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.

10) Getting pushed out the window by Joker

Referring to the "Mad Love" comic and episode of Batman: The Animated Series. After Joker gets disheartened thinking his schemes to kill Batman will never work, Harley takes it upon herself to get the job done.

She just about succeeds in doing it too, but Batman gets into the former psychiatrist's head and convinces her to call Joker. Joker's massive ego won't stand for being outdone by his counterpart, and when he arrives he attacks Harley with a vengeance, eventually knocking her out of a high storey window.

Luckily, the GCPD arrives at about the same time and Montoya sees her, calling an ambulance.

Verdict: AGREED 

That last panel is not normally how the GCPD apprehend villains. Well, unless Batman gets to them first, I guess. These are not comedic boo-boos, Harley is lying in a pool of her own blood and is severely injured. Worse, she blames herself. We can't see Montoya's face and it's not just because this scene happened at night. This is when the whole Harley/Joker relationship dynamic became apparent. We'd seen them all through out the comic/episode acting like a bit of a normal couple for the most part. Joker had been seen criticising Harley for a dodgy punchline, and kicked her into the basement because he wasn't in the mood.. but they were understandable in the context and sort of played for laughs. This last scene - was when everybody stopped laughing. Definitely agree.

9) Joker tried to kill her in front of Batman

Referring to Batman #663 "The Clown at Midnight" (find my review here). In this one, a shot, injured, seemingly mute, recovering Joker plans an elaborate scheme despite being incarcerated. It starts with all of his old henchmen being killed off mysteriously and was designed to end - as Detective Batman reveals - with Harley Quinn's death at midnight.

Harley being the amazing athlete she is, incapacitates Joker and gets away physically, but just can't seem to shake him mentally and is drawn back.. even as she knows what Joker is going to do.





The whole idea was to have Batman watch her die. As the comic is mostly dialogue and characters thought processes - we get an introspective into Joker's mind. How he didn't mind Harley at first but now he finds her disgusting and thinks of her as less than human.

Verdict: AGREE

I for one, really enjoyed this comic for the pure insight that we don't normally get from Joker, the elaborate thought process that Batman goes through to solve things and a refreshing take on Harley - while most other comics either had her as purely arm candy or a punching bag, here we see how amazing Harley is.

She's physically powerful, adept at disguising herself, capable of murder without a second thought, smart enough to carry out (and more than likely help arrange) an intricate scheme and clever enough to avoid detection/capture until the very end. Harley is a strong character - but ultimately flawed like we all are. In her case, it's her devout devotion to the Joker that's her only downfall.

Probably what makes this one so horrible is that we can all understand or imagine what it's like to question if your partner still loves you.. but it's another thing entirely to ask that after you've been running around on their request setting your own death trap and also having to shoot said partner to even garner a sliver of their attention. 

8) Getting shot by Deadshot

Referring to Suicide Squad New52 #7 (review here) with 'The Hunt for Harley Quinn' storyline.

Now, WatchMojo said "They'd expect this from Joker but (not from) her own Suicide Squad" which doesn't really hit the mark. I mean, it's the Suicide Squad, not the Super Friends. After all that, she survived the wound - mostly because Deadshot aimed for non-vitals, partially because DC couldn't kill anyone important in this series, ironically - and the only reason she got shot in the first place is because she had some psychotic break where she decided putting Joker's skinned face onto Deadshot's would allow her to talk to Joker.. who she believed was dead.

She also kinda treats him being dead as an equivalent to Joker leaving the relationship, so that's fun.
Deadshot had been given orders to take her dead or alive after she escaped Belle Reve but he insisted on keeping her alive for some stupid boner driven plot device reason. So it wasn't like he even wanted to shoot her in the first place.

Verdict: DISAGREE 

I've never been shot, and I'm sure it sucks but despite whatever mental nonsense she had going on in her head, this was kind of Harley's fault. If I had to pick something else from this comic, this issue alone had a flashback to Harleen's conversion into Harley Quinn as well as some twisted back story about a bitchy boss. These also suck, but I'd say the worst thing to happen to Harley wasn't being shot, it was her new backstory.

Instead of deciding to follow the Joker and become Harley Quinn herself, willingly joining a life of crime with a murderer.. this Joker takes away her choice and just dumps her in an acid vat to gender swap clone her into himself after playing on her daddy issues. Not anyone's ideal origin, really.

7) Joker's comeback

This one is Suicide Squad's tie in issue to the Death of the Family event. (Again, see my review here!) Joker comes back from the 'dead' - complete with stapled on face. He crashes Deadshot's 'funeral', punches one of the guests around, threatens to circumcise Deadshot and poisons everyone (sort of? It's not very clear.) else.

This is a weird, weird issue that is mostly spent with Joker punching Harley, pulling her hair, shoving a razor blade in her mouth, treading on her funeral dress, cutting her, threatening her and basically telling her he's been stalking her too. This to me was confusing because it implied Joker was waaaay too invested in Harley's love life - especially when this presumably means Joker was hiding out watching Deadshot and Harley attempt to bone each other waaaay back at the start of the run.

