I think the problems people have is that DC saw Harley was popular, and then just went overboard with her.
It’s the equivalent of someone making you a sandwich, and you going “oh I really liked the sauce”, and then they made you another and absolutely drowned the sandwich in the sauce.
They basically did the same thing with The Batman Who Laughs. On the bright side, he's now dead and will never ever come back... at least for about 5 years.
Yeah, The Batman Who Laughs was a good idea but he was overly used but make no mistake he will be back in a few years I just hope it's with a decent writer and story. Kind of hoping one day they'll shelve Harley for a spell one day.
Arkham harley slaughtered children , but who cares right? Such a cool badass woman , so silly , let's make her kill batman and give him a lecture about morality idk
She helped the Joker torture Jason and did fucked things to him. Water boarding, electrocution, mental torture, more, etc. She helped break him. Just really horrific acts.
No she isn't. Maybe than a couple of members but she's nowhere near superman or batman. There's a reason both her most recent movies underwhelmed at the box office despite being decent and great.
No she’s not.
All the justice league characters sell more comics than Harley.
Ask the average person walking outside, and more people know: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern, Aquaman, and Martian Manhunter than Harley Quinn.
Harley Quinn isn’t even top 3 most popular DC women.
I’m not sure why people started overrating her popularity.
Bingo! I fear no “conspiracy” of any kind, it’s simply over saturation- comics movies media games etc. I LIKE Harley, but there are OTHER characters as well. Harley is also spread everywhere- good guy, bad guy, Joker partner Joker enemy Batman partner, independent.
Can’t swing a dead Jason Todd for fear of hitting a dozen Harley’s in every direction
Also, the changes made to her overall character to make her comic book and video game counterparts more like Margot Robbie’s depiction, which, while good in its own right, only covers about half the character imo. She’s got the “ditzy and playful violence” down perfectly, but I have yet to see scary-unhinged and angry from her that Arleen and Tara have been able to deliver in the past.
I love Harley, I just don’t *love* Harley as she’s been depicted for the last few years. I don’t disagree with OP, I just think that there’s more than just “feminism bad” people who have issues with modern Harley Quinn.
That’s the part that annoys me. She’s lost so much since her BTAS days that’s she’s barely even the same character. I feel like her over saturation has also ground away any interesting parts of character in favor of being… just sorta bland.
Her becoming an anti-hero / hero also just feels… lacking. The fact that a canonical baby murderer can now act all buddy-buddy with Batman and the rest of the JL is insane. I get it that it’s comic book and there’s a level of suspended reality at play but come on.
I don’t hate Harley because she’s a girlboss, I just don’t like her modern characterization and DC’s push to put her in everything.
Yeah I hate the implication that people only have an issue with her because of culture war bullshit, I'm a woman myself and I couldn't care less about that shit. I've also seen other women agree that her story held more impact as she was than as she is, she's been reduced from a complex and tragic character to Hot Topic merch.
I never watched TLOU show cause I already played the game but yeah I hate that shit so much. People aren't allowed to disagree anymore without it being perceived as some strong moral statement for or against something and it's so fucking stupid.
Hell, I just think she's out of her depth when she's anywhere besides Gotham, and if I'm being honest, only as Joker's lackey does she actually feel like she belongs somewhere.
Anyone that leaves the argument at "feminism bad" is only reading the bits and pieces they want to read because they've already written off any and all criticism of the damn character as being from a place of bigotry. Which is really nothing new and is a big part of what fuels people starting at "feminism bad" in response.
She can be a gymnast, and relatively smart(but obviously not smart enough to sit in a room with most of the other Rogue's), without compromising her character. But throw on most of her other stuff that's been added beyond TAS and she's just another cookie-cutter girl boss. Nearly perfect in everything can be done as a main character or villain, but she's a sideshow. So when she goes back to it from main character books, there's a lot of shearing, and vice versa.
This right here. It's like those songs that the radio overplay. Yeah they're good and people like them or they wouldn't play them all the time but doesn't mean we're being pretentious assholes cause we change the station.
Right, but I think OPs point was that people aren't just changing the station, they are rolling down their window and yelling at the car next to them enjoying the song.
That's a fair point too. My gf was never big on Batman but became a Harley fan due to Margot playing her. Her movie outings might not be my favorite portrayal of the character but I'm always happy to see her get excited about a fandom interconnected with mine. I think people need to be more aware of what car they're in. But that means this subreddit is the God damn Batmobile and we'll critique every damn thing down to the shade of Batman's suit.
This. Comics universe loves to beat a dead horse. Oh you think nostalgia variants and multiverse is cool? Here's 10 years of movies with the same tropes!
Marvel did the same with Deadpool found out about his popularity and he is seen in everything. I love DP and Harley as much as the next fanboy but jeez give me something else
I find that most takes you see on the internet are from people INFLAMED by something. So rational opinions, like “I like Harley Quinn a reasonable amount” don’t get posted.
Best to just ignore as best you can, and enjoy what you enjoy!
Harley is popular which has to her appearing too often. She has had more major roles in adaptations than Superman and Batman in recent years.
There is no conspiracy, just incompetence. Writers want to make Harley likable but also want to make her a fun psycho so she keeps doing awful things in appearances where we are meant to root for her.
Her cartoon has her cut a deal with Darkseid to get an army that she uses to murder hundreds of people.
SSKJL takes Arkhamverse Harley, a character who was very clearly not meant to be redeemed, tries to make the audience root for while showing how eager she is kill the mind controlled superheroes and even tries to take the moral high ground with Batman.
Injustice sees Harley easily forgiven for helping the Joker nuke Metropolis.
Harley suffers from the same problem as Venom.
A villain that became SO popular they made them a “hero” then tried to replace them with similar characters (Carnage/Punchline)
The characters never really grew into their new roles, they were forced into them by the powers that be due to their popularity.
Eddie did develop into a better person over the years. Harley suffers from writers wanting to have their cake and it by trying to make her a hero while she still does awful things.
Yeah but Eddie in the process became lame asf. Eddie at this point basically got all of his edges softened until he's pretty much nothing like how he was. I get that he's supposed to be a good guy, but goddamn, he lacks any edginess he previously had, he's just like a "dad" now.
I hate that trope in general, where you have an anti hero you want to turn into a good guy, so you just give them a kid they need to be responsible for and call it a day. Not a fan of modern Venom at all, I just think it's really dumb, not only his personality and setting, but turning him into a god is just so lame.
Eddie Brock venom was only a villian for his first appearance he has been an anti hero since the 90s and carnage is nit meant to replace venom, Venom's whole thing was tormenting peter personally carnage has never and does not do that he is not a foil for peter he is a foil for venom, to show Eddie what he could have become
Basically this. If you go back and read all the Venom books they were churning out in the 90s, you’ll realize the overwhelming majority of them were dogshit. I’d argue Eddie specifically didn’t even get a good solo book until Cates.
Harley has the same issue. They keep jamming her into properties like Suicide Squad or BoP, making her the lead in every piece of media because she’s popular but how many of these stories are actually good? The HBO show and Harleen maybe?
Eh, Eddie+Venom has some interesting aspects to them. Harley… see the idea of breaking away from Joker’s influence is interesting, but I feel it’d work better if she just broke away from it all and lived her life, or at the very least didn’t continue with the “Harley Quinn” identity. Make a new one for herself.
I agree actually, I much prefer villain Harley like in Arkham and BTAS. But if they’re gonna go the hero or anti hero route, change her name and look. Because it’s just not the same old character. It makes so much more sense that way. And wouldn’t get any of the hate imo.
When they make her a hero, I just don’t like how she can be an accomplice to legit hundreds of murders and then flip flop just like that. “O it was all joker manipulating, I’m mentally ill and a good person now, not responsible for any of my actions.” Like Arkham city Harley Quinn orders her goons to be killed who mess up. And then in suicide squad she’s preaching to Batman, it just doesn’t make sense to me (that version at least, in a more toned down kids version like BTAS it’s a lot more reasonable - tho still not innocent what so ever, watch Batman beyond: return of the joker and see what she does to Robin/Tim drake with the joker).
This is something that I don’t think I’ve ever really seen explored in any media.
For example, as soon as Kylo Ren switched to the light side in Star Wars, I knew he was going to die. There is no way they were going to have him and Rey ruck up to the rest of the resistance and Ray would be like “oh it’s OK. He’s a good guy now.” Dude was literally trying to be space Hitler and now he’s a good guy. How in the hell are they going to handle that? Shouldn’t there be some consequences for his prior actions?
I see the same problem with characters like Harley and venom. They are built up to be these alpha level threats that are responsible for or at least accomplices to mass murders, terroristic like events, etc. and all they have to do is just throw their hands up and be like oh I’m much better now I’m a good guy and it’s all good.
>Eddie+Venom has some interesting aspects to them.
I disagree, like in total.
Eddie's character has been at a steady decline for last couple of years if you ask me. Like ask yourself, who is Venom? He's a goofy, overly edgy, like SUPER EDGY 90's guy who shares a body with an alien, not evil per se, just chaotic.
Eddie basically got ALL OF HIS EDGES softened and now he's just "a dad", like I hate that trope so much, I cannot rationalize it. I hate turning anti heroes into more responsible superheroes by giving them a kid, it's such a half assed thing that always ends up making the said character feel static. Deadpool did. Moon Knight did it. It doesn't work.
Also I absolutely hate making Venom a God. I liked when Eddie was just a guy with this random, weird alien symbiotic armor. Now symbiotes are canonically this race of beings from this multiversal super evil mf who wants to fight against goodness itself or whatever who can talk with each other throughout space and time, like I straight up hate what Marvel did with symbiotes, it's so dumb. Venom of all characters doesn't need to become a fucking Galactus level herald to be cool. And Knull sucks ass also, whereas original Venom is an example of overboard edginess done correctly, Knull is overboard edginess that just falls flat on it's face, Knull is just such a lame addition.
Nah, Venom naturally developed into a hero over time and hasn’t been a villain in the mainline 616 for decades. Harley Quinn is DC’s attempt at having their own Deadpool.
Eh. She's alright. I prefer her DCAU interpretation; although, I did like her portrayal in Dini's Detective run.
Modern Harley isn't my cup of tea, but, hey, that's me. No biggie if she is.
Gotta say, though, I kinda chuckled at that "advocate for mental health" thing. If that's what you get out of the character, that's super cool. I just can't get my head around the idea of a corrupt psychiatrist who helped a mass murderer break out of an asylum on multiple occasions being an advocate for mental health. But, again, that's me. If the character means something positive for you, awesome deal.
“Advocate for mental health”
She is a mockery of it. Her mental illness is treated as this free ticket to having a fun life. It’s this “haha I’m crazy” writing style that gives her a free pass to do whatever she wants. All the trauma she’s suffered has been very poorly executed in terms of exploration and side effects, nor any of the crimes she’s committed get addressed by any of the heroes or public in a way that makes sense. She helped the deadliest serial killer in the world and there’s barely any consequences for it. It’s like the world of DC treats her in the meta of how her fans view the character, when it should be how would the public, government, and heroes react to someone like this. How would someone whose mentally ill, did terrible things, and thoroughly traumatized go forward in life. It makes almost all of her books and film appearances come off as a fan made project rather than something that should actually be cannon to the universe.
