The Symbolism of Joker and Folie a Deux

-The Mystic Shamanism of Arthur Fleck and the real reason for the audience backlash

Copyright © John R. Clarke 2024

The sequel to controversial 2019 multi award winning masterpiece ‘Joker’ by Warner Brothers Studios- the sequel that nobody wanted- is out and the reviews are in, and the reaction to Joker: Folie a Deux, is proving as polarising as the original.

The difference between the 2019 film and the sequel can be summed up as the first was art, and the sequel is arthouse.

photo courtesy of Warner Bros Studios

The first had a raw visceral power and resonated as a message with countless people across the world. Folie a Deux, the musical sequel starring Lady Gaga, appears in the early feedback and reviews to have missed the mark with the audience. I’m not going to spend any time here commenting on the acting or the production itself, the acting and production is top notch as you would expect.

I want to sing the symbols. I want to focus on the message of Joker, why it chimed so strongly that it was called ‘dangerous’ and ‘irresponsible’, and why Hollywood may be afraid of its own creation.

In this essay I am going to tease out the themes and symbols that have proven so resonant but are so elusive to the conscious mind, and why there is such an audience backlash to the message of the sequel.

‘Do you know what it’s like out there Murray? Do you ever even leave the studio?’

Joker 2019

In many ways, the success of Joker took everyone by surprise, including the creators themselves. Director Todd Phillips admitted that the film was never intended to be a blockbuster hit but rather a way to sneak a non-Joker script into the studio under the guise of a comic book movie. Phillips saw an opportunity to tell a deeply human story about alienation, mental illness, and society’s decay—one that had little in common with the typical superhero fare.

Yet, between the sharp, incisive script and the powerhouse performance by Joaquin Phoenix, and the merging with the Joker mythos, the result was something nobody anticipated. Phoenix’s portrayal of Arthur Fleck wasn’t just compelling; it was transformative. His descent into madness, mirrored in the cracking of his fragile psyche, struck a chord with audiences across the world. People saw something of themselves in Arthur’s struggle, something raw and painfully real. What was intended as a character study became a cultural moment, a film that captured the zeitgeist in ways Hollywood wasn’t prepared for.

They didn’t recognise what they had, what they had made. This only became apparent from the outpouring of love and admiration from an audience who were electrified by this rendition of Joker.

What Hollywood didn’t consider was how many people feel alienated and nobody cares. They feel alone and nobody cares. Their mental health is in tatters. Nobody cares. Like Thomas Wayne, Hollywood is self-absorbed, privileged, used to looking down on people who haven’t ‘made something of themselves.’

‘Do you think people like Thomas Wayne ever think about what it’s like to be the other guy? They don’t.

Joker, 2019

The irony in Joker lies in how it portrays power and privilege, particularly through characters like Thomas Wayne, who epitomize an elite class blind to the struggles of the masses. The film's reception revealed this divide even further, as the audience—by both Wayne’s and society’s standards—was seen as a crowd of "clowns." Yet, it is exactly this audience that connected so deeply with Arthur Fleck, because his story taps into universal, unconscious archetypes and the alchemical journey of transformation.

Arthur resonates not simply as a character, but as a symbol for those who feel overlooked and discarded by society. His descent into madness mirrors the alchemical nigredo—the blackening phase of destruction and rebirth. His transformation reflects something profoundly human, which is why so many people, dismissed by those "who have made something of their lives," found truth in his journey.

‘Those of us who have made something of our lives will look at those who haven’t as nothing but clowns’

Thomas Wayne

Joker unintentionally presents a perfect mirror image of the mystic's journey, but with its meaning reversed. In Western culture, we are taught to view a descent into darkness as a failure, as a collapse into madness. Yet, in the film, Arthur’s journey into the underworld is not a defeat—it is a twisted form of transformation. This runs counter to everything our culture tells us about sanity and madness.

The film blurs the line between madness and mysticism, exposing how society dictates which path a person is perceived to follow. In a world that values external success, Arthur’s descent is seen as madness, but had the context been different, it might have been understood as a profound spiritual awakening. Society plays the ultimate role in labelling someone a mystic or a madman, and Joker shines a harsh light on that distinction and the injustice inherent in it.

photo courtesy of Warner Bros Studios

Identity, Madness, and Society

‘The World Is A Stage’

Joker: Folie A Deux, 2024

Life may well be a stage, but we are cast in our roles long before we ever set foot upon it. From the moment we enter the world, the external forces of nationality, culture, sex, and class begin to shape us, imposing roles that define who we are expected to be. This pressure only grows as we age, shaping not just our actions but our very sense of self.

