The Joker's Robbery of Gotham National Bank

The Joker's Robbery of Gotham National Bank
General Information
Location:	Gotham National Bank
Media:	The Dark Knight
Result:	The following occur: Five of the Joker's thugs, Dopey, Chuckles, Happy, Grumpy, and the Bus Driver killed. The Manager of Gotham National Bank was gassed by an unidentified chemical. The Joker escaped with the money.

The Joker's Robbery of Gotham National Bank was Joker's first major attack on Gotham.

Plan

A textbook "take-over" robbery, Joker's plan called for three masked thugs (including himself) to enter the bank's lobby and subdue the employees, security guards, and clients, while two others swung onto the roof from an adjacent office building, one to disable the silent alarm before it could be tripped, and another to open the vault.

Unknown to any of the thugs, the Joker had also arranged a sequence of double-crosses, that would end with him being the only one left alive at the same moment the robbery was completed.

Execution

Happy and Dopey arrived on the roof, and Dopey, after disabling the alarm, was shot in the back by Happy, who made his way to the vault.

The Joker, disguised as Bozo, Grumpy, and Chuckles stormed into the bank lobby to pacify those within. This included an ingenious touch by which the Joker placed grenades into the terrified customers' hands and pulled the pins, ensuring that they could do nothing with their hands except hold on.

In a surprise move Chuckles was killed when the Bank Manager, a mob employee, opened fire with a shotgun. Grumpy was wounded, while the Joker shot the manager in the legs. Grumpy then went to the vault, which Happy had opened despite the hidden electric security system. Grumpy shot Happy as ordered, and loaded several duffel bags with the cash inside.

Believing that he had been set up, Grumpy pointed his gun at Bozo, but was run over by a school bus driven through a wall. The Joker and the bus driver loaded the cash into the bus, then Joker calmly shot the driver and began to leave, but couldn't resist showing his face to the manager and the security cameras.

The Joker then drove the bus away, merging smoothly into a line of other school buses, just as the GCPD started arriving from the opposite direction.

Aftermath

At some point later, Joker used the money he gained in the robbery to create his custom suit. In large part because of the events of the robbery, the mafia, due to Gambol's anger towards Joker, was strongly reluctant to hire him to kill the Batman, with the Chechen being the only one suggesting they hire him. It wasn't after Lau squealed on the entire mob that they finally hired him to kill Batman in exchange for "half" of the Mob's remaining money. Afterwards, Joker literally burned the money he earned with the Chechen's cigar when demonstrating that he doesn't actually care for money, implying that his earlier backstab plan was largely for his own amusement.

Trivia

• This clip was played at Comic-Con.
• The Joker's bank robber mask is available with the Best Buy version of the DVD (or Blu-ray) and the DC Collectible Joker.
• The masks of Joker's Thugs are available as Crime Scene Evidence with the Movie Masters Gotham City Thug figure.
• They include, The Joker's mask, the bus driver's mask, a mask called Tears of Joy (the mask of the figure itself and the mask of Grumpy), a mask called Kiss of Death (mask of Happy), and a mask called Tears of Anger (Chuckles' mask).
• The robbery scene was inspired by Michael Mann's epic Heat (1995).
• The video games, PAYDAY: The Heist (2011) and it's sequel, PAYDAY 2 (2013) are influence by the robbery scene as well as the movie Heat.