Bird of Prey Review

Media: Movie
Title: Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)
Released: February 7, 2020
Seen before?: No

Hey peeps and welcome to a review of Birds of Prey. It’s my first foray into film review, so I expect no one to be gentle about it. Also, for knowing nothing about DC Comics, I seem to have made this blog only about DC so far. I swear I know other things.

Movies are still allowed to be fun, right? Because that’s what I found this movie to be. It’s not the best movie ever. It’s a decent superhero movie with problems. You know, like most superhero movies. It’s not special. It wanders aimlessly at points. It’s just a silly, fun movie.

Granted, this movie most likely did not hit its projections which makes it a failure in the eyes of the studios. Gone are the days where these silly, fun movies exist solely for the masses and not just an expectation to make more money for people who have already made plenty of money. The marketing for this movie was awful. I barely knew when this movie actually came out. I thought it came out a week later because they seemed to latch more on to Valentine’s Day instead of the week before. You know, when the movie was actually released. There also seemed to be minimal marketing for the movie. There were trailers but TV spots seemed limited. I don’t know if the trailer was actually attached to any films in the previous months, but that’s a big marketing ploy. I could tell the studios didn’t have much faith in driving people to other movies considering the trailers that were before this movie. Not even a Wonder Woman trailer, which would’ve fit in perfectly. I think DC is over the entire idea of an extended universe and this movie unfortunately got the shit end.

Enough about Hollywood and their money-hungry schemes and let’s actually discuss this movie. The aesthetics of the movie pleased me. I’m a sucker for glitter and bright colors. That’s not something superhero movies are known for. (Looking at you Marvel, with your brown and navy movie palettes). Harley’s assault on the police station was gorgeous with the smoke and glitter bombs. If it weren’t for the heinous acts behind the bombs, I would love to live in that kind of world. The boobytrap battle was also similarly colorful, which was great considering it took place at night. The colors captured the spirit of Harley. The tone wouldn’t have meshed together correctly if the color palette was filled with dim, dark colors instead of the bright pinks and blues.

The plot of the movie was simple, which helped the movie tremendously. Too many times in action movies, the plot is needlessly complicated for the movie. Not every movie needs to be a super-complicated mind game to keep the audience occupied. With decently written characters, a basic plot can serve its purpose. Now, did I find the characters in this movie decently written? It’s debatable.

I feel that DC is trying to make Harley Quinn a new anti-hero instead of keeping her as a villain. This movie shirks away so many opportunities to show that Harley is every bit the criminal mastermind that Joker is. She even states in the opening animation that she was the brains behind some of the Joker’s schemes. Yet, she has a minimal body count. She maims rather than kills. The movie portrays her as more of a joke than an actual villain. She doesn’t actually create any mastermind plan. She lucks her way through the movie. That doesn’t fit with the idea that Harley is supposed to show everyone that she’s her own independent woman. Honestly, it showed that even in the end, she relies on others to get her out of situations. Where’s the villain that she should be? I understand that Harley’s path to villainy is highly linked to her abusive relationship with the Joker. That is honestly a real reason why she might not be as villainous without the Joker. Except, usually various mediums that she’s appeared in when she’s not in a relationship with the Joker, she’s still quite villainous. Maybe not the twisted carnage of the Joker, but she still veers more bad than good. It felt like they were trying to capitalize on the success of Deadpool, but Harley’s not him. She’s a popular character in her own right and honestly, DC does a lot better when it’s not trying to ape what Marvel’s already put out. That’s not a diss about DC because DC does a lot of things better than Marvel.

I take issue with the fact that Harley never knew that everyone hated her and wanted her dead. There is no way the Joker could have protected Harley that well. Even before she reveals that she and Joker have split, she clearly states how much everyone hates her and only puts up with her because the Joker will retaliate. I don’t buy that no one ever tried to take her out before that point. The Joker would have obviously taken care of whoever attempted but she shouldn’t be so naive to this fact. During the segments, I wasn’t a fan of the pop-ups. It did give a more distinct voice to Harley but it was also too reminiscent of Suicide Squad’s failed version.

Moving on, let’s discuss Renee Montoya. She’s a cop stereotype but I like her better than Jim Gordon. She’s someone who actually showed that she’s worth more than she’s given credit for. Montoya proved throughout the movie that she is smarter than the other detectives. When the time came, she knew that she was worth more. I do wonder, is Gordon actually around in this universe? I assume that the movie takes place in Gotham since the ACE chemicals building is there. I feel that Gordon would’ve taken her into his precinct or something because she seems like a detective that he would trust. I just don’t know if this movie actually connects to the DCEU. I know it’s connected with Suicide Squad, but is it really connected with the other movies as well? I also appreciate that the movie admitted that Montoya was a lesbian. Major movies don’t really acknowledge these facts to where even a throwaway line, like in this movie, is better than erasing the LGBT+ content. Or to have false little hopes that LGBT+ content is an actual factor. (Disney-owned content…) No, they didn’t make any use of Montoya being a lesbian, but for them to actually own up to it for a major character is something. Especially when they don’t admit it for Harley. Montoya is the type of character that could have easily been annoying because she is an antagonistic figure for Harley but you root for her. The movie lays the groundwork for her, where most superhero movies wouldn’t try.