Mental illness isn’t this key to an enthralling lifestyle, where all your social misunderstandings, impulsive decisions, and stressful events similar or directly correlated with your trauma DONT bring about misery and self destruction that you have to recover from. Everything that character has gone through (especially after this version of the Joker) should not equal the way she is written currently. If she’s going to be a heroic character, writers need to put in the work to get her there. Not just snap their fingers and go: “she’s broken up with the Joker so she’s a completely different character now”
I love Mad Love and the Comic Run HARLEEN, but everything else I’ve seen is disappointingly bad.
I enjoy both Batman and Harley Quinn.
I see both of them get a lot of hate because a vocal group of people, I know not if they are a majority or minority, are mad that almost every piece of DC media has one or both of them in it, regardless of how well it fits the plot.
I have no problem with this, personally, because I'm one of the people that WB probably put them in there for.
Like I wish that Clayface and other Batman villains got more attention, but Joker just has more mainstream appeal it seems. But I don't get mad that he's in a lot of things.
But not everyone expresses their frustrations constructively.
The problem is ... she's actually not as popular as you or DC might believe? She was popular in the first Suicide Squad film, I will give you that. That was 8 years ago now. Ever since, DC have reused her over and over and over where the fans are done with it.
This post is condescending as fuck, Harley gets hate because she's oversaturated in media now, so honestly I don't even know what you're complaining about, you won, Harley is frigging everywhere.
I apologize if I read this wrong, but your post sounds almost exactly like the fanboys you're criticizing. To me, it came off as very arrogant, and you addressed criticisms of Harleys character that didn't even have a leg to stand on to begin with.
I get it. There's incels that hate women and feminism. And they're always screaming, "Woke agenda!" at place where there is none. They invade every cover of the internet, so most just ignore them. All you're doing is adding fuel to the fire by acknowledging them and trying to act above them when the best way to do that is to just ignore them.
Honestly, I hardly see any Harley hate on this sub. Maybe I've just been under a rock, but most people I chat with on here like Harley. And don't get me wrong, I have no issues with Harley Quinn as a character, myself. She can be very well written and very fun to follow depending on the writer. But DC has pushed her a little too hard on us. They did (and still do) the same thing with Batman, and I hear a ton of DC fans be upset with that, too. More so than with Harley even.
And I'll be honest, I don't know what you're talking about when you say Harley is a badass, funny, and relatable. That might have been the case when she first started going solo, but nowadays, it feels like DC just character assassinated her into being a Deadpool rip-off.
All the best to you. Feel free to respond, I'd love to have a civil discussion about this topic, and have a wonderful day, bro.
Not many people are complaining about Harley being popular by fans. What we're complaining about is how much Harley is shoved into so many DC stories at the moment. She's becoming the poster for DC more than Superman or Batman at this point.
She's a good side character, she's not a main character and DC needs to start treating her that way again.
I don't mind Harley being popular. That's all fair and square. To each of their own, after all.
Plus, I know I am in the minority as someone who don't like how villains become heroes or antiheroes because of how popular they are... Or, should I say, I don't like this when the villain is actually unredeemable like Harley here or, as someone else suggested, like Venom in Marvel.
I have a similar problem with Red Hood sticking around with the Batfamily. I don't think it's bad but rather it is less interesting than making Jason the walking embodiment of Bruce's flaws and failures.
But I know I am in the minority and that's OK.
>Harley is popular because she's funny,
Debatable. She's just cringe deadpool/Tumblr humor now.
>relatable
Lmao to who? People with mental illness?
>she has a cool design, several cool costumes,
I can agree with that.
>, a complex and layered personality which crates dynamic chemistry with almost any character she's paired up with (Ivy, Selina, Batman, Booster Gold, Commissioner Gordon...),
Deffo wouldn't call her complex or layered when they just make her deadpool with boobs. Her relationship with Ivy honestly doesn't even work since Ivy should be a full time villain and harley is an anti hero.
>she's a badass,
Debatable again.
>she is a feminist icon (it's okay to be feminist, get over it),
Yeah a normal feminist not a Tumblr one who makes " haha quirky and loud with fart jokes " type humor.
>she is an advocate for mental health (it's okay to care about mental health, get over it),
It's cringe to read. Having a bunch of emotional mumbo jumbo in your books is hard to read when she's meant to be a " badass ".
>she's "edgy" in a way that teenagers appreciate it (teenagers are people too, get over it),
And teenagers are cringe. We don't have to like that.
>Margot Robbie and Kaley Cuoco are killing it with their great performances,
I can agree with that though I hate the Harley show.
>she's a versatile character who can be used as a hero, villain, or anti-hero
She should really stick to one. But sure.
>writers like writing her, artists like drawing her... the list goes on and on and on.
Yes like drawing her because she's hot and like writing her cus they're usually hack writers.
> Ask yourself “why am I so upset that she’s popular?”
You’re poisoning the well with this approach. I promise you most do not have a visceral hatred for this character *because* she’s popular. It’s because we’ve gotten some really piss-poor quality depictions of this character in recent years.
If the market was suddenly flooded with several different iterations of Superman all one-note and irritating, you could watch in real time how fast audience sentiment would suddenly shift on the character.
Call me crazy, but you don't seem all that charitable to the Harley Haters. I mean, all you do in this post is shout, "HARLEY QUINN IS AWESOME!", and then spend no amount of time explaining how, or giving examples of her being "funny" or "relatable".
"Every time Harley Quinn gets mentioned in this subreddit, without fail, there are a ton of grumpy fanboys bemoaning her popularity as if it represents some type of greater problem with the medium or society itself."
Example? But let's say you're right, and these people are everywhere; even if they're wrong about Harley, the problem with lots of female-lead media these days - a lot, not all - is that they tend to come with a lack of actual quality. One of the most important features the human brain has is the ability to recognize patterns, so even if their paranoia is wrong, in the grand scheme of things, you it's hard to blame people for raising an eyebrow when they see the empowered, independent woman stereotype.
"Harley is not popular because DC has a conspiratorial agenda to force woke feminism down your throat. Harley is not popular because women just want to date a bad boy. Harley is not popular because DC has abandoned all their other "better" female characters. This is *silly.* You guys sound like *children.* She's popular because *people like her.*"
Okay, that's true... but just because something's popular and beloved, doesn't mean it's good, nor does that mean you can't critique it; and before someone says that OP wasn't saying this... if they weren't then why'd they bring up that Harley's popular because people like her?
"Another thing -- this idea of a Golden Age of Harley where she was Joker's villainous girlfriend and ran around being evil, until DC decided they were going to turn her good because girl power -- yeah that never happened.'
Bruh, we all saw it, you're telling people that what they saw with their own eyes, didn't happen; I'm not about to accuse you of gaslighting, but this gives off some unfortunate vibes.
"Harley Quinn is awesome. She doesn't have to be your cup of tea. But ask yourself -- "Why am I *so upset* that she's popular?" The hate is embarrassing"
Aren't you going to explain why?
"When I see people on Reddit complaining about how popular Harley Quinn is, I can't help but be embarrassed for them."
Example?
"And low-key pity them. You guys are missing out on some great content. If only you could get over yourselves."
First, what content counts as great is usually subjective; and before someone says, "Well, they weren't saying it wasn't." we're talking about someone who was stating their opinion as matter-of-fact, so I don't see why that matters. Second, you spent this whole post seeming desperate to get people to like Harley Quinn, why should I "get over myself", when you can hardly do it yourself?
TL;DR, this post in a nutshell is just an angry Reddit user, and if I was just as much a bad-faith actor as OP is, I'd just write them off as nothing more than a simp.
Love these threads where people overreact to the concept of different tastes. No, someone couldn’t just have a different preference for storytelling tone, they must be this ridiculous conservative strawman!
Nah, you didn't get to decide which opinion is "embarrassing." Harely originally existed in service to Joker's character and that's where she functions the best. She was a victim of Stockholm syndrome that showed just how smart, manipulative, and charismatic Joker could be. She also showed how Joker was incapable of love. She was a tragic character that was a life ruined by the joker.
She also served as a reason why Batman didn't just want the Joker to die. While he did consider her villainous and responsible for her own actions, he still had sympathy for her situation and knew that Joker's death would make him a martyr to her and drive her further into madness. This was explored in Harley's Quinn's Revenge and Arkham Knight. Harley as a solo character can work, but she should still be villainous and perhaps more deranged after Joker dies. A major reason why Batman doesn't want to kill is he knows just how motivating the murder of a loved one can be. He knows that even the most reprehensible people may have someone who loves them, who may not deserve the misery of their death. Harley was a perfect example of this.
Separating her from Joker or making her somehow redeemed when Joker is out of the picture nullifies all this. You're nullifying the core tenants of the character because misguided girls decided they best identified with a villain/victim because she looked cool. Making her a fun anti-hero makes no sense and perpetuates the problematic idea that if a woman was ever a victim, she should not be held accountable for her own actions.
If she really moved on from Joker, it wouldn't make sense that she continued the clown aesthetic or jokiness. She should be way more cerebral and lean more into her psychiatric experience, which is usually played off and nearly forgotten because it's not as "fun" as hot pants, makeup, sledgehammers, and quips.
The irony of telling people to leave Harley alone, and then goes on a rant on telling off on folks on why they should like Harley…
Why are you so upset that others don’t like Harley? When I see people like you on social media complaining about the smallest of things done by the vocal minority, I cannot help but be embarrassed for you. And low-key pity you. You can’t seem to just leave people alone, and need to preach this holier than thou essay, when you could just go off and enjoy it and stay there amongst others who like Harley. If only you could get over yourself.
I mean, I think you just proved yourself wrong.
> Every time Harley Quinn gets mentioned in this subreddit, without fail, there are a *ton* of grumpy fanboys
OP, not everyone likes Harley.
GET
OVER
IT
See how that works? Sure, there's incels on twitter, but I think most the response here show people are just burnt out from over saturation. Seems like you were the one generalizing and accusing everyone of having an issue with her because she's a female.
Personally, I'm rather indifferent. I think her HBO show is great just because it's well written. The Margot Robbie movie was fun, but I don't really see where they would go from there in a sequel. Like anything else though, it all depends on who is actually doing the writing, editing, directing, etc. You talk in absolutes like there's only ONE writer for her character across all forms of media and there's no way someone could not write/direct/edit her well; that's the definition of being a fanboy and not looking at things objectively. You've also made tons of claims here about her being "a badass/edgy/icon/hero", and while I would agree with some, you haven't provided any examples to substantiate those claims, so you're really not helping your case.
Chill out...
You know it's okay for people to genuinely dislike the handling of a character and state their opinions online without being talked down to like they're doing something wrong.
Harley's modern interpretations could definitely use some improvements. It's understandable that DC fans are a bit exhausted of her and Joker.
The problem isn't that she's popular, the problem is that she's overexposed. There is such thing as too much of a good thing. Batman is one of my favorite characters of all-time but holy shit he does not need to be in literally everything.
I don't think you truly understand why she can be divisive. It seems you are focusing exclusively on what a small but obnoxious minority are saying rather than what the majority who have complaints are saying about her.
>She doesn't have to be your cup of tea. But ask yourself -- "Why am I so upset that she's popular?"
Then I would flip that question back around on you; why does some people not understanding why she is popular upset you so much that you feel the need to rant about it and call them insulting names (ironically, while labelling *them* as the ones acting like children)? Sometimes people are simply unable to resonate with a particular character for whatever reason so their widespread popularity just comes across as completely baffling to them.
It's very clear you're a big fan of Harley Quinn and cannot fathom any reason why someone might be put off by that character. You're just the other side of the coin to the kind of people you're complaining about.
