There's a little over a week to go before
Joker arrives in theaters, and, as we've now told you on multiple occasions, there's a lot of controversy surrounding the DC Comics adaptation. There are concerns that the movie not only glorifies the villain, but also the violence he carries out on those he believes have wronged him.
Now, director Todd Phillips has once again weighed in on the backlash, and after acknowledging the concerns of those who were affected by the Aurora shootings, the filmmaker made it clear that he doesn't believe
Joker is any more concerning that something like
John Wick (which features the lead character gunning down hundreds of people over the course of two hours).
"I mean, I think that Aurora is obviously a horrible, horrible situation but even that is not something you blame on the movie. Quite frankly, if you do your own research about Aurora that gentleman wasn't even going in as Joker, That was misreported, his hair was dyed red he was having, obviously, a mental breakdown and there's something horrifying about that but it wasn't related to it outside of the fact that it happened at a movie theater. This is not the thing that the movie is trying to represent.
"The movie still takes place in a fictional world. It can have real-world invocations, options, but it's a fictional character in a fictional world that's been around for 80 years. The one that bugs me more is the toxic white male thing when you go, oh I just saw John Wick 3. He's a white male who kills 300 people and everybody's laughing and hooting and hollering. Why does this movie get held to different standards? It honestly doesn't make sense to me."
It's an interesting argument, but one that doesn't really add up in some ways. John Wick is obviously a very violent movie, but its lead is a hitman and not a dangerous sociopath who is looking to take out his frustrations on a society he believes has wronged him.
Right now, no one really seems to know what the right answer is or whether it's unfair that
Joker is being targeted. If, God forbid, something does happen, it's also hard to say what the solution would be; should The Joker be banned? Should movies featuring disturbed main characters not be allowed? Or should there be a committee who decides what we can and can't watch in theaters?
It's a complicated situation, and you can hear Phillips' comments in the player below: