I held off this review until I was sure this creative show wouldn’t fall victim to the whole…“Discovery and Warner merge, and HBO Max, which was successful on its own, is suddenly deemed not so successful because it was missing reality shows (what???), and then Discovery kills the ‘Batgirl’ movie that I really wanted to see but for some reason kept ‘The Flash’ in theaters even though it’s starring an actor who (allegedly) has anger management issues and ended up tanking at the box office anyway, and then Discovery took a hatchet to the entire HBOMax/Max lineup”…thing. Yes, I might have an opinion on all of that. Sorry (not-sorry) for the rant.
But it seems the “Harley Quinn” series was not only spared the “Batgirl” movie’s sad fate, but the adult animated series has been confirmed for a fourth season. Huzzah!
Before going much further, however, I must emphasize this is an adult animated series. As IMDB so succinctly states, “Harley Quinn” contains: moderate sex & nudity (I would say extreme sex and nudity in the Valentine’s Day episode); moderate alcohol, drugs, & smoking; moderate frightening & intense scenes; severe profanity; and severe violence & gore. Do not go into this thinking, “It’s a cartoon; it’s for kids.” Were these episodes shown at your local theater, they would each receive well-deserved R ratings.
So what makes this show worth a recommendation? The simple answer is it’s laugh-out-loud funny, an adrenaline shot into an otherwise dreary DC Universe, and a powerhouse of feminist and inclusive themes. If that wasn’t enough, it contains very smart writing, excellent voice acting, and seasons-long arcs with strong character development and growth.
At its core, the series is about a woman (Harley Quinn) leaving an abusive relationship (Joker) and striking out on her own, trying to figure out who she is and what she likes when she’s not focused on pleasing a man who can never be pleased. Season 1 shows Harley discovering who she is apart from her dysfunctional relationship; season 2 allows her personal growth, not just “away from someone” but toward something (and someone) she finds truly fulfilling; and season 3 is about her struggles to make a healthy relationship work, something she has failed at since childhood. Along the way, she battles the Justice League, the Legion of Doom, her own personal demons, and the entire Gotham City Police Department.
The series is as loud, brash, crude, and smart as its main protagonist, Harley Quinn, and it can be quite fulfilling in a way that many of the cookie-cutter superhero films these days are not.
***The Bechdel Test for the “Harley Quinn” series: 1) The series contains two women as mainstay characters in each episode, Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy, and also highlights several women as peripheral characters; 2) Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy speak with each other all the time, and they frequently interact with other women who make guest appearances; 3) Though the focus of conversations during season 1 tends to be on Harley Quinn’s dysfunctional relationship with Joker, she and Poison Ivy frequently discuss a variety of other topics throughout various episodes, including their own burgeoning romance as the series progresses.