Joker: 10 1970s Comic Book Movies DC Should Make Next

We couldn't talk about which 1970s movies could be remade with DC characters without pointing out that the one standout classic of the era to win all five major Oscars also happens to feature the Joker (Jack Nicholson) and Penguin (Danny DeVito) locked up together in an asylum. How is this not already the model for an Arkham movie?

Like Joker, Cuckoo's Nest invites us to sympathise with a criminal who's done some pretty terrible things (Nicholson's Randle P. McMurphy is a serial violent assaulter with a conviction for statutory rape) by placing them in a scenario which highlights an uncaring social care system and negative attitudes to mental health.

Similarly, an Arkham-by-way-of-Cuckoo's-Nest movie would give us all the colourful oddballs of Batman's rogue's gallery, but invite our sympathies by highlighting that Arkham seems to exist only to punish and torment its inmates, essentially making them worse, rather than to rehabilitate.

The original movie of course features one of the all-time great screen villains in Nurse Mildred Ratched, so this would also be a chance for a similar comics villain to shine by tormenting the more well-known classic villains. Lyle Bolton plays this role of an anti-rehabilitation abuser of Arkham inmates in the comics, but a Nurse Ratched-type reinvention of Arkham Reborn's Alyce Sinner might be a better choice.

With Arkham Asylum as an acclaimed comic and a hit video game, there has been interest in an Arkham movie for years, including an animated movie spun off from Batman: The Animated Series which almost came to fruition. Could this be the way to finally make it happen?