Batman: Prelude to the Wedding - Harley Quinn vs. the Joker

[cyberghostface]

 

Comments

[icon_uk]

Okay, first of all, unless there's a twist ending, this is not what I was hoping for from this issue.

Second of all, don't talk about past death-traps if you're not going to show them, ESPECIALLLY if they were going to feature a certain former sidekick!

[cyberghostface]

There’s an elaborate death trap early on, Harley tries to drown Joker in pudding.

[alicemacher]

Pudding... heh. An ironic trap indeed.

As for past death-traps, the Death of a Hundred Smiles would be the one from Mad Love in which Batman was to be lowered upside down into a tank of piranhas.

[ozaline]

Perhaps it's best that Beaver Dam of the Damned is left to tge imagination, I'm sure it couldn't meet the hype.

[janegray]

Was Harley distracted by something in the last page? Otherwise, no way should Joker have been able to best her in hand-to-hand combat like that.

[cyberghostface]

He did some illusions/house of mirrors type thing with her.

[lordultimus]

Joker's fighting skills vary wildly between writers. Sometimes he's the equal of Batman, other times he has a glass jaw.

[crinos]

Its weird that it seems like the Harley Joker relationship is morphing from one where its purely Joker being abusive towards Harely and Harely is just the abused victim who the Joker brainwashed into a life of crime, into some sort of bizarre Punch and Judy set up where the two of them are constantly trying to kill each other or torture each other, but they stay together because they have a psychotic codependent relationship (and also the sex is fantastic. I presume, Joker always seemed rather Asexual to me).

[lizard_of_aus]

There were shades of the latter in the early, early days of Harley, I think. Remember the ending of Harlequinade?

[crinos]

I do, but I always kind of interpreted it as Joker being shocked that Harley actually bit back, and after it turned out to be a fake gun he used a little positive reinforcement to bring her back in line.

And, I mean, originally in Jokers favor Harley didn't even have a name or a background. She was just there as a nod to the Adam West show where the villains would frequently have a Moll or a female groupie hanging out with them.

[icon_uk]

That's part of the reason for her, she was intended to be a recurring moll type character, who could do the actual whacky comedy bits, so they could focus on making the Joker scarier.

[ekrolo2]

This is a change I personally like because the Mad Love status quo, much like a lot of DCAU things, has no longevity, it's something you can use only once or at most, a handful of times before it gets really, really stale very quickly.

This is infinitely more interesting and allows for more than "Mad Love rehash #23534". There's also the fact that Harley's victimhood rings hollower with each passing moment she sees comic Joker do progressively more awful things and doesn't care. It does not work for mainline DC, not with how Joker's characterized and if the writers want us to still sympathize with her.

Now, only someone could give Mister Freeze something new like this besides repeating Heart of fucking Ice for the ten billion time in the past hour alone, that'd be great.

[crinos]

I once had an idea for Mr. Freeze where he actually ended up reviving Nora, and she gained Ice Powers and became the latest Killer Frost, and her and Victor settled down and became semi retired save for occasional stints in villainy (Usually prompted by Nora, who was left slightly unstable by her new powers, with Victor tagging along reluctantly).

But now that Killer Frost has become a good guy and is a member of the Justice League, I think this is an idea worth exploring again. I mean its not like members of the Bat rogues haven't gone legit or semi legit before (Harley, Ivy, The Riddler, even Clayface more recently). So maybe have Nora get revived, become the new killer frost, become a hero in Gotham, and Mr. Freeze retires from active villainy and becomes the lovable curmudgeonly resident mad science expert that Batman occasionally consults when he needs help on a case.

[shadowpsykie]

so... what happened? is that the end of the issue?

[cyberghostface]

More or less, there's just a page of him getting the gun and going to the church that leads into the Batman issue.

[dcbanacek]

So Joker's going to wait for the ""if anyone can show just cause why this couple cannot lawfully be joined together in matrimony, let them speak now or forever hold their peace" part before shooting... Bats, Cats or the preacher?

I mean killing the priest worked so well at Dick and Kori's wedding.

[beeyo]

Well, ***SPOILERS*** for the last issue of Batman, but




Joker is either dead or very close to it. He's not gonna make it to the wedding

[dcbanacek]

But he got dressed up for it and everything... :)

[informationgeek]

Damn Sami Basri's artwork is great. I wish they got more work.

[thezmage]

I’ve always been kind of assuming that Joker was going to replace the preacher and officiate the wedding

[icon_uk]

Since it's unlikely he can get away with replacing the bride.

[scorntx]

He could replace a bridesmaid.