Far-flung from most Joker incarnations, the Clown Prince of Crime that appears in Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight uses makeup to achieve his signature appearance instead of it being due to an accident. Up until that point, The Joker owed his pasty-faced complexion, green hair and red lips to an unfortunate fall into a vat of chemicals that permanently disfigured him. However, by the film’s very nature, the villain's penchant for wearing makeup seemingly implies that he never took his famous tumble in the chemical plant from the comics. Alternatively, he covers up his scarred visage with face paint and delivers two infamous speeches full of contradicting and unreliable information to explain the origin of his physical condition.

In The Dark Knight, the Joker terrorizes both Gambol, a Gotham City mob boss, and Rachel Dawes, Bruce Wayne’s childhood friend and love interest, with conflicting explanations for his facial scars. Considering that the Nolanverse Batman films are grittier and more grounded in realism than Jack Nicholson and Cesar Romero’s takes on the character, the Joker skirting the truth around his general appearance lends to the state of his mental health. The character’s makeup design is wholly rooted in his unstable psychological state as opposed to Nicholson and Romero’s neat, colorful and impeccably painted presentation.

RELATED: How Tim Burton Broke Batman’s Big Rule - and Sent Him on a Killing Spree

Heath Ledger as Joker in The Dark Knight Rises

In a conversation with IGN, makeup artist John Caglione Jr. states that he developed a “real, not so comic bookey approach to the makeup." He explains “What would it be if this guy slept in his makeup? You know, this psychopath didn't spruce up his makeup for two or three weeks, and he never changes his clothes... You think of a clown's makeup, and for the most part, they're pretty detailed with sharp lines, but this had to be the opposite of that."

Before the theatrical release of The Dark Knight, controversy emerged about the face paint and how Joker’s new appearance possibly meant that his origin deviated from the source material. In the 1951 comic, Batman Vol. 1 #168, “The Man Behind the Red Hood,” the Joker's rebirth as Batman’s arch-nemesis apparently started when he was a lab worker turned thief who stole a million dollars from the Monarch Playing Card Company. To conceal his identity, he donned a costume, took on the moniker of the “Red Hood” and equipped an oxygen tube to his hood so that he could sneak out of their facility through a pool of chemical waste and survive. However, his daring escape permanently altered his skin, hair and lips unbeknownst to him.

Moreover, like Ledger’s iteration’s conflicting stories in the Nolanverse, his origin story isn’t exactly consistent in the comics either. In Batman: The Killing Joke, the Joker quits his job at Ace Chemicals to try his hand at stand-up comedy but bombs. In this version of the villain's backstory, he has a wife named Jeannie with a baby on the way. In need of fast cash to support his family, the Joker makes a deal with local criminals to break into his old job to rob them. Like in Batman Vol. 1 #168, he wears the Red Hood outfit to disguise himself when tragedy suddenly strikes. Jeannie dies in an electrical accident, but the show must go on, and The Joker -- increasingly unhinged --continues with his plans to rob Ace Chemicals. After a shoot-out with the Gotham City police on site, his partners in crime die. Then, to make matters worse, Batman shows up to stop him. In a wayward attempt at eluding capture, The Joker dives into an adjacent lake to the factory. Unfortunately, the polluted body of water is full of hazardous chemicals that give him his famous appearance.

RELATED: Batman Returns: Does Catwoman Really Have Nine Lives?

Again, like in the Nolanverse, The Joker from the comics is an unreliable narrator. On the subject of his genesis, he states, “Sometimes I remember it one way, sometimes another... if I'm going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice!" Despite this fact, many Batman fans went into the theater expecting to be disappointed with the Joker’s portrayal in The Dark Knight because it didn’t appear to align with previous versions of the character. News of Ledger’s casting also shed doubt on the film’s credibility before its release, as people did not believe that he could embody the larger-than-life villain based on his prior roles.

Nevertheless, the late actor proved the naysayers wrong and crushed his performance, including the controversy surrounding his makeup in the film. Ultimately, the decision to go with a more realistic approach to the Gotham City villain better matches the tone of the celebrated trilogy. Face paint or not, Nolan’s Batman movies have set the pace for all future iterations of the character. Though it indicates that The Dark Knight may have changed a key part of the Joker’s origin, most fans agree that Ledger’s portrayal is the ultimate Clown Prince of Crime to this day.

KEEP READING: The Batman's New Trailer Indicates The Riddler Knows Bruce Wayne's Dark Secret