The Joker is terrifying enough without any powers to speak of, so imagine just how bad things get when he's given access to an unlimited source of cosmic abilities.
If that happens to be your greatest fear, then you best avoid Emperor Joker. Stemming from the brilliant and yet evidently bonkers mind of Long Halloween scribe Jeph Loeb, Emperor Joker sees the Clown Prince of Crime given the abilities of Mister Mxyzptlk. Mxyzptlk has been screwing with the Man of Steel for years, and with the inter-dimensional imp capable of doing, well... pretty much anything he desires, you can probably see why Joker getting his hands on those powers was bad news.
The Clown Prince tortured Batman for an eternity, and even made the great Darkseid himself tremble beneath his might. By the time Mxyzptlk and the Spectre are able to trick Joker into losing his power, Batman has been killed and resurrected on millions of separate occasions. Superman has to literally steal Bruce's memories to ensure the Dark Knight isn't left permanently scarred by the ordeal.
That's partially what makes Emperor Joker such a brilliantly twisted comic. It all took place in actual DC continuity, so if Spectre and Mxyzptlk had failed, one can only imagine what things could've looked like.
WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well.
In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.
