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One aspect of #joker I thought wasn't commented on much is the often pathological relationship between sons and single mothers.
What truly makes #jokermovie a movie for, and about, incels is the relationship between Arthur Fleck and his mother, Penny.
What truly makes #jokermovie a movie for, and about, incels is the relationship between Arthur Fleck and his mother, Penny.
She is entirely self-obsessed (she is narcissistic), and has no regard for her son and his needs. She has been in abusive relationships, through which Arthur has been irreparably damaged.
It's worked out for his mother, because, being a neutered and broken man, Arthur lives to please his mother. It would seem calculated, because without him, she would, as all women fear, completely isolated.
She is the one who allowed the abuse to happen, forever damaging her son. Regardless, she tells him to always smile, which seems to be about all she's taught him in terms of how to handle life.
Taking the one thing she's taught him to heart, Arthus has made it his goal to spread happiness. As a result of his pathological need to please his narcissistic mother, he's trying to become a comedian.
Yet while she is the reason he wants to become a comedian so he can spread joy, she ruthlessly negs him when he talks of becoming one. "Don't you have to be funny to do that?"
Though he isn't funny, Arthur Fleck, a man in his 30s, has no self-awareness of this. He's a grown man who has little understanding of his strengths and weaknesses, because of his mother.
Arthur has even bought the delusion that he's the illegitimate son of Thomas Wayne. Some day, in Arthur's mind, Thomas Wayne will kiss the frog in a fatherly embrace, and it will turn out he's actually a prince!
A big part of being a man is to know where your strengths and weaknesses lie, and where you are on the totem pole, but this was never imparted to him due to a lack of a father.
It resonates with a lot of what @JLPtalk talks about regarding sons and mothers. It also reminds me of the socio-psychological dynamics between the genders explained in @RationalMale's book series...
Mothers cannot create men on their own, and, have innate psychological incentives not to. And, without exception, the more control a woman has over a boy or a man, the less of a man he will become.
What it ends with is Arthur killing his mother, killing his failed father figure who he aspired after, and starting a massive rebellion in Gotham City.
It is known in history that when you have a mass of men who are completely disenfranchised, abused and with little left to lose, the result is violence and rebellion. This is what they fear about incels.
This film is a lot deeper than I initially thought it was.
