Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey

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watch it while it lasts.

https://youtu.be/ewe7cSNq9G4

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[GeneChing]

[GeneChing]

[GeneChing]

Jurnee Smollett-Bell on Playing Black Canary in 'Birds of Prey'
Marie Claire
Megan DiTrolio
,Marie Claire•January 15, 2020


Photo credit: Photo by Claudette Barius/ & © DC Comics
From Marie Claire

Jurnee Smollett-Bell has been a fan of martial-arts superhero Black Canary (her power: a deafening sonic scream) for years; the actress has even used the DC Comics character as her avatar when playing video games. This month, the 33-year-old Angeleno takes Black Canary to the big screen in Birds of Prey (Warner Bros., February 7), with Margot Robbie reprising her role as Harley Quinn. Below, she talks about the trip that changed her life, how she's seen Hollywood shift, and owning her power.

Marie Claire: What was it like training for the role?
Jurnee Smollett-Bell: I'm that obsessive actor who's like 'Throw me a coach! I can do it.' We started training with 87eleven's stunt team, one of the best stunt teams in the business. They trained us in this nondescript warehouse in L.A. for five months. I was also working out five days a week with my trainer, and then again with the 87Eleven team. I was still nursing and coming off a mom bod. I lived in a constant state of pain!


Photo credit: Claudette Barius/ & © DC Comic

MC: What was the audition and casting process for Black Canary like?
JSB:
It was a role my manager actually had first mentioned to me. Initially, they weren't so interested in me even auditioning because I wasn't available—I was shooting Lovecraft Country for HBO, which was a direct conflict [Smollett-Bell’s upcoming HBO horror drama, created by Jordan Peele and Misha Green]. Then, Misha said to me ‘Aren't they casting for Birds of Prey?’ I talked to her about it. I was, ‘Yeah. It really sucks. They won't even let me audition for it because I'm not going to be available.' She said, '*****, go after it!'

I went to my manager and my agents and said, ‘Listen, Misha said I should go for it and that there's a chance they actually won't be shooting during that time.’ I did a self-tape in Chicago while I was shooting the pilot for Lovecraft Country; they weren't telling us what the character was, but we had assumed it was Black Canary. I knew her from Injustice 2, the video game, which I played once in a while with my husband. Honestly, when I did the audition, I just thought All right. I'm going to do this, but they're never going to cast me. Then, I sent the tape in and they responded to it very enthusiastically and asked if I could come to L.A. to meet with the director, Cathy Yan. That went well. They asked for me to do a chemistry read with Margot [Robbie]. That went well. Then, they asked for me to screen test at Warner Bros., which was a grueling day. They were mixing and matching all of us girls into different pairings to see what the best chemistry was. I think I ended up doing this one scene over 30 times because there were so many different pairings. Black Canary was just so second nature to me. I just inherently understood her.

MC: How so? What connected you to her as a character?
JSB:
In the film, we're meeting Black Canary before she actually becomes Black Canary, in the sense that she hasn't really owned her power. She's struggling with the gift she has. She struggles with the fact that she has a gift that she doesn't want to own. To me, that's something I can honestly just relate to. I think we all can.

MC: How so? Have you ever felt like you weren't ready to take on a role, but you just had to go for it? How have you moved past that intimidation?
JSB:
Oh my goodness. Yes. It happens in waves, for me at least. There are moments where I feel like I'm completely walking in my calling. There are moments where I am truly struggling.

One of the moments was I was just on a flight, on my 20th birthday, to South Africa. I had it in my head that I was going to become more of an activist and not as much an actor or an artist. I was a part of an organization called Artists For A New South Africa, and I was broke. This organization was made up of all these artists I had grown up with, who were mentors of mine, like Samuel L. Jackson and his wife, LaTanya Richardson, Alfre Woodard and Blair Underwood. They were all taking a delegation to South Africa to build a well [so that villagers could have access to clean, safe water].

This trip changed my life. What I saw on the ground was the power of art. I saw how my mentors could use their art to manifest tangible change. We would go to these small villages and walk inside a hut where the roof was made of tin. The local people there were so beautiful and so kind and so humble. You had children who were raising their siblings. Children who had lost both parents to HIV/AIDS. They were walking five kilometers one way, five kilometers back, just to get water. Putting a well inside the village could impact it greatly. It took these artists and the art that they had created, and to come to the village and to see how all these people were so impacted—it blew my mind. I realized, if I have a gift, how dare I not use it?

MC: That ownership of power can be channeled in so many ways. You grew up in Hollywood, starting your career as a child star in Full House. How have you seen the industry evolve over the years? How has the balance of power shifted?
JSB:
I've absolutely seen it evolve. I think what we're witnessing right now is a real shift in the balance of power within the industry. So many have stopped asking for a seat at the table. They've just said, 'I'm going to go and build my own table.' I very much feel a part of the Time's Up Movement, and have worked closely with the organization since the beginning. I focus a lot of my work within Time's Up on WOC, which stands for Women of Color. Working with Time's Up to really make sure that women of all kinds are the nucleus of this movement has been a real passion of mine. I think in the past we've seen how the women's movement can be so splintered. I think what's so powerful about #MeToo and about Time's Up is that you have women of color right in the center. That's unprecedented. That's never happened in our history before. The goal is to truly make it intersectional. You have women of all abilities, women of all kinds, coming to the table and saying, 'No. This is what we need,' and using their voice. It's been incredibly powerful to see. It's powerful to see how it's affecting the industry. It personally me affected me greatly.

