Harley Quinn Is Out For Her Freedom In The First Trailer For ‘Birds of Prey’
Margot Robbie blows the roof off this thing.
Harley Quinn has had something of an undignified history, both in comics and on the screen.
She was dreamt up as nothing more than a female version of the Clown Prince of Crime, the Joker; a kind of gender-flipped villain, defined wholly by her boyfriend Mr. J. Indeed, her origin story is one of obsession, not autonomy. She was a therapist who became utterly invested in the Joker, singularly dedicated to breaking him out of jail and then, once she had done that, singularly dedicated with keeping in his affections.
So yeah, we’re not exactly talking about the most empowering of characters, or of histories. Which makes the first trailer for Quinn’s new film Birds of Prey something special indeed.
The trailer lays its cards on the table straight away: the Joker is out of the picture. He and Quinn are broken up, she tells us. But she’s not weeping over spilled milk; she’s out for herself now, desperate to finally define her own autonomy and discover what it’s like to be her very own woman.
Hence the film’s subtitle — And The Fantabulous Emancipation of one Harley Quinn — and hence it being a fascinating new take on the character. Birds of Prey doesn’t cast Harley as a fetish object, or a secondary heavy. She’s the main attraction here, and her narrative journey is one of self-discovery.
If that hasn’t gotten you excited yet, maybe all of the supporting characters will. Jurnee Smollett-Bell stars as superheroine Black Canary, Rosie Perez is the gun-wielding vigilante Renee Montoya, and Ewan McGregor is the all-time great Batman antagonist Black Mask, desperate to put an end to Quinn’s tale of self-worth.
Of course, the trailer is light on plot details — the film doesn’t come out till February 2020, so this is more like a vibe check than anything else. But it still looks absolutely thrilling.
Drink it in.