#sorry to nia for just rewriting everything i said this morning but the world deserves to know!

[shoesofthefishermanswife]

harley rant

i think one of the main reasons harley's current ongoing is so disappointing to me, (besides the lack of genuine humor), is that i can't quite call it out of character? like, yes, she is known to attach herself to one cause and get lost in it. it started in childhood with her gymnastics, then her doctorates, then jo.ker, ect. especially since her life is a mess and her main support systems have left her behind. she could absolutely throw herself into hero-ing. but there's no examination of that as part of her cycle. it's treating it like an unambiguous forward step. additionally, she doesn't struggle with it the right way?

more importantly- nothing has any emotional weight. she's alone! and that should shake her up much more than it does. (sorry kevin, you do not count, and are a topic for another rant).

there's an issue of hq2000 (#20 i believe?) where she has to face her own personal hell (and et.rigan?). it's a weird arc, and largely forgettable, but there are a couple of key moments from it that i find myself coming back to. she gets stuck in this groundhog-day-esque scenario where she has to fail to save her gang and winds up alone. time after time, no matter how aware of the pattern she becomes. and it tears her apart.

harley quinn (2000), #20, page 11 [I.D. A screenshot of a comic panel. Harley Quinn is kneeling, head in hands, saying, "...all alone...". She is wearing her jester costume. A couple flaming embers on the ground beside her illuminate her. END I.D.]

harley quinn (2000), #20, page 14 [I.D. A screenshot of 5 comic panels with black backgrounds. In the first panel, Harley Quinn stands in her jester costume and says "Whatever your game, Etrigan-- I can play it. And I play to win!" Her arms are crossed and she is sticking her tongue out. In the second panel, she bends over to kneeling and says, "I don't mind bein' alone-- it's time with my favorite person! You hear me? A little introspection's a good thing." In the third panel, the camera zooms out and she's fully collapsed onto the ground. She says, "Good thing." In the fourth panel, it's zoomed out even further to the point where no details remain, and she says, "Good for the soul." The fifth panel is completely black. END I.D.]

and i go crazy because where is this kind of stuff in her current series? they have moments where they try to touch on it, but it falls so flat. her stuff should be funny! but it needs to have serious moments for the humor to contrast with.

ALSO! the art for these panels makes a huge difference in how impactful they are. but her current art lacks balance or feeling depending on who's working on it. either way it fails to elevate the writing in any way.

at this point, harley is pretty connected to the ongoing events of the dc universe. but her emotional state is so far removed from any larger context.

she literally just DIED??!?? (or almost died?) and they brought her back like 4 pages later. which they absolutely just did because they can. like what was the point of that? could they not have used the tools already at their disposal to reach whatever narrative goal they were trying to achieve. and could they not have taken an issue or two to give it some weight? like harley's death needs to be heartbreaking as a reader bc someone should care and hardly anyone will. where's the examination of that?

this is a series that could be something! it has a lot of the right pieces. but for whatever reason, they can't figure out how to assemble them in the right way. the balance is so off. i know what we could have and it makes me want to stop dc headquarters and keep them hostage until they fix it.