Wonder Woman: Agent of Peace #1

Commitment to Chaos

During a run-in with a villainous crime syndicate, Wonder Woman learns about a hit list whose biggest target is a familiar name – Harley Quinn! Can the Champion of Paradise Island track down the Clown Princess of Crime before it’s too late?

Writers: Conner/Palmiotti
Artist: Miranda

Colours: Hi-Fi

April 2020

There's not a lot of variation in these two covers, Wonder Woman looking "off-screen" at whatever threat she's countering. Harley Quinn acting tough behind her, and in BOTH covers manages to make direct eye contact with the reader. I'm not the biggest fan of Conner's artwork.. but good gravy it looks like something from the Louvre next to the horrible body shapes and contortions that the variant gives us. What happened to variant Diana's shoulder and stomach?? Why are variant Harley's boobs looming like visions of doom from the future.... larger than life and certainly larger than her head! 

I first became aware of this comic from the Wonder Woman fan page on Facebook, and the majority of comments were "Why is Harley here? She's way over-saturated" which  is true, she really is. Combined with the fact that both the former writers and artist hail from the Harley Quinn solo series, there is not a doubt in my mind that Wonder Woman is going to get sidelined in her own series. 

The last time these two got involved it was like a really weird fan fiction where not only was Wonder Woman sidelined, but she was really out of character for the sake of having her team up with the Brooklyn Babbler. 

Well, I'm wearing my Wonder Woman shirt.. let's see if this issue is at least better than that time. 

Opening on Wonder Woman wandering through some city - we get some exposition about buildings collapsing randomly followed by some real estate fraud but it doesn't say where she is. I haven't kept up as late with the current Wonder Woman but she used to be based around Washington DC either for her museum or Dept. of Metahuman affairs, New York for her embassy or Boston for her agency.. 

I guess we're in generic USA City. Wonder Woman looks a bit like a strung out supermodel and because it wouldn't be a Conner/Palmiotti book without it, there's obligatory scenes of both gushing fan girls and authoritarian-stereotypical tough guys for the heroine to beat up. 

Birds of Prey (and the fantabulous emancipation of one Harley Quinn) Trailer #1

Today I watched the Birds of Prey trailer.
Kinda wish I hadn't.
Well... this will be an ultimate breakdown, and believe me, when you screen cap this stuff you realise how much time is spent yet again on Harley as opposed to the rest of the motley crew.
Also how much everyone slags the Birds of Prey TV show when this looks to be in the same vein.




Hardly Quinn walks down a neon street asking someone if they know what a harlequin is.

She goes on to explain in a weird, drunken voice that 'a harlequin's role is to serve, they're nothing without a master.' Actually, harlequins were more like advisers to royalty and were the only ones who could basically tell the king he was a frickin' gobshite without losing their head over it.

Cut to Huntress in a old looking church for like a split second.

Back to Hardly Quinn in a bar after she got drunk and fell into a pile of sequins and diamontes.

She's talking to the race swapped Black Canary... who is apparently a smoker? Um, lady - your lungs? The ones you need to screm? Alright, good luck scremin' loud with laryngitis.

"Gurl, don't even try to talk to me, you a mess."

Hardly tells Canary; 'No one gives two shits who we are beyond that.' Ah, this is some meta reference that no-one cares who the Birds are because Hardly is taking all their screen time.

WB/DC logos in that miserable half pink half blue dye job that would otherwise get you dropped from beauty school.
Hardly cuts her pigtails... slightly? I guess this is character development in her mind.

"Sometimes I cut myself.. but I'm not splitting hairs over it."

'The Joker and I... broke up.' Cut to a terrible drawing of the Joker as seen in his original comic form being stabbed and slashed. Ironic that his image is damaged, yet his tattoo is mysteriously absent. Hmm.

"Screw you for leaving me out of your great movie, Pheonix!"

Hardly throws more knives at it and it turns out she's a pretty bad shot.
Cut to Gotham apparently half on fire and what could be Montoya sashaying towards the flames.

Only a split second mind. Who cares what new catastrophe has befallen Gotham now because HARDLY HAS BOYFRIEND TWUBBLES!
'Need a new start but as it turns out I wasn't the only gal in Gotham looking for emancipation.'

