Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)
or just simply Birds of Prey – which
is then later renamed to Harley Quinn:
Birds of Prey in an attempt to encourage more ticket sales after a
disappointing premiere week – is the eighth installment of the DC Extended
Universe (DCEU). It’s a spin-off movie
of 2016’s Suicide Squad that centers on
its break out star Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) and is set after the events of
that movie. On top of that, it also
serves as an origin story for the DCEU’s version of the Birds of Prey, DC Comics’ iconic
all-female superhero team.
In this movie, the Joker breaks
up with Harley Quinn, and without the protection afforded to her by being identified
as the Joker’s gal, she becomes fair game to all the bad guys in Gotham whom she has wronged, including the cruel, narcissistic crime lord Roman Sionis a.k.a.
Black Mask (Ewan McGregor). Intertwined
with this storyline are the arcs of Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco), a young
pickpocket who gets a contract put out on her head after she stole a diamond
valuable to Sionis; Dinah Lance a.k.a. Black Canary (Jurmee Smollett-Bell), a
lounge singer in Sionis’ bar who becomes his reluctant henchman; Renee Montoya
(Rosie Perez), an alcoholic detective who’s obsessed with building a case
against Sionis; and Helena Bertinelli a.k.a. the Huntress (Mary Elizabeth
Winstead), a vigilante bent on revenge against the mobsters who massacred her
family.
While it has some fun, stylishness,
and competence, Birds of Prey is still easily the worst of all DCEU movies so far. It delivers some cool moments,
nice visuals, and emissions of quirkiness that appeal to that part of our brain
that’s attracted to whimsy, but its positive elements are just unable to rise above the
clutter and coalesce into making a generally pleasing, worthwhile film. The filmmakers might have intended the movie
to play out like Harley Quinn’s chaotic psyche, but if this is so, the effect
is just messy.
A Birds of Prey live-action film adaptation done right would have centered on Black Canary and Barbara Gordon a.k.a. Oracle (the codename she adopted when she was paralyzed and retired as Batgirl), with a few other recognizable members along for the ride. Instead, this movie makes Harley Quinn – who has never been a member of Birds of Prey – the centerpiece. Moreover, by combining this Birds of Prey movie with what’s essentially a Harley Quinn movie, it means the studio has no confidence that the Birds of Prey characters can carry a movie on their own. But I guess if the characterizations of these characters in that hypothetical Harley Quinn-less Birds of Prey movie are going to be just the same as their lackluster, inaccurate characterizations in the actual movie made, it might as well that the charismatic Harley Quinn was put front and center.
A Birds of Prey live-action film adaptation done right would have centered on Black Canary and Barbara Gordon a.k.a. Oracle (the codename she adopted when she was paralyzed and retired as Batgirl), with a few other recognizable members along for the ride. Instead, this movie makes Harley Quinn – who has never been a member of Birds of Prey – the centerpiece. Moreover, by combining this Birds of Prey movie with what’s essentially a Harley Quinn movie, it means the studio has no confidence that the Birds of Prey characters can carry a movie on their own. But I guess if the characterizations of these characters in that hypothetical Harley Quinn-less Birds of Prey movie are going to be just the same as their lackluster, inaccurate characterizations in the actual movie made, it might as well that the charismatic Harley Quinn was put front and center.
This is a terrible Birds of Prey movie because it features an
ensemble that’s nothing like Birds of Prey.
Firstly, Harley Quinn, Renee Montoya, and Cassandra Cain aren’t canonical
members of the team. Secondly, other
than Harley, the characters are depicted poorly, and their wardrobe looks
straight out of the flea market. None of
them are close to the looks and personalities of their comic book counterparts.
Now, I admit that making Renee
Montaya talk like an 80’s movie cop and making Huntress an angsty vigilante try-hard
(in almost the same way the Monarch is a supervillain try-hard in The Venture Bros.) are genuinely amusing
spins which warrant chuckles. Nonetheless,
overall, DCEU Renee Montoya and Huntress aren’t even close to being as interesting
as their comic book counterparts. Meanwhile,
DCEU Black Canary – the character on which this movie should have built upon – looks
like a cheap knockoff that calling her “Black Canary” seems like a disservice
to that legacy character. But the worst
of the bunch is the take on Cassandra Cain.
I really hated what the DCEU did to this character. In the comics, she’s a mute, badass fighting
machine who had even donned the identity of Batgirl at one point – a legit
Batman disciple. In DCEU’s Birds of Prey, she’s a chubby, outspoken,
obnoxious klepto who just basically serves as a plot device.
In the end, I don’t exactly hate Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous
Emancipation of One Harley Quinn). I
knew already that this movie was going to be bad – passable at best – based on the
trailers, so I managed to curb my expectations.
As a result, it got to entertain me at a basic sense – mostly because of Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn. But, yeah, I would have preferred a DCEU Birds of Prey film that respected and understood its source material and went out of its way to faithfully translate its essence on screen.
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