Maeve of Winter (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
maeve_of_winter) wrote2016-08-14 02:41 am
maeve_of_winter) wrote2016-08-14 02:41 am
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Thoughts on Suicide Squad, Harley, and the Joker (Spoilers Ahoy!)
I walked into this movie not expecting to like it very much, so I was surprised to find the movie fun and engaging, though certainly not flawless.
To begin, here are two of my favorite Harley moments from the Batman cartoon, both from "Harley's Holiday."
Harley's day out.
Harley's return to Arkham.
My thoughts are as follows:
LIKES
1) Waller's characterization was fantastic as someone who ostensibly good but in no way afraid to use violence to achieve her goals. I was worrying they made her a little bit to generic, but they absolutely cemented her character midway through the movie as a stone-cold soldier.
2) The movie really felt like a shared universe with a variety of different superheroes and villains operating within it. They did an excellent job of establishing the vast array of technology, magic, and the people who use the two within the DC 'verse.
3)The camera angles and shots were very well-done, and gave the film a dynamism well-suited to its tone without seeming too fast or a failed attempt at spectacle.
4)The scene where the Lamborghini plunges into the water does an excellent job of portraying Harley Quinn's potent mix of vulnerability and psychosis. The scene is gorgeously cinematic, with the bright taillights of the car disappearing beneath the surface and the next shot revealing that's Harley has plunged through the windshield and is now drifting half-in and half-out of the car, with her hair floating around her as she lies still, as if some sort of moribund mermaid. Then the moment Batman reaches out to help her, she reaches out and slashes at him with a knife. I think the scene epitomizes the tragic but twisted nature of Batman's various rogues, as well as the violent but strangely co-dependent relationship they have with him
5) While Jared Leto's Joker has been very controversial, I liked that he was not the center of the film and just a recurring character only relevant to Harley rather than a driving force behind the plot.
6) If nothing else, the portrayal of the Joker and Harley as a modern-day gangster and his moll was refreshing. I know that the Joker's aesthetic has always been a nightmarish take on "Guys and Dolls" rather than bling or tattoos, but it was a unique approach that I felt worked well for the setting and tone of the film. (More on them below.)
7) The soundtrack was very well-done, and I liked that the songs felt suited to the scenes rather than just being a random assemblage of top forty hits at the time of filming.
8) While I'm not very familiar with Diablo's character, I found him interesting and compelling as someone who honestly wanted to change and no longer was compelled to use his abilities for malice.
9) I appreciated the comic book reference of Boomerang tricking another Squad member into testing the neck implants.
10) I do like the mocking "Jared Leto is so edgy" posts about his method acting. IE:
Jared Leto: Sometimes, when I'm home alone, I eat stromboli with my hands instead of using a fork and knife.
Director: My God, I can't tell where the Joker ends and Leto begins! I've created a monster!
Those crack me up every time.
DISLIKES
1) A lot of the beginning, particularly the parts with the prison warden, either needed to be cut or rewritten. That scene with the warden taking a selfie with Harley was absolutely cringe-worthy in its tryhard edginess.
2) Some of Deadshot's quips go on for too long and should have been cut short or abridged.
3) I understand the goal is probably to sell Hot Topic merchandise to fourteen-year-olds, but I was less than impressed with the whitewashing of the unhealthiness of Joker and Harley's relationship.
4) I didn't appreciate how they reduced Harley's agency in this version compared to her original origin.
5) The "We're not a team, we're a family"-esque line felt really forced and unnecessary considering what type of movie this was. For the life of me, I do not understand why so many writers across various mediums want to force that theme when it's completely opposite of what is actually portrayed and often comes across as overly cliche and sugary.
6) Some of the lines, IE, "We're bad guys! It's what we do!" just felt a little bit too on the nose.
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS AND THEORIES
For those of you who don't know, Harley Quinn first appeared in the 90's Batman cartoon as the Joker's female sidekick in "Joker's Favor." She proved to be so wildly popular with fans that she went on to star in several episodes, including "Harley's Holiday" and "Harlequinade." Eventually, she had a villainous friendship with Poison Ivy, as detailed in "Harley and Ivy," and they went on to star in the "Gotham Girls" webseries.
Harley proved so wildly popular that she was integrated into the comics and received her own solo comic series in 2007. Her title was the highest-selling comic with a female lead for all of DC's titles, with sales figures higher than Wonder Woman, Supergirl, and Batgirl.