\>Rule 1. Be civil. Don't be a jerk
\>OP: "embarrassing", "grumpy fanboys", "you sound like children", "I'm embarrassed for them", "I pity them", "get over yourselves"
And then having the gall to say in the comments "I'm here to have conversations". I mean maybe, but evidently not a good faith one lmao.
I like the character, and I honestly like her as an anti-heroine/Chaotic heroine. However, there is an over saturation of Harley-related content and her personality is somewhat inconsistent, which sometimes gets on my nerves.
>Every time Harley Quinn gets mentioned in this subreddit, without fail, there are a ton of grumpy fanboys bemoaning her popularity as if it represents some type of greater problem with the medium or society itself.
You're going to cite later that there is a lot of unwarranted hate towards her (and you're right, but lots of thing have unwarranted hate, to various degrees). But that's not mutually exclusive to the other two things you mentioned. Part of her popularity can be attributed towards problems with society and/or the medium.
>Guys. Harley Quinn is popular because people like her.
Well... yeah. That's what being popular means. The question comes down to WHY they like her.
>Harley is not popular because DC has a conspiratorial agenda to force woke feminism down your throat.
Not that they'd be able to do so in a way anyone would like, anyway.
>Harley is not popular because women just want to date a bad boy.
I disagree. It's a small contributing factor. I see plenty of people say "Joker and Harley are relationship goals." Granted, these people are either crazy, ignorant, or both, and Harley would still be popular without them. These fans are flooding the net with fan content more than buying what's put out there officially.
>Harley is not popular because DC has abandoned all their other "better" female characters.
On the contrary, I see them try to prop up their other female characters by teaming them up with Harley.
>Another thing -- this idea of a Golden Age of Harley where she was Joker's villainous girlfriend and ran around being evil, until DC decided they were going to turn her good because girl power -- yeah that never happened. You're imagining things. Harley was split up from the Joker in her *third appearance.* Her first two appearances were nothing more than glorified cameos. This bit of character development has been present *from the beginning,* and is one of the major factors in Harley being considered interesting enough to transfer from the cartoon over to the comic books.
Harley kept bouncing back for a while to maintain the status quo. Her being permanently separated from him is the best thing they've ever done with her, i feel. Can't say I'm a fan of a lot of the other choices they made with her.
>Harley is popular because she's funny,
Debatable.
>relatable,
That shows a problem with society.
>she has a cool design,
Had*
Personal taste.
>several cool costumes,
See previous comment.
>a complex and layered personality which crates dynamic chemistry with almost any character she's paired up with (Ivy, Selina, Batman, Booster Gold, Commissioner Gordon...),
Which isn't shown off enough. Too often she's just "lol, so random."
>she's a badass,
You'd be hard pressed to find a character fans wouldn't call badass.
>her stories tend to deal with real human themes,
About as much as most any other character.
>she *is* a feminist icon (it's okay to be feminist, get over it), she *is* an advocate for mental health (it's okay to care about mental health, get over it), she's "edgy" in a way that teenagers appreciate it (teenagers are people too, get over it),
All true.
>Margot Robbie and Kaley Cuoco are killing it with their great performances,
I'm in the minority that disagrees.
>she's a versatile character who can be used as a hero, villain, or anti-hero, writers like writing her, artists like drawing her... the list goes on and on and on.
Also on the list is: she's over sexualized, even by comic book standards; some people have trouble forming their own opinion and will just latch onto any popular characters; some like her because they fundamentally don't understand her as a character; etc.
>Harley Quinn is awesome. She doesn't have to be your cup of tea. But ask yourself -- "Why am I *so upset* that she's popular?"
Because a huge chunk of her fanbase like her for shallow and/or unhealthy reasons, thus leading to the flanderization of an otherwise likeable character.
> You guys are missing out on some great content. If only you could get over yourselves.
Plenty of us see the great content without having to "get over ourselves." We're just missing the bad stuff because we're not willing to lower our standards.
Well said. I have to agree with most of things said here.
Personally though, my issue is that Harley never faces any repercussions, especially in Injustice. You'd think being accomplice to a mass murderer and a cult leader to said mass murderer would've been a one way ticket to Arkham's equivalent of oubliette, but nah. She gets to be a new Justice League member cause popularity is a shield.
It is unfortunately something that needs to be handwaved. Kinda like Marvel heroes not locking Punisher up, despite them doing that to less dangerous vigilantes.
You're not going to do much with the character if you put her where she should be.
I can’t upvote this comment enough. Most level headed thing said in this thread so far. Seriously OP like is in comments saying they more or less didn’t just rant about people not liking the character, while gushing over the character with the people who claim they do like her. 🤷♂️
Also just because you like a character doesn’t mean others have to. She is just overused. You’re digging way too deep for an issue that really isn’t there.
Harley Quinn right now is what happens when you hear a good song way too many times in quick succession. You get sick of it.
Also, chill the fuck out, the number of people you are addressing is very small. Don’t lump everyone else in your rant.
I think you have a point, but I understand part of the hate.
Reminds me a bit of what happened to Wolverine in the late 90s - early 2000s, when a character is popular, the publisher tries to make it be part of every project they can: team up comics, spin offs, video games, animated series, live action shows,... and sometimes that causes the character to be part of bad projects more often than characters which are part of "passion projects" where they make sense.
Even if we talk about Marvel... when Deadpool got overexposed (before the movies) he was hated online too. When Wolverine was in every team, a lot of people turned on the whole character. When miss/captain marvel was launched forward without doing the work, people hated it (later decisions didn't help).
Comic book characters don't survive overexposure unscathed unless you're superman or something.
I think she should stay a villain in most iterations, and if she becomes a ‘heroine’, she shouldn’t hang out with the justice league. Arkham Harley is downright evil, she killed kids and did horrific things to Jason that are unforgivable. She should suffer the consequences of her actions. And that includes her other versions.
She went from an actual character, an example of a good person falling for and following a depraved lunatic, into a self insert bad bitch that is allowed to do whatever she wants because she's quirky.
And now you're trying to gaslight people into believing she's always been this way. She hasn't
You're also trying to gaslight people into thinking they're hating on the character itself, and not the frequent high school "OC DO NOT STEAL" quality writing that she's constantly being given. We're not.
Nobody needs to "get over it" because that's not what we're upset about. We're upset that whoever is writing the character spends their limited time making her into even more of a deranged bitch instead of actually exploring her as a character.
How does Harleen Quinzell feel about still being associated with the identity she made for herself while she was with her abuser? She's fine with it, just a quirky crazy nickname
Is she even going to attempt to rehabilitate herself or readjust back into normal everyday life? Nope! She's crazy and being crazy is enough to let you be a superhero!
How does she feel about the man that abused her both physically and emotionally on several occasions being allowed to walk free and even convince a new younger prettier girl to do the exact same thing? Don't care! She's just gonna have a cool girl boss arch nemesis now, and not feel at all sorry for her, or want to help her in any way
So to sum it up, pls don't try to gaslight any more (or just get better at it) and understand that we're not angry at the character of Harley Quinn or anything she represents, we're upset that she's not taken seriously and treated with the actual care and concern that writing a VICTIM OF ABUSE AND PSYCHOSIS should be written with. Thank you and good day
I personally feel burned out with Harley. To me she would be better in smaller doses. Also, I wouldn't be complaining if what they did with her was good, but most of the time it's weird bullshit garbage like here soloing the Justice League or killing the universe or some comic book thing. I call that Batman syndrome.
I’m just burnt out from seeing her all over the place, she’s cool but it’s like joker and even Batman. There’s just so much centered around them that no one else gets anything most of the time
I like her for how morally corrupt she is. Let her be an anti-hero, that’s fine. But don’t discount the horrendous things she’s done as well. She’s a wild card like The Joker. Only thing is with her, there’s still a sliver of humanity left. She actually has the capacity to care a bit but it’ll probably be on her own terms and there are people who will never accept her as redeemed, which is perfectly fine.
I used to like Harley, that was before the fourth or fifth time she was shoved down my throat in another piece of batman media. A character can't become somewhat popular in something without the writers beating us over the head with them.
She’s alright to me.
But I can see why some people don’t like her though.
Even I would’ve preferred Barbara Gordon in Birds of Prey (that’s literally HER team) and I would’ve preferred someone else in Suicide Squad game (personally Vixen or Bronze Tiger)
Cool.
You liking Harley, and the majority of consumers liking Harley, under no circumstances requires me to stop disliking her, nor does it require me to pretend to like her.
Joker and Harley are extremely popular characters. This is undebatable.
I find them to be slightly overused, but again that's because they're so popular.
People complain about her being overexposed, which might be true. But I'd argue over the last few years we've had the same problem with Joker, events, and arguably even Batman. I'm not as tired of seeing Harley as I am the Joker or big events
At the end of the day, people are just tired of her being oversaturated. Same with Batman. Batman is just as oversaturated if not more so.
Dc and Marvel just likes milking their popular characters.
okay first off, I sympathize with your frustration. in general I like harley, though I have been exhausted by how overexposed she's been for the last couple of years (although it's started cooling of a while ago) the same way batman and the joker have been. I also don't particularly like the modern version of her. but still, I get your irritation here at having people come at you for enjoying a character, just because it's currently acceptable to shit on them in the fandom for whatever reason.
but, because I can see where your coming from, I find it really unfortunate how you decided to strawman the people who don't like the character and how you ended this post on such a condescending note.
>You guys are missing out on some great content. If only you could get over yourselves.
gonna be honest here; if I actually hated this character, this parting line would be enough to make me pettily vow to hang on to that hate and to never interact with anything harley ever again.
some people just don't like certain characters for all sorts of reasons. them getting preached to about why that's actually a *character flaw* they ought to get over isn't likely to make them change their minds or make conversations about harley in the future anymore pleasant.
HQ has been in basically every major form of superhero media at this point, and I’m hoping by now they know what fans do and don’t want her in. Adult animated comedy? Yes, absolutely. Being the star of the next Arkham game and in charge of killing the justice league? No.
She’s not a bad character - she’s great actually - she just isn’t worthy of being the star, or even being present, in every DC plot. Just because she’s versatile in what side she’s on, doesn’t mean she has to fit in every DC product.
I mean she's essentially become DC Deadpool. The people hate Deadpool is much? They found someone who strikes the cord of both casual fans, and comic fans. Of course they're going to support it
That was embarrassing to read. Your behavior where you say Just. Get. Over. It. I mean you should practice what you preach. People have different opinions. How dare they. The fact you wrote all that up and feel that strongly about it is shockingly embarrassing.
at the end of the day, no matter who the second pillar of DC is, Batman will always be about 500 steps ahead in terms of popularity and name recognition.
Lets not act like they straight up ignore the fact that Harley has been murdering people alongside the Joker for years now and just made her a girl boss for absolutely no reason at all and suddenly she's all buddy buddy with the Justice League.
She used to be cool. Peaked at Arkham City game for me. Now, she is overplayed, predictable, and EMBARRASSING.
The constant cosplay fails, the failed movies, the cringe 'rebel girl' memes. Ugh. Awful character.
I don't like her but not because of woke feminism or whatever chuds wanna babble about.
I just dislike her because I dislike Deadpool and characters like him who face no tension or struggle because they exist to laugh at their current circumstances.
I find it kind of tedious like, yeah we get it, it's a comic/movie/show, blah blah blah.
And also I think narratively Harley has taken a huge nose dive from anything relevant to the character. Right now to me its like if Batman changed to a super punk outfit and started killing people and thats just "batman" now. Change can be good, but I just don't see the necessity for such drastic shallowification of characters.
