Despite the lack of a Batman, audience exhaustion with comic book movies, and a story that often seemed overly imitative of Martin Scorsese’s work, Todd Phillips’ 2019 joker was a certified hit whose box office success (and two Oscar wins) all but ensured that there would be a sequel. Folie à DeuxPhillips’ new musical joker sequel, it feels like it knows exactly how willing people were to believe in the dark power fantasy of the first film. Folie à Deux remembers the way theatergoers could see joker‘s Arthur Fleck as a disgruntled victim of the system driven to murder by a deeply broken society.

But instead of trying to find more meaning in the Joker’s madnessFolie à Deux lights up the metaphorical house to take a much more negative critical look at the central anti-villain and hero worship culture. It’s a solid enough pitch that could have made for an interesting comic series. But as a movie Folie à Deux is a bogus mess that barely manages to express its handful of good ideas.

Joker: Folie à Deux continues the story of failed comedian Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix), the most infamous inmate at Gotham City’s Arkham Asylum. After two years of being locked up and systematically abused by Arkham’s team of guards led by Jackie Sullivan (Brendan Gleeson), Arthur has become a smileless, thin shell of his former self. Although people finally want to hear Arthur tell jokes, it’s hard for him to make sense knowing that District Attorney Harvey Dent (Harry Lawtey) will push for the death penalty at his upcoming trial. But as much as Arthur would like to reflect on his fate in quiet solitude, the Joker’s celebrity makes it impossible for him to ever have a moment of peace.

After joker and the framing of Arthur as a murderous folk heroFolie à Deux It feels like Phillips is taking a step back to portray him as a man struggling with what it really means to have spawned a nascent movement based on ideas he doesn’t necessarily embody. Everyone saw Arthur, in clown make-up, photographing a late night talk show host on national television – a key moment from joker cleverly told Folie à Deux‘s first animated short titled ‘Me and My Shadow’.

For many people, that shot cemented the Joker as a concept that expressed their own frustrations with the very same kinds of systems that failed Arthur. For Arthur’s lawyer Maryanne Stewart (Catherine Keener), playing the Joker as a separate identity feels like one of the few ways they could win their case. But Folie à Deux uses Arthur’s catatonic depression to highlight what his path to stardom really was: a killing spree that landed him in prison and well on his way to being executed by the state.

While Gotham stories are always ready for whimsical plot twists, there is a matter-of-fact quality to them Folie à Deux that will likely be a disappointment to fans expecting theatrical bombast. The film is essentially a courtroom drama about a defendant on the verge of losing a case that appears to be stacked against him. But you sense that Phillips is trying to liven things up and tie things together Folie à Deux‘s loose threads on fame as a monstrous phenomenon while introducing Harleen “Lee” Quinzel’s (Lady Gaga) version.

After years of DC trying to evolve the Harley Quinn brand beyond her roots as the Joker’s girlfriend, Folie à Deux brings her back to most of the basics. Here she’s just an inmate in Arkham and not a psychiatrist working for the city, but she still brings color and – most importantly – music to Arthur’s life. On the surface, casting Lady Gaga to sing Hollywood standards as one of the most iconic and subversive characters DC has ever featured was a brilliant decision. But Gaga’s Lee has largely been relegated to the periphery of Folie à Deux‘s story in a way that makes it feel like Phillips doesn’t really know what to do with her other than have her take Phoenix’s Joker on stage in some musical fantasy sequences.

There are some things that work wonderfully Folie à Deux’‘s take on Harley and Joker as a couple, as are the many allusions to the way her star has often overshadowed his in the grand scheme of DC Comics IP. During their escapes from reality — one of which is styled as a kind of variety hour — Arthur’s fear that Lee might be more in love with the idea of ​​the Joker than he is manifests as stealing the show as fans applaud. The clowns’ fantasies help Folie à Deux better illustrate Arthur’s insecurity, but also his hope that Lee could be the first person to truly understand him. But the film spends so little time really building Lee into a concrete presence that you never get a real sense of what she gets out of their relationship.

If Folie à DeuxThe band’s musical numbers were genuinely entertaining, which may not be a big deal, but for the most part they are so lacking in whimsy or any sense of fun that it’s hard to ever get swept up in them. They’re also over almost as soon as they start. The film then immediately drops you back into Arthur’s bleak reality, from which there never seems to be a viable escape route.

If joker was therefore a dark comedy Folie à Deux is his brooding, tragic twin brother with a frown on his face. It’s a sour note to end this franchise on, but a great reminder that all comedians bomb in the end.