**Black Canary intensifies**

DC Universe Harley Quinn #59

Sooo... emancipated Harley wears a belt saying Puddin's Harley. That's totally cool, I guess. Apart from that, I like the details in her hands, the shadow effect is nice.. but it loses points for Harley's mother being shoe-horned in there when you know it's never going to change her high opinion of her angelic daughter. Some points back because Nathan couldn't give a shit. Does she even still have that stupid dog?

And no, not this time, crazy weeaboo style cover! This one is not as appealing as the last one. Your tubular body with melon boobs offends me and I don't understand what's happening in the background.

Getya tongue outta yer teeth unless you legitimately have food stuck in there!!



The first page is a bit jarring - Harley is dreaming about passing the trials and being a cosmic badass...while jumping over a crowd of well moisturised hands but the way she goes about it is just so vain!

"Brooklyn's favourite daughter, Harley Quinn...."

"I look so cool and hot!"

"Listen ta them, they love me!" 

This bugs me. (tee hee) But seriously, when has Harley faced any real opposition for being who she is? Let's face it, everyone gives her a pass, everyone apparently adores her, and she's never had to go through any cosmic shite to get to this point.
Still..... here we are apparently.

Watching an extreme close-up of Harley's eyeball like it's a horror movie, listening to her say she fell asleep on the comfy couch when she's clearly in a bed, then she goes to her en suite. So she's in her bedroom. Then oh no, she's got a bug head when she looks in the mirror!

Flashback to a day ago, where Harley is again swarmed by her adoring Legions, merely for standing on a stage about to be dunked. People even have the same foam gloves that Miley Cyrus tainted back in the day. So... this is for charity.. but I assume people have paid money for these, money that is probably going into Harley's pocket as we haven't heard otherwise.

So is her more recent fame based off her short lived faux-youTube series, that time she ran for Mayor or when she had her goon squad of stereotypes that tried to help the city but normally ended up making things worse. It's still really unclear if people realise she's that Harley Quinn that hung out with the Joker and what not.. every now and then someone says to her "grr grr you're a criminal grr grr" and Harley just goes "No, I've changed. Hmph!" and struts out to waves of applause from the general populace of Coney Island who just don't care about all the crap she's brought to their city since Harley "left her life of crime behind."

* montage of all the people Harley has killed or dismembered, the time she kept throwing her animal's excrement over the town, when she maimed people because she wanted to win a sports game, where she wreaked her SJW-type justice against people but in a way that was too extreme, every time she jumped at a chance to make her own life better but had dire consequences for other citizens (think Little Black Books, etc) and all the times she caused property damage*

The Ten Worst Things Harley Quinn Has Ever Done!

On a similar note to the "Top Ten Worst Things That Happened To Harley Quinn" post, this time I'm going to have a look at "The Ten Worst Things Harley Quinn Has Ever Done!"

The title is unfortunate, I would have removed the 'Ever' part of it, seeing as how this video was posted back in April 2017, and the poster clearly underestimates how badly Harley can be written.
There are a lot of similar videos and posts out there too.

Let's get stuck in, shall we?

Top 10 Worst Things that Happened to Harley Quinn

Today I gave in to the click bait and watched this WatchMojo.com video titled "Top 10 Worst Things that Happened to Harley Quinn" so I thought I'd go through it here to see what it was all about, what I agree with, what I don't and what I thought overall.

After all, there are so many different versions of Harley Quinn and they've each had different experiences.. Is it going to be fair? Is it going to be mostly classic Harley, or newer Harley? Are video game versions excluded? What about TV and movies?

Let's dig in.

Woe at the Comic Store

So today I went into a comic store with my husband and it was very surreal.

For one thing, he bought several comics... I only got two. Usually I have the most, and he gets one or two. So what happened? Well.....Nothing else appealed to me in that store. What the hell, right?

I did see a couple of annoying things though.

A while ago, Gotham City Sirens was re-released with new covers. That's fine, a lot of series do that. However, I saw an omnibus today and this is what it looked like.

Harley Quinn and the Gotham City Sirens. 

Yeah, I shit you not. If that's not the most blatant cash grab combined with complete lack of understanding of the comic... I don't know what is.

I mean, she's on all of the covers anyway... was it not clear who this trio was comprised of??