MC: How so?
JSB:
Reese Witherspoon is incredible to me. I adore her so much. She's been so vocal, and so instrumental at really seeing change happen on the ground. When I started going to the meetings for Time's Up and really doing the work and volunteering, I wasn't expecting it to impact me how it did. When it came time for me to sign on for Lovecraft Country, I saw the effects of Times Up in the negotiation phase. There were things that happened that wouldn't have happened to me prior to Time's Up. Reese had gone to Casey Bloys, the head of HBO programming, and had spoken to him about the importance of gender parity within his company. That conversation lead to so many of us having pay adjusted. He really went and looked at the salaries of the women who were working on his shows. A lot of it stemmed from the conversation with Reese.


Photo credit: Claudette Barius/ & © DC Comics

MC: Before Time's Up, you had said that things that happened to you. Do you mean in terms of pay disparity?
JSB:
Yes, absolutely. I found out several times after the fact that it didn't matter what billing I was getting, I was still getting less than my male counterparts. I mean, shocking. We all are doing the same work. We're doing the same hours. The commitment's not going to be any less. Why should our commitment and our vision and our gift be valued less? Honestly, it's criminal that it has been valued less for so long. It just took us all joined together to say, 'No.' To say Time's Up. I'm just seeing that the industry shift is a magnitude I've never seen.

MC: So many fans (and the original writer, Gail Simone) were excited about your casting, while others expected Black Canary to be white like she is in the comic. How do you respond to them?
JSB: For so long, so many people have been shut out. There are so many of us who are hungry to see the world the way it actually looks in cinema.

Interview edited for length and clarity. A version of this interview originally appeared in the February 2020 issue of Marie Claire.

I know a few female martial artists who luv Black Canary.

[GeneChing]

There are vids behind the link.

NEWSJANUARY 24, 2020 6:30PM PT
Margot Robbie, ‘Birds of Prey’ Co-Stars Justify the Movie’s R-Rating, Violence and Cussing
By J. KIM MURPHY

Following the success of “Joker” last year, DC Films is continuing its gritty streak with “Birds of Prey,” a slam-bang adventure about Harley Quinn.

Though DC Film’s 2016 tentpole “Suicide Squad” took a critical bashing at the time, filmgoers quickly took a liking to Margot Robbie’s portrayal of Harley Quinn. “Birds of Prey” gives the fan favorite character her own adventure, having her ditch the male-dominated Squad to work alongside a rogues’ gallery of women.

For the creators behind the upcoming movie, an R-rating was the only way the project made any sense.

“Harley’s not really someone to hold back,” Robbie told Variety‘s Marc Malkin on Thursday at the opening of Harleywood in Hollywood. “The R-rating really allowed us to take it to the next level with fight scenes.”

Director Cathy Yan added, “The women are unabashedly themselves and very unapologetic in the movie. It was very liberating to have the jokes that we wanted to have and (to) show (the characters) for who they are.”

Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who plays Huntress, echoed Yan’s comments. “I think it’s very true to who Harley is…She’s the one telling the story, so we see it through her eyes and her eyes are quite poppy and creative and unlike anything else,” Winstead said. “I think it’s totally uninhibited in every way. That’s what it felt like shooting it. We got to do whatever we wanted. We got to improv. We’re throwing around curse words.”

Along with a badmouthed lexicon, an R-rating also opens up opportunities for more bombastic violence. The fight scenes required extensive training with personal trainers and stunt choreographers.

“Oh, it was brutal,” said Jurnee Smollett-Bell, who plays Black Canary.

“They did the majority of their own stunts,” Yan explained. “I think they all became so strong because of it. Their bodies got stronger; they learned to fight. Everyone really ultimately appreciated it… because it really turned them into the superheroes they are.”

When asked if the project’s dialogue or violence was ever in danger of veering too far into bad taste, Yan laughed. “Not, that is not this movie,” she said. “Restraint was not really in the DNA of this one.“

We are invited to the screener next week. Anticipate a KungFuMagazine.com review when this premieres.

Good fights. That's all I ever ask.

[GeneChing]

Birds of Prey Director Cathy Yan on Reinventing Gotham City and Working with Hyenas
Plus, a great explanation for why Suicide Squad’s Joker got kicked to the curb.
By James Grebey
February 5, 2020


Birds of Prey, 2020.Everett Collection / Courtesy of Warner Bros.

Margot Robbie had been pushing for her breakout Suicide Squad character, charmingly unstable Harley Quinn, to get a movie of her very own for a while. Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn), which hits theaters on Friday, was a long time coming, but for director Cathy Yan, things happened very quickly.

Yan had just premiered her first feature, Dead Pigs, at Sundance in 2018, and it was only a month or so later that she found herself meeting with Robbie and screenwriter Christina Hodson. “We talked mostly about ourselves actually and just got to know each other, but it became very clear to me that this was a really interesting point of view on a superhero film,” Yan recalls.

Shortly after that, Yan pitched Warner Bros. her vision Birds of Prey and a different kind of Gotham that felt more like a scrappy neighborhood than midtown. Just like that, Yan had made the jump from an indie festival to a blockbuster tentpole. And, she was one of the few women to direct a superhero movie. (Encouragingly, she’s actually the first of four women to do so this year, as Black Widow, Wonder Woman 1984, and The Eternals are also all female-helmed.)

A very loose sequel to Suicide Squad, Yan’s Birds of Prey catches up with Harley Quinn as she’s trying to go at it solo following a breakup with the Joker (Jared Leto, who is busy elsewhere being a “living vampire,” is nowhere to be seen in the movie). But, after she crosses Roman Sionis (Ewan McGregor, having a ball playing the B-list Batman