It's Tha Joka Baby

it's tha joka baby

the great thing about having your own au is that you can take characters you dont like and make them completely different people until you like them

lore's under the cut!

??? (Nickname: J) lived a relatively simple life in the beginning. Coming from a terrible home, she never really flourished - simply went through the motions that were expected of any person in her generation. She eventually landed a job as a children's magician/clown, and while she was good at it, it didn't rake in as much money as she needed to live comfortably.

Especially considering the fact that she was a young, single mom. Her kid was about the only thing tethering her to a normal life, out of a desire to be better than her own parents were to her.

J had always had impulses. Desires. Be it a product of his upbringing, or his terribly boring existence, but he'd always had the desire to do bad things. Shake things up - like popping a bounce house with the kids inside, or bashing a particularly annoying participant over the head with his magician's wand. Things he'd repress, for obvious reasons. All except for one.

She had started stealing money or other valuables from her customers. Though she was desperate to be normal, J would often find ways to excuse her behavior. She wasn't able to keep the lights on at her current salary? Well, it was only fair that she took a little extra while on a job - she had earned it, after all; didn't you know how little this job paid? It wasn't anything they'd miss.

And that worked for a good long while. Until he opened his mailbox to find a letter.

The Red Hood Gang, in this universe, is basically a method of distraction. Does someone need everyone's eyes on something else while they go about their own plans? They pay Red Hood One to gather a group of his cronies and go cause mischief somewhere. J had been one of the people summoned to work as a Red Hood, as they had a whole heaping handful of evidence of her larceny as well as a clear threat against the life of her daughter.

With no choice, J donned the Red Hood. At first it went against everything she had been trying so hard to do; not to hurt people, or do anything bad, just keep herself in line. But, she couldn't deny...there was a certain freedom to it. When she donned the mask, she could be anyone she wanted, and no one would be able to tie what she did back to her.

Slowly, the guilt began to fade away. And J started to get ideas.

J adored the merry mischief that the Hoods would occasionally get into. Sometimes their plans were rigid (often defined by the person paying Red Hood One), but, occasionally, they were allowed to do whatever the hell they wanted. It was these times that J shined amongst the Hoods, as her plans were chaotic and nonsensical and drew in the people who also saw being a Hood as a chance at freedom. She eventually began to outshine Red Hood One, and would start to hold meetings with other Hoods in secret.

J began to wonder: what was the point of only having this sort of chaos contained to small bursts? So many people she knew - herself included - had been freed by chaos and madness. And she had seen firsthand the changes it could bring when the Hoods struck. Being paid for what they did didn't sit right with her; the nonsense of life should be a gift bestowed upon for free.

He had begun to sink deeper in the Red Hood ideals and lifestyle, and in turn started to neglect his normal one. He stopped stealing money, stopped putting effort into his job, and generally just...stopped being a person altogether. Being out of the mask felt like he was playing pretend now.

This did have one consequence that devastated him, though. His daughter, his only tether to normality, was taken away from him due to his accidental neglect in his ever-growing madness. This was the final thing to push J over the edge.

J had decided, then, that nothing in life mattered. It was a lesson she decided to teach the rest of Gotham - the only thing above all was madness, and chaos, and all of the things people locked deep inside themselves. J had already become popular amongst the Red Hoods, and so she finally took the mantle of Red Hood One by killing her predecessor. With her new title, she lead a new era of Hoods, ones who performed nonsensical crimes who had no pattern other than what caused the most disruption or destruction as possible. She was determined to paint the city mad.

When her and her Hoods were hitting Ace Chemicals, they were interrupted by Batman - who was a relatively new hero at the time. He had not known yet that the entire chemical plant was dangerously unstable, and as he engaged Red Hood One, the railing under their feet began to break. During their fight, it eventually gave way, and while Batman was able to cling to the edge and save himself, J wasn't so lucky.

After his accident in the chemical plant, J gave up completely the mask of the Red Hood. Now he had one burned permanently into his entire body. He took the moniker of the Joker, after a nickname he'd gained during his time as a Red Hood, and he's still deadset on showing Gotham the innate absurdness and chaotic meaninglessness of life.

....At least, that's what Bruce has pieced together. Who knows if any of it's the truth?