How gracious of Harley Quinn - the clear leader of this trio - to allow some 'minor villains of lesser fame' to join her on her adventures! Or rather, use her name to boost sales. Bloody hell, is this how sad we're getting, DC? Just slap Harley's name on anything and it's good to go, right? Especially with Maggot Robbie running around trying to ruin that series AND Birds of Prey at the same time!

I thought Gotham City Sirens did a great job of making sure each character had enough screen time and had everybody play to their strengths and even their character flaws. Hell, Selina being the 'main' ish character and the one who brought them all together.. you'd think she'd be the one in focus but no, everything was equal.

Well, that's what I thought anyway, but apparently I just read another 'Harley Quinn and her bitches' book entirely wrong.

Harley Quinn's motivation in Suicide Squad

I just re-read my last post and realised I had more questions  about what I initially thought was the problem with the comic.

Particularly when I read the dialogue in this screen cap.

Harley states that she never "felt right"doing the things they did. Note there are no specific examples of what it was they did. Now, considering the New52 reboot essentially scrapped their previous history.. this was a bit of stupid because we can only really look to the past to see what things they did.

Are they talking about the chaos they spread in No Man's Land? Was it the Joker Fish from the Animated Series? Joker's Last Laugh? That time they took a holiday to Metropolis and doused everyone in gas? Brainwashing Robin in Batman Beyond?

I guess so, but at the same time.. by DC's own logic, it can't be.

I've bought this up a few times but one more time.. DC failed to show us what this new relationship actually entailed and how long it was for. You would assume from Harley's speech that they were together for a while but later on in Detective Comics 23.2 we find out that Joker basically dumped her the second he got out of Arkham. Suicide Squad itself only really shows a few psychiatric sessions, a vat dumping and then a sad flashback of a clown themed bedroom.

I... I'm not corrupt enough (surprisingly!) to picture New52 Harley and Joker banging!
I barely survived the weird... fully clothed Deadshot clown car romp.

In my opinion, this whole dramatic break up would have been a lot better if they had at least flash-backed to or explained what things they were doing.

Now another important bit here is that while Harley states she wasn't comfortable doing what Joker wanted her to do, she did it because she loved him. This, I don't have a problem with because that was very similar in pre-New 52 but with one exception. Harley was never an outright baddie, she was basically lead astray by Joker, only seeing what they were doing as fun and games. So while she would never take it upon herself to carry out large scale crime operations or murder, she wasn't exactly torn up over the 'fun things' Joker and her did either. If someone else complained, they just didn't "get the joke."

The next thing Harley says is that someone else (Waller, presumably) offered her a chance to be something different than what she had been. This part nagged me because when you think about it... it didn't.

New 52: Death of the Family

Alright, fine, I'll read one tie in book in this lousy series! So here
you go.. for my torment and your pleasure - apparently - here is the two tie in books Suicide Squad wanted you to read as part of the Death of the Family Event.

Here we will sift through the wreckage that is Batman #13 and Batman #14.









Soo.... this one had me rolling my eyes already by page one. Yeah, I get that they're hyping up the Joker and having this major comic wide event but... damn.
Check the dramatics on this.

It's GOTHAM. It's always RAINING AND MISERABLE. Oh no, some force of nature backed the river up, better see it as a doomsday sign! Yikes. Then they're going on about a two headed lion. Gotta give Joker props for that, inseminating a lioness wrong and waiting months for the pay off. That's dedication.

We see Bullock and Gordon chatting about newspaper headlines and reading the bones but it's still not super clear if this is something someone's actually printed or what.

Next thing we know, this happens.

Just... straight up.. no chill, walking into a cop shop. So... basically we could have just had him walk in and take his own face back instead of Harley Quinn? Then why did you put us though those stupid Suicide Squad issues?! Gah!

Suicide Squad New52 #11

Sept 2012

Here we are again with that wacky Suicide Squad! Now this issue narrowly avoids being sinned for 'cover situation not appearing in comic' which is nice because this scene actually DOES happen in the issue.. just not entirely focused on Harley Quinn.

So she's got spooky Batman eyes, apparently wears full vinyl, they couldn't even be arsed to mix up her colours so she's got blue on one side and red on the other for some reason and someone seems to have broken all of her fingers. The guys are all in the background, no one cares about them. Except Deadshot and his aerial ballerina antics. So en pointe. Hah!

