Confused Identity, Bad Marketing, and More: The Keys to Harley Quinn's Box Office Failure

After years of mediocre performances at the box office, and poor critical reviews, 2019 seemed to be the year DC was getting back on track with their film studio. Aquaman was decently received and brought in a massive box office haul of over a billion, SHAZAM is the best-reviewed modern DC film since The Dark Knight and Joker brought another best performance win to the DC universe thanks to Joaquin Pheonix's haunting depiction of Arthur Fleck. If 2019 was any indication, it would have been that DC was making its way back to the top as a contender with the box office giant that is Marvel Studios. However, the first offering DC brings into the new decade, Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn (yes that is sadly the title they went with), is flopping despite having fairly positive reviews from the audience and critics alike. So the question is, why? Why is it flopping? And the answer can be broken down into a few different categories: a horrific marketing campaign, a confusion of identity within the film's narrative, and an R rating that was neither earned, deserved or even necessary.

When making a film, it's very important to establish who your target demographic is going to be. That being said, just because a film is targeted for a certain audience, doesn't mean it cannot be enjoyed by everyone, or that you shouldn't strive to entertain as many as possible. At the end of the day, in the film industry, it's hard for a patron to consider to invest if that investment is not returned. This is something that a lot of films, this one included, have completely forgotten with rhetoric like "if you didn't like this movie (the people in question being cis, white males) than it wasn't made for you, and we could care less what your opinion on it is." It is fine to acknowledge that there are going to be members of the audience that may not resonate with your message and that there will be people who cannot identify with a character's struggle as it is so vastly different from their own, but again, movies are first and foremost entertainment and trying to tell the people who are looking to buy your product to buzz off with any criticism they may have, is just not smart business. In addition to this, Harley Quinn (I will be referring to this film as such for the remainder as it's not Birds of Prey, nor should it have been), made sure to tap into buzz topics like feminism and misogyny which quite frankly, when paired with the footage shown in the trailers, are not themes that most audience members would deem organic to the whimsical nature of the film. Having seen the film, the push of these themes are even more ludicrous as they barely have a place in the film at all. However, as bad as all of this is the biggest sin of its marketing comes from the film itself, and how the very premise of the movie alienated the fans dedicated to these books, and by doing this Warner Bros and company shot their own, free hype man in the face. 

The very first thing people started to complain about with this movie when set photos, promotional posters, and trailers came out were the inaccuracies to the books. "That's not Cassandra Cain," or "Why the fuck isn't Roman Sionis in a Black Mask," or "What the hell is going on with Huntress and Canary's look," but none of these criticisms held a candle to the ultimate heart of the problem with: "Where is Barbara Gordon, you can't have Birds of Prey without Barbara Gordon." And sadly the answer to that last question is: No you can't, and the people that made this film knew that because the sad truth about it all is that the Birds of Prey don't count for shit in this movie because at the end of the day the movie is not about this version of the Birds of Prey, it's about Harley Quinn finding herself a mentee. Now before I utterly destroy this film, I am going to say that it's actually an enjoyable movie. If you are some random person who has never read a comic in their life, you'll probably find this movie to be very enjoyable, and that's fine. The version of Harley presented in this movie is fantastic, she's pretty, she's fun, has great fight scenes, but most importantly, she's flawed. She's a woman that is broken and has been consistently underestimated due to her proximity to the most notorious criminal in Gotham's underground. However, this movie could have been so much more, and that's what is so god damn infuriating. So now we are going to look at the ultimate sins that this movie commits in its narrative.

Sins of the Narrative

Character assassination would be too kind a word used to describe what was done to Cassandra Cain. She is not the only character that is mishandled, but she is the only character that physically made me ill as they took one of DC's greatest written female characters and turned her into a shitty preteen pickpocket with too smart of a mouth. She wasn't endearing, and the fact that they forced the pickpocketing angle in every second she was on screen was annoying and overdone (you don't need to have her constantly pickpocketing in every scene she's in, that's not how pickpockets work). Additionally, while I understand the idea of trying to make Cass ignorant of the Joker giving Harley a clean slate to redefine herself and serve in a guardian role to this kid, it's fucking dumb. Having a resident of Gotham be ignorant of who the Joker is the equivalent to a New Yorker circa 2002 not knowing who Osama Bin Laden is. He's a psychopathic terrorist that threatens the safety of Gotham every 3rd Tuesday for literal shits and giggles. 

