When Warner Brothers and DC first announced they were planning a
Birds of Prey
movie, I was over-the-moon ecstatic! I have loved the Birds of Prey
since their first appearance as a mere Oracle / Black Canary team-up way
back in DC's
Showcase comic. When they confirmed that Huntress
would be a character in the movie, I could hardly contain my excitement,
since Huntress has always been my favorite comic book character. Then,
WB after the
Suicide Squad film, it was announced that Harley Quinn would be in the
Birds of Prey
movie. I thought to myself, 'Okay. She'll be the villain they are
after.' But oh, no, they couldn't do that. Instead, Harley Quinn,
because of her popularity, suddenly had to become the main star of the
film. And thus, the film became known as
Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn.
Ugh. Not happy at all. The previews for the film focused on Harley
Quinn, with barely a glimpse of the Huntress or Black Canary. And then
Cassandra Cain and Det. Renee Montoya suddenly got thrown in the mix.
No Oracle. No Barbara Gordon. No Lady Blackhawk. None of the regular
Birds of Prey appeared. And when I finally saw the film - well, less
than stellar would be the biggest understatement of the year.
So,
since DC had no on-going Birds of Prey series at the time, they
announced a new mini-series coming out by Amanda Conner and Jimmy
Palmiotti, two amazingly talented creators. Only, the title was:
Harley Quinn and the Birds of Prey. UGH! But, I have every issue that the Birds of Prey have been in since those
Showcase comics,
so I bought it. The fourth issue came out relatively recently, so I
sat down and read the mini-series. Conner's art is absolutely
beautiful, as it always is. And yes, it is the current Helena
Bertinelli version of Huntress, which I'm not exactly fond of, but it is
the Huntress, so I can deal with that. Yes, it has Black Canary,
Cassandra Cain, and Renee Montoya as the other cast for the Birds, but
it also has Barbara Gordon (not necessarily as Oracle, though) and Power
Girl (whose series Conner and Palmiotti worked on) and the Atlee
version of Terra (who Conner and Palmiotti also created).
Unfortunately, just like the movie, the Birds of Prey and their
supporting cast are just background characters - make no mistake about
it, this is completely a Harley Quinn mini-series.
Harley Quinn and the Birds of Prey
opens with a Harley Quinn dream sequence. Then a visit from Power
Girl, who stops by to just check-in on Harley and gets the story of how
Harley stranded herself and Poison Ivy on a deserted island so they
could have some alone time, and how Ivy was mad at her and won't speak
to her. Then 'The Dreamin' Seaman' hotel where Harley and her gang have
been staying has been torched, and her friend Tony has been hurt so
badly he's in the hospital. And Harley wants not only payback, but she
wants to get the funds to pay off the (a-hem) mortgage company - and she
knows just how to do it. So, it's back to Gotham for Harley (along
with Red Tool [can you say Deadpool knock-off?], who is bound and
determined to protect his Harley) with a plan to get the money she
needs, payback the people who hurt Tony and torched their home, and
teach her ex a little lesson in the process.
Enter
Renee Montoya, who is determined to send Harley back to New York. And
Huntress, who is also after the same men as Harley. And Black Canary
and Cassandra Cain - well, just 'cuz. Now, there is no denying the fact
that Palmiotti is an excellent writer. His dialogue and jokes (the
number of beaver jokes is outrageous, and yet, each and every one of
them made me giggle, if not outright laugh) are fantastic, and the story
moves at a pretty good pace. The only problem is, 3/4 of the book is
about Harley, and maybe, if we are lucky, we get about 1/4 of the book
that features members of the Birds of Prey, and even then, a lot of that
time has the Birds interacting with Harley. Yes, I get the fact that
DC and WB see Harley Quinn as their big-time seller, but c'mon? The
original Birds of Prey series ran for well over 100 issues, and there
were two other series that followed that - surely that is enough to show
that there is plenty of interest in the Birds of Prey sufficient that
they can stand on their own without the need to throw Harley Quinn into
the mix?! But, as usual, the comic company feels the need to force the
comic to match whatever movie happens to be out there at the time (even
if the movie did not exactly do so well).
Now,
I'm not going to lie - I did like the fact that Conner and Palmiotti
gave us a couple of appearances by Power Girl (next to Huntress, she's
my second favorite all-time character), as well as Atlee (who appears to
have dropped the name Terra, since, as she says in her appearance here,
that she doesn't want to use that name since she found out someone
"mean" was using it before her). Since they worked on both the Power
Girl and Terra series for DC, it's only natural they would want to at
least give their characters a brief appearance (and since Power Girl
actually had a mini-series where she teamed up with Harley - and yes, I
have that, too, since it does have Power Girl in it).
The
mini-series has plenty of humor, plenty of mayhem, and, since it is DC
Black Label, it has plenty of foul language (which, oddly enough, does
not seem so out of place for a character like Harley and the streets of
Gotham City). No outright nudity, but there are a number of butt-shots
and near-nudity. I'm guessing after Batman's goods were shown in that
first Black Label mini-series by DC, they have backed off on any
outright nudity (but violence and every curse word under the sun are
okay).
Now
that this is out of their system, I'm hoping if DC does any more Birds
of Prey series in the future, they will give readers and fans the REAL
Birds of Prey back!
RATING:
6 cans of Reaper Madness Energy Drink out of 10 for at the very least,
giving us another Birds of Prey book to hold the fans over until DC
finally revives the original concept...
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