As a child of the ’90s, Harley Quinn was one of my first cartoon crushes. Next to Mary Jane Watson, Ms. Quinn is one of the comic book gals that has always had a place in my heart, even when the comics starring her haven’t been to my liking. After checking back in with her during some Poison Ivy appearances and this past Summer’s Gotham City Sirens special, I decided I’d give the latest arc of Harley Quinn a spin, and while it did throw me into the deep end of the pool, writer Elliot Kanan and artist Carlos Olivares gave me enough flotation devices to ride along with Harley on what can only be described as one of the worst road trips I’ve ever seen.
Harley has made a lot of people mad lately. A lot. Whether it’s money, revenge, or her love that they are after, a lot of people are looking for her, which has led to a sizable bounty being placed on her, dead or alive. Fortunately for the people who want Harley (and unfortunately for Harley herself), she’s currently held captive by the Gunbuddies, two wannabe mercenaries with eyes on the reward for bringing Harley in. However, they’re quite a distance away from the West Coast collector who’s placed the highest bid, so Harley has to either unwillingly tag along or make her escape. This is part one of a new storyline, so Harley escapes into the Coast City Zoo, where she befriends a Tapir and runs up against Fire and Ice. Well, at least they aren’t trying to kill her….
Credit where credit is due, Elliot Kalan deserves a lot of praise for making this issue of Harley Quinn as easy to follow as it is. This far into the series I wouldn’t expect a lot of handholding, and Kalan doesn’t do that, instead doling out the information you need for the story right now and trusting that you’ll either catch up on your own time for the other subplots in the book or just trust the editorial notes to keep you going. Kalan’s script moves at a quick pace and really has a strong sense of momentum, even though that does lead to the book feeling a tad overstuffed at times (once Harley reached the Coast City Zoo I was sure I was going to see a “next issue” tease, only to find there were five more pages to go). Harley is a very peculiar character to write (it’s very easy to give into the impulse to just make her “DC Deadpool”), but Kalan wisely keeps her fourth-wall breaking to an extreme minimum and instead keeps putting Harley in the underdog position, which is my preferred method of Harley antics. It’s much more fun when she’s allowing people to underestimate her and trying to keep going with things on the fly than her being a know-it-all jaded character. That being said, there are a lot of subplots in this series that are a little hard to keep track of for someone picking up the book off the rack.
DC
Artist Carlos Olivares has a style that feels like it was ripped from old Ren & Stimpy cartoons of my childhood, and it’s a perfect fit for this issue. The art is just cartoony enough to highlight the absurdity of Harley’s situation, but not so absurd that you feel like you got a mislabeled all-ages book. The highlight of the issue is Harley’s battle with the Gunbuddies inside of their camper van. The fact that we only see the outside of the van as it careens down the highway is extremely funny, and really impressive when you consider we are just going by what Olivares has drawn with the van’s movement and the dialogue balloons.
Harley Quinn #54 isn’t quite the “new reader entry” I was hoping it would be, but there’s still a lot in this opening arc to pique my interest for more. As a fan of the HBO Max Harley Quinn show, this is the first time in a while that I’ve read a Harley comic that feels almost in line with the humor of that show. If Kalan and Olivares can keep this up, I may be back on the Harley train for a while.
You must be logged in to post a comment.