Review: Harley Quinn “All the Best Inmates Have Daddy Issues”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

While out at a bar, Harley and Ivy happen upon a newly revived Joker! Except without any of his previous memories or homicidal tendencies, likely due to falling into that pool of chemicals he planned to push Harley into back in the season finale. Ivy thinks he might just be fucking with them, though Harley thinks he might have fully reformed. This causes her to flashback to when she was just starting out as Joker’s psychologist when Gordon was in his prime physique and Harvey “One Face” Dent was about to be re-elected as District Attorney. Harley was first brought in to try and get the location of a bomb that Joker, who was rocking some Heath Ledger hair, had hidden somewhere but wouldn’t tell anyone. Not even a Christian Bale style beatdown by Batman gets it out of him.

Harley and Joker seemed to connect pretty quickly, but she couldn’t get him to talk about much. Upon a brief conversation with the also imprisoned Poison Ivy, Harley decided to poke Joker about his family. And Joker soon let her know about the most traumatic period of his life: his father killing his pet ferret (later revealed to be a retold story from Ivy). Gordon thinks she’s in a bit too deep, though Harvey hopes to use her to buy time until the election. Eventually Joker fesses up, though in exchange for getting a meal in the cafeteria instead of in solitary. He says the bomb is “in the heart of Little Italy”, which Batman and Gordon assume means the Italian district in Gotham, but is actually the literal heart of an Italian chef who serves Joker his food. Joker then uses this diversion to escape with Harley, with Harvey ready to kill them both, but she’s saved by Poison Ivy, who surrenders and asked Harley to be her therapist.

In the present, Harley and Ivy use Psycho to probe sane Joker’s mind, finding he’s completely reformed and forgotten everything. However, it seems the probing might have started him on the path back to his madness. As the girls leave, they’re stopped by Harvey, now Two-Face, and his goons.

OUR TAKE
The reins return to Harley this week, though with a flashback episode instead of something moving the plot forward. I’m a little bit miffed at that, but it’s not a huge deal. It was still interesting to see a bit of this show’s version of “Mad Love”, AKA the BTAS episode that first fleshed out Harley’s origin story. While this series propels itself with the expectation of established knowledge about the Batman franchise (which makes sense considering it’s on a streaming service made for people who are already fans of these characters), I’ve been glad to see that it’s more or less managed to work on its own without relying too much on people needing to be very familiar with prior versions of Harley, Batman, Joker and so on. It certainly HELPS if those viewers are, but it’s not a detriment if they aren’t. Can’t say the same for other original series on DC Universe, specifically Titans, which feels like it’s fueled primarily by character reputation as opposed to having its own story.

It’s actually because of that issue with Titans that I’m a bit wary of this episode. Not to say it was bad, far from it, but more that its filling in of lore, even lore within this show’s universe, could go too far in the other direction if handled improperly. Again, I did enjoy this episode showing us how these characters in their former lives which will likely set up stuff to come, I just hope the sharpness and restraint on the fanservice will carry through on this show. Fanservice should only add, never subtract, from a viewing experience. For example, throughout this episode, you could probably pick out several subtle references to the 2008 film, The Dark Knight, where it’s through dialogue or plot choices or character designs. If you’ve never seen that movie somehow, it’s not going to bother or distract you to not notice or understand those references. But if you DID, then recognizing them is a fun little bonus. So far, Harley Quinn has handled this well and hopefully will continue to do so.

Lastly, considering we’re headed into a Two-Face and Bane episode next week, I’ve noticed that I might have sold this Two-Face a bit short. As shown here, he does use the deceptive nature of his name in the comedy, notably with lying to Bane last episode about being partners, but more subtly than the other villains have. I guess what might have made it more obvious, if less subtle, were if he were to switch between his “campaign voice” (which makes use of Andy Daly more like what people know him for) and his “villain voice” to highlight the two personalities. But that’s not really a problem, just a neat little thing.