The People’s Joker, a hilarious trans riff on DC characters, shut down over ‘rights issues’

Polygon’s team was on-the-ground at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2022. They reported on horror, comedy and action movies that are expected to dominate cinematic discourse as we move into the awards season. This review was published in conjunction with the film’s TIFF premiere.

“This Movie is not illegal. I just said that to get you to come.” So says Vera Drew, the writer-director-star-effects artist behind the queer Batman movie The People’s Joker. But before the film’s premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, Warner Bros. served a cease-and-desist order against the film anyway. The film was subsequently canceled from subsequent festivals, leaving no hope for the future. The People’s Joker in doubt.

Vera’s vision of DC Comics’ signature villain the Joker as a metaphor for the trans experience certainly should be covered by fair use and parody under the First Amendment, which protects creators’ right to use what’s now known as “existing IP” for comic effect. The key here is that a parody has to “significantly transform” that IP to make it clear that it isn’t an official release from the rights owner — not a problem when it comes to Vera’s wholly unique film.

Although fanfiction may seem unlikely to be used for autobiography, it is a great vehicle. But given how personal the relationship can get between fans and the pop culture they love, it makes sense that Vera, a passionate fan of the Bat-verse, would use the Joker’s character and lore to tell the story of her own transformation from a failed improv comedian into a gloriously unhinged trans agent of comedic chaos. The People’s Joker might even be called an act of comedic terrorism, if it wasn’t so damn sincere.

The movie started when a friend of Vera’s sent her $12 to make “the Vera Drew cut of Todd Phillips’ Joker,” an editing project that eventually turned into an ambitious crowdsourced production. Vera issued a call in 2020 to comedians and animators for her new web series. Vera Drew on Hot TopicsShe also described the in The People’s Joker’s post-screening Q&A at TIFF as existing solely “to get me sponsored by Hot Topic” so she can finally live out her dream of being a goth girl in her 30s.

Introducing the project in a YouTube video called “Welcome to The People’s Joker,” Vera asked viewers to send her snippets of themselves and their friends performing as Batman characters, promising she would incorporate them into her “trans coming-of-age story.” The film stars Vera in the story of her gender transition, “using Harley Quinn and The Joker as analogues for the gender experience.”

Numerous people replied. Combined with satirical in-universe TV segments — the most popular TV show in Vera’s Gotham City is a show called Suicide Cop — and green-screen footage shot in Vera’s home, the results were composited into The People’s Joker. Vera joked at the Q&A, “Obviously, I’m a maximalist.” Her film is a riot of visual styles, from classic 2D animation to hand-drawn backdrops of the abandoned theme park where her Joker gets her start as a performer to demented NPCs straight out of a funhouse version of The Sims. Key epiphanies in her protagonist’s life are illustrated with elaborately constructed psychedelic fractals that got applause from audience members for their audacity and artistry. These combine with deliberately crude 8-bit animations that replace expensive special effects, turning the film’s DIY origins into a brain-breaking punchline.

Vera Drew’s day job is at Abso Lutely Productions, the production company behind absurdist anti-comedy TV shows like Amazing Show by Tim and Eric, Great Job!,Nathan is for You, And Eric Andre Show. She also directed the most recently completed season of Cinema.Tim Heidecker, Bob Odenkirk, and Scott Aukerman make a guest appearance in the film. They provide a good example for how humor can be used in this movie through their absurdist comedy.

Tim and Eric regular David Liebe Hart plays a major role as Ra’s al Ghul, reimagined here as the guru of an exploitative improv school called UCB — the only legal path to performing comedy in Vera’s version of Gotham City. Saturday Night Live cast member Sarah Sherman plays SNL Lorne Michaels is reimagined as Lorne, the producer. He’s a Lego-type character with hot-dog legs who falls down stairs naked after falling on a banana peel. L.A. comedian Nathan Faustyn, a longtime friend of Vera’s, co-stars as the Penguin, a supportive friend (and alcoholic comedian) who encourages Vera/Joker to come out as trans.

The film isn’t entirely a comedy in-joke, however — which is good, because the story of Vera/Joker’s “anti-comedy” career is the most straightforward and least memorable aspect of the film. Podcasts and documentary about this art form will have lengthy discussions on the roles of comedians in telling the truth between Joker, the Penguin. Comedic stories of transgender coming-of-age, especially ones that involve the person falling in a vat full of feminizing hormones are rarer. Dedicated “to mom and Joel Schumacher,” The People’s Joker is also a sincere exploration of Vera’s journey toward self-realization, beginning with her childhood as a “miserable little girl” trapped in a boy’s body in Smallville.

The main character’s deadname is bleeped out whenever someone says it out loud, a humorous sign that this is a trans-made production. The film’s exploration of her relationship with her mother puts a Band-Aid of humor over real pain. At one point, Vera/Joker and her mom have a screaming match at a cafe, yelling, “You’re mentally ill!” “No, you’re mentally ill!” at each other. As it should, TIFF had a lot of fun with the joke.

Vera/Joker narrates much of the film in a Harley Quinn outfit, popping in for tongue-in-cheek “You might be wondering how I got here” asides that epitomize her witty, withering sense of humor. They are complemented by sincere tributes. Batman stories like Hush! The Dark Knight Returns, and yes, Todd Phillips’ Joker: Vera/Joker is addicted to a laughing gas prescribed to her in childhood by a doctor trying to suppress her trans identity, and she does dance down a 2D rendering of the famous “Joker stairs” once her transformation is complete.

TIFF image

The character also has an emotionally abusive romance with “Mr. J,” a trans male version of the Jared Leto version of Joker from David Ayer’s 2016 take on Suicide Squad. One of the most surreal, quintessentially Vera Drew moments in the film comes when Vera/Joker and Mr. J lie in bed telling each other about their childhoods, rendering sincere gender trauma into absurdist comedy by virtue of face paint and a “Damaged” forehead tattoo. The film culminates in a deeply odd but moving musical number, where Vera/Joker wishes for just “one happy memory” from her childhood from a fairy puppet named Mx. Myxzyx.

Peter Kuplowsky is a TIFF Midnight Madness programer and has been a strong supporter. The People’s Joker. An anonymous cast member said that Kuplowsky decided to defy the injunction by the film not getting even one public viewing.

Warner Bros.’ cease-and-desist order came hours before the film was set to premiere, and at TIFF, the cast and crew described a stressful, uncertain leadup to the film’s midnight premiere on Sept. 13 — which, if they can’t get the film’s legal issues sorted out, may end up being its only public screening ever. Which would be regrettable — in an age where corporate IP has become a de facto religion in global cinema culture, The People’s JokerIt’s a Molotov cocktail movie with an outrageous point of view. And it’s hilarious, too.

For the moment, subsequent TIFF screenings have been canceled, and the film’s future is unclear. It had been scheduled to screen at several festivals, including Fantastic Fest and Beyond Fest later this September. Vera was looking for distributors to help her film. It’s a tougher task. But she’s clearly smart and savvy about her public image. With luck, she’ll be able to spin the inevitable publicity around the injunction to her advantage. If she fails, she may have to let the film out on the public like the Joker.