The cartoon episode "Mad Love" explained her backstory. She was an Arkham Asylum psychiatrist who tried to work with the Joker and fell in love with him through his manipulations and wound up going insane and turning to a life of crime to be with. The cartoon emphasizes throughout its run that the Joker is violent and temperamental toward her, that he won't lift a finger to help her if he does not immediately benefit from it, and that he's sold her out in the past for his own self-interest.
The Suicide Squad Harley was tortured by the Joker into becoming Harley, rather than choosing villainy for herself. However, the Suicide Squad Joker does appear to genuinely care for Harley on some level. Whereas in the cartoon he just left her to rot in Arkham, here he busts into Belle Reve twice to broke her out, dives into the acid vat to save her, and hijacks a helicopter to bring her back. The scene with him surrounded by knives seems to support the idea that the Joker genuinely missed Harley, as genuinely as the Joker can feel anything, anyway. (Did anyone else catch the baby outfits in that scene, which seemed to match up to the twins Harley imagined later? Could this possibly be going in a One Bad Day direction?)
One aspect that was different from the Batman cartoon that I also found an interesting twist was Harley's white-picket-fence-and-2.5-kids fantasy. Traditionally, Harley has always been depicted as in love with the Joker. Her love for him is certainly delusional, and it is clear she does not recognize him as the psychopath he is, but it is the Joker as a villain (which is all that he ever is) that she loves.
In Suicide Squad, it really appears that Harley is in love with the Joker as a man, if that person exists, or that she wants him to change to be more in line with the person she imagines him as. Her fantasy shows the Joker as a regular man and her as a regular woman, with the two of them being caring, attentive parents.
When Harley had similar fantasies of married life with the Joker in the "Mad Love" comic, both of them still retained their villainous appearances and costumes, with Harley even still wearing her jester cap. It was Ward and June Cleaver, but with the twist of Joker and Harley still being themselves even while thrust into suburbia.
Harley has always held an idealized version of the Joker. But here, she idealizes him till he's not the Joker at all. What Suicide Squad Harley, as much as she derides normalcy, truly seems to want is a normal life separate from villainy and violence.
Ultimately, I am intensely dubious of the message the filmmakers are trying to convey with Harley and her knight in a purple crocodile skin jacket, but it is something new and appears, as of now, at least, to be multi-layered.
To begin, here are two of my favorite Harley moments from the Batman cartoon, both from "Harley's Holiday."
Harley's day out.
Harley's return to Arkham.
My thoughts are as follows:
LIKES
1) Waller's characterization was fantastic as someone who ostensibly good but in no way afraid to use violence to achieve her goals. I was worrying they made her a little bit to generic, but they absolutely cemented her character midway through the movie as a stone-cold soldier.
2) The movie really felt like a shared universe with a variety of different superheroes and villains operating within it. They did an excellent job of establishing the vast array of technology, magic, and the people who use the two within the DC 'verse.
3)The camera angles and shots were very well-done, and gave the film a dynamism well-suited to its tone without seeming too fast or a failed attempt at spectacle.
4)The scene where the Lamborghini plunges into the water does an excellent job of portraying Harley Quinn's potent mix of vulnerability and psychosis. The scene is gorgeously cinematic, with the bright taillights of the car disappearing beneath the surface and the next shot revealing that's Harley has plunged through the windshield and is now drifting half-in and half-out of the car, with her hair floating around her as she lies still, as if some sort of moribund mermaid. Then the moment Batman reaches out to help her, she reaches out and slashes at him with a knife. I think the scene epitomizes the tragic but twisted nature of Batman's various rogues, as well as the violent but strangely co-dependent relationship they have with him
5) While Jared Leto's Joker has been very controversial, I liked that he was not the center of the film and just a recurring character only relevant to Harley rather than a driving force behind the plot.
6) If nothing else, the portrayal of the Joker and Harley as a modern-day gangster and his moll was refreshing. I know that the Joker's aesthetic has always been a nightmarish take on "Guys and Dolls" rather than bling or tattoos, but it was a unique approach that I felt worked well for the setting and tone of the film. (More on them below.)
7) The soundtrack was very well-done, and I liked that the songs felt suited to the scenes rather than just being a random assemblage of top forty hits at the time of filming.
