Harley Quinn is forced to contend with the Trolley Problem. Also some math problems. There are robots too—really, the main problem here is Keepsake, who is back, and very much deserves a bat to the face in Harley Quinn #11, written by Stephanie Phillips, drawn by Riley Rossmo, colored by Ivan Plascencia and lettered by Devon Bennett.
Harley Quinn #11 opens in media res, with that most classic of superhero challenges—save the poor victim tied to the tracks before a train can run them over! Unfortunately, it also opens with a math problem that, when solved, undermines the threat by quite a bit. She’s had hours to fix things. Geez, Harley, what have you been doing with your time?
Then again, as my editors can no doubt confirm, I’ve had my own problems with time management, so I can perhaps afford to be less harsh on Harley. Especially considering she’s just going through a rough break-up.
Fine. Okay. Harley’s doing her best. And I’m pleased to report, the same can be said of the creative team. After a rough couple of issues leading up to and out of the Fear State, it’s great to see this comic get back on track and chugging along better than ever.
Whatever sense complacency that may have come about for anyone who did the math is immediately undone by the art for these opening pages. There is a wild sense of urgency and stress—Harley’s no Batman. She does not have this situation under control, and she’s one fumble away from dooming both herself and Kevin. Defusing bombs is stressful in the best of times, doing so while hanging on to the underside of a train going 80 miles (128 km, for my friends at home) an hour? It should feel dangerous, and the art team nails it.
I also want to take this moment to appreciate the narrative captions, which have bothered me through this series. While I’ve enjoyed what’s in them, they have often distracted me from the ongoing story, forcing me to do a number of rereads just to keep track of what’s going on. This issue seems to be striking a much better balance between words and action, making for a much tighter issue.
Speaking of words, Harley’s support group seems to have gotten much better at using theirs. There’s been a minor timeskip of sorts off-panel, where Harley was once fumbling to connect to people who weren’t sure they wanted to be there, the group now appears to have come together in mutual respect and support. Each member seems to have done some important personal growth under Harley’s guidance.
Do I wish I could have seen more of the journey? Absolutely. But that would have been a very different story, and I can understand the choice to leave more room for action and less room for group therapy in a superhero comic. As it is, what we get is heartening. Harley still has the same vulnerability that she did the first time she talked to the group. She continues to talk to them as equals, and she shows how much she cares about each of them. The biggest change is the confidence she has with this group, and it’s a beautiful thing to see.
One of the newest additions is former member of Keepsake’s Caucus of Corruption, a woman Keepsake mind-controlled into becoming a Bane knockoff named Blane. A woman who has also worked for the Joker in the past, and is coming to terms with a terrible history of being used by terrible supervillains. Harley Quinn has always been the poster child for just how much supervillain harms the people they work with with their selfishness, and it is fascinating to see that explored more. It’s the kind of thing you will only see glimpses of in a Batman comic, and I’m grateful to this series for giving this kind of story more space to exist.
Of course, like I said earlier, this comic needs more than just therapy, as Keepsake continues to pester Harley, going all out on his supervillainy. I’ve gone back and forth on how much I enjoy him as a villain, but this issue? Unreserved fun. I find it hilarious that he not only recycles other villains’ gimmicks, but reuses their actual henchmen to fill his ranks as well.
He lures Harley in and attempts to force her to choose between saving Gotham’s citizens from a bomb or to save the life of a single Kevin—though when she cuts through yet another one of his monologues he just tries to have her killed instead.
I love the action sequence here. Rossmo is a little more conventionally structured in his art, here – rectangularly shaped panels instead of some of the more playful designs we’ve seen – but their placement within a larger scene is still chaotic enough to give a wild vitality to the action. The star of this issue for me, however, is Plascencia, who seems to thrive on nighttime coloring – and also orange. Orange is an underrated color, but with Keepsake putting his signature orange mark on everything, Plascencia’s making orange shine. And glow. And burn and embody chaos as it’s smeared across things in Keepsake’s terrible handwriting. Halloween’s come early this year, and I love it.
When this book started out, it was a comic book I wanted to love more. It’s often a book that I feel requires a little effort on my heart to fully love. This issue, though, feels like the creative team has really figured out how to bring the best out of each other, and while the issue might not be the perfect jumping on point, if you’ve been missing out on the series, there’s no better time than now to hop on board.
Armaan is obsessed with the way stories are told. From video games to theater, TTRPGs to comics, he has written for, and about, them all. He will not stop, actually; believe us, we've tried.
