Ever wonder how Jack Nicholson became the Clown Prince of Crime? We have to thank Warner Bros.' desire to bring a "darker, edgier" Batman to the big screen ... and "The Shining."

Here's a bit of Overlook Hotel lore you may not have heard before. Back in 1980, producer Michael E. Uslan was mulling over the cinematic incarnation of the Dark Knight and came across a publicity still of Jack Nicholson in "The Shining." He started doodling over it, and voila! Gotham City's most notorious criminal.

Audiences would get a load of Jack as the Joker nine years later in Tim Burton's "Batman" and Uslan would go on to serve as a producer on pretty much every single Batman-related film project to come out of Warner Bros. Check out the drawing that jump-started one of the most lucrative WB franchises of all time below, and thanks to Retronaut for the find.