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Brianna Cueva
Professor Vana Derohanessian
English 114B
29 April 2014
The Villains of True Life
We the people, depend upon the government when it comes to our safety and our civil rights
of freedom. Little do we know, the Government can be the one to give our safety and rights away
wanting to justify harm. Whether it is direct impairment, or ambiguous harm they, the ones with
power, do not take your best interest into consideration. They take care of themselves and if that
means running over their own then they will. All in order to achieve success and power. The
World Governments are prefigured as heroes. Once gained all power, they show their villainous
ways. Their actions turn from applicable to narcissistic. In front of the naked eye they turn from
heroes to villains. The youth looks up to those in power and those who are heroes only to
become devastated when the results they expected turn to the results that they once feared.
Villains within the story lines also known as the antagonists are frowned upon but most people
do not realize that the worst villains dont exist as characters in comics or movies but out here in
the real world. Villains within comic books such as The Joker in The Dark Knight Returns by
Frank Miller only reflect off real world villains. Whether The Joker is a fictional character in a
set of a comic series he can be analyzed within Adolf Hitler from the Holocaust and the current
villainous ways of the Syrian Forces because they all use murder in order to embed fear into the
eyes of the innocence only to indicating they have no future.
Within The Dark Knight Rises by Frank Miller the Joker commits a various amount of illegal
crimes. He goes on a killing rampage when he is awoken in the Arkham Asylum. He confronts
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the idea that Batman has returned into heroism in the city of Gotham. When introduced to the
news the Joker finds his way to manipulate the minds of his caretakers. When he successfully
brain washes the staff of Arkham they are able to pull off getting him on a live talk show where
he began his murder rampage and killed everyone within the walls of the television studio where
he later escapes out into the city of Gotham. Batman is notified when the Joker escapes and
becomes a wanted man. Batman and his sidekick Robin go on the hunt to find the Joker but once
he is tracked down he had already gone on another murderous rampage at a county fair. While
batman successfully confronts the Joker at the County fair words were not the resolution to the
violent confrontation that has happened between the two. Batman ends up defeating the Joker but
it was he the Joker that took his own life. In a moment of despair he snaps his own neck in hope
of bringing down batman as a vicious murderer.(see figure 1.0)
There is no doubt that the joker is a villain, there is doubt on which the joker may represent in
reality. Although the Joker was never part of the Gotham government he represents a lot of
government powered figures from the past, the present, and some coming into power well off in
the future. The joker regained power by putting in fear into the eyes of the youth and into the
eyes of the adults. He imbedded fear into everyone in Gotham. A real life example of an
empowered individual who imbedded fear into those within his territory will be Adolf Hitler.
During the late 1941s and early 1942s started the genocide called the Holocaust who was led
by Adolf Hitler. During the Holocaust Millions of children were massacred for being Jewish.
There was no real reason on why Hitler believed they should all be murdered. He believed they
were inferior and that is why they were sent to gas chambers and concentration camps.
Children are symbolized as pure and are seen as the future. Therefore, when children are
appeared to be massacred those held responsible are trying to send a message. A message in
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order to let everyone know that there is no future for them. It embeds fear into the eyes of the
innocent and that is how villains like Adolf and the joker regain power over their people. Within
the graphic novel, The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller there is a graphic photograph of the
Joker sitting inside of a free cotton candy stand. Surrounding the cotton candy stand are dozens
of children in uniform. They are perceived to be boy scouts and while they are thinking that the
Joker is being nice and handing out free cotton candy to the children of the community, he is
poisoning the cotton candy in order to conquer his plan of a mass murdering. He targets the
children because children represent innocence and the future. When a mass murdering is targeted
at a group of innocent children it shows the rest of city that there is no future. Throughout this
photograph the Joker really establishes power and impotence. (Figure 1.1) Like the joker Adolf
Hitler had no mercy for the innocence within the eyes of the children of Germany. He showed no
sorrow. (Figure 2) The similarities between the Joker and Adolf Hitler are those of the same
person although the joker is not based behind the character of Adolf Hitler their similarities are
that as the same person.
Reading about the massacres that the joker has committed puts the reader into shock because
of the horrific actions one must take in order to murder dozens of children. Then transitioning
those actions into actions to were taken in reality by Adolf Hitler must turn your stomach.
Although the joker is a fictional character Adolf Hitlers character is not but that was in the past.
It was a horrific massacre where millions upon millions of innocent people lost their lives due to
a vision one person had. Both massacres are now in the past. On the thirtieth of April two
thousand fourteen there was a government bombing on an elementary school in Syria. The
children at the school were getting ready to see an art exhibit that had just been finished at the
school when the government aircrafts struck the school with two barrel bombs. The artwork
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showed the pureness within the minds of the innocent. The innocence within the children whose
lives were lost is that of the purest. According to the article, Childrens Art at Syria School and
Then a Bomb by Anne Barnard Every day, across Syria, children who are simply trying to go
about their everyday lives are being killed and maimed by indiscriminate attacks on populated
areas. Like Hitler and the joker, the Syrian government served a purpose with this elementary
school bombing. They are showing the citizens that they have no chance against the government
and most importantly they have no future because their innocent youth was so recently bombed
by their own protectors. It is pessimistic that those with such power must stoop down to murder
in order to justify their impotence.
The government is supposed to protect your rights and is supposed to make sure you are safe.
It is reassuring to know your life is in good hands. When it comes to most if not all of the
governments let you down when it comes to your high hopes of protection. No Government is to
be named a hero. When reading the Dark Knight Returns people frown upon the Joker not
noticing that he is no better than who we are trusting to run our countries. When we trust people
enough to believe all that is spoken out of their mouths then we get bombed, or sent to
concentration camps to die. The Joker poisoned dozens of children in order to be heard. Adolf
Hitler massacred millions upon millions of Jewish innocent people in order to create his vision of
the perfect country. The Syrian Government sent their air force to drop two barrel bombs at a
elementary school to show the citizens that they have no chance against the government. Yes,
they all got their points across with cowardness. Noticing they are all men brutally taking the
lives of the innocent only to show they are in power, only to show they take the initiative to take
care of things when they get out of hand. Governments think in order to take care of things and
put un wanting desires to a hold they must show they are the ones with the upper hand, they must
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murder people in order to show that they are not playing. They plant the seed of fear within the
minds of those that had survived the attacks in order to justify they will not go against the
governments. The villains of true life.















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(Figure 1.0) Here is the moment where in a moment of despair the Joker decides to snap his own
neck in order to make batman the villain.

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(Figure 1.1) Here the Joker is in the cotton candy stand handing out free cotton candy to a group
of Boy Scout children. He secretly has poisoned the cotton candy so that he can recreate a mass
murdering he has thought out in his head and turn it into reality. On the lower right hand corner
you can see that the poison has kicked into their system causing their death.

(Figure 1.2) Work: Children are seen behind barbed wire in Auschwitz










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Works Cited
Yan Holly, Abedine Saad. 25 Children Killed in Elementary School Bombing, Syrian activists
say. CNN. 30 April. 2014. Web. 30 April. 2014.
Miller Frank, and others. The Dark Knight Return. New York: DC Comics, 1996. Print.
Corcoran Kieran. Winter in the camps. Dailymail. 26 December. 2013. Web. 30 April.
2014.