gotham Cathedral, etc. etc. So as a realistic portrayal, this film comes at the bottom of the list.

Origin: As the origin of a super-villain, starting with someone who is already an important figure in organized crime and pushing him a bit further is a good start. In terms of explaining his origins, it was also good to place him as the killer of Bruce Wayne’s parents, showing him to be someone who was always a sociopath. He just got worse when he “lost his mind.” But the story falls down when saying it was a plunge into chemicals and having his appearance altered as a result that put him over the edge. There’s no psychological depth there. So no Speckie for Jack Nicholson.

Justification: Jack Nicholson’s Joker is a crime boss first and foremost. He is going for wealth, luxury, beautiful women (though in his most creepy moment, he deliberately mutilates his lovers) and in general trying to make money off crime. A totally normal justification–though when you look at this random killings through the chemicals he distributes to the public, which he launches into after making himself the new crime boss, his reasons may seem to fall down into the cartoonish. But the story articulates a reason for him–he considers death a form of art. While the reason is weird, he has a reason that makes sense within the context of the story world.

And given the truly strange things people have praised as art, this justification strikes at a fear that creators will build something dangerous, consequences be damned. That someone will love their creation to the degree they lose sight of the effect it can have–they don’t care about hurting people, they just want to follow their own creative impulses, with no restrictions. Certainly this fear of creativity-without-restrictions is based on a realistic reaction to many human inventions. So I give the “Speckie” for best Joker in this category to Jack Nicholson.

Creepiness: This version of the Joker is the least creepy of the three. Though he does have several creepy moments, including his deliberate mutilation of the faces of his paramours.

Lethality: While this Joker is certainly responsible for the deaths of many people, in person he’s not much of fighter. He kills mostly through actions he plans and has others carry out. Lethal, yes, but no Speckie for this Joker.

Leadership: On the other hand, this Joker is by far the best leader of the three. Arthur Fleck in Joker not only has no leadership skills, he has nobody directly serving under his command. Heath Ledger’s Joker, who is a leader, but who continually and casually sacrifices his own men, inspires thoughts of “why does anyone ever actually follow this clown?” (“pun” intended). Nicholson’s Joker may have horrifically random plans for the public at large, but his troops serve him because he give them reasons to do so–loyalty in exchange for loyalty. Speckie awarded!

Film Message: Unlike Joker, in which the message of the story permeates the film and parsing out exactly what that message means is probably one of the main reasons Joker has been nominated for “Best Picture,” the 1989 version of Batman was low on deliberate messages. Still, simply by portraying one character as the hero and another as the villain, the movie has a message about the nature of Good and Evil. First, that such categories actually exist. Second, that one of the most important defining characteristics of evil is to lack empathy for others–one of this Joker’s prime characteristics. (In fact, that’s the message that laughing at the distress of others sends more than any other–that I feel no empathy for you.) I happen to like this message better than what Joker offers, but because the message is apparently accidental and very similar to the message behind The Dark Knight, no Speckie will be awarded here.

Evil Influence: In the movie, the Joker encourages his troops to engage in a certain measure of zany criminality. Sure, he influences them to do things they otherwise would not do, but his influence on others isn’t really what this film is about.

As for real-world potential to inspire evil, the idea that evil is cool and good is boring might worm its way into a viewer’s mind from this film. Because Batman is dark and brooding and good, while the Joker is fun and happy and evil. Though I actually am more concerned with people who believe happiness is a characteristic of being good, inherently part of the package of goodness, which it isn’t necessarily (as most versions of Batman show).

So overall, this film neither portrays, nor in fact is responsible for much noteworthy in terms of “evil influence.” (No Speckie!)

Famous Real Evil Person Most Like: Again, as a comparison, the person I’m about to name fails in a number of ways to completely match the Joker in Batman, but I feel better about this analogy than I did comparing Arthur Fleck to John Wayne Gacy. Who among historical figures that come to mind saw himself as an artist over his entire lifetime? Who was more noteworthy for his leadership and ability to inspire others than anything else? Who followed a vision for the world that meant good things for his followers, but death and destruction for those “not on his team”? Who had a vision for the future? Who used poison chemicals to destroy people?

An uncharacteristically happy Hitler (after France surrendered)

The Joker in Batman is like most like Hitler.