He then forces Harley to assist him with some other scheme - even though she probably would have done it anyway had he just asked her - then tries to kill her off.

Verdict: AGREED 

This was a horrible issue - not the least because NOTHING made sense - but it was absolutely painful sitting there and watching relationship torture porn. Obviously bad relationships are a vicious cycle, and nothing captured that better than the early relationship of Harley and Joker. Since the New52 reboot though, it was basically a D-grade horror movie. Some knock-off of Halloween running around and being pretentiously psychotic around his protege without the subtle nuances of a psychological thriller or even a bad made for TV movie.

6) Guy Kopski's death

This one was in Harley Quinn's original run, "If the crime fits!". (For review, click here)

Now, for those not familiar with Guy Kopski - he was Harleen's boyfriend at university, and he was obsessed with chaos theory but he was caring and loving towards Harleen.

For the next Harley Quinn solo, Conner and Palmiotti ripped off the idea but made their version of Guy much, much younger and willing to murder for tweenage Harleen for no real reason. He managed to throw another girl out of a car that he was driving into a truck, which is preposterous but his biggest achievement is having a beaver named after him. Get it, because it's so funny?

You can tell how much I think that retelling is worth. Anyway, the Dodsen's made Guy an important character in Harleen's life and one that would shape her future relationships as well as the direction of her life.

Guy is obviously supposed to represent the Joker in many ways - his hair, his face, the way he cracks jokes and the parallels he draws to his relationship are all horrible disasters but they're happy together. Even his attire resembles a casual version of Joker's purple suit and spats.

He's interested in chaos theory, like I mentioned earlier and he often brings up the Joker's name or his exploits. Guy represents Harleen's perfect relationship, and what she could have had if things didn't go horribly awry.. firstly Harleen deciding to experiment the strengths of love using Guy as an unknowing subject and secondly their professor removing the control by spiking Guy's drink.

The comic itself ended very ambiguously, not really confirming who pulled the trigger at the end. You can see how upset Harleen was, and that's the sort of thing that'll stick with you and haunt you. 

Verdict: AGREED

This is a regret that Harleen will carry to her grave. Unlike other villains, Harley didn't have any obvious trauma that she was trying to get revenge for, for example, so the tragedy here is that she COULD have had a perfectly normal, happy life. Again, the ambiguous nature of the shooting, not knowing how much the Joker venom affected Guy in the end makes it difficult to say what exactly happened but the end result is that Harleen - a talented gymnast on a scholarship - heads down the path of madness, intent on meeting the Joker... and we all know how that ends.

5) Her Suicide Squad initiation

Another Suicide Squad issue, this one is the first with the New52 reboot. (Review etc here..)

So the premise of the comic was that everyone was being tortured to give up the name of Amanda Waller but it was really just a ruse to see who would crack under pressure.

She spends her time being shocked with car batteries and reminiscing about her weird ass crimes. 

WatchMojo refers to her being forcibly kidnapped and made to work in the Suicide Squad.. which sounds good but as we all know, while they're forced to go on missions, the actual joining is generally offered, with time off their sentences being the reward if they survive.

As we see here, Harley is not only happy to be involved in the missions but she volunteered (flashback in issue #8) to do it.

Verdict: DISAGREE 

Yes, being tortured sucks but Harley knew what she would be getting into when she joined a black ops group. The headline makes it sound like she was tortured randomly but it was part of a trial to make sure she (and the others) wouldn't betray anyone. Given you often see her cracking jokes and grinning through-out, my bet is that she either realised this was the case or enjoys a bit of pain.

So, not really one of the worst things to happen to her. My substitution would be being brain-jacked by Regulus, being brought back to life by Waller or that time she made out with Deadshot.

4) Being strangled for misunderstanding the plan

Okay this one is mostly No Man's Land TPB 4&5/Assembly Redux sort of territory.



Harley's part in No Man's Land comes immediately after her main stream comic debut in Batman: Harley Quinn. She also had the fun romp in The Code pts I and II. After that things did get a little bit darker. Not only was Joker more violent, but Harley herself was also more ruthless.

For the most part they get along fairly well, Joker murders a few of his henchmen and eventually he does strangle Harley. It's not the focus of the story, and he lets go shortly after. It seems to be more rage about No Man's Land ending before he took it over, rather than Harley 'just misunderstanding' it seemed like he was strangling her because he was pondering something quietly (for three hours, mind) and didn't want to be interrupted.


With his ego, just Harley saying that Joker wasn't involved in something would be enough for him to snap. Hell, he straight up killed one henchman for dropping the TV and one for answering a question he asked them. Afterwards, they continue making plans as normal

There is a fair amount of violence when he finds her annoying though. 

Even there, he seems to kick Harley to get her to shut up because he's playing a sadistic game with the other henchman. He wants that guy to answer, and kills him when he responds. He didn't kill Harley. I guess it could be boiled down to 'main character armour' but still, if you go by the next pages it seems like he wants her there, just not talking.

Unless it's praise, of course. 