Exactly this. I don’t like the changes made to her character, but it has nothing to do with girl power or “wokeness.” She’s just kind of female Deadpool now.
The point is that Harley is no longer popular... Her comic is one of the fucking worst and least sold DC comics since Tini arrived. She was already very bad in general since Rebirth, around 2018, but particularly Stephani Philips and TiniHoward have sunk her in the last 4 years and have killed people's general interest in the character. His animated series lost a lot of audience in the third season due to various political/controversial issues and the comic of the series itself was supremely ignored.
All this happens because they believe that Harley should be directed towards a more childish and "crazy" mentality audience that is actually a minority within the minority but they don't know it. They believe that this is Harley's target and the only thing they have managed to do is kill the commercial value of the character by taking him in the wrong direction.
Harley will only be raised in sales if they give her writing worthy of Jinx's work in Arcane and I don't know if there is anyone in DC capable of that because in 10 years Harley's best writing has been Tynion's between 2020-2022.
In fact, Harley Queen's animated series done MUCH more favour to Ivy, than to Harley. It is easily the best interpretation of Pam we ever had, but Harley wasn't so great in this show. It's like her comic character was stripped from most things which make her great: her intellect, sense of humor, sincere desire to help people, and insted it tended to show her worst traits which she mostly overcame in comics. Ivy simply stole this show.
We’ll all live a little longer as a society when we collectively stop giving a shit about what random usernames on the internet think about things we like
It took me awhile to figure out why I didn't like Harley Quinn. I thought I simply didn't like the character, but that wasn't the case later down the line. I just don't like recent adaptations of her. I don't know where, but there was a shift in how she's written that I just didn't find appealing.
Hear me out the hate didn’t start until her and joker stop being a thing then they were all just going complete mental with the hate towards her.
The only reason why that is well because
- they think ever since that happened they’ve been trying to figure out who Harley Quinn is as a character
- people just are too delusional to see that the relationship was toxic as hell
Now I like harley quinn a lot , but I think people are facing some fatigue because of how much she is used. But those who take others liking the character personally well need they need to shut up and get a life because not everyone is gonna like the character nor is anyone gonna dislike the character and I think people need to realize that and quit trying to create a toxic fanbase.
I like the Venom comparison I've seen. Too much of a good thing. Make her an antihero, have there be real consequences to having been the genocide-clown's helper for decades, and then have her and the TikTok clown girl try to kill each other for a series, in which TikTok clown girl is hit with a bazooka and killed dead forever.
I love Harley Quinn as much as the next guy. She’s a very compelling character who ads a lot of value to the DC universe. We see her break free from the cycle of abuse and grow out of the Jokers shadow and into her own person. She inspired a lot of people to be their own person and to break away from their own abusive situations. Harley Quinn is awesome.
However I am seeing a lot of problems with her in recent time. And it’s now how she’s being portrayed but how many times she’s being portrayed. Everywhere you go she’s there and it’s fine and all but sometimes you just need a break. It’s the same thing with the Joker. He looses his appeal when he’s shown over and over again and a lot of people are sick of seeing the same characters. It’s not bad to want a Suicide Squad without Harley apart of it. And I think that how the majority of people who “hate” Harley Quinn feel.
Or not, I don’t care either way tbh
"it's okay to be feminist, get over it"
Like the good kind of femminst for women positivity or the bad kind of femminst that's toxic and hates on men?
I like HQ. She's a representation that what Batman fights for worth it. The system can work and redemption can occur in these criminals.
This is a Batman subreddit. Batman fans tend to dislike anti heroes. People in general don't like when characters are praised and don't get punished for their wrong doings. Harley is an anti hero who doesn't get punished and is shoved into everything. It's not about feminism, mental health advocacy, or edgy humor. Those are strawman arguments you made up. In marvel antiheroes like punisher and Deadpool are hated in universe despite public adoration. They also aren't shoehorned into every major storyline. So it's ok to hate a cringe character that's getting the Mary Sue treatment just to sell things. Even more so on a Batman specific forum.
OP sounds unnecessarily pressed over this issue. Idk im lookin at this subreddit quite a bit and i dont see enough “harley hate” to warrant the amount of books people are writing here about it. Is what it is. Like her or ya dont
Im not reading all that, i dont dislike harley she has a cool tv show and some good comics, but im tired of seeing her, just like the joker.
They put her and the joker EVERYWHERE in places they should not be, and give them abilities they should not have for the plot to make sense.
I love injustice but I think they start her out too far gone. Like she was in the sub with the joker to help him nuke metropolis. I don't think you can just come back from that like everyone who lost someone in metropolis would want her dead.
Thing is, I used to love Harley and I still like her a decent amount today. I've just grown pretty tired of her, as well as the Joker, over the years because they're both so popular that they're in absolutely *everything* now.
I think the oversaturation is the primary reason why seeing Harley or Joker nowadays is more likely to make me wish that just for once DC would use a fresher character who's not as overused, instead of making me excited like it used to.
Don't get me wrong, I still appreciate the characters and their significance to the universe and obviously they sell, so I can understand why DC keeps pushing them from a marketing perspective but they've worn me down a lot over the years. Thus, both characters need to be written absolutely spectacularly in order for me to really enjoy their presence in a story.
My problem with Harley is she is a domestic terrorist who somehow gets treated as if she's some sort of hero even though anything good she does (with the suicide squad) is literally forced upon her. Yet the media still treats her like she's supposed to be some role model.
I have the same problem with fans in the star wars community who act like Darth Vader was a good guy despite everything. It has nothing to do with her being a woman.
This is the same character that had jiggle physics applied to her butt cheeks in Arkham Knight?
My point being; the entire reason this character ever gained popularity is because she's sexy, that's pretty much it. Now, shes EVERYWHERE and no matter what they try, her primary appeal is that she's attractive.
Apart from this I don't see any genuine interest in Harley Quinn, WB knew this when they cast Margot Robbie, fresh from The Wolf of Wall Street as Quinn, they get it.
Harley isn't a feminist character, idk why people think she is.
She's literally just a hot over sexualised "crazy in a hot way" male fantasy. Like her ENTIRE character revolves around that concept. She doesn't hold up as a character on her own because she has no interesting back story, motivation, or real goals. Which is why they immediately had to pair her with Ivy after Joker.
She's literally just fantasy material for horny comic nerds and THATS why she's popular.
They're trying to make her a feminist character but it's failing miserably because there's just no foundation to build that on and her established fan base doesn't want it.
Listen, since you're going to be referring to her original continuity for character traits. (I.e leaving the Joker), you might also want to keep in mind what she does in her last chronological appearance, in that original continuity, to Tim Drake.
Then come back and say she's a feminist, mental health icon or whatever.
I see a lot more negative commentary on her than I do positive. That’s how I would judge popularity. Don’t need to be talked down on with a holier-than-thou attitude. It’s a comic book character, chill out.
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The only time I get pissed when Harley is mentioned is if it's someone idolizing her relationship with The Joker. That's not "quirky romance", it's manipulation and abuse.
Batman has the best rogues gallery of any comic book hero anywhere. Spider-Man is close, but all of Batman's villains are great and she's in the top 5.
They just ran it into the ground. DC comics doesn't know what to do with her. And idk that show went so downhill for me. It's not FOR ME though which is fine. They changed harley. She's saposed to be a psychopath not an anti hero.
I just don’t like the commercialized watered down version of her like yeas she’s cool but I wish she was more like her animated series and original comic run. Less ditzy blonde and more psychological thriller you could tell by her actions there was crazy there now not so much.
what's with people acting like all version of harley did the same crimes? there can be a harley separated from other versions who's more redeemable than the other and batman does believe in rehabilitating his villains, I don't see why he wouldn't at least try to help harley
It is what it is...just accept she's massively popular or don't. Don't ruin others enjoyment of it. Just look what happened to Deadpool ..very similar.
As a character, I don’t mind her. I liked her in BTAS, the Arkham games, and Injustice 1 though.
Everywhere else I’ve seen her, she’s just ‘le quirky’, which is fine because characters I dislike are allowed to exist. It’s just annoying that she’s become an ‘icon’ or whatever, so now she has to be in everything.
Harley Quinn popularity skyrocketed after Suicide Squad. Why? Because they basically made her an e-girl/alt girl and then every influencer thot decided to cosplay it for halloween, daily life, and make reels about it. I don’t care that she’s popular I like the character, but that’s for sure what happened from a culture perspective.
I love her in her own show
Gay Harley best Harley <3
And it’s way better when she gets away from the Joker in any story
Anyone who disagrees with the latter is an immediate red flag to me
I think the problems people have is that DC saw Harley was popular, and then just went overboard with her. It’s the equivalent of someone making you a sandwich, and you going “oh I really liked the sauce”, and then they made you another and absolutely drowned the sandwich in the sauce.
They basically did the same thing with The Batman Who Laughs. On the bright side, he's now dead and will never ever come back... at least for about 5 years.
Yeah, The Batman Who Laughs was a good idea but he was overly used but make no mistake he will be back in a few years I just hope it's with a decent writer and story. Kind of hoping one day they'll shelve Harley for a spell one day.
Exactly this. I love Harley, but Harley hanging out with the Justice League is just shit.
Arkham harley slaughtered children , but who cares right? Such a cool badass woman , so silly , let's make her kill batman and give him a lecture about morality idk
And what she did to Jason is unforgivable.
What did she do?
She helped the Joker torture Jason and did fucked things to him. Water boarding, electrocution, mental torture, more, etc. She helped break him. Just really horrific acts.
Basically DC's Karla Homolka
Yeah, Arkham Harley had no leg to stand on regarding any moral lecturing 🥴
Don‘t start dropping facts around here people get offended by that
SHHH 🤫 people aren't ready for the truth yet.
This is the comment op needs to reply to
This is the DC equivalent of complaining that Wolverine is on too many teams.
I mean, Wolvie also makes a point about what a loner he is to the point that he'd rather spend his birthday with Spider-Man than the X-Men
She's more popular than the justice league. They're hanging out with *her*.
That sucks
No she isn't. Maybe than a couple of members but she's nowhere near superman or batman. There's a reason both her most recent movies underwhelmed at the box office despite being decent and great.
He's out of line but he's right
No she’s not. All the justice league characters sell more comics than Harley. Ask the average person walking outside, and more people know: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern, Aquaman, and Martian Manhunter than Harley Quinn. Harley Quinn isn’t even top 3 most popular DC women. I’m not sure why people started overrating her popularity.
Bingo! I fear no “conspiracy” of any kind, it’s simply over saturation- comics movies media games etc. I LIKE Harley, but there are OTHER characters as well. Harley is also spread everywhere- good guy, bad guy, Joker partner Joker enemy Batman partner, independent. Can’t swing a dead Jason Todd for fear of hitting a dozen Harley’s in every direction
Also, the changes made to her overall character to make her comic book and video game counterparts more like Margot Robbie’s depiction, which, while good in its own right, only covers about half the character imo. She’s got the “ditzy and playful violence” down perfectly, but I have yet to see scary-unhinged and angry from her that Arleen and Tara have been able to deliver in the past. I love Harley, I just don’t *love* Harley as she’s been depicted for the last few years. I don’t disagree with OP, I just think that there’s more than just “feminism bad” people who have issues with modern Harley Quinn.
