- It’s actually worse than Suicide Squad. Yeah, I said it, and I stand by it. Avoid this movie at all costs.

Full Disclosure: My expectations were pretty damn low going into this one, but I thought, “At least it can’t be worse than Suicide Squad.” With Margot Robbie taking the lead in her second at bat as anti-heroine Harley Quinn, it had to be at least OK… Right?

Review

When the marketing team behind your big-budget superhero movie decides to change the title a few days after it opens, you know you’re in deep shit. That’s a massive red flag for audiences and a desperation move by a studio hoping to recoup a tentpole-sized budget. For promotion purposes, the unwieldy title of Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) was shortened to simply Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey. Once you get to that point though, it’s far too late. This movie is an irredeemable pile of shit. It’s a headache-inducing assault on the eyes and ears that needs to be destroyed as soon as possible. I’m not exaggerating. I actually left the theater with a splitting headache. Was it from the amount of time I spent rolling my eyes every few seconds at this movie’s feeble attempts at “humor”? Who can really say? I’ve never been one to walk out of a movie before it’s over. “Buy the ticket, take the ride” is my philosophy. That said, this is the closest I’ve ever come to storming out of a movie theater from sheer exhaustion and boredom.

To her credit, Margot Robbie gave it her all. It just wasn’t enough to salvage this shit show.

It’s hard for me to wrap my head around how terrible this movie was. Everything from the soundtrack to the egg sandwich fetish was mind-numbingly boring. The fight choreography and action sequences were kind of cool I guess, but that’s it. There was no character development, the plot was shit, and the jokes didn’t land. Hell, even the obligatory post-credits Easter egg was a massive disappointment. It was all PG-level humor wrapped in an R-rated package. I don’t know who the target audience was here. The filmmakers aimed for the style and humor of Deadpool, but wound up falling desperately short of the mark. Maybe nine year olds watching their first R movie might find it edgy and cool, but anyone with a fully-developed frontal lobe cannot honestly say they enjoyed this movie. (Unless they were insanely high, but even then…)

The lamest group of superheroes put together on screen since… well… the last time Harley Quinn was in a group of superheroes.

Maybe it’s time for all of us to swallow the cold hard fact that Harley Quinn as a character just isn’t that interesting, despite Margot Robbie’s best efforts to bring her to life. Her backstory is weak, even for a third-tier comic book villain. A respected criminal psychologist catches the worst case of Stockholm syndrome imaginable, falls into a perpetually abusive relationship with Gotham City’s most notorious psychopathic mastermind (the Joker), turns out to be an even crazier sociopath than he is, gets dumped, then goes on a convoluted redemption tour (but not really) with a bunch of thrown-together misfits no one has ever heard of. Oh, and somehow along the way, she found time to become a world class gymnast/martial arts expert/weapons master. There just isn’t much there to identify with. Admittedly, I only know Harley Quinn from this, Suicide Squad, and Batman: The Animated Series, so I’m not the foremost expert. I can only comment on what I’ve seen. Margot Robbie is a terrific actress, but she has unfortunately decided to attach herself to this utterly uninteresting character for the foreseeable future.

Spoilers Ahead

There was an excruciating amount of exposition through voiceover here. I mean sooooo much! It felt like half the script was just Harley Quinn talking at us, explaining everything from her childhood to the whole plot of Suicide Squad, and everything in between and since. It’s another reason why I think this movie is secretly meant for preteens. Birds of Prey constantly treats its audience like fucking morons that have no concept of basic storytelling. The story stops, starts, rewinds and fast forwards ad nauseam to the point where the movie has no momentum throughout. It’s not confusing, interesting, or fun; it was just a terrible storytelling choice. I can see where this choice came from: It’s meant to mirror the fractured psyche of Harley Quinn. It just doesn't work on any level here and it’s honestly pretty lazy.

Birds of Prey also suffered from having to be recklessly shoehorned into the greater DC Extended Universe, which is a shambles anyway. This movie was part reboot, part pseudo-sequel to Suicide Squad. Warner Brothers obviously didn’t want to completely cut ties with Suicide Squad, especially when there’s another one coming down the pipeline. The main question for me going forward now is, can James Gunn save this franchise? While I’m an admirer of the Guardians of the Galaxy director’s work, this is a tall order for anyone. I’d say, “It can’t get much worse,” but that’s what I said about Suicide Squad, and here we are.

I hate to rag on a 13-year old kid, but I will anyway. Ella Jay Basco (who played Cassandra Cain) needs to pursue a new avenue of employment ASAP. It’s hard to find a decent kid actor, but her “performance” was so wooden and emotionless that you’d be hard-pressed to find a worse actor if you went out and picked a random kid off the street. (Please, nobody do that, by the way.) The filmmakers seem to believe that having a teenager say “shit” and “fuck” a few times is an adequate substitution for charisma and screen presence. It’s not. To be fair though, she wasn’t alone. Almost every actor in this movie was just sleepwalking their way to a paycheck. Given the shitty dialogue they were all given to work with, I can’t say I blame them. At least Ewan McGregor looked like he was having fun as gang leader Roman Sionis/Black Mask. He wasn’t “good” by any means, but he was at least borderline watchable.

These two had the best chemistry of any two characters in Birds of Prey. — These two had the best chemistry of any two characters in *Birds of Prey*.

5 Quick Hits

Bruce the CGI hyena was pretty cute and should’ve had a larger role.
I should’ve left during the cartoon intro that explained in exhausting detail every aspect of Harley Quinn’s life. It was just a sign of things to come. I bit the bullet though, and I’ll never get that precious 109 minutes of my life back.
What the fuck was up with Black Canary’s supernatural voice power? Why didn’t she just use that shit the whole time and wipe out all of Sionis’ goons in the first place? Of course the answer is, “Then we wouldn’t have a climax.” It’s just one of the many lazy and nonsensical aspects of this haphazardly thrown together universe.
The Marilyn Monroe “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend” sequence was as dumb and pointless as the rest of this godforsaken movie, and seemed to exist simply to fill time.
It’s only a matter of time before “egg sandwich” becomes a search category on Pornhub. Mark my words.