“But Hitler wasn’t funny at all!” you may object. True, but that wasn’t the aspect I was comparing. “But the Joker didn’t kill nearly as many people as Hilter!” True, but Hilter headed up an entire nation with a much greater capacity to kill than Gotham City gangs had. This version of the Joker, if he had all power, would have most likely have “artistically” killed millions. “But the Joker is nowhere near as hateful as Hitler was!” True–and a very significant difference. Hitler was highly emotional and hateful and the Joker simply thought killing was funny, mostly emotionally detached as he killed. Still, I don’t think killing-even-though-you-hate-less makes the Joker’s intentions benign. “But Hitler was much more evil!”

Well, yes, I agree Hitler was more evil–certainly the Joker in Batman showed no lust for genocide. But John Wayne Gacy, driven by sexual lust, was also more evil than Arthur Fleck. The point of comparison is not to say the characters are the same in their effect or power, but that there are similarities in motivations and methods of operations. Der Führer was dangerous not because he personally was a killer, but because of what he led others to do for their own benefit, at the detriment of others. Like Jack Nicholson’s Joker.

The Joker in The Dark Knight

Image copyright: Warner Brothers and DC Comics.

Realism: The Dark Knight cast off the more cartoon-ish elements of Batman, striving to adopt a more realistic feel. Yet in some ways it’s not like ordinary reality at all. The Joker has a horde of followers who are completely reliable but also completely expendable–not a realistic thing. Batman gets chased by the police to salvage the reputation of Harvey Dent–hey, why does that make any sense at all? (I mean, if there’s gonna be a cover-up, why not say crime bosses killed each other?) Plus, some physics things I won’t delve into. Suffice it to summarize that The Dark Knight is only moderately realistic.

Origin: The Dark Knight does not portray the origin of the Joker. He simply shows up on the scene, all kitted up and ready to go. A few times he talks about how he got the scars on his face. There’s an implication at one moment he was a victim of abuse, but later it becomes clear that he was lying. His lack of clear origin makes him more mysterious, more frightening. So in a surprise move, I’m giving the “best super-villain origin” award to the version of the Joker that actually contains no origin story! (“I’m so surprised, but proud, to have received the Speckie award in this category…” 🙂 ) Though this contains an editorial comment on my part–evil doesn’t need to be explained nearly as much as good does. (Do we have a solid case of abuses and slights that made John Wayne Gacy who he was? Or Hilter who he was? Not really–only a little of that kind of thing happened to them.)

Justification: The Joker in The Dark Knight has no clear justification for his actions. “Some men just want to watch the world burn,” Michael Cane’s Alfred explains to Batman. Some people will find this unrealistic–but that’s because they are hook, line, and sinker buying into the idea that human evil is aberrant and requires some special origin story to explain it. Actually, some humans from infancy show no sign of empathy for others. Some humans really do kill and engage in mayhem for no clear reason. And most humans, as both studies and history have shown, will participate in evil if an authority figure is telling them to do so. People are not usually devoid of empathy, but people much more easily accept evil than the evil-is-mental-pathology view allows for. Still, I already gave out a “Speckie” for the no-origin origin. I won’t double down with a no-justification justification.

Creepiness: Yeah, Heath Ledger’s Joker is pretty creepy on multiple occasions. It’s a tribute to Joaquin Phoneix’s tremendous acting that Arthur Fleck manages to be an empathetic figure we pity most of the time, while at particular moments out-creeping Heath Ledger’s Joker. The Dark Knight’s Joker is more consistently creepy, but I already gave the Speckie to Joker–Arthur Fleck–Joaquin Phoenix.

Lethality: Both in personal, physical actions and by nefarious plans, this Joker is the most lethal of the three. SPECKIE winner!

Leadership: While this Joker is awfully good at coming up with detailed plans–unlike Arthur Fleck–I really wonder how he gets anyone to follow him. Any observant subordinate would quickly realize how bad this Joker’s plans go for his foot soldiers and would not want to participate. The only way his followers make sense is if they are trapped on his team, with no way to escape it. More on that in a bit, but still, while this Joker is a leader, he isn’t one you can imagine a normal person following. No Speckie here.

Film Message: This movie does get message-y at times. Of course it resonates in harmony with 1989’s Batman that there really are categories of Good and Evil and that Evil needs to be resisted. Very true. This movie does even better and makes it clear that resisting evil doesn’t necessarily have to do with physical victory in a fight. The two boatloads of people, each rigged with explosives, each with a controller to blow up the other ship, was about tempting people to do harm to others–resisting the evil at that moment was found not in a physical fight but in refusing to play along with the evil plan. By deciding to be good, even at the risk of their own lives.

