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Heath Ledger once said: “There is no Yoda, there’s no one who points you in the right direction. You’ve got to figure that out by yourself,” about his work. It’s the same instinct that had him leaving school at sixteen to chase acting entirely on his own terms.

By the time he built the Joker, he’d taken that instinct further than almost anyone would. Locked in a London hotel for a month, keeping a diary, he described landing “in the realm of a psychopath, someone with very little to no conscience towards his acts.” Months later, still working, he told a reporter he’d slept two hours the night before, even with medication.

Heath Ledger passed away on January 22, 2008, twenty eight years old, found in his Manhattan apartment. The cause was accidental: six prescription medications combined, among them the opioids oxycodone and hydrocodone, alongside sedatives meant to help him sleep.

A year later his family stood on the Oscars stage to accept the award he never got to see. His sister said they were accepting it on behalf of his daughter.

What he said about why he did any of it in the first place still holds: “I only do this because I’m having fun. The day I stop having fun, I’ll just walk away.”

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