Now where we left off, some high up Basilisk random offed himself in a mess of convoluted situations. Waller has some questions about this, so she interrogates El Diablo. Yeah, nevermind that he kissed the good doctor Visyak to expel the cyanide from her lungs, he must be the spy! Or he probably didn't want to mack out with a snakey dude. Whatever.

Next she'll have Diablo feed her grapes. 

Waller has the guards standing either side of El Diablo conveniently teleport away so she can attack him with a collapsible chair.  She again boasts that she's happy to off any of these squad jerks via neck-bomb but no one believes her. 

Next thing we know, El Diablo is packed onto a cargo plane and aww, Waller even had him strapped in! How sweet. I'm sure she'd hate for the guy she just threatened to get hurt. 

Suicide Squad New 52 #9

This issue picks up where the last one left off, and by that I means in classic New 52 Suicide Squad style it just chucks you in anywhere and continuity be damned!

The cover isn't too bad - King Shark looks ridiculous as usual, El Diablo looks like he's trying to smack Light's booty.

I know Light's doing the booty and boobies pose but it doesn't look exploitative, surprisingly. My main issue with her is that her pants meld into her boots. It's weird. Stop doing that in comics.
Also her arm thingies are missing. AGAIN. Someone fire the Suicide Squad's wardrobe department.

The background is decent, Resurrection Man is eh. True, I don't know much about this character but from what I do know he's pretty much Multi-Man but with surprisingly more in the angst department. I prefer Multi-Man.

Harley and Ivy meet Betty and Veronica #3

Originally I was going to do a review of Batman and Harley Quinn, but then I found out that the sequel comic was out before the prequel comic and that made me irrationally angry and confused (especially over which one's Harley Quinn and Batman and which is Batman and Harley Quinn) so I decided do review something else.

Then I remember that this comic kinda sucks too but now I'm already committed so dammit!!

Alright then - covers first. Main cover... nothing to write home about. I'm pretty sure they just reused the same image of Hardly Quinn jumping (what, is she the new Pikachu now? Even that guy has branched out though!) and then the rest of that cover and the variant cover decided to drive home the cheerleader fetish but not in a porno way, more in an all American cheerleader style.

That's fine I guess, as long as you actually DELIVER on the whole cheerleader thing. I wanna see these skills not just have someone exposition that they're staying alive *because* of unseen cheerleader skills. That's bull turd. And question? Why is Betty's uniform torn on the first cover? Oh, she's got knuckle dusters and spiky cuffs, she's supposed to be Harley. Meanwhile, Betty has the decency to at least do up her shoelaces while running from Harley's foes. While the second cover looks better art wise, I gotta say I was expecting a comparison of Ivy and Veronica instead of the old 'my shadow's alive and someone else' gag.
Well, fool me once I guess.



When we last left off, there was some lame drama about body switching which I also called BS on because the art/story was very unclear about it (just lots of screaming and fainting from Betty ans Veronica's perspective) and I remember thinking it was stupid that two teenagers and two adults had interchangeable bodies.


Well, more on that story because they totally did switch bodies, and conveniently both sets of girls wake up in bed together to figure that out! Man, just think of how many pages we would have lost if Betty had been taken to her own house and Harley and Ivy dumped in their own hideouts or on some Gotham Street corner.

Veronica's maid doesn't realise anything's amiss and Catwoman is... decidedly caring in this. Kinda weird.




I mean, damn, the Lodge's lodge must have a bajillion rooms and they bunk these two together. Especially after the fighting and the fainting - no doctors on call?

Rebirth Harley Quinn: #32 Off the leash

Now here's a comic I haven't wanted to poke with a finglonger in a very very long time but seeing as how it's their last bow from mediocre comics (at least for now) I thought I'd see them out.
You know, mock them, hold the door for 'em, kick 'em on the way out?


Starting with the covers. Man, I get that they're hyping this whole world shaking death thing (did anyone NOT guess it was going to be Mason? Honestly curious about that.) but I literally cannot take Hardly seriously here.

For one thing, that hideous make-up running down her face and for wearing go go pants to a freakin' graveyard.