Dinah Lance was another character who they laid out very well. They set up perfectly that she works for Roman for the money only. That she’s terrified of him and doesn’t want him to use her. She hates that by saving Harley, she’s drawn deeper into Roman’s business. She didn’t want to help anyone. She just wants money and she would rather use her voice than her moves. The movie doesn’t establish if the Black Canary name was something her mother had used when helping the police. To be fair, the movie also doesn’t really address her by that name either. I don’t know how much they’ve changed Dinah's story. I’m not familiar with her origins, so I don’t know if her mother having the same ability is true. To be fair, comics do retcon things like this all the time, so it might be true now. I found her story to be much more compelling than Harley’s. To her feeling trapped by all of your circumstances and trying to find the best way to keep living was beautiful. Yes, it’s a little on the nose that she’s essentially a caged bird singing for the villain but the movie makes it work. It doesn’t keep her on the stage. In fact, she’s only seen up there once. The movie shows her hidden talents and not just her voice. She’s a formidable fighter who stands up for herself in the end. That she does find a way to fight against her circumstances and make a real difference. She doesn’t have to be like her mother, but that doesn’t mean she has to hide away her power either. I appreciate that the movie did have Dinah pass out after using her voice in the final fight. She’s never used it to the strength before. Of course she wouldn’t be able to handle the surge of power that has to be used. Most movies would gloss over that. It’s the small things about the movie that make it okay.

Let’s move onto my favorite character of the movie: Helena Bertinelli aka Huntress. Honestly, she is not an amazingly developed character. We are told about how cool she is from every character in the movie. She does actually prove that she’s an amazing fighter, but really, most interactions with her just devolve into how awesome her name is and how awesome she is at fighting. Yes, her backstory is part of the driving force of the plot but they almost introduce her too late into the movie. She is a shadow figure for the first two acts. They could’ve thrown in a throwaway line about how it’s rumored someone survived the Bertinelli massacre. You’re making this for the general public. They aren’t going to know the meaning behind the name and that Huntress is the one causing the murders around town. I’m not advocating hand-holding for the audience. Just that having her only appear in the third act really limits her as a character. When so much about the plot is about the Bertinelli diamond, I would think she would have a little bit bigger of a plot. Yet, in the end, I still absolutely love her. I don’t care that all the characters were telling me how cool she is, because I think she’s awesome as well. I can see from an outside perspective how that can be annoying for someone who doesn’t find the character enjoyable.

Onto the weak links of the film. I hate to admit this, but I really didn’t like Cassandra Cain. I don’t think the script did her any favors. She existed to get kidnapped by everyone. For someone who works the streets as a pickpocket, she has no fighting skills. She was absolutely useless in the boobytrap battle. She just got attacked multiple times, with the other four saving her. Yes, she helped defeat Roman in the end but it didn’t mean anything. Her defining trait is that she is a pickpocket. They didn’t really try to give any motivation to her beyond her small conversation with Dinah in the apartment hallway. I know that this is not the Cassandra Cain from the comics. I kind of wish they would have just let her be an adult character and made it closer to the comics than what they chose to do here.

Roman Sionis and Victor Zsasz. I will give them credit in that they were wonderfully overdramatic. They were villains that fit the tone of the movie. I don’t appreciate the weird relationship that the two were engaged in. I understand that villains are made to be gay far too often. That being gay is seen as a villainous trait. Being gay is absolutely not a villainous thing and should be emphasized in a more positive light. This movie could have done this very concept. That being said, these two characters were played as lovers to me. It was awkward and unsettling, particularly because they weren’t going to go anywhere with that. I can definitely also see the possibility that Victor is in love with Roman but Roman is too egotistical to recognize this fact. In a time where homophobia is still rampant and gay people are still played as a joke, this was not character choices that should have been made. Especially when they were slightly positive by telling us that Montoya was a lesbian. That doesn’t balance out the charade they made here. It’s a little insulting as an audience member that gay relationships, good or bad, don’t receive the same treatment as straight ones. Again, it would have been reductive to have the only real physical LGBT+ content come from these two when Montoya and Harley exist, but the movie wasn’t interested in pushing the boundaries even close to that.

I don’t want to give a rating for this movie. I’m not good with putting numbers to abstract concepts. I feel that rating it out of five or ten doesn’t mean anything to most people. We just focus on the really positive or the really negative. Also, that rating is based on my experience with media so it’s meaningless unless you know exactly how I feel about all things media. This blog, while about my feelings on media, will never really capture the turmoil of trying to rate things on a number system. I’ll just leave it on the note that this was an honestly fun movie and I’m a little sad that it didn’t do better.