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Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of one Harley Quinn)

Velocity said:
I don't see the Deadpool comparison, really. Harley doesn't break the 4th wall, she isn't immortal...
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They're both irreverent antiheroes, characters with a violent criminal history who are trying to redeem themselves. They're both characters without a filter on their speech and behavior, allowing them to be transgressive and absurd, and they both tend heavily toward humor and deconstructive or metatextual commentary on comic book tropes.

And yes, Harley breaking the fourth wall has been a thing ever since the debut of her self-titled series in the "New 52" continuity in 2011. And it sounds like she'll do so in the movie as well, at least in framing narration.
 
They're both irreverent antiheroes, characters with a violent criminal history who are trying to redeem themselves. They're both characters without a filter on their speech and behavior, allowing them to be transgressive and absurd, and they both tend heavily toward humor and deconstructive or metatextual commentary on comic book tropes.

And yes, Harley breaking the fourth wall has been a thing ever since the debut of her self-titled series in the "New 52" continuity in 2011. And it sounds like she'll do so in the movie as well, at least in framing narration.
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Exactly. Harley Quinn in the comics has just been female Deadpool since 2011. Even DC Rebirth didn't "fix" the character like it did with some (but unfortunately nowhere near all) DC characters.


crookeddy said:
So, in other words, you are going to really like this movie the way you did with Shazam?
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No, because I intensely hate the movie just for what they did to Cassandra Cain alone, much less the fact that I already didn't like Robbie as Quinn much in Suicide Squad, and the fact that the entire "Birds of Prey" concept has been completely fucked over. At least Shazam is still about a kid who uses a magic word to transform himself into a superhero. Harley Quinn: The Movie has ruined literally every character it touches. It looks like one of the most viscerally unpleasant superhero films ever made (second probably only to The Joker).

This might come as a surprise if you don't actually pay attention, but I hate a lot of movies, including superhero ones. This movie isn't "Shazam", its a shitty vanity project for a mediocre actress that is royally fucking over a great DC property because DC will never not be at least partially shit. For every Wonder Woman or Aquaman there has to be at least one Harley Quinn or Joker. Apparently the executives in charge at WB believe in Thanos' philosophy of balance.

I do not automatically like superhero movies. I loathe Logan, Ang Lee's Hulk, Seth Rogen's Green Hornet, and Ant-Man & The Wasp, and find The Amazing Spider-Man movies, Fant4stic, Man of Steel and especially Batman v Superman to be total crap (although to be honest Fant4stic is kind of a guilty pleasure trainwreck of a movie for me).

So, yeah, this is not like Shazam. That at least had a premise that I liked (because I loved the basic premise when the original Captain Marvel did it), while this movie is ruining a concept I really enjoyed all because someone at DC thinks that Robbie needs a vanity project. Its like how the last few X-Men movies had a lot of problems that came from focusing on Jennifer Lawrence too much, except even they didn't fuck over the other characters as much as this is.
 
Xerxes82 said:
So, I'm admittedly not the target audience for this movie. I LOATHE Harley Quinn.

But that... looks terrible. Hopefully it's just me, and fans get a good movie out it.
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There's always a target audience, even when it's not a general/casual audience that can only handle sci-fi when it's mixed with soap opera instead of being just pulp, get them to sit through anything from 1980 and chances are they won't be able to handle it. But I digress, it's okay for both to exist - variety tends to be a good thing!

And in a way it's nice that the LCD isn't the only way to aim entertainment en masse at anymore.

Still, I prefer the days when villains weren't idolized. It's nice having a villain who's just there to be defeated every week. Or Superfriends, a show so grating that I was cheering on the baddies and that doesn't happen often... Or maybe she's turned good, she did her time or whatever.

If nothing else, at least Catwoman is lucky, she never dated the Joker after the first date because of his green hair. But Batman 66 kept it all as camp and never took it all seriously as gospel, thank goodness.
 
Qonundrum said:
Still, I prefer the days when villains weren't idolized.
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Harley's usual comics characterization these days is more antihero than villain -- she's an ex-villain on a redemptive journey, like a goofier Xena. At least, I think that's the case.
 
JD said:
Yeah, she pretty much becomes a hero once she leaves the Joker.
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It's funny how she can do stuff like detonate a nuclear bomb and kills millions and yet she's allowed a somewhat happy ending. Like in "Injustice".
 
Anwar said:
It's funny how she can do stuff like detonate a nuclear bomb and kills millions and yet she's allowed a somewhat happy ending. Like in "Injustice".
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I guess it's like the Hulk... you can be a rampaging monster one minute and a hero the next. Depends on who is writing you.
 
Mage said:
That's amazing! How cool for you! You've actually seen the movie already! The rest of us are still waiting to form an actual, informed opinion since we've only seen the trailer. Man, you must be a real cool boss for having seen the movie itself already.
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To be fair, the trailer is sufficient to establish that this is far from a comics-accurate Cassandra Cain. Her whole concept is that her normal childhood language development was co-opted and supplanted by intense training in interpreting body language and nonverbal cues. As a result, she is an almost preternaturally skilled fighter, but she is also nearly mute. The mere fact that she's chatting away normally in this trailer means that, yeah, this character is pretty far divorced from comics Cassandra.