Yet without those roles, restrictive and toxic as they may be, who would we be? Without a single connection in the world, who would you be? More than we realise of our sense of identity comes not from within, but from learned behaviours and reactions thrust onto us from the world.

Arthur Fleck is an embodiment of this. From the start, his role was one of invisibility, rejection, and failure. There is no way for him to pass the external tests society requires to prove his worth. He is denied the opportunity to receive the validation that others take for granted, the kind that makes them feel valued. In response to this Arthur’s sense of self begins to fracture.

Laing argued that this ‘ontological insecurity’—the fundamental uncertainty about one’s existence and identity—lies at the heart of many cases of schizophrenia. His work emphasized how dysfunctional family dynamics, and by extension society, often play a significant role in driving individuals toward madness.

‘All of you, the system that knows so much, you decide what’s right or wrong, just as you decide what’s funny, or not’

Joker 2019

Arthur’s descent into madness reflects this dynamic perfectly. His breakdown is not due to some inherent flaw in himself but from the suffocating pressure to conform to a world that refuses to recognize him. His madness is shaped not by something within, but by an external world that denies his right to exist authentically.

If a haunting can be defined as the absence of something being so felt that it becomes a presence, then the Gotham that Arthur inhabits is haunted by love. It’s absence seeps through every scene, every bleak interaction, every act of violence and alienation.  

‘My whole life, I didn’t know that I really existed, but I do’.

Joker, 2019

Arthur, like Gotham, is haunted by the absence of love. He is a direct product of its absence, which can be felt profoundly throughout the movie. That lack, that absence, is itself an indictment against the society that treated him so callously, and that is not how society likes to see itself.

The Mythic Resonance of the Mother Identified Son

In ancient myth, figures like Achilles derived their sense of semi-divinity through their mothers, with Achilles himself raised by his mother. In fact, it was his mother that told him stories of his godlike heritage and set him on is path to glory.

Thetis was a sea goddess, and Achilles' semi-divine status came through her. According to the myth, Thetis dipped Achilles into the River Styx to make him invulnerable, except for his heel, where she held him. She was also deeply involved in his life and fate, often advising him and attempting to protect him from harm. In The Iliad, her influence is central, as she intervenes with the gods on Achilles' behalf.

In Arthur, we can see an almost perfect inversion of this mythic maternal relationship. Penny Fleck, far from intervening with the gods on Arthur’s behalf, instead exposes him to danger in the form of a violent partner. This negligence on Penny’s behalf results in making Arthur more vulnerable, in a mirror image of Thetis gifting Achilles with almost perfect invulnerability. Like Thetis, Penny tells Arthur stories about his father and his place in the world, but this tale is one of rejection. When she has the opportunity to positively reinforce Arthur’s dreams of becoming a comedian, she chooses instead to crush him. There is inappropriate emotional incest when Arthur washes her hair in the bath, in a strangely fractured, poisoned portrayal of a powerful woman connected with water.

Again, we see the journey of the mythic hero but inverted, through a dark glass, in the style that typifies Arthur’s story from beginning to end. As Jung famously noted, the closer we live to a mythic life, the closer we are to madness. Arthur’s life, in its tragic mythic proportions, mirrors this role, as his mother-identified sense of self both anchors and destroys him.

photo courtesy of Warner Bros Studios

Mad or Mystic: Who Decides? Not You

Madness—the behaviours and language society deems strange and unacceptable—has a mirror image, one that William James recognized as early as 1902. He observed that psychosis and mysticism are like identical twins, two sides of the same coin. In his view, one represented the ‘desirable’ path of mysticism, while the other was seen as "diabolical" madness. He sententiously remarked that “seraph and snake exist side by side.”

‘I’ve got nothing left to lose. My life is nothing but a comedy’

Joker 2019

But who gets to decide which is which?

You don’t. We don’t. Society does. Joker exposes just how thin that line really is, how easily one can fall from mystic to madman in the eyes of the world. It’s Michel Foucault’s ‘game of exclusion’ still at play—where society defines who fits within its norms and who must be cast out as the other.

Arthur Fleck’s transformation shows that true power can be found outside the roles society assigns to us. When you strip away those external identities—those mirrors through which we are told to see ourselves—you have the chance to forge a new self in the fire. To emerge transformed, something more. That’s alchemy. That’s shamanism.

It is, much, much harder to go from disorganised to organised, this is the psychiatric equivalent of time running backwards or sandcastles forming spontaneously in the air. It’s possible, it’s just extremely unlikely.

But that it what we saw with Arthur. We saw him become more. He was turning lead into gold, and we were here for it, even if it was through a dark mirror.

There are millions and millions of highly transmutable people in the world, both men and women, on the alchemical journey. Arthur Fleck is like a spark in the darkness around millions and millions of highly flammable individuals. So, it is the recognition of this that led to the accusations of the film being dangerous and irresponsible, even though these were not the conscious reasons given, it is this that underlies the criticism.

