Joaquin Phoenix s supervillain-to-be has it rough in a new trailer for Joker posted Wednesday. (Watch it above.)

Arthur Fleck (Phoenix) gets beaten, publicly humiliated and reprimanded by a mom in a dark preview without comic book flourishes.

All I have are negative thoughts, Fleck tells a counselor.

No kidding.

Director Todd Phillips take on how Fleck becomes Joker tracks him from a struggling comic who idolizes a talk show host played by Robert De Niro, to a vicious bozo who torments Gotham City. Especially Batman.

This will not be the last Joker movie ever made, Phillips told the Los Angeles Times . It might be the last one Joaquin and I do, but someone else is going to come along and do another one, just like with Spider-Man. So if you dont like this one, dont worry itll get reinvented again.

Joker opens Oct. 4.