Doesn't mean you gotta freak out about it, though.
 
I'm not too familiar with the character (like hardly at all), but doesn't she usually get adopted by Bruce or Babs or whatever and they do teach her how to talk, if only basically?
 
Kate Kane said:
I'm not too familiar with the character (like hardly at all), but doesn't she usually get adopted by Bruce or Babs or whatever and they do teach her how to talk, if only basically?
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Ayup. But this would appear to be a version prior to anything like that happening -- though admittedly, confirming her status would be one of those wait-for-the-actual-movie things.
 
The Realist said:
To be fair, the trailer is sufficient to establish that this is far from a comics-accurate Cassandra Cain. Her whole concept is that her normal childhood language development was co-opted and supplanted by intense training in interpreting body language and nonverbal cues. As a result, she is an almost preternaturally skilled fighter, but she is also nearly mute. The mere fact that she's chatting away normally in this trailer means that, yeah, this character is pretty far divorced from comics Cassandra.

Doesn't mean you gotta freak out about it, though.
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That wasn't my point. My point was that, as usual kirk55555 is juding things he hasn't seen. He's talking about how the MOVIE has destroyed something. There isn't even a movie yet.
 
Mage said:
I'm seeing stuff that looks fun. But, kind of a poorly made trailer I feel. No real build up to anything, just.....stuff.
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Yep. Looks like Pirates 4/5 Jack Sparrow flick with a Juggalo aesthetic.
 
The Realist said:
To be fair, the trailer is sufficient to establish that this is far from a comics-accurate Cassandra Cain. Her whole concept is that her normal childhood language development was co-opted and supplanted by intense training in interpreting body language and nonverbal cues. As a result, she is an almost preternaturally skilled fighter, but she is also nearly mute. The mere fact that she's chatting away normally in this trailer means that, yeah, this character is pretty far divorced from comics Cassandra.

Doesn't mean you gotta freak out about it, though.
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I'll give you and Kirk55555 Casandra, but I don't think we've seen anywhere enough of Helena, Black Canary, or Renee Montoya to really judge how the movie handles or mishandles them. We do see a girl with dark hair in a what looks like Catholic church, and Helena with a crossbow in the trailer, so they are probably using the major elements of her comic version for movie. We also see Black Canary as a singer, which isn't a traditional part of the character, but they did turn her into a singer in the Fletcher/Stewart/Tarr Batgirl run, and then her spin-off, so that also comes from the comics.
 
Mage said:
That's amazing! How cool for you! You've actually seen the movie already! The rest of us are still waiting to form an actual, informed opinion since we've only seen the trailer. Man, you must be a real cool boss for having seen the movie itself already.
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That trailer 100% confirms that Cassandra Cain isn't a mute (or mostly mute) warrior trained to kill but moving beyond that to became a superhero. It confirms that Robbie's "Harley Quinn" is still nothing like the pre-New 52 Harley. The Black Canary is a singer like the shitty modern version (and also smokes apparently, which I'm sure is highly recommended for singers and people who need both cardio and a clear throat to fight crime). Huntress doesn't really show up, but it doesn't matter because this isn't even a fake BOP movie, its a vanity project for Robbie that also screwed over some B to D list DC characters.

Mage said:
That wasn't my point. My point was that, as usual kirk55555 is juding things he hasn't seen. He's talking about how the MOVIE has destroyed something. There isn't even a movie yet.
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Except it HAS destroyed Cassandra. One of my favorite DC characters, and definitely my favorite "Batfamily" character (and I'm including batman in that) is a generic teen sidekick, and they almost certainly turned her into that just because deadpool has a spunky teen sidekick. They could have used any Bat-related side character for this (Harper Row is just sitting there being worthless, or hell even Sin would make more sense and still be an asian female character), but they're fucking over Cassandra. There will never be a version of cassandra that matches the comic version, at least not unless DC does a full movie reboot. That's pretty damn "destroyed".
 
kirk55555 said:
That trailer 100% confirms that Cassandra Cain isn't a mute (or mostly mute) warrior trained to kill but moving beyond that to became a superhero. It confirms that Robbie's "Harley Quinn" is still nothing like the pre-New 52 Harley. The Black Canary is a singer like the shitty modern version (and also smokes apparently, which I'm sure is highly recommended for singers and people who need both cardio and a clear throat to fight crime). Huntress doesn't really show up, but it doesn't matter because this isn't even a fake BOP movie, its a vanity project for Robbie that also screwed over some B to D list DC characters.



Except it HAS destroyed Cassandra. One of my favorite DC characters, and definitely my favorite "Batfamily" character (and I'm including batman in that) is a generic teen sidekick, and they almost certainly turned her into that just because deadpool has a spunky teen sidekick. They could have used any Bat-related side character for this (Harper Row is just sitting there being worthless, or hell even Sin would make more sense and still be an asian female character), but they're fucking over Cassandra. There will never be a version of cassandra that matches the comic version, at least not unless DC does a full movie reboot. That's pretty damn "destroyed".
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Still completely missing my point. But that's fine.
 
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