It is frightening to light a spark in the darkness and see millions of eyes, each with the flame reflecting back. But that is the purpose of art- to show us something, to make us really feel something. We are so used to being entertained that when art comes along, we almost can’t cope with it.

The House Always Wins: Folie a Deux

There is no doubt that Joker is a work of true art, a mirror into which people may gaze and see uncomfortable truths. It does this so effectively that initially critics recoiled from it: the great irony being that the biggest producer of synthetic reality and mass managing morality, Hollywood, has produced something real. The incredible, electrifying performance of Joaquim Phoenix brought Arthur to life as like with a bolt of lightning. This was a story told in symbols, acted to perfection, and perfectly produced with a mind blowing soundtrack.

‘being wrong can be dangerous, but being right, when society regards the majority’s falsehood as truth, can be fatal.’

Thomas Szasz, The Myth of Mental Illness

And so, we arrive at the sequel, the Folie A Deux, and we can see why it is that it is being rejected by anyone who resonated with the original. From the beginning, expectations, we could also say desire, for a sequel were low. Joker was so perfect, an incredible multi-faceted dark jewel of cinema that could- should? - stand as a solitaire.

This is where the perfect song of symbols is, alas, fumbled and dropped.

The Folie a Deux, or madness of two, is an empty rendition of the Hieros Gamos or alchemical wedding. This trope is so dear to Hollywood’s heart, but it has no place in this story in this way. (The story it belongs in is ‘Snow White’ subscribe to read more about the purpose of the alchemical wedding or Hieros Gamos). Arthur didn’t need to be activated by romance. He had already been activated by the shedding of his former self. The only progression for the story would be to see Joker enjoying causing chaos and taking his place in the world at the top of the stairs. The alchemical wedding or Hieros Gamos represents power gained through the divine union of the male and female polarities. This symbol does not fit with the story thus far and represents a giant step backwards in the alchemical journey. It is one that the audience find hard to swallow just as we cannot abide its exclusion in ‘Snow White’. The entire romance is, symbolically, pointless. It adds nothing and in fact detracts from the mystical journey so far.

We know- we feel- that the only progression of Arthur’s story is for him to power up the stairs and take his place among the elite. He has earned it. In his darkness he became a true shaman, and it was real, we saw it spread like fire around him.

We know what this symbolises even if Hollywood does not, even if we can’t give a name to it in this bleak and empty digital modern landscape.

The disappointment in the ending is a natural unconscious reaction to this misstep. Arthur’s sacrifice of himself and his ignominious end are disappointing.

We feel such a deep and utter disappointment and sense of nihilism because we have seen someone lit with the fire of alchemy, who has shed his false persona. who has become, through this painful process, more than he was before. Arthur already sacrificed his Self, we saw him burn in the fires of resurrection. So -what is this sequel trying to say?

The message seems to be the house always wins.

Arthur/Joker implodes. He is torn back down, betrayed in love, found guilty in his court case, and meets a meaningless violent end. Lady Gaga goes off back up the stairs and Arthur is pulled back under, pulled back to the bottom of the stairs and a sad fate.

Unlike the first movie, there is precious little symbolism to unpack beyond the visual representation of the stairs and the misplaced alchemical wedding. It is the same story, told again in a way that strips the meaning from the first with such consistent merciless brutality it can only be intentional.

Thought Arthur was going to complete his alchemical journey?

Not on Hollywood’s watch.

The message of Folie a Deux seems to be a joyless warning to those who, often with no choice, embark on the long dark night of the soul.

 And that is why people are reacting with high emotion and sense of betrayal to this sequel. There is no doubt that this sequel is designed as a repudiation of the first movie. How are we supposed to process that? I suggest with deep amusement, both at the fact that the original appears to be largely accidental and because there is no taking the message of the first film back.

We know the symbols, and we know them better than Hollywood ever will. Because we are more mythic than the privileged. We are madder.

We are powerful, and the symbolism of Joker held up a darkly shining mirror of the truth. Is Joker dangerous? Yes, in the way all art is dangerous. Audience reaction to art is like electricity hitting water. You don’t know what way it’s going to go, including back to the source. Perhaps that’s why we are offered so very little of it in this world.

With Joker we were given the real thing. With the sequel we have been given something different, something more in line with the usual Hollywood product. It’s very good, it’s well acted, it’s slick, but it’s not alchemical, because the symbol sequence no longer rings true. There is no meaning to it.

But what did we expect?

-That’s Hollywood baby!

                      John 😊

🎼Symbol Singer/Monger/Walla 🎶

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