This movie falls apart in its second act because it gets way too big. The movie is set in Gotham City, and Roman Sionis puts out a hit on the darknet for $500,000 on a preteen girl with no specifics. Do you really expect anyone to believe that Batman wouldn't catch wind of this? Now I am not saying Batman should have appeared because quite frankly, there is a very good chance that he's not allowed to given the fact there is a good possibility that Reeves' Batman is not apart of the DCEU and that prevents them from using the character outside of his films. That being said, a character doesn't have to be shown to feel his presence. Have a scene where Sionis is talking to one of his teams trying to track down Harley and the guy starts freaking out: "Oh God HE'S HERE!" you hear a rattle of machine-gun fire and a deafening scream before the line cuts out." Then Have Roman curse under his breath "I fucking hate the God damn Bat!" and this would force Roman to become more irritable, unstable and as a result more sloppy and more prone to mistakes, consequently setting up his fall in the final act.

This entire premise would have worked 1,000,000 times better as Gotham City Sirens. Having the focus of the film be this diamond that has the account numbers for a crime syndicate's offshore bank accounts digitally etched into it is honestly a really solid idea, having the diamond just accidentally swiped by some preteen pickpocket, is just fucking dumb writing. If you instead had the conflict been that Catwoman stole this diamond from Roman to fence it, but the heat from pissing off Black Mask makes the cargo too hot to sell. Then she turns to Ivy and Harley for help; now that has the makings for a great story. Have Harley be completely broken over her recent break-up (like she is in the first act of this film), and she's staying with Ivy who is trying to get her to realize its for the best, that he was an abusive dick and that she's worth so much more, but then Catwoman provides an opportunity for villainess catharsis with the bad girls taking down the bad guys of Gotham and reaping the spoils afterward. Harley is all in because rising above Joker on his own turf will be the ultimate fuck you to him, and Ivy reluctantly agrees because she's trying to protect her friend from trouble. From there the possibilities are endless and the movie pretty much writes itself. At the end of the day, Birds of Prey is the ultimate problem with this movie because Birds of Prey makes no sense with Harley Quinn and without Barbara Gordon. 

Real Birds of Prey (Notice No Harley Quinn in Sight)

Ever since the first Deadpool and its major success at the box office, companies making superhero films have salivated at the mouth to make these super properties rated R. It makes for an edgier film and the controversy of it being rated R will drive sales through the roof. That being said, forcing an R rating on something doesn't guarantee it a success. DC's Joker deserved it's R rating as it was a genuinely disturbing movie that dealt with very mature and dark subject material. It was marketed for adults and should only be consumed by adults or with parental consent. Harley Quinn, on the other hand, did not deserve its R rating. Outside of one or two fights, the violence was fairly tame and the only place this movie earns its R rating is in the profanity. They had to try VERY hard to get this R rating and it doesn't make sense. If I were to guess who the target demographic of this film was supposed to be, I would have said girls from the age of 13-16. This is, after all, a story of Harley Quinn taking on a teenage sidekick at the end of the day. Rating the film R prevents it from reaching that demographic easily. 

At this point, it's no secret that Harley Quinn is a loss. It has failed to meet all of its projections for its opening weekend opening with a super sub-par 33 million with profits dropping 35 percent from Saturday into Sunday and dropping even further to 72 percent after the opening weekend (all stats per boxofficemojo.com). Warner Brothers are hopelessly trying to do damage control with things like changing the name to Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey and while this title is far more true to what the movie is, and is WAY less pretentious and awful, the movies' problems go way beyond its shitty original title. The fact of the matter is that the prime people who you want to market these films to are the fans, and most fans felt alienated by the butchering of characters that they have loved. You can have the best marketing team in the world pushing this film seven ways to Sunday and it would have still failed because at the end of the day, most normal people look to their friends who love comics to gauge their interest and whether or not a movie is worth seeing.