Joker Begins ... my DC movies viewing order

A quick aside before we get to the heat of the meat: longtime "readers" of this blog may have noticed that I’ve gone from ranting about minor, inconsequential things like the St Kilda Schoolgirl and Global Warming, to mainly just setting out my versions of viewing and listening orders of some of my favourite things. The main reason for this is that something happened a little over a year ago that I genuinely have every right to rant about ... for once ... but it’s actually so distressing I just can’t (at least, not yet), and so instead I’m just putting my head down ... and putting stuff in order. 

Which brings me to this month’s dumb post: Something that can distress everyone - The DC movie universe (also called the DCEU (or "DC Extended Universe") and "The Worlds Of DC" (pronounced "TWO-D(i)C", according to my bois at The Weekly Planet)). 

I finally watched the Joker movie recently, like a billion other dollars, and it was fine. And then I went home and watched a good Joker movie – The Dark Knight (apart from being a sick burn, that really is a cracking movie and is, in fact, what got me into this Batman guy in the first place (prior to that I was a paid-up Marvel geek)). 

This beer is also a bit better than the Joker movie...

The main problem with the Joker movie is that, although it’s a good character study of a particular person having a breakdown and dressing up like a clown and lashing out because society, it’s not really the Joker. 

But Heath Ledger’s Joker is a GREAT Joker. 

A great Joker's good, but an amazing Joker - now that would be great!

Still, I actually think these movies can work together, if we assume that Arthur Fleck’s Joker is a “proto-Joker”, who gets the ball rolling, and then later on Heath Ledger’s Joker also dresses up like a clown but knocks it up a notch like Elzar (and is much more menacing, chaotic and, importantly, anonymous). 

So, although, it’s been explicitly stated that the Joker movie is stand-alone, separate to any other DC movie properties, I think it works as a semi-prequel to the Dark Knight trilogy. And THEN, the Dark Knight trilogy works as a semi-prequel to the later DCEU. 
Again, there are minor inconsistencies (different Jokers, slightly different Wayne murders*) BUT Joker has a young Bruce Wayne, the Dark Knight trilogy has a Bruce Wayne coming of age and then “retiring”, and then the DCEU has a much older Bruce Wayne (who must have decided to come back to Gotham at some point, and reverse his second “official” death). And I know that some say (like, um, Zack Snyder...) that the Dark Knight trilogy's gritty and realistic Nolanverse can't be in the same fantastical universe as that of the DCEU, but Man of Steel makes it clear that the world was kind of normal before Superman is outed from the alien closet (despite hints that maybe there are other metahuman goings-on that people were previously unaware of). Plus Christopher Nolan is an executive producer on Man of Steel! Not to mention the fact that including the Dark Knight trilogy lifts the average quality of the whole DC franchise...
BAM!!    
So, without further ado, here is my DCEU movie viewing order (with some spurious explanations where necessary). Note that I haven’t included the prequel comics, etc, because you don’t care. 
Feel free to ignore it along with my MCU and X-Men viewing orders!

The official and only DC movie viewing order 

Joker (Note: the only real problem including this here is that this movie’s Thomas Wayne ends up looking IDENTICAL to the senator in The Dark Knight Rises, but otherwise this pretty much works. Oh yeah, and Thomas Wayne can't be that much of a dick, Arthur must be mistaken...) 

Batman Begins 

Gotham Knight – This is definitely in the Nolanverse, taking place between Batman Begins and The Dark Knight (e.g., it includes Detective Ramirez, the beginnings of Captain Gordon’s Major Crimes Unit, and the gang war between ‘The Russian’ and Sal Maroni). It also includes Jonathan Crane (who hasn’t been seen since the Arkham breakout in Batman Begins), Killer Croc (who was being experimented on by Crane – and this does not appear inconsistent with Suicide Squad), and Deadshot**. 

Gotham Tonight – TV series on The Dark Knight blu-ray special features – 6 short episodes like a news/entertainment show in the 5 weeks leading up to The Dark Knight, giving a bit of an introduction to the characters and themes that show up in The Dark Knight. Includes some of the actual characters (played by the actors) being interviewed, including Sal Maroni and Harvey Dent. 

The Dark Knight 

The Dark Knight Rises 

Green Lantern *** 

Man of Steel 

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (Ultimate Edition only, please)

Suicide Squad (refers to events in B v S)

Wonder Woman – The start and end take place in the present, but the majority takes place around World War I (but I still like it here). Also, there's a bonus epilogue on the blu-ray, where Etta Candy has a mission to recover a Mother Box hidden under a World War I battlefield (likely the one hidden by the humans centuries ago, as then seen in Justice League). 

Justice League 

Aquaman – very brief references to the events of Justice League (when Mera talks to Arthur about him defeating Steppenwolf). 

Shazam – Includes an almost-cameo by Superman, and Freddy has an honest-to-goodness Batarang (along with many other references to the other superheroes of the DC universe, including merch). Also, the ‘Superhero Hooky’ motion comic (on the blu-ray) is a new story post-Shazam. 

After that, we'll soon have (among others) Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn), which I'm really looking forward to, Wonder Woman 1984 and, of course, the new The Batman movie, which might throw all of this out (especially if there’s a black Jim Gordon and Catwoman) but let’s cross that bat-bridge when we come to it…

* It could be assumed that every depiction of the Waynes getting murdered (e.g., in Joker, Batman Begins, Batman v Superman, etc, etc, ad infinitum) is just someone's possibly flawed memory (a child, a Joker) that may or may not be entirely correct! 

** One of the main problems with including the Nolanverse with the DCEU seems to be one important element of this slightly-canon piece, since this Deadshot certainly appears to be a white guy (though I just explain it away due to the lighting … and the fact that it’s a cartoon …) 

*** Wait, wait – hear me out! I know this is technically not part of the DCEU, but it still fits easily here (and the Lanterns have been canonically teased in Justice League). It includes Amanda Waller (and could even serve as a bit of her origin, including shots of her (dead?) husband and son, and the reasoning behind why she might want a taskforce to take down alien threats…), and the Parallax climax (Climarallax?) could have been explained away by the authorities as a weather event? Waller says that finding Abin Sur’s body is also the first proof the humans have of alien life (meaning it has to be before Man of Steel). Plus Taika Waititi's in it! Scott Mendelson also reckons it works well as part of the DCEU, and means the next Green Lantern movie (e.g., Green Lantern Corps) can get straight to business and not re-hash things...