8) While I'm not very familiar with Diablo's character, I found him interesting and compelling as someone who honestly wanted to change and no longer was compelled to use his abilities for malice.
9) I appreciated the comic book reference of Boomerang tricking another Squad member into testing the neck implants.
10) I do like the mocking "Jared Leto is so edgy" posts about his method acting. IE:
Jared Leto: Sometimes, when I'm home alone, I eat stromboli with my hands instead of using a fork and knife.
Director: My God, I can't tell where the Joker ends and Leto begins! I've created a monster!
Those crack me up every time.
DISLIKES
1) A lot of the beginning, particularly the parts with the prison warden, either needed to be cut or rewritten. That scene with the warden taking a selfie with Harley was absolutely cringe-worthy in its tryhard edginess.
2) Some of Deadshot's quips go on for too long and should have been cut short or abridged.
3) I understand the goal is probably to sell Hot Topic merchandise to fourteen-year-olds, but I was less than impressed with the whitewashing of the unhealthiness of Joker and Harley's relationship.
4) I didn't appreciate how they reduced Harley's agency in this version compared to her original origin.
5) The "We're not a team, we're a family"-esque line felt really forced and unnecessary considering what type of movie this was. For the life of me, I do not understand why so many writers across various mediums want to force that theme when it's completely opposite of what is actually portrayed and often comes across as overly cliche and sugary.
6) Some of the lines, IE, "We're bad guys! It's what we do!" just felt a little bit too on the nose.
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS AND THEORIES
For those of you who don't know, Harley Quinn first appeared in the 90's Batman cartoon as the Joker's female sidekick in "Joker's Favor." She proved to be so wildly popular with fans that she went on to star in several episodes, including "Harley's Holiday" and "Harlequinade." Eventually, she had a villainous friendship with Poison Ivy, as detailed in "Harley and Ivy," and they went on to star in the "Gotham Girls" webseries.
Harley proved so wildly popular that she was integrated into the comics and received her own solo comic series in 2007. Her title was the highest-selling comic with a female lead for all of DC's titles, with sales figures higher than Wonder Woman, Supergirl, and Batgirl.
The cartoon episode "Mad Love" explained her backstory. She was an Arkham Asylum psychiatrist who tried to work with the Joker and fell in love with him through his manipulations and wound up going insane and turning to a life of crime to be with. The cartoon emphasizes throughout its run that the Joker is violent and temperamental toward her, that he won't lift a finger to help her if he does not immediately benefit from it, and that he's sold her out in the past for his own self-interest.
The Suicide Squad Harley was tortured by the Joker into becoming Harley, rather than choosing villainy for herself. However, the Suicide Squad Joker does appear to genuinely care for Harley on some level. Whereas in the cartoon he just left her to rot in Arkham, here he busts into Belle Reve twice to broke her out, dives into the acid vat to save her, and hijacks a helicopter to bring her back. The scene with him surrounded by knives seems to support the idea that the Joker genuinely missed Harley, as genuinely as the Joker can feel anything, anyway. (Did anyone else catch the baby outfits in that scene, which seemed to match up to the twins Harley imagined later? Could this possibly be going in a One Bad Day direction?)
One aspect that was different from the Batman cartoon that I also found an interesting twist was Harley's white-picket-fence-and-2.5-kids fantasy. Traditionally, Harley has always been depicted as in love with the Joker. Her love for him is certainly delusional, and it is clear she does not recognize him as the psychopath he is, but it is the Joker as a villain (which is all that he ever is) that she loves.
In Suicide Squad, it really appears that Harley is in love with the Joker as a man, if that person exists, or that she wants him to change to be more in line with the person she imagines him as. Her fantasy shows the Joker as a regular man and her as a regular woman, with the two of them being caring, attentive parents.
When Harley had similar fantasies of married life with the Joker in the "Mad Love" comic, both of them still retained their villainous appearances and costumes, with Harley even still wearing her jester cap. It was Ward and June Cleaver, but with the twist of Joker and Harley still being themselves even while thrust into suburbia.
Harley has always held an idealized version of the Joker. But here, she idealizes him till he's not the Joker at all. What Suicide Squad Harley, as much as she derides normalcy, truly seems to want is a normal life separate from villainy and violence.
Ultimately, I am intensely dubious of the message the filmmakers are trying to convey with Harley and her knight in a purple crocodile skin jacket, but it is something new and appears, as of now, at least, to be multi-layered.