The idea is that being Good is not just about fighting bad people trying to kill others, but is more importantly about resisting Evil in yourself. That’s a message I heartily approve of. I like this message much more than what’s found in either of the other films.

However, I felt the message got muddled by declaring that if only people knew Harvey Dent had done wrong that would do some kind of horrific damage to the morale of people in Gotham City. Yes, people can get hurt when they learn of someone they thought of as a paragon of virtue has fallen into shameful behavior. But the problem there, I would say, is expecting any real person to be a paragon. Paragons are best found in fiction, where they can model what their creator thinks is ideal behavior for you to imitate if you chose. But real people would be better served by recognizing other real people are capable of doing wrong you’d never expect.

Besides, as much as I find the message of Joker to be morally troubling, Joker handled it’s message more artfully than The Dark Knight, in which “the message” was mostly made known through impassioned speeches. Artistically there’s a lot to be said for showing the message through actions, rather than through things directly said (though directness is at times appropriate–it depends on the audience).

Evil Influence: This Joker is all about evil influence! However he manages to get his followers to obey his orders to their deaths, he does. Yet his central premise is to get people most other people see as good to do things most of us see as evil. He wants people to choose to blow other people up–to pick one family member over others–to despair that anything good can happen in the future. To accept the idea that it is society that’s profoundly dysfunctional in loving plans, not him for destroying them. That breaking people and wending them to his will is what he was put on Planet Earth to do. That if Batman has one thing he won’t do, that’s the very thing the Joker wants him to do.

How about real-world potential for promotion of evil? The movie does rather normalize extreme violence, though it consistently portrays such violence as bad. The movie does casually embrace the idea that lying to the public is a good idea–covering up Harvey Dent’s fall into insanity is a good thing. Because the public can’t handle truth. Such a notion isn’t particularly supportive of the morality of truth-telling. We could say the Heath Ledger’s Joker glamorized evil by being more interesting than Christian Bale’s Batman. Perhaps The Dark Knight even significantly helped inspire the interest in the Joker as his own character that’s given us the current Joker movie.

But overall, because The Dark Knight primarily conceives of the Joker as an evil influence on others, seeking to prod them to do wrong, therefore I give this portrayal the Speckie-award-I-invented-for-this-post. (YAY!)

Famous Real Evil Person Most Like: Please excuse me for veering from using a human person as my example here. But when we are talking about someone who is seeking to destroy and ruin, someone whose backstory we don’t know very much about, someone primarily interested in prodding good people to do evil things, who is openly cynical about people ever sincerely doing right, who has a horde of insane but also insanely loyal followers, who is negatively focused on destruction of good rather than any form of creative vision, all of that paints a picture of a particular person.

“The Darkness” from the movie Legend. Who did you think it was? 😉 Copyright: Universal Pictures

The Joker in The Dark Knight is most like Satan.

Granted Satan works almost exclusively behind the scenes, cannot be punched in the face or killed by any human means, has an influence much broader than Gotham City, and generally only inspires people to kill others, rather than directly killing himself. But still, as one with no empathy for human suffering, no desire to build or obtain or create, who seeks to put good people in situations what will cause them to become evil, this version of the Joker is very much like Satan as portrayed in the Bible (discussed in a previous post here).

Conclusion

So with eight made-up “Speckie” awards to give out, the “Travis Perry Academy” assigned 3 Speckies to the Joker in Joker, 3 to the Joker in The Dark Knight, with only two going to the Joker in Batman. What does that count really mean, since I both made up the categories and judged them?

It means I think the Joker is a character worth thinking about and writing about. I think the Joker film is very interesting and has some strong points. But it also has weak points, most notably how it fails to explain the origin of a super-villain. And has a muddled and potentially sinister “kill the rich” message embedded within it.

It means that while I consider Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker to be memorable, his portrayal was no greater than Heath Ledger’s, simply different. Though both performances were in some limited ways less impressive than what Jack Nicholson and Tim Burton did with the character.

I think Joaquin Phoenix deserves an award for best actor. But best picture? Best director? Best screenplay? No, I don’t think so.

So what do you think about the Joker as a character? Any comments on my analysis? Any particular thoughts about Joker the movie? Or other examples of the Joker as a character?