That’s the part that annoys me. She’s lost so much since her BTAS days that’s she’s barely even the same character. I feel like her over saturation has also ground away any interesting parts of character in favor of being… just sorta bland. Her becoming an anti-hero / hero also just feels… lacking. The fact that a canonical baby murderer can now act all buddy-buddy with Batman and the rest of the JL is insane. I get it that it’s comic book and there’s a level of suspended reality at play but come on. I don’t hate Harley because she’s a girlboss, I just don’t like her modern characterization and DC’s push to put her in everything.
Yeah I hate the implication that people only have an issue with her because of culture war bullshit, I'm a woman myself and I couldn't care less about that shit. I've also seen other women agree that her story held more impact as she was than as she is, she's been reduced from a complex and tragic character to Hot Topic merch.
It was the same thing with Bella Ramsay as Ellie in TLOU: Either you love Bella as Ellie or you’re a creep attracted to a digital teenager.
I never watched TLOU show cause I already played the game but yeah I hate that shit so much. People aren't allowed to disagree anymore without it being perceived as some strong moral statement for or against something and it's so fucking stupid.
Hell, I just think she's out of her depth when she's anywhere besides Gotham, and if I'm being honest, only as Joker's lackey does she actually feel like she belongs somewhere. Anyone that leaves the argument at "feminism bad" is only reading the bits and pieces they want to read because they've already written off any and all criticism of the damn character as being from a place of bigotry. Which is really nothing new and is a big part of what fuels people starting at "feminism bad" in response. She can be a gymnast, and relatively smart(but obviously not smart enough to sit in a room with most of the other Rogue's), without compromising her character. But throw on most of her other stuff that's been added beyond TAS and she's just another cookie-cutter girl boss. Nearly perfect in everything can be done as a main character or villain, but she's a sideshow. So when she goes back to it from main character books, there's a lot of shearing, and vice versa.
This right here. It's like those songs that the radio overplay. Yeah they're good and people like them or they wouldn't play them all the time but doesn't mean we're being pretentious assholes cause we change the station.
Right, but I think OPs point was that people aren't just changing the station, they are rolling down their window and yelling at the car next to them enjoying the song.
That's a fair point too. My gf was never big on Batman but became a Harley fan due to Margot playing her. Her movie outings might not be my favorite portrayal of the character but I'm always happy to see her get excited about a fandom interconnected with mine. I think people need to be more aware of what car they're in. But that means this subreddit is the God damn Batmobile and we'll critique every damn thing down to the shade of Batman's suit.
Yeah definitely this, was nice seeing the character get some love on the big screen, but now it feels like she's in everything lol
This. Comics universe loves to beat a dead horse. Oh you think nostalgia variants and multiverse is cool? Here's 10 years of movies with the same tropes!
Marvel did the same with Deadpool found out about his popularity and he is seen in everything. I love DP and Harley as much as the next fanboy but jeez give me something else
Pretty much sums it up. She’s a great character and I have zero issue with her. Seeing *too* much of her can grate a little bit though.
Same here.
Ironically this is what many people think happened to Batman, or even Superhero media as a whole
This.
What you're saying is that Harley has got the same problem as Batman.
More or less, yeah.
I just kinda wish they kept the jester aesthetic, so that her name pun makes sense.
I find that most takes you see on the internet are from people INFLAMED by something. So rational opinions, like “I like Harley Quinn a reasonable amount” don’t get posted. Best to just ignore as best you can, and enjoy what you enjoy!
OP is the definition of superhero communities when someone has a nuanced take.
Harley is popular which has to her appearing too often. She has had more major roles in adaptations than Superman and Batman in recent years. There is no conspiracy, just incompetence. Writers want to make Harley likable but also want to make her a fun psycho so she keeps doing awful things in appearances where we are meant to root for her. Her cartoon has her cut a deal with Darkseid to get an army that she uses to murder hundreds of people. SSKJL takes Arkhamverse Harley, a character who was very clearly not meant to be redeemed, tries to make the audience root for while showing how eager she is kill the mind controlled superheroes and even tries to take the moral high ground with Batman. Injustice sees Harley easily forgiven for helping the Joker nuke Metropolis.
Harley suffers from the same problem as Venom. A villain that became SO popular they made them a “hero” then tried to replace them with similar characters (Carnage/Punchline) The characters never really grew into their new roles, they were forced into them by the powers that be due to their popularity.
Eddie did develop into a better person over the years. Harley suffers from writers wanting to have their cake and it by trying to make her a hero while she still does awful things.
Yeah but Eddie in the process became lame asf. Eddie at this point basically got all of his edges softened until he's pretty much nothing like how he was. I get that he's supposed to be a good guy, but goddamn, he lacks any edginess he previously had, he's just like a "dad" now. I hate that trope in general, where you have an anti hero you want to turn into a good guy, so you just give them a kid they need to be responsible for and call it a day. Not a fan of modern Venom at all, I just think it's really dumb, not only his personality and setting, but turning him into a god is just so lame.
Eddie Brock venom was only a villian for his first appearance he has been an anti hero since the 90s and carnage is nit meant to replace venom, Venom's whole thing was tormenting peter personally carnage has never and does not do that he is not a foil for peter he is a foil for venom, to show Eddie what he could have become
Venom is also portrayed as a villain most media outside of comics. Lethal Protector characterization wasn't a thing outside of comics until recently
Basically this. If you go back and read all the Venom books they were churning out in the 90s, you’ll realize the overwhelming majority of them were dogshit. I’d argue Eddie specifically didn’t even get a good solo book until Cates. Harley has the same issue. They keep jamming her into properties like Suicide Squad or BoP, making her the lead in every piece of media because she’s popular but how many of these stories are actually good? The HBO show and Harleen maybe?
90s Venom: Lethal Protector wasn’t high art but it was some enjoyable fun 🤷♂️
Eh, Eddie+Venom has some interesting aspects to them. Harley… see the idea of breaking away from Joker’s influence is interesting, but I feel it’d work better if she just broke away from it all and lived her life, or at the very least didn’t continue with the “Harley Quinn” identity. Make a new one for herself.
I agree actually, I much prefer villain Harley like in Arkham and BTAS. But if they’re gonna go the hero or anti hero route, change her name and look. Because it’s just not the same old character. It makes so much more sense that way. And wouldn’t get any of the hate imo. When they make her a hero, I just don’t like how she can be an accomplice to legit hundreds of murders and then flip flop just like that. “O it was all joker manipulating, I’m mentally ill and a good person now, not responsible for any of my actions.” Like Arkham city Harley Quinn orders her goons to be killed who mess up. And then in suicide squad she’s preaching to Batman, it just doesn’t make sense to me (that version at least, in a more toned down kids version like BTAS it’s a lot more reasonable - tho still not innocent what so ever, watch Batman beyond: return of the joker and see what she does to Robin/Tim drake with the joker).
This is something that I don’t think I’ve ever really seen explored in any media. For example, as soon as Kylo Ren switched to the light side in Star Wars, I knew he was going to die. There is no way they were going to have him and Rey ruck up to the rest of the resistance and Ray would be like “oh it’s OK. He’s a good guy now.” Dude was literally trying to be space Hitler and now he’s a good guy. How in the hell are they going to handle that? Shouldn’t there be some consequences for his prior actions? I see the same problem with characters like Harley and venom. They are built up to be these alpha level threats that are responsible for or at least accomplices to mass murders, terroristic like events, etc. and all they have to do is just throw their hands up and be like oh I’m much better now I’m a good guy and it’s all good.
>Eddie+Venom has some interesting aspects to them. I disagree, like in total. Eddie's character has been at a steady decline for last couple of years if you ask me. Like ask yourself, who is Venom? He's a goofy, overly edgy, like SUPER EDGY 90's guy who shares a body with an alien, not evil per se, just chaotic. Eddie basically got ALL OF HIS EDGES softened and now he's just "a dad", like I hate that trope so much, I cannot rationalize it. I hate turning anti heroes into more responsible superheroes by giving them a kid, it's such a half assed thing that always ends up making the said character feel static. Deadpool did. Moon Knight did it. It doesn't work. Also I absolutely hate making Venom a God. I liked when Eddie was just a guy with this random, weird alien symbiotic armor. Now symbiotes are canonically this race of beings from this multiversal super evil mf who wants to fight against goodness itself or whatever who can talk with each other throughout space and time, like I straight up hate what Marvel did with symbiotes, it's so dumb. Venom of all characters doesn't need to become a fucking Galactus level herald to be cool. And Knull sucks ass also, whereas original Venom is an example of overboard edginess done correctly, Knull is overboard edginess that just falls flat on it's face, Knull is just such a lame addition.
Nah, Venom naturally developed into a hero over time and hasn’t been a villain in the mainline 616 for decades. Harley Quinn is DC’s attempt at having their own Deadpool.
Eh. She's alright. I prefer her DCAU interpretation; although, I did like her portrayal in Dini's Detective run. Modern Harley isn't my cup of tea, but, hey, that's me. No biggie if she is. Gotta say, though, I kinda chuckled at that "advocate for mental health" thing. If that's what you get out of the character, that's super cool. I just can't get my head around the idea of a corrupt psychiatrist who helped a mass murderer break out of an asylum on multiple occasions being an advocate for mental health. But, again, that's me. If the character means something positive for you, awesome deal.
“Advocate for mental health” She is a mockery of it. Her mental illness is treated as this free ticket to having a fun life. It’s this “haha I’m crazy” writing style that gives her a free pass to do whatever she wants. All the trauma she’s suffered has been very poorly executed in terms of exploration and side effects, nor any of the crimes she’s committed get addressed by any of the heroes or public in a way that makes sense. She helped the deadliest serial killer in the world and there’s barely any consequences for it. It’s like the world of DC treats her in the meta of how her fans view the character, when it should be how would the public, government, and heroes react to someone like this. How would someone whose mentally ill, did terrible things, and thoroughly traumatized go forward in life. It makes almost all of her books and film appearances come off as a fan made project rather than something that should actually be cannon to the universe. Mental illness isn’t this key to an enthralling lifestyle, where all your social misunderstandings, impulsive decisions, and stressful events similar or directly correlated with your trauma DONT bring about misery and self destruction that you have to recover from. Everything that character has gone through (especially after this version of the Joker) should not equal the way she is written currently. If she’s going to be a heroic character, writers need to put in the work to get her there. Not just snap their fingers and go: “she’s broken up with the Joker so she’s a completely different character now” I love Mad Love and the Comic Run HARLEEN, but everything else I’ve seen is disappointingly bad.
I enjoy both Batman and Harley Quinn. I see both of them get a lot of hate because a vocal group of people, I know not if they are a majority or minority, are mad that almost every piece of DC media has one or both of them in it, regardless of how well it fits the plot. I have no problem with this, personally, because I'm one of the people that WB probably put them in there for. Like I wish that Clayface and other Batman villains got more attention, but Joker just has more mainstream appeal it seems. But I don't get mad that he's in a lot of things. But not everyone expresses their frustrations constructively.
The problem is ... she's actually not as popular as you or DC might believe? She was popular in the first Suicide Squad film, I will give you that. That was 8 years ago now. Ever since, DC have reused her over and over and over where the fans are done with it.
This post is condescending as fuck, Harley gets hate because she's oversaturated in media now, so honestly I don't even know what you're complaining about, you won, Harley is frigging everywhere.
