Comic Review: Batman: Prelude to the Wedding: Harley Quinn Vs. Joker

Batman: Prelude to the Wedding: Harley Quinn Vs. Joker

DC Comics

Writer: Tim Seeley

Artists: Sami Basri and Jessica Kholine

Holy cow, the title of this article has three colons. That’s so many. Anyway.

Oh my god, finally! After reading mediocre title after mediocre title, there’s something I can actually recommend to people this week! As always, Tim Seeley’s grasp on character is one of the finest in DC. His Nightwing Rebirth run was consistently excellent, as was his Green Lanterns run. Seeley has in fact been writing the majority of the Prelude to the Wedding issues, and I think that has a lot to do with their consistently high quality.

First up is the art! I will say that it’s not quite as good as I would like it to be, but it also does a lot of things right! There are two things about the art that elevate it for me: the colors and the costume designs. Too many comics these days have bland, “realistic” color schemes like we’re afraid that if we go outside a certain spectrum the medium will be branded “funny books” again and no one will take us seriously. Comics are meant to be just a tad outside the realm of the real! It’s reality, but richer, stranger, made more believable because of the unrealistic design choices. Colors have always been a large part of that, and so it’s refreshing to see a comic where Joker’s hair is unrepentantly deep green and his suit is a truly deep purple. I think the colors could have gone even further, but I like them the way they are too. As for the other element, the designs, you only have to look at Harley’s two original costumes here to see what I mean. They’re both adorable and show a very solid design sense (especially when it comes to avoiding overdesign). Considering that the whole comic is centered around Harley and Joker, I don’t feel like her costumes are too small of an element to bring special notice to – they’re a decent amount of the visual experience of the comic. The artist’s main weak point is a simple but tricky one: facial expressions. They exist, but they’re really not as differentiated from each other as I feel they ought to be. They’re not terrible, or even bad, but I do think the artist could improve them a little more! The linework here is fairly thin and there’s not a lot of texture, but the colors actually manage to do the heavy lifting here and the overall image totally works. Indeed, most of the effective textures come from color contrasts, such as in Harley’s dress or when Joker’s covered with tapioca. It’s a very interesting strategy, and I like it more than I thought I would. The panelwork’s nothing special, but you can’t have it all. I’m more than satisfied.

The story, then! You know, is it just me or can Seeley write a heck of a Joker? And a heck of a Harley, too! This comic is, much like the last couple issues of Batman, mostly a prolonged conversation. There’s a very sizeable amount of action and tension – certainly more than in the last issue of Batman – but it goes along with the conversation naturally. So what’s the conversation about? Ahh, just the same-old-same-old Harley-Joker will-they-or-won’t-they abusive fun times. It’s certainly nice to see Harley with the upper hand, though, and it’s very applicable what with the wedding tie-in and all. Being a conversation-style, character-driven issue, it should come as no surprise that it’s quite good. Seeley, as I’ve said in many a review, absolutely knows his stuff when it comes to characters. It’s his particular strength as a writer to know his characters inside and out and create very believable interactions between them. And that’s what this issue is! One big believable interaction. We see Harley’s well-meaning revenge. We see Joker’s slimy manipulation. We see how they work and don’t work together. What I’m trying to say here is that their relationship makes sense in this issue. Or rather, Seeley has shown us an interaction where both characters abide perfectly by their internal rules. That is the definition of character and believability, and this issue is a pleasure to read.