Harley Quinn - The Animated Series: The Eat. Bang! Kill. Tour
Writer: Tee Franklin
Artist: Max Sarin
Publisher: DC Comics
Harley Quinn is one of DC’s most interesting characters.
Eschewing the typical protagonist-hero and antagonist-villain molds of most popular DC characters, her interactions are forever surprising, as no one knows just how to react to her. In her most modern incarnations she’s inherently relatable to readers who are also challenged by right-and-wrong, compared to heroes and villains operating at an extreme of piety or hate.
People love a comeback story, as they tap into our own personal need to improve. As we mature into adulthood, we carry with us our traumas and the burdens of our worst moments. Having grown up on countless heroes’ journeys showcasing a character’s absolute pinnacle, it makes sense that older audiences are drawn to the flawed, finding truth in their attempts to try again, even in the face of potential failure and disappointment.
Progress isn’t linear. For many of us, sometimes the most difficult place we find ourselves is when we’ve failed a second time, or a third, and we need to get up and try again. Harley Quinn is so relatable – and even inspirational – because she faces the horrors of her past and how they have shaped her as a person. She endeavours to improve in the face of her own emotional ignorance, all the while taking on responsibility for the wellbeing of those around her. She’s not Luke Skywalker, she’s Rocky, just with a more horrible past to overcome.
Want to read about more of 2021’s best comics? Visit Amazon to purchase the full length ‘Best Comic Books of 2021’ book or eBook. It contains 45 in-depth reviews of the year's greatest comic book titles.
DC Comics have been in flux over the past two years, an interminable length of time for the most dedicated comic book fans. These difficulties have mainly stemmed from their changes in creative leadership, but also corporate impacts, and other factors like the continued digitisation of comic books. During this period it has been very interesting to see where they’ve been cautious and conservative, and where they’ve been proactive and enterprising.
DC spent the past two years pragmatically playing to their strengths. During 2021, their volume of Batman releases and his appearances in other titles was overwhelming; the Dark Knight appearing in two to three titles each week was the norm (“DC COMICS AND BATMAN! FOREVER AND FOREVER, A HUNDRED YEARS!”). They produced a high volume of alternate covers, regularly argued to be a shortsighted sales strategy that exploits completists and the most hardcore comic fans. They even faced speculative criticism that their ‘Future State’ event was being used as a method to reduce the overall quantity of titles they were releasing, in an effort to cut costs.
Thankfully, during this period they have also been brave and bold enough to try a range of new titles and series like ‘Harley Quinn - The Animated Series - The Eat. Bang! Kill. Tour’. These include alternate continuities like the Murphyverse, attempts at new audiences with titles like 'Batman / Fortnite', their darker DC Black Label titles, high quality original graphic novels for young adults, must-read mini-series like 'DCeased', comprehensive events like 'Dark Knights: Death Metal', entry level comics for young children, and oversized one-shots celebrating the diversity of their readers, creators, and characters.
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They’ve been on the front foot of contemporary customer demand with their digital only and digital first comics. The Milestone Initiative in partnership with Milestone Comics has been a fantastic undertaking, utilising their size and strength to showcase Milestone’s stories to a much larger audience. They’ve even shown a complete willingness to try 'new' or 'alternate' versions of their most popular heroes: the 'Future State' event saw this occur for a limited time across all DC titles, but more notably have been new titles starring Connor Kent as Superman, Jace Fox as Batman, Yara Flor as Wonder Girl (Wonder Woman), Wally West as The Flash, and Jackson Hyde as Aquaman. Cynics may argue this is just a sales strategy that exploits dedicated collectors seeking new characters’ first appearances and #1’s. But the new versions of these characters collectively offer greatly improved diversity, allowing for many in the comic book audience to see themselves represented by the biggest characters in comics.
While the recent creative and commercial success of DC Comics’ individual titles and their overall oeuvre can definitely be called into question, they have had some strategy in place guiding their actions, even if its subsequent execution hasn’t always landed. It’s fairly clear they’ve been savvy enough to understand comic book market segmentation and customer profiles, and develop attempts to service their wants. Those still in the building should consider their efforts commendable.
DC Comics have decades of success with dark and serious comics for adults, and lighter, more fun material for younger audiences. In reaction to modern times, there's presently a demand across all entertainment for escapism that is fun, including in the adult comic book reading market. For DC, this means breaking away from an overreliance on Batman and the Joker, and the dark world in which they operate. Fun and funny titles for adults like ‘Blue & Gold’, ‘One-Star Squadron’, and ‘Harley Quinn: The Animated Series: The Eat. Bang! Kill. Tour’ may not be DC Comics top selling books, but their positive and amusing nature will serve a portion of the comic book market that has either stopped reading comics, or are presently enjoying them less than usual.
Drawing off the success and high quality of ‘Harley Quinn: The Animated Series’ was a smart move by DC Comics. As a standalone story, ‘The Eat. Bang! Kill. Tour’ zips along nicely, its overall narrative aligning with roughly two to three episodes of the HBO Max show. Published long before the (probable) 2022 release of season three, the book suffers from none of the potential issues and struggles of an inbetweenquel. The book picks up immediately after the second season finale, dropping readers straight into the action. Harley and Ivy are fleeing Ivy’s disastrous wedding, with a livid Commissioner Gordon in hot pursuit. Their attempts to go into hiding fail miserably, in large part due to Harley’s inability to keep her head down and take the path of least resistance in the face of conflict.