Verdict: DISAGREE 

I'm disagreeing with this one because while being strangled is not exactly fun and games.. I don't think it really fits on this list. Hmm, how do I put this? Okay, the other things so far have been fairly big ticket events, like say the death of someone close or when Joker planned to elaborately kill her after she did all the work for that very same deathtrap... while this part is about one panel, and if you keep reading the comic you see Harley running around gleefully holding Joker's arm while plotting to steal babies, tricking people into shooting their own men and later distracting Batman so Joker can go to the police station and kill some cops and threaten the kidnapped babies. 

I've seen keyboard warriors demand death sentences for people convicted or suspected of doing less than this. It doesn't excuse Joker strangling her, but it also wasn't a drawn out death by strangulation situation either, so it's weird that they sort of pointed out this one panel as the straw that broke the camel's back. I think The Simpsons show a more brutal strangulation scene on a regular basis.

3) Her New 52 origin

Yeah, more Suicide Squad New 52. In the original universe, Harley had intentions of getting close to several psychos in Arkham in order to write and profit off, a tell all book. In the New52 this was tweaked a bit. Instead of Dr. Arkham being her boss, this time it's a Dr. Serano... someone.. killable.
Harley's overworked and stressed but the clincher comes when she sees that Serano has pilfered her notes and is going to write the tell all book using her hard won notes.

She attacks Serano and later finds solace with the Joker, who she's been falling for. He's wormed his way into her favour after killing the man who slaughtered her father, and he's interested in her ballsier than thou attitude. Mentally confused, Harley releases Joker then meekly follows him to his special place.. a chemical lab that for some reason doesn't have any good (or any bad) security measures.

She's thrown into the mix and comes out paler than me in the moonlight. Oh, she also has a new attitude and a new hair style.

Verdict: AGREED

Yep, being involved with the New52 is generally the worst thing that could happen to any given DC character. 'Nuff said.

2) Giving birth to the Joker's baby

Injustice Universe. 

Wow, this one could have been worded differently.

It wasn't the baby she minded having. It was that she had to go into hiding because she was scared on what Joker might do. She had to go through that all alone, including having her own child grow up knowing her as "Aunty Harley", believing Harley's sister was actually her mother. Then, when she finally went back to the Joker he didn't seem to realise she'd been missing for over a year.

Verdict: AGREED 

I think this would be triple the emotional damage right here. You hear about how a lot of women in
abusive relationships stay with their abuser so they won't take anything out on the kids.

Harley - often considered impulsive and reckless or flat out stupid by most - has shown incredible foresight in getting the kid out of there so she can have a normal life and Harley doesn't have to fear for Lucy's safety.

It's not all doom and gloom. Harley eventually gets back with Lucy and Lucy is told the truth about her mother. The whole pregnancy thing ultimately ended up making Harley an ally of the good guys - firstly her horror when she realises Lois was pregnant, and secondly her 'fight' with Black Canary ultimately got her in with Batman's team.

1) Becoming Harley Quinn to begin with

Well that's a very broad topic. What would be number 0? That she was born with the name Harleen Quinnzel? That she was born at all? Damn, WatchMojo got no chill!

Anyway, that's not to say her entire life was terrible.
Depending on which version you read, she may have been unhinged already.
Depending on which version you prefer, she may have made friends she wouldn't have done if she wasn't Harley, like Gotham City Sirens, The Insurgents, the Bombshells, her motorcycle club or her friendship with Poison Ivy.

I still maintain that Harley and Joker have a mutually abusive relationship. Yes, he's the main offender, but Harley has, in many ways, attached herself like a limpet to the most dangerous man in the DC universe and won't take no for an answer, and won't die. One doesn't cancel out the other, but you can't ignore it either.

Verdict: UNDECIDED 

As in yes, I agree but I also think having this as number one is the biggest cop out ever. I also think me being undecided about it is also a cop out in a way but that's neither here nor there and... and THEY STARTED IT!

Tally:

Agreements: 6

Disagreements: 3

Undecided: 1

What else should have been on this list? Well, there was the death of the Joker in Arkham City, that time she plunged down a ravine in Batman Beyond and had to restart her life. True, she turned out alright but man that falling business is ROUGH. That time Joker trapped her in a rocket and tried to shoot her to her demise in Batman: Harley Quinn. There was that ending in Injustice where she took one too many pies to the face and went ballistic on her wedding day. Being murdered by Owlman on Earth-3. The 'Break into Comics' fail. Death by jetpak. Being replaced by other 'Harleys' in BTAS, Suicide Squad or Joker/Mask with the Jokettes. That time she banged that room full of Joker cosplayers. When DC made her into a child murderer. Losing her partner (and her newfound sanity) in Convergence broke my heart in like, ten different ways. So did her many, awful, redundant re-designs and losing her hyenas. 

Some people might say losing Mason Macabre, but hey, he's in a much better place now... OUT OF HARLEY'S SOLO BOOK. Oh, and the whole Suicide Squad movie business. Yeah, that would be my number one with a bullet.