The character Harley Quinn may not have originated on the pages of DC Comics (she first appeared on Batman: The Animated Series in 1992), but it didn’t take long for her to become a fan favorite. She makes her big screen debut later this year in Suicide Squad (she briefly appeared in live-action on the short-lived TV series Birds of Prey, and showed up on Arrow), played by Margot Robbie. What we’ve seen thus far looks promising, and the three words Robbie uses to describe her character should get fans even more pumped than they already are.
During an interview for their preview of highly anticipated 2016 movies, Margot Robbie talked to Cineplex about her role, and describing the former Arkham Asylum psychiatrist she said:
Harley is creepy, violent, crazy — all of the things that I aspire to be! No. It’s the fun of living vicariously through someone who is doing things that I would never do in real life.
Wielding a baseball bat, covered in smudged make up, and decked out in brightly colored hot pants, the big screen version of Harley Quinn sees the 25-year-old Australian outback looking like an extra from The Warriors. And I mean that in the best possible way. It’s an aesthetic that it simultaneously very comic book-y, but also has a grim, gritty, street feel. In all honesty, that can be applied to Suicide Squad as a whole; it feels both like something from the comics but grounded at the same time.
Suicide Squad’s version of Harley looks to be completely unhinged and maniacal, and, especially if Margot Robbie is telling the truth, she’s going to be a lot of fun to watch. We’re especially curious to see her interact with Jared Leto’s even more deranged than usual version of the Joker.
Since bludgeoning her way into many of our minds for the first time in The Wolf of Wall Street in 2013, all Robbie has done is steal scenes in every movie she’s been in, and DC’s super villain team up Suicide Squad looks to be more of the same. Check out the trailer that showed up after San Diego Comic-Con last year.
Suicide Squad doesn’t hit movie theaters until August 5, 2016. Later this month, however, on January 19, The CW is airing a special called DC Films Presents: Dawn of the Justice League, a look at their upcoming slate of films hosted by Kevin Smith, that will reportedly conclude with a new Suicide Squad trailer, so we have that to look forward to in the meantime.