Shit, she even had a funeral corset in Suicide Squad New52 and spent half of Arkham City/Harley's Revenge with crying face mascara and she looked ten times more respectable than this! The other cover.... meh. It's drawn well (and therefore probably doesn't belong anywhere near this comic) but come on, how many memes of Harley Quinn have you seen like this? Nathan kinda looks like some rabid turd one of the hyenas shat out but it's one of his better looks.





Now this panel comes right after the Mayor literally tells them to off Hardly Quinn and Harley Sinn. He tells them to dump them somewhere, anywhere. Seriously. And one of the thugs actually goes along with the whole - "no, don't shoot my face because it'll upset my parents!" bit.

What - you think you're gonna get an open casket funeral instead of being dropped in a ditch somewhere? Idiot.
Firstly - that face ain't worth savin' sweetheart. Secondly - are they seriously dumb enough to shoot at Hardly's collar?



I was already rolling my eyes at the classic Bond villain 'leave the bad guy alone because they're totally going to die like, I'm 99% sure of it this time I think' routine, but this takes the cake.
Especially when everyone knows Hardly's not going to die. I mean come on, her neck isn't even damaged and they're like 'yeah, better not double check she's dead. I'm sure it's fine.'

Suicide Squad New 52 #8

Nostalgia is awesome. If you asked me for ten cool things about the nineties, I could list my favourite artists, movies, video games, food franchises.... you name it. On the flip side, if you asked me for some dodgy nineties nostalgia something like this piece of... art... would be at the top of the list.

June 2012.

But it's not even from the nineties! I hear you cry. You're right, anonymous voice in my head. This is from 2012. This is not a good thing. That said.... at least four out of five characters are in proportion. What the absolute hell happened to Harley Quinn???

She's lost her eyeballs, gained some ginormous bazungas, changed the direction her hair colours go, her thigh is the same size going down to her knee and oh look. Eight issues in and there's already ANOTHER variation on her costume. Yikes.

Anyway... maybe the art is better on the inside.


Well, it is a bit but the logic is not so sound. Everything is blood stained red and that's pretty cool. Lime's death is relayed in a really awkward pose. Savant is also in an awkwarder pose than what we left him in. King Shark... likes showing off his gams in surprisingly clear sewage water.
Harley Quinn found the strength to roll over after being shot.

Wait, why was she shot? Oh yeah, she trapped Deadshot inside some random room in the Gotham City police station and put the skinned Joker face on him. Remember? There was a whole issue about storming the police station.

Soo.... why does the page say this was in Arkham Asylum?

I feel like ten seconds of fact checking would have solved this problem but no-one could be bothered. Won Fon Hey?

Yet Even More Ugly Harley Quinn Merchandise!

DID I HEAR MY NAME????

You know, this kind of post could go on forever the way DC is milkin' the ever lovin' fudge out of their main pillar. You know, the female one. No, the one that's not from Themyscira and is actually worth building a pillar around.

So yes, I have managed to find even more merchandise for Harley Quinn - merchandise that only the most dedicated fan could stomach, and even then not without wincing or cringing away from it.

Firstly - do you even look back fondly on Harley Quinn's original Suicide Squad outfit? Do you like horribly paired colours? Do you enjoy wearing socks and sandals together?

Then these Harley Quinn tights could be for you!

I don't even know what you would wear this with or if you could even really wear shoes with them on? Is that a white diamond on the blue calf or is it just a dodgy design job?

They retail for about as much as your average knee high tights (read: way too much) and don't actually resemble her costume that much.

How can one pair of tights cause so many questions?







Otherwise, here are some that are inspired by the grungy, infection riddled prison tatts from the movie. Let the world know you're obsessed, draw like a child and can't spell 'secret!'

Nerdy Investigations: New 52 Harley Quinn

Earlier in a New52 Suicide Squad post, I asked myself what made writer Adam Glass change Harley Quinn so much when I remember him saying he was such a fan. In comic terms, this revamp may as well have been a few decades ago instead of back in 2011 but hey.

I decided to do some digging to try and find the interview I was recalling. 

We're not just going to focus on the outfit but mind you.. you have to point out what an extreme change she went through with her duds alone,  never mind her personality. 

