a sequence in which she deliberately antagonises
various members of the Squad, trying to provoke
hem into a response. “She’s a rabbit hole,”
counsels Captain Boomerang. “Don’t fall in.”
It’s no surprise that the Extended Edition
ups the ante on Harley. For, even in a movie
starring Will Smith and Jared Leto, even in a ilm
hat has Batman swoop in every now and again
o bust some heads, she is the undoubted
stand-out. The reason why you’re not reading a
piece about Killer Croc right now. But where did
t all begin?
“IT IS TO laugh, huh, Mr J?” With that one
ine, delivered while perched on a desk as the
Joker throws darts backwards at a picture of
Commissioner Gordon, Harley Quinn announced
herself to the world in Joker’s Favor, a 1992
episode of The Animated Series. It’s fascinating
o note just how complete the character already
was. The costume may have changed — no red-
and-blue pigtails or hot pants for this Harley,
who’s clad in a red-and-black jester’s costume
— and certain intricacies of her relationship with
he Joker had yet to be illed in, but otherwise
t’s all there: the “Mr J” catchphrase (that’s
studded throughout Suicide Squad), the
nsouciant attitude, the welcome dollop of female
Driving the Joker wild
in the forthcoming
LEGO Batman Movie.Harley Quinn debuts a
new look in the Arkham
Asylum video game.energy that enlivened the Joker, a character
whose henchmen had traditionally been manly
hunks of meat. They might as well have called
him the Bloker.
Dini wanted to shake that up a little.
“I thought a girl would be good in the mix.
I came up with an idea for a snappy blonde girl
who would hang out with the Joker,” he explains
of Harley Quinn’s origin. “And she really did have
a purpose for him. He can’t go into a lot of places
without being recognised, so it helps to have a
couple of allies to do the dirty work for him.”
Although Harley’s personality sprang almost
fully formed from Dini’s ingers, Bruce Timm —
the animation director on Batman: The Animated
Series — is credited as her co-creator. “I don’t
think Bruce really knew about the character until
I’d handed him the outline,” laughs Dini. Timm
was entirely responsible for the look and
movement of the character. “He came up with a
design for Harley in her jester costume, and what
she looked like when she was in disguise,” adds
Dini. “She almost looked like a dancer in the way
she was posed. That was the idea, that she was
very athletic and capable if she got into a ight.”
There have been murmurings over the years
that Harley Quinn was initially intended as a
one-and-done character. Not the case. “I likeda v t c u s t t s p i “ l J C h e t w a w — t i s
in
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