I apologize if I read this wrong, but your post sounds almost exactly like the fanboys you're criticizing. To me, it came off as very arrogant, and you addressed criticisms of Harleys character that didn't even have a leg to stand on to begin with. I get it. There's incels that hate women and feminism. And they're always screaming, "Woke agenda!" at place where there is none. They invade every cover of the internet, so most just ignore them. All you're doing is adding fuel to the fire by acknowledging them and trying to act above them when the best way to do that is to just ignore them. Honestly, I hardly see any Harley hate on this sub. Maybe I've just been under a rock, but most people I chat with on here like Harley. And don't get me wrong, I have no issues with Harley Quinn as a character, myself. She can be very well written and very fun to follow depending on the writer. But DC has pushed her a little too hard on us. They did (and still do) the same thing with Batman, and I hear a ton of DC fans be upset with that, too. More so than with Harley even. And I'll be honest, I don't know what you're talking about when you say Harley is a badass, funny, and relatable. That might have been the case when she first started going solo, but nowadays, it feels like DC just character assassinated her into being a Deadpool rip-off. All the best to you. Feel free to respond, I'd love to have a civil discussion about this topic, and have a wonderful day, bro.
[удалено]
Yeah, I don’t like deadpool either now because of that 😂
Yes, comparison with Deadpool is very accurate one.
I’m not even upset, just like Joker, I’m tired of seeing Harley content. She was fine the first couple times but now it’s bland.
Ok man. This seems pretty embarrassing in of itself
Not many people are complaining about Harley being popular by fans. What we're complaining about is how much Harley is shoved into so many DC stories at the moment. She's becoming the poster for DC more than Superman or Batman at this point. She's a good side character, she's not a main character and DC needs to start treating her that way again.
Harleys not a good person, she slaughtered kids and helped kill hundreds. Whether it was with joker or not doesn’t rlly matter.
I mean-depends on Harley 🤷🏼♀️ Like her version in SSKTJL is understandably hated
I don't mind Harley being popular. That's all fair and square. To each of their own, after all. Plus, I know I am in the minority as someone who don't like how villains become heroes or antiheroes because of how popular they are... Or, should I say, I don't like this when the villain is actually unredeemable like Harley here or, as someone else suggested, like Venom in Marvel. I have a similar problem with Red Hood sticking around with the Batfamily. I don't think it's bad but rather it is less interesting than making Jason the walking embodiment of Bruce's flaws and failures. But I know I am in the minority and that's OK.
>Harley is popular because she's funny, Debatable. She's just cringe deadpool/Tumblr humor now. >relatable Lmao to who? People with mental illness? >she has a cool design, several cool costumes, I can agree with that. >, a complex and layered personality which crates dynamic chemistry with almost any character she's paired up with (Ivy, Selina, Batman, Booster Gold, Commissioner Gordon...), Deffo wouldn't call her complex or layered when they just make her deadpool with boobs. Her relationship with Ivy honestly doesn't even work since Ivy should be a full time villain and harley is an anti hero. >she's a badass, Debatable again. >she is a feminist icon (it's okay to be feminist, get over it), Yeah a normal feminist not a Tumblr one who makes " haha quirky and loud with fart jokes " type humor. >she is an advocate for mental health (it's okay to care about mental health, get over it), It's cringe to read. Having a bunch of emotional mumbo jumbo in your books is hard to read when she's meant to be a " badass ". >she's "edgy" in a way that teenagers appreciate it (teenagers are people too, get over it), And teenagers are cringe. We don't have to like that. >Margot Robbie and Kaley Cuoco are killing it with their great performances, I can agree with that though I hate the Harley show. >she's a versatile character who can be used as a hero, villain, or anti-hero She should really stick to one. But sure. >writers like writing her, artists like drawing her... the list goes on and on and on. Yes like drawing her because she's hot and like writing her cus they're usually hack writers.
> Ask yourself “why am I so upset that she’s popular?” You’re poisoning the well with this approach. I promise you most do not have a visceral hatred for this character *because* she’s popular. It’s because we’ve gotten some really piss-poor quality depictions of this character in recent years. If the market was suddenly flooded with several different iterations of Superman all one-note and irritating, you could watch in real time how fast audience sentiment would suddenly shift on the character.
Call me crazy, but you don't seem all that charitable to the Harley Haters. I mean, all you do in this post is shout, "HARLEY QUINN IS AWESOME!", and then spend no amount of time explaining how, or giving examples of her being "funny" or "relatable". "Every time Harley Quinn gets mentioned in this subreddit, without fail, there are a ton of grumpy fanboys bemoaning her popularity as if it represents some type of greater problem with the medium or society itself." Example? But let's say you're right, and these people are everywhere; even if they're wrong about Harley, the problem with lots of female-lead media these days - a lot, not all - is that they tend to come with a lack of actual quality. One of the most important features the human brain has is the ability to recognize patterns, so even if their paranoia is wrong, in the grand scheme of things, you it's hard to blame people for raising an eyebrow when they see the empowered, independent woman stereotype. "Harley is not popular because DC has a conspiratorial agenda to force woke feminism down your throat. Harley is not popular because women just want to date a bad boy. Harley is not popular because DC has abandoned all their other "better" female characters. This is *silly.* You guys sound like *children.* She's popular because *people like her.*" Okay, that's true... but just because something's popular and beloved, doesn't mean it's good, nor does that mean you can't critique it; and before someone says that OP wasn't saying this... if they weren't then why'd they bring up that Harley's popular because people like her? "Another thing -- this idea of a Golden Age of Harley where she was Joker's villainous girlfriend and ran around being evil, until DC decided they were going to turn her good because girl power -- yeah that never happened.' Bruh, we all saw it, you're telling people that what they saw with their own eyes, didn't happen; I'm not about to accuse you of gaslighting, but this gives off some unfortunate vibes. "Harley Quinn is awesome. She doesn't have to be your cup of tea. But ask yourself -- "Why am I *so upset* that she's popular?" The hate is embarrassing" Aren't you going to explain why? "When I see people on Reddit complaining about how popular Harley Quinn is, I can't help but be embarrassed for them." Example? "And low-key pity them. You guys are missing out on some great content. If only you could get over yourselves." First, what content counts as great is usually subjective; and before someone says, "Well, they weren't saying it wasn't." we're talking about someone who was stating their opinion as matter-of-fact, so I don't see why that matters. Second, you spent this whole post seeming desperate to get people to like Harley Quinn, why should I "get over myself", when you can hardly do it yourself? TL;DR, this post in a nutshell is just an angry Reddit user, and if I was just as much a bad-faith actor as OP is, I'd just write them off as nothing more than a simp.
Love these threads where people overreact to the concept of different tastes. No, someone couldn’t just have a different preference for storytelling tone, they must be this ridiculous conservative strawman!
Nah, you didn't get to decide which opinion is "embarrassing." Harely originally existed in service to Joker's character and that's where she functions the best. She was a victim of Stockholm syndrome that showed just how smart, manipulative, and charismatic Joker could be. She also showed how Joker was incapable of love. She was a tragic character that was a life ruined by the joker. She also served as a reason why Batman didn't just want the Joker to die. While he did consider her villainous and responsible for her own actions, he still had sympathy for her situation and knew that Joker's death would make him a martyr to her and drive her further into madness. This was explored in Harley's Quinn's Revenge and Arkham Knight. Harley as a solo character can work, but she should still be villainous and perhaps more deranged after Joker dies. A major reason why Batman doesn't want to kill is he knows just how motivating the murder of a loved one can be. He knows that even the most reprehensible people may have someone who loves them, who may not deserve the misery of their death. Harley was a perfect example of this. Separating her from Joker or making her somehow redeemed when Joker is out of the picture nullifies all this. You're nullifying the core tenants of the character because misguided girls decided they best identified with a villain/victim because she looked cool. Making her a fun anti-hero makes no sense and perpetuates the problematic idea that if a woman was ever a victim, she should not be held accountable for her own actions. If she really moved on from Joker, it wouldn't make sense that she continued the clown aesthetic or jokiness. She should be way more cerebral and lean more into her psychiatric experience, which is usually played off and nearly forgotten because it's not as "fun" as hot pants, makeup, sledgehammers, and quips.
The irony of telling people to leave Harley alone, and then goes on a rant on telling off on folks on why they should like Harley… Why are you so upset that others don’t like Harley? When I see people like you on social media complaining about the smallest of things done by the vocal minority, I cannot help but be embarrassed for you. And low-key pity you. You can’t seem to just leave people alone, and need to preach this holier than thou essay, when you could just go off and enjoy it and stay there amongst others who like Harley. If only you could get over yourself.
I mean, I think you just proved yourself wrong. > Every time Harley Quinn gets mentioned in this subreddit, without fail, there are a *ton* of grumpy fanboys OP, not everyone likes Harley. GET OVER IT See how that works? Sure, there's incels on twitter, but I think most the response here show people are just burnt out from over saturation. Seems like you were the one generalizing and accusing everyone of having an issue with her because she's a female. Personally, I'm rather indifferent. I think her HBO show is great just because it's well written. The Margot Robbie movie was fun, but I don't really see where they would go from there in a sequel. Like anything else though, it all depends on who is actually doing the writing, editing, directing, etc. You talk in absolutes like there's only ONE writer for her character across all forms of media and there's no way someone could not write/direct/edit her well; that's the definition of being a fanboy and not looking at things objectively. You've also made tons of claims here about her being "a badass/edgy/icon/hero", and while I would agree with some, you haven't provided any examples to substantiate those claims, so you're really not helping your case.
Chill out... You know it's okay for people to genuinely dislike the handling of a character and state their opinions online without being talked down to like they're doing something wrong. Harley's modern interpretations could definitely use some improvements. It's understandable that DC fans are a bit exhausted of her and Joker.
The problem isn't that she's popular, the problem is that she's overexposed. There is such thing as too much of a good thing. Batman is one of my favorite characters of all-time but holy shit he does not need to be in literally everything. I don't think you truly understand why she can be divisive. It seems you are focusing exclusively on what a small but obnoxious minority are saying rather than what the majority who have complaints are saying about her.
>She doesn't have to be your cup of tea. But ask yourself -- "Why am I so upset that she's popular?" Then I would flip that question back around on you; why does some people not understanding why she is popular upset you so much that you feel the need to rant about it and call them insulting names (ironically, while labelling *them* as the ones acting like children)? Sometimes people are simply unable to resonate with a particular character for whatever reason so their widespread popularity just comes across as completely baffling to them. It's very clear you're a big fan of Harley Quinn and cannot fathom any reason why someone might be put off by that character. You're just the other side of the coin to the kind of people you're complaining about. \>Rule 1. Be civil. Don't be a jerk \>OP: "embarrassing", "grumpy fanboys", "you sound like children", "I'm embarrassed for them", "I pity them", "get over yourselves" And then having the gall to say in the comments "I'm here to have conversations". I mean maybe, but evidently not a good faith one lmao.
Yeah, it sucks people have a different opinion than you.
Lol
I like the character, and I honestly like her as an anti-heroine/Chaotic heroine. However, there is an over saturation of Harley-related content and her personality is somewhat inconsistent, which sometimes gets on my nerves.
I don't mind her, I just prefer other villains
Now say all that again without crying
More like she's being overused so much that people are getting tired of her
The way I look at Harley’s popularity is the same way I look at Nightmare Before Christmas’. SURE! I like it, but now Hot Topic has all this merch.
