After being declared not guilty, Punchline is poised to use all of her resources to become Gotham’s queen of crime.
WARNING: The following article contains spoilers from “Punchline: Chapter 13” in The Joker #13, on sale now.
The verdict finally came in for Punchline’s trial and she has been found not guilty. In “Punchline: Chapter 13” from The Joker #13 (by Sam Johns, James Tynion IV, Belen Ortega, Luis Guerrerro, Becca Carey), Punchline is officially exonerated from the crimes she committed during the Joker War.
As bad as that is, odds are strong that things are about to get worse. Behind the scenes, aside from working hard to change the public’s perception of her, Punchline has also been building up her own power base, becoming Gotham City’s latest crime lord. The thing is, she may not be intending to share it with the Joker when she gets out, setting up her own future state.
In Future State: Gotham #3 (by Joshua Williamson, Dennis Culver, Giannis Milonogiannis, ALW’s Troy Peteri), a news report proclaimed that Punchline was not only the Joker’s ex-girlfriend in the future, but had become a criminal mastermind in her own right, separate from him. If this is true, then it paints a different picture for Punchline’s plans once she is free to go.
She has been acquiring criminal assets and control over a major gang while in prison, as well as manipulating her devoted followers, who see her as some kind of victim. By the time she sets foot onto the streets, Punchline will be in command of one of the greatest criminal factions in Gotham. One that she may not be inclined to share with the Joker. After all, the entire argument for her case was that she was a victim of the Joker. To this end, she needed to denounce him loudly, publicly, and often. Even if the Joker does not believe what she is saying, there has been no indication that Punchline will return to her boyfriend once free.
Every contact she has, while the flavoring screams “Joker”, are all loyal to her instead. The following she has amassed with the public love her, agree that she is a victim here, and once she’s out, they will do whatever she tells them to. It all belongs to her, not him.
So the question to ask is: Why would Punchline betray the Joker? The simplest is that Punchline is an opportunist. Everything she’s done has been to climb the ladder higher and assist in establishing herself as someone noteworthy to be emulated. Ambition can be a powerful motivator and Punchline has already proven to be cut from a very different cloth than Harley Quinn, reveling in her villainy in a way the Joker’s first girlfriend never did.
If that isn’t the reason, it’s possible she may feel that the Joker has betrayed her. She displayed a deep devotion to him during the Joker War, believing he was a genius redefining society. However, in the aftermath of the war, not only did the Joker run away without her, he didn’t even bother to try freeing her from prison. Punchline might have gotten sick of waiting and decided to handle things herself, using her seething feelings towards her soon-to-be-ex as the driving force of her case for freedom. If so, then this is the opening act to their inevitable, and probably violent, breakup when Punchline is ready to strike out on her own.
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