Want more of 2021’s greatest comics? Visit Amazon to purchase the full length ‘Best Comic Books of 2021’ book or eBook. It contains 45 detailed essays reviewing the year's best comic book titles.
Familiar faces from the show appear throughout, and new characters are introduced, including villains that perfectly match the show’s tone. While a lot happens during the book, it concludes with most of the show’s status quo intact. The story and characters have been pushed forward, but are also in much the same position that they started. Harley and Ivy’s relationship has arguably been the show’s most significant storyline, establishing their close bond as best friends, before evolving this into a romantic and sexual relationship, while reacting to the numerous hurdles and difficulties their new love has caused. ‘The Eat. Bang! Kill. Tour’ recognises the vitality of Harley and Ivy’s dynamic, and makes this a core focus. We dive deeper into their confusion, their love, their sexual attraction, and their erratic and emotional fluctuations between joy and fear. Much of this is delivered through witty and passionate character dialogue, though the book occasionally supplements this with narrative thoughts and internal monologue from the characters, a sharp method to succinctly provide additional depth to proceedings. It’s a very long way from the overused giant thought bubbles of silver and bronze age comics, which would regularly take up a third of every panel on a page.
One of the animated series strongest points is its superb vocal performances, permanently at a level of excellence that even the best cartoons struggle to match. Even by its own high standards, it’s very hard to go past Haley Cuoco’s Harley, Lake Bell’s Ivy, and Christopher Meloni’s Commissioner Gordon as the show’s standout performances. In testament to how accurately ‘The Eat. Bang! Kill. Tour’ aligns with its cartoon counterpart, I couldn’t help but hear the voices of the main characters when reading their dialogue. It brings the book to life, giving it an extra element that nearly all other comics have no chance of achieving.
What will immediately strike fans of the show is the book’s art. It’s remarkably true to the show, while also being entirely its own thing. A side-by-side comparison would reveal that there are some quite notable differences between the two, but it’s likely that the show’s animation style won’t garner a second thought after only a few pages. The colour work is key to this, Marissa Louise replicating specifics from the show with high accuracy, while ensuring that the book’s original elements are uniform in tone. It’s bright and alive, feeling like a child unleashing a brand new 128 colour crayon set, with little in common with Gotham’s grim blacks and greys, or Metropolis’ muted blues.
The exactness of the character costumes also goes a long way to help support the book aligning with the feel of the show. Overall, the art is very typical of Max Sarin’s work, such as the beloved ‘Giant Days’ and the excellent ‘Wicked Things’. Sarin’s work is primarily highly energetic and fast paced, but balanced with the knowledge of when to slow down for a story’s vital moments. It’s a perfect match for ‘Harley Quinn: The Animated Series’, whose primary breakneck-speed superhero storylines are complimented by its secondary slower-but-just-as-important larger character arcs, such as Harley’s journey to discover her sense of self identity, and Harley and Ivy’s burgeoning relationship. Sarin’s work is great when it’s highly active, fantastically showcasing movement and motion, and also when characters are just in conversation, serving up a vast range of incredible facial expressions.
It’s clear that they’ve brought a lot of their own original ideas and trademark elements to the book. The new monsters and villains are uniquely creative, with one antagonist more visually interesting than anything the animated series has produced. Sarin’s peppering of cartoonish elements - like love hearts in the air and on eyes, and skulls and black steam around heads for anger - deliver a sense of whimsy and joyful silliness. They also have a great understanding of when and how to insert additional detail into the secondary elements of their artwork, such as backgrounds, settings, and objects. These can be relevant to who a character is, they can reference events from the show, and sometimes they’re just there to make a scene feel more vibrant. More than any other factor, Sarin’s understanding of what to prioritise as visual focus and their overall artistic talents are what makes this book succeed. They know that this is a character driven story coupled with high-octane action, and they deliver this from start to finish, never letting up.
As if Louise and Sarin’s efforts weren’t enough, Taylor Esposito takes things even further with some five star, grade A lettering. If your average comic book letterer was Chad Kroeger, then Esposito is Aretha Franklin, such is the depth and skill of their range. They know perfectly how to convey Harley’s overwhelmingly quick, stream of consciousness, and her five thoughts at once dialogue. Their variance of font sizing, italicizing, and bolding are beyond impressive, contributing significantly to the book’s alignment with the animated series. They regularly enhance important dialogue by adding supplementary bold outlines and colour borders. Sound effects – ranging from bullets, to car horns, to kisses – increase the overall dynamism meaningfully, and choices on placement, sizing, shape, and colour are expert. Even the use of different fonts for advising the location of a scene, creator credits, and titles brings extra excitement to proceedings. This book is supposed to be fun, and Esposito does everything they can to make that happen. Sarin also contributes on this front, including their lettering for logos, and signage.
Given its relationship to the high profile and actively ongoing animated series, it will be interesting to see if there are any sequels or continuations to this book in the future. How would they work in combination with the show? What about in the not-to-distant-future, once the show has finally concluded? Given its immense quality, it would be hugely disappointing if it turns out that this is the only ‘Harley Quinn: The Animated Series’ book ever created. It’s a stellar debut, lacking even any minor teething issues, and provides the groundwork to take things so much further. Hopefully DC recognise its quality and its potential, and are as excited to create further adventures as fans will be to read them.
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