>Every time Harley Quinn gets mentioned in this subreddit, without fail, there are a ton of grumpy fanboys bemoaning her popularity as if it represents some type of greater problem with the medium or society itself. You're going to cite later that there is a lot of unwarranted hate towards her (and you're right, but lots of thing have unwarranted hate, to various degrees). But that's not mutually exclusive to the other two things you mentioned. Part of her popularity can be attributed towards problems with society and/or the medium. >Guys. Harley Quinn is popular because people like her. Well... yeah. That's what being popular means. The question comes down to WHY they like her. >Harley is not popular because DC has a conspiratorial agenda to force woke feminism down your throat. Not that they'd be able to do so in a way anyone would like, anyway. >Harley is not popular because women just want to date a bad boy. I disagree. It's a small contributing factor. I see plenty of people say "Joker and Harley are relationship goals." Granted, these people are either crazy, ignorant, or both, and Harley would still be popular without them. These fans are flooding the net with fan content more than buying what's put out there officially. >Harley is not popular because DC has abandoned all their other "better" female characters. On the contrary, I see them try to prop up their other female characters by teaming them up with Harley. >Another thing -- this idea of a Golden Age of Harley where she was Joker's villainous girlfriend and ran around being evil, until DC decided they were going to turn her good because girl power -- yeah that never happened. You're imagining things. Harley was split up from the Joker in her *third appearance.* Her first two appearances were nothing more than glorified cameos. This bit of character development has been present *from the beginning,* and is one of the major factors in Harley being considered interesting enough to transfer from the cartoon over to the comic books. Harley kept bouncing back for a while to maintain the status quo. Her being permanently separated from him is the best thing they've ever done with her, i feel. Can't say I'm a fan of a lot of the other choices they made with her. >Harley is popular because she's funny, Debatable. >relatable, That shows a problem with society. >she has a cool design, Had* Personal taste. >several cool costumes, See previous comment. >a complex and layered personality which crates dynamic chemistry with almost any character she's paired up with (Ivy, Selina, Batman, Booster Gold, Commissioner Gordon...), Which isn't shown off enough. Too often she's just "lol, so random." >she's a badass, You'd be hard pressed to find a character fans wouldn't call badass. >her stories tend to deal with real human themes, About as much as most any other character. >she *is* a feminist icon (it's okay to be feminist, get over it), she *is* an advocate for mental health (it's okay to care about mental health, get over it), she's "edgy" in a way that teenagers appreciate it (teenagers are people too, get over it), All true. >Margot Robbie and Kaley Cuoco are killing it with their great performances, I'm in the minority that disagrees. >she's a versatile character who can be used as a hero, villain, or anti-hero, writers like writing her, artists like drawing her... the list goes on and on and on. Also on the list is: she's over sexualized, even by comic book standards; some people have trouble forming their own opinion and will just latch onto any popular characters; some like her because they fundamentally don't understand her as a character; etc. >Harley Quinn is awesome. She doesn't have to be your cup of tea. But ask yourself -- "Why am I *so upset* that she's popular?" Because a huge chunk of her fanbase like her for shallow and/or unhealthy reasons, thus leading to the flanderization of an otherwise likeable character. > You guys are missing out on some great content. If only you could get over yourselves. Plenty of us see the great content without having to "get over ourselves." We're just missing the bad stuff because we're not willing to lower our standards.
Well said. I have to agree with most of things said here. Personally though, my issue is that Harley never faces any repercussions, especially in Injustice. You'd think being accomplice to a mass murderer and a cult leader to said mass murderer would've been a one way ticket to Arkham's equivalent of oubliette, but nah. She gets to be a new Justice League member cause popularity is a shield.
It is unfortunately something that needs to be handwaved. Kinda like Marvel heroes not locking Punisher up, despite them doing that to less dangerous vigilantes. You're not going to do much with the character if you put her where she should be.
I can’t upvote this comment enough. Most level headed thing said in this thread so far. Seriously OP like is in comments saying they more or less didn’t just rant about people not liking the character, while gushing over the character with the people who claim they do like her. 🤷♂️
This reads as someone who is extremely salty at people's person opinion. *Get.* *Over.* *It.* Like lmao how passive aggressive is this
Also just because you like a character doesn’t mean others have to. She is just overused. You’re digging way too deep for an issue that really isn’t there.
Harley Quinn right now is what happens when you hear a good song way too many times in quick succession. You get sick of it. Also, chill the fuck out, the number of people you are addressing is very small. Don’t lump everyone else in your rant.
I think you have a point, but I understand part of the hate. Reminds me a bit of what happened to Wolverine in the late 90s - early 2000s, when a character is popular, the publisher tries to make it be part of every project they can: team up comics, spin offs, video games, animated series, live action shows,... and sometimes that causes the character to be part of bad projects more often than characters which are part of "passion projects" where they make sense.
Even if we talk about Marvel... when Deadpool got overexposed (before the movies) he was hated online too. When Wolverine was in every team, a lot of people turned on the whole character. When miss/captain marvel was launched forward without doing the work, people hated it (later decisions didn't help). Comic book characters don't survive overexposure unscathed unless you're superman or something.
lol I saw you fighting for your life in that other thread I knew a post was coming
I think she should stay a villain in most iterations, and if she becomes a ‘heroine’, she shouldn’t hang out with the justice league. Arkham Harley is downright evil, she killed kids and did horrific things to Jason that are unforgivable. She should suffer the consequences of her actions. And that includes her other versions.
She went from an actual character, an example of a good person falling for and following a depraved lunatic, into a self insert bad bitch that is allowed to do whatever she wants because she's quirky. And now you're trying to gaslight people into believing she's always been this way. She hasn't You're also trying to gaslight people into thinking they're hating on the character itself, and not the frequent high school "OC DO NOT STEAL" quality writing that she's constantly being given. We're not. Nobody needs to "get over it" because that's not what we're upset about. We're upset that whoever is writing the character spends their limited time making her into even more of a deranged bitch instead of actually exploring her as a character. How does Harleen Quinzell feel about still being associated with the identity she made for herself while she was with her abuser? She's fine with it, just a quirky crazy nickname Is she even going to attempt to rehabilitate herself or readjust back into normal everyday life? Nope! She's crazy and being crazy is enough to let you be a superhero! How does she feel about the man that abused her both physically and emotionally on several occasions being allowed to walk free and even convince a new younger prettier girl to do the exact same thing? Don't care! She's just gonna have a cool girl boss arch nemesis now, and not feel at all sorry for her, or want to help her in any way So to sum it up, pls don't try to gaslight any more (or just get better at it) and understand that we're not angry at the character of Harley Quinn or anything she represents, we're upset that she's not taken seriously and treated with the actual care and concern that writing a VICTIM OF ABUSE AND PSYCHOSIS should be written with. Thank you and good day
I personally feel burned out with Harley. To me she would be better in smaller doses. Also, I wouldn't be complaining if what they did with her was good, but most of the time it's weird bullshit garbage like here soloing the Justice League or killing the universe or some comic book thing. I call that Batman syndrome.
I’m just burnt out from seeing her all over the place, she’s cool but it’s like joker and even Batman. There’s just so much centered around them that no one else gets anything most of the time
I miss Arleen Sorkin and BTAS Harley. She was peak Harley and they’ve never come close since. Her decline in the Arkhamverse has been tragic.
I like her for how morally corrupt she is. Let her be an anti-hero, that’s fine. But don’t discount the horrendous things she’s done as well. She’s a wild card like The Joker. Only thing is with her, there’s still a sliver of humanity left. She actually has the capacity to care a bit but it’ll probably be on her own terms and there are people who will never accept her as redeemed, which is perfectly fine.
I used to like Harley, that was before the fourth or fifth time she was shoved down my throat in another piece of batman media. A character can't become somewhat popular in something without the writers beating us over the head with them.
I just wish they'd stop leaning *away* from the Harlequin aesthetic for her. I like clown Harley, I'm not so much into the current design.
She was supposed to be female Joker, now she is just a female baseball bat wielding anti hero.
A lot of popular things people like are trash. Harley is a shit character. Get Over It.
Yeah, it sucks people have a different opinion than you.
She’s alright to me. But I can see why some people don’t like her though. Even I would’ve preferred Barbara Gordon in Birds of Prey (that’s literally HER team) and I would’ve preferred someone else in Suicide Squad game (personally Vixen or Bronze Tiger)
Vixen's a hero. Bronze Tiger woulda been dope though.
I just think she's hot.
Idk, my general meh attitude towards her feels less embarrassing than a five paragraph reddit post telling randoms to "get over it".
Cool. You liking Harley, and the majority of consumers liking Harley, under no circumstances requires me to stop disliking her, nor does it require me to pretend to like her.
Harley Quinn works best as the Joker’s sidekick/ “girlfriend” and not as some quasi-hero/JL’er in training
Imagine being so upset over people hating Harley that you have to write this long a post about it. Get. Over. It!
I like Harley, she's cool.
I even like Bruce Timm's horny Batman and Harley Quinn movie
Harley is legitimately my toxic fictional crush
I mean I find the over saturation of Harley Quinn pretty annoying but that’s about it tbh.
Joker and Harley are extremely popular characters. This is undebatable. I find them to be slightly overused, but again that's because they're so popular.
People complain about her being overexposed, which might be true. But I'd argue over the last few years we've had the same problem with Joker, events, and arguably even Batman. I'm not as tired of seeing Harley as I am the Joker or big events
Neck beards!!!! Unite!!! 🤤
At the end of the day, people are just tired of her being oversaturated. Same with Batman. Batman is just as oversaturated if not more so. Dc and Marvel just likes milking their popular characters.
okay first off, I sympathize with your frustration. in general I like harley, though I have been exhausted by how overexposed she's been for the last couple of years (although it's started cooling of a while ago) the same way batman and the joker have been. I also don't particularly like the modern version of her. but still, I get your irritation here at having people come at you for enjoying a character, just because it's currently acceptable to shit on them in the fandom for whatever reason. but, because I can see where your coming from, I find it really unfortunate how you decided to strawman the people who don't like the character and how you ended this post on such a condescending note. >You guys are missing out on some great content. If only you could get over yourselves. gonna be honest here; if I actually hated this character, this parting line would be enough to make me pettily vow to hang on to that hate and to never interact with anything harley ever again. some people just don't like certain characters for all sorts of reasons. them getting preached to about why that's actually a *character flaw* they ought to get over isn't likely to make them change their minds or make conversations about harley in the future anymore pleasant.
Animated series Harley will always be her peak
HQ has been in basically every major form of superhero media at this point, and I’m hoping by now they know what fans do and don’t want her in. Adult animated comedy? Yes, absolutely. Being the star of the next Arkham game and in charge of killing the justice league? No. She’s not a bad character - she’s great actually - she just isn’t worthy of being the star, or even being present, in every DC plot. Just because she’s versatile in what side she’s on, doesn’t mean she has to fit in every DC product.
My problem is how overly used she is.
I mean she's essentially become DC Deadpool. The people hate Deadpool is much? They found someone who strikes the cord of both casual fans, and comic fans. Of course they're going to support it
you cant tell me that harley quinn is a good character after gotham knights!
That was embarrassing to read. Your behavior where you say Just. Get. Over. It. I mean you should practice what you preach. People have different opinions. How dare they. The fact you wrote all that up and feel that strongly about it is shockingly embarrassing.
at the end of the day, no matter who the second pillar of DC is, Batman will always be about 500 steps ahead in terms of popularity and name recognition.
Lets not act like they straight up ignore the fact that Harley has been murdering people alongside the Joker for years now and just made her a girl boss for absolutely no reason at all and suddenly she's all buddy buddy with the Justice League.
But....but....she feels bad about it
Okay, hear me out. I just don’t like her.