For one thing, she went from a harlequinn to someone whose only visual cue that they were linked to clowns at one time was the ruffle collar and her kind of two toned theme with some diamonds sprinkled around. And even those are pushing it. For someone unfamiliar with the premise of Harley Quinn, she could be a renaissance era hooker or something. It's like someone asked Jim Lee to draw a Harley Quinn revamp and he only heard the word 'harlot'. 

Alright, sex worker jokes and slut shaming is not the way I want to go about this. So, let's compare two other revamps to how Harley Quinn was re-imagined.

So there was this one time when someone thought this was an awesome idea for Superman.

Everyone hated it, and he was soon back to fighting evil in his underoos which is more iconic and makes more money for DC.

With the Harley costume hate, DC decided it was better to keep it and ride the gravy train of publicity.









The other one I want to bring up is Catman. I was only introduced to Catman in Gail Simone's fantabulous Secret Six series. Originally created way back in 1963, he was a cat themed villain (duh) much like Catwoman and often got into scrapes with her as well as the Bat.

Eventually, he became a bit of a joke - that he was nothing like his old self but rather out of shape, dying his hair to make him look more bad-ass, all that jazz. This was in 2003 in a Green Arrow comic.

Then Gail Simone stepped in in 2005.

Suicide Squad New 52 #7

This is another issue I reviewed back in the day under my original blog. If you're interested, you can check it out here. What, you haven't got time nor inclination? Well fear not, here's the into to it which I feel aptly sums up what I thought about the cover.

Suicide Squad Seven - The Alliterating Issue
Yes, it’s that time of the month again, so dig out your hot pants, get ready to storm Gotham PD and grab that skinned off Joker face because it’s the SUICIDE SQUAD #7 REVIEW!

Assuming I read like a normal person, let’s start with the cover. When I first saw this cover, I didn’t like it. Now I can see it full size it’s kind of growing on me, like Joker flesh on Deadshot’s face.(Tee hee) The new Harley Quinn logo surprised me, as last time they just stole her old one. You know, the one from the ‘original’ DC universe pre-reboot, post-pre-infinite... ehh... you know what I mean. The one that doesn’t exist anymore, or kind of does in some ways, but only in ways DC can make money off it.. Ehhh, you know what I mean.

Yep - remember how they used the previous Harley Quinn logo on the issue just prior to this one? It's been replaced with a new logo for her, and also doubles as one of the nails in the original Harley Quinn's coffin. Quite useful. Apart from that, the cover also raises some questions about Harley Quinn's costume... well, I mean MORE questions. 

For one thing.. does she wear the cape or not? It seems like every other issue it vanishes. Secondly... before her arm thingies looked like gauntlets... but one this cover in particular they look more like gloves. Also her nails aren't red one hand black the other.

New creative team for Harley Quinn!

Guess what?

I have just heard that Conner and Palmiotti are officially off the Harley Quinn reins!

Woohoo!!

It's no secret that I was never a fan of their work. Yes, I did start collecting the issues when they first came out because initially I was overjoyed that there was going to be a different Harley Quinn than the mess we got in Suicide Squad.



The novelty of 'collecting' the multiple covers for issues that never felt.. quite right soon dissipated and I told my local comic store to take my pull list for that series and shove it - right up DC's keister. They said it was a little hard for them to do that being so far away but they've done a good job of keeping my comic depository clear of shit comics so there's that.

This Harley came across as super arrogant and up herself TBH

It also felt like while several storylines were being juggled... nothing really happened?
There was a surprising focus on Harley's professional life but this was soon sidelined in favour of her zany tenants, multiple hangers-on, Bat-cameos and all of their wacky wacky antics.

As well as that... it wasn't making me laugh.

The classic Harley Quinn solo series did that. Sure, some bits were hit and miss but for the most part there was a lot of humour whether it was visual sight gags, ironic humour, actual puns - you name it!
The calling card of the Hardly Quinn solo was an assault of scatological humour, over use of exaggerated accents, fourth wall breaking and a large amount of T&A.

Sometimes a few all at once. 

Critics said that this was DC's female copy of Deadpool and it's hard to dispute that except that Deadpool for the most part is funny (and has a coherent, funny movie too).
Just goes to show that when you take the girl out of the jester costume.. she gets less funny but for some reason the crowds are eating this drivel up.

So why are Conner and Palmiotti scarpering?