#realized it was the also the song sung during first reformed's last scene ���

[elektroblues]

leaning on everlasting arms beating amazing grace as most criable hymn kinda...........

[the-sapphire-general]

My Thoughts on Batman and Harley Quinn

The most disappointing animated Batman movie I’ve ever seen. I know I said that in a previous post, but to be honest, I feel like giving my own review on this movie for a friend who is also a Batman fan. Before I begin, yes I am familiar with Batman, but I haven’t read any of the comics, so my Batman lore isn’t as gigantic than what I know. I watched Batman: The Animated Series. I used to watch it with my brothers growing up, although I think I missed a few episodes. Anyway, I know about the series and it’s a very good Batman cartoon, one of my favorites next to Batman Beyond and The Batman. So I was expecting a nice throwback to the series my brothers love and one that I grew to love myself. Unfortunately, I got less than what I expected. Minor spoilers ahead (though not much really happened).

Batman and Harley Quinn begins with a cartoon-like credits introduction after the first scene of the movie, which I thought would be better for a lighthearted Batman cartoon aimed for young kids instead of what should be a movie with the tone and style of Batman: The Animated Series. The story is basically about Poison Ivy and The Floronic Man (a guy I don’t even know because I don’t read the comics) wanting to create some type of virus that can turn all humans and animals into plant hybrids, so Batman and Nightwing must stop them with help from Harley Quinn because if one miscalculation is made when making the virus, it can kill everything on Earth. Story-wise, it’s not that entertaining. There’s mostly filler during the movie that could have been left out entirely like Harley chasing down a guy she knew from the past because he offended her mother, and a scene where she and the dynamic duo go to a bar, and there’s two consecutive songs, one sung by Harley, the other sung by Two-Face’s lackeys from an episode of BTAS if I remember correctly. I had no idea what was happening during these two specific scenes. I found them ridiculous. Also, Nightwing and Harley…do stuff in the bedroom. Yeah, they kind of showed an interest in one another. After weird stuff happened, they finally confront Poison Ivy and Floronic Man near the end and try to stop them and after that, it just ends there. No, I’m serious. The movie ends when Harley Quinn figures out how to beat Floronic Man. I didn’t include Poison Ivy because she realized about the consequences, but I’ll get to that in a bit. I really have no idea what else to say about the story. I really don’t. The serious and comedic aspects lack balance and the story isn’t that exciting. That’s all I can say.

Now moving on to other things about the movie. The only few perks is I liked how they tried to get the BTAS feel and as usual, Kevin Conroy and Loren voiced Batman and Nightwing. Despite mixed reception regarding Melissa Rauch as Harley Quinn, she did a good job and I love Rauch and her character from The Big Bang Theory, Bernadette, so I knew I would like her performance as Harley. It was just Harley herself that wasn’t written properly like the rest of the movie. As for the humor, a few of the jokes were good but most of them were hit-or-miss. I’m not saying adding humor in Batman is bad. It’s okay to add humor, but if it’s used too much, it just gets ridiculous depending on the franchise, and Batman is mostly a serious franchise. If it weren’t for the violence, sexual themes, and swearing, the movie could have been almost like a cartoon for little kids.

These next comments are random but Batman was out-of-character a few times, and the biggest moment for me was right at the end where he kissed Harley’s cheek when she gave him and Nightwing the solution to defeating Floronic Man and saving the world. Seriously, Batman kissed Harley’s cheek. Okay, I know he kissed Catwoman if I’m right (again, I haven’t read the comics), it’s not like he can’t kiss anyone, but the kiss in that single scene went against his character. My brother loathed how Batman was OOC, and that was his least favorite scene too. I mean, why?? Also, why didn’t Batman figure out how to defeat Floronic Man? He’s supposed to be intelligent! My brother is a huge Batman fan, and he hates the movie now after watching it. Oh yeah, did I mention what the solution was to beat Floronic Man? Well, the solution was…to light a match and burn him. Yeah. The movie ended with a very OOC Batman and Nightwing kissing Harley’s cheeks after making that solution, and after some credits, Floronic Man is running while on fire. That’s when it truly ends. At least, I thought it did until there was a final scene of a reformed Harley hosting a reality TV show that was a strange version of the real-life talk show, Dr. Phil. Go ahead and see it for yourself.

Also, Poison Ivy isn’t mentioned in this so far because like I said, she knew about the consequences of using the virus to turn everything into plants and didn’t go with the plan after seeing Harley crying. That really happened. To be honest, Ivy and Harley’s only scene would have been touching if the movie was better. So Poison Ivy defied Floronic Man, and she had one badass moment that I actually started to love as it happened, but then Floronic Man just knocked her out with one punch…and I hated that. I love Poison Ivy, I always have, and I found that disrespectful to her character. She went against Floronic Man only to get knocked unconscious in seconds. That was her last scene. I’m not joking. 

Now this is just my overall personal opinion, so you don’t have to agree with me on what I said about this movie. A lot of people like this movie while my brothers and I, and many others, just didn’t like it. So if you like it, good for you. If not, welcome to the club. The movie was a disappointment for me, and it was just a weird movie. I don’t know what went wrong. DC’s other movies were good, so I have no idea what caused this movie to wind up the way it is, which I can only describe in as few words as possible, as bizarre fan-fiction. It’s not the worst movie I’ve seen but it’s also not the best. I hope the next animated film makes up for this because it did not reach my expectations.