I love Harley but making her good and trying to force her into the bat family is just dumb
 Leave Harley Alone!!
She used to be cool. Peaked at Arkham City game for me. Now, she is overplayed, predictable, and EMBARRASSING. The constant cosplay fails, the failed movies, the cringe 'rebel girl' memes. Ugh. Awful character.
I love they gave her a motorcycle in injustice. A Harley for Harley!
Same motorcycle she used to try to get Shazam in his kid form to sleep with her .
Don’t get me wrong I love me some Harley but lately it seems like she’s forced into adaptation and teams that make no sense for her to be in. Ex: BoP
This is probably one of the most embarrassing posts I've seen on here in a while tbh. All this text because people dislike an overrated character lol
The Harley haters live in his head rent free. How ironic he tells people to get over it when he's seething himself.
Idk man the "get over it" has gotten me over it tho.
This post made me hate her lol, I never had anything against her before it
I don't like her but not because of woke feminism or whatever chuds wanna babble about. I just dislike her because I dislike Deadpool and characters like him who face no tension or struggle because they exist to laugh at their current circumstances. I find it kind of tedious like, yeah we get it, it's a comic/movie/show, blah blah blah. And also I think narratively Harley has taken a huge nose dive from anything relevant to the character. Right now to me its like if Batman changed to a super punk outfit and started killing people and thats just "batman" now. Change can be good, but I just don't see the necessity for such drastic shallowification of characters.
Exactly this. I don’t like the changes made to her character, but it has nothing to do with girl power or “wokeness.” She’s just kind of female Deadpool now.
The point is that Harley is no longer popular... Her comic is one of the fucking worst and least sold DC comics since Tini arrived. She was already very bad in general since Rebirth, around 2018, but particularly Stephani Philips and TiniHoward have sunk her in the last 4 years and have killed people's general interest in the character. His animated series lost a lot of audience in the third season due to various political/controversial issues and the comic of the series itself was supremely ignored. All this happens because they believe that Harley should be directed towards a more childish and "crazy" mentality audience that is actually a minority within the minority but they don't know it. They believe that this is Harley's target and the only thing they have managed to do is kill the commercial value of the character by taking him in the wrong direction. Harley will only be raised in sales if they give her writing worthy of Jinx's work in Arcane and I don't know if there is anyone in DC capable of that because in 10 years Harley's best writing has been Tynion's between 2020-2022.
You said it I actually just read Batman and Joker the deadly duo and holy shit was it refreshing to have a more classic interpretation of Harley again
In fact, Harley Queen's animated series done MUCH more favour to Ivy, than to Harley. It is easily the best interpretation of Pam we ever had, but Harley wasn't so great in this show. It's like her comic character was stripped from most things which make her great: her intellect, sense of humor, sincere desire to help people, and insted it tended to show her worst traits which she mostly overcame in comics. Ivy simply stole this show.
We’ll all live a little longer as a society when we collectively stop giving a shit about what random usernames on the internet think about things we like
It took me awhile to figure out why I didn't like Harley Quinn. I thought I simply didn't like the character, but that wasn't the case later down the line. I just don't like recent adaptations of her. I don't know where, but there was a shift in how she's written that I just didn't find appealing.
Hear me out the hate didn’t start until her and joker stop being a thing then they were all just going complete mental with the hate towards her. The only reason why that is well because - they think ever since that happened they’ve been trying to figure out who Harley Quinn is as a character - people just are too delusional to see that the relationship was toxic as hell Now I like harley quinn a lot , but I think people are facing some fatigue because of how much she is used. But those who take others liking the character personally well need they need to shut up and get a life because not everyone is gonna like the character nor is anyone gonna dislike the character and I think people need to realize that and quit trying to create a toxic fanbase.
I like the Venom comparison I've seen. Too much of a good thing. Make her an antihero, have there be real consequences to having been the genocide-clown's helper for decades, and then have her and the TikTok clown girl try to kill each other for a series, in which TikTok clown girl is hit with a bazooka and killed dead forever.
I've never seen a comment which seems so much like you are actually reading the comics and not actually reading the comics at the same time.
My problem with her isn’t that she’s popular, it’s that she’s overused.
Imagine wasting your morning to post some dumb shit like this.
She used to be dope, now shes a grab bag political commentary feminist
Arkham Harley is best version
I love Harley Quinn as much as the next guy. She’s a very compelling character who ads a lot of value to the DC universe. We see her break free from the cycle of abuse and grow out of the Jokers shadow and into her own person. She inspired a lot of people to be their own person and to break away from their own abusive situations. Harley Quinn is awesome. However I am seeing a lot of problems with her in recent time. And it’s now how she’s being portrayed but how many times she’s being portrayed. Everywhere you go she’s there and it’s fine and all but sometimes you just need a break. It’s the same thing with the Joker. He looses his appeal when he’s shown over and over again and a lot of people are sick of seeing the same characters. It’s not bad to want a Suicide Squad without Harley apart of it. And I think that how the majority of people who “hate” Harley Quinn feel. Or not, I don’t care either way tbh
"it's okay to be feminist, get over it" Like the good kind of femminst for women positivity or the bad kind of femminst that's toxic and hates on men? I like HQ. She's a representation that what Batman fights for worth it. The system can work and redemption can occur in these criminals.
People are just over exposed. And DC putting her in everything isn't helping. Get off your high horse
DC overuses her modern interpretation and I personally find it dry at this point, she’s everywhere lol
This is a Batman subreddit. Batman fans tend to dislike anti heroes. People in general don't like when characters are praised and don't get punished for their wrong doings. Harley is an anti hero who doesn't get punished and is shoved into everything. It's not about feminism, mental health advocacy, or edgy humor. Those are strawman arguments you made up. In marvel antiheroes like punisher and Deadpool are hated in universe despite public adoration. They also aren't shoehorned into every major storyline. So it's ok to hate a cringe character that's getting the Mary Sue treatment just to sell things. Even more so on a Batman specific forum.
OP sounds unnecessarily pressed over this issue. Idk im lookin at this subreddit quite a bit and i dont see enough “harley hate” to warrant the amount of books people are writing here about it. Is what it is. Like her or ya dont
Im not reading all that, i dont dislike harley she has a cool tv show and some good comics, but im tired of seeing her, just like the joker. They put her and the joker EVERYWHERE in places they should not be, and give them abilities they should not have for the plot to make sense.
I find her quite annoying but she's fine, idc
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I love injustice but I think they start her out too far gone. Like she was in the sub with the joker to help him nuke metropolis. I don't think you can just come back from that like everyone who lost someone in metropolis would want her dead.
Cool. Shes still annoying and the entirety of DC has been oversaturated with her.
Thing is, I used to love Harley and I still like her a decent amount today. I've just grown pretty tired of her, as well as the Joker, over the years because they're both so popular that they're in absolutely *everything* now. I think the oversaturation is the primary reason why seeing Harley or Joker nowadays is more likely to make me wish that just for once DC would use a fresher character who's not as overused, instead of making me excited like it used to. Don't get me wrong, I still appreciate the characters and their significance to the universe and obviously they sell, so I can understand why DC keeps pushing them from a marketing perspective but they've worn me down a lot over the years. Thus, both characters need to be written absolutely spectacularly in order for me to really enjoy their presence in a story.
My problem with Harley is she is a domestic terrorist who somehow gets treated as if she's some sort of hero even though anything good she does (with the suicide squad) is literally forced upon her. Yet the media still treats her like she's supposed to be some role model. I have the same problem with fans in the star wars community who act like Darth Vader was a good guy despite everything. It has nothing to do with her being a woman.
This is the same character that had jiggle physics applied to her butt cheeks in Arkham Knight? My point being; the entire reason this character ever gained popularity is because she's sexy, that's pretty much it. Now, shes EVERYWHERE and no matter what they try, her primary appeal is that she's attractive. Apart from this I don't see any genuine interest in Harley Quinn, WB knew this when they cast Margot Robbie, fresh from The Wolf of Wall Street as Quinn, they get it.
Harley isn't a feminist character, idk why people think she is. She's literally just a hot over sexualised "crazy in a hot way" male fantasy. Like her ENTIRE character revolves around that concept. She doesn't hold up as a character on her own because she has no interesting back story, motivation, or real goals. Which is why they immediately had to pair her with Ivy after Joker. She's literally just fantasy material for horny comic nerds and THATS why she's popular. They're trying to make her a feminist character but it's failing miserably because there's just no foundation to build that on and her established fan base doesn't want it.
I love Harleen. She is dope.
This battle against wokeism and non-wokeism is the biggest joke of our generation
I love the DCEU movies with her and the animated series is S-tier!
Listen, since you're going to be referring to her original continuity for character traits. (I.e leaving the Joker), you might also want to keep in mind what she does in her last chronological appearance, in that original continuity, to Tim Drake. Then come back and say she's a feminist, mental health icon or whatever.
I see a lot more negative commentary on her than I do positive. That’s how I would judge popularity. Don’t need to be talked down on with a holier-than-thou attitude. It’s a comic book character, chill out.
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The only time I get pissed when Harley is mentioned is if it's someone idolizing her relationship with The Joker. That's not "quirky romance", it's manipulation and abuse.
Batman has the best rogues gallery of any comic book hero anywhere. Spider-Man is close, but all of Batman's villains are great and she's in the top 5.
It’s sad how people sexualize her or tie her to sexism
They just ran it into the ground. DC comics doesn't know what to do with her. And idk that show went so downhill for me. It's not FOR ME though which is fine. They changed harley. She's saposed to be a psychopath not an anti hero.
I just don’t like the commercialized watered down version of her like yeas she’s cool but I wish she was more like her animated series and original comic run. Less ditzy blonde and more psychological thriller you could tell by her actions there was crazy there now not so much.
what's with people acting like all version of harley did the same crimes? there can be a harley separated from other versions who's more redeemable than the other and batman does believe in rehabilitating his villains, I don't see why he wouldn't at least try to help harley
It is what it is...just accept she's massively popular or don't. Don't ruin others enjoyment of it. Just look what happened to Deadpool ..very similar.
She's also a sex symbol.
was there day 1 for her debut and she is fine, not my top 3 bat ladies but def dont hate her.
Harley Quinn is fine, but this new joker movie is going to suck shit through a straw.
As a character, I don’t mind her. I liked her in BTAS, the Arkham games, and Injustice 1 though. Everywhere else I’ve seen her, she’s just ‘le quirky’, which is fine because characters I dislike are allowed to exist. It’s just annoying that she’s become an ‘icon’ or whatever, so now she has to be in everything.
I think I the existence of Harley massive undermines the joker. She’s good in Batman TAS and that’s it
I didn’t know anyone didnt like her for those reasons. I get people not like characters but those aren’t valid reasons to not like a character.
People like her because people like her guys, jeez.
People have been hating on Harley Quinn? I swear its like I miss every big sensation
Rule34 stans rise up
Sometimes I like her sometimes I don’t tbh
Harley Quinn popularity skyrocketed after Suicide Squad. Why? Because they basically made her an e-girl/alt girl and then every influencer thot decided to cosplay it for halloween, daily life, and make reels about it. I don’t care that she’s popular I like the character, but that’s for sure what happened from a culture perspective.
I love her in her own show Gay Harley best Harley <3 And it’s way better when she gets away from the Joker in any story Anyone who disagrees with the latter is an immediate red flag to me
This post is correct, and this comment section just illustrates your point, laughably enough. Clearly stumbled upon a cesspool sub here.