'Joker' just unveiled its first teaser at CinemaCon, and the hype is real

Like so many comic book movies, Todd Phillips' Joker has been shrouded in mystery.

But at CinemaCon Tuesday, we were finally allowed a peek behind the curtain — and what we saw might surprise you.

Phillips, on stage to introduce the first teaser trailer, acknowledged the rumor and speculation that's surrounded his project. "There's been a lot of chatter about what this film is and what it isn't, and most of it hasn't been very accurate," he said.

Setting the record straight, however, might be harder than it looks. Phillips recalled an exchange with a Warner Bros. executive in which he was asked to describe the movie, and found that he couldn't.

He did offer up a genre for the film: "It's a tragedy."

So far, so much marketing speak -- except the teaser footage actually delivered on much of what he was promised.

The teaser, which drops online Wednesday, begins with glimpses of Arthur's life that grow increasingly darker as it goes on: Arthur (Joaquin Phoenix) walking around Gotham City, Arthur at home with his mother (Frances Conroy), Arthur interacting with others (including Zazie Beetz and Brian Tyree Henry), Arthur cackling loudly by himself in public.

"Smile" plays as we see Arthur getting kicked around by the world -- he's beat up by thugs, hit by a car, mocked loudly and frequently. His laugh, and a shot of Arkham Asylum, serve as reminders of where this is all headed.

"I used to think that my life was a tragedy," Arthur says in voiceover, as we see him dying his hair green and transforming himself into the Joker we know. "But now I realize it's a comedy."

All in all, it proved a tremendously effective introduction to a new version of a character we've seen in countless iterations already -- and I say that as someone who was initially skeptical of the whole endeavor.

I don't think I was the only one taken by it, either.

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Sure, at this point, no one's actually seen Joker -- just a really well-cut trailer for it. But if the idea here was to move the conversation from confusion and doubt to unbridled excitement? Mission accomplished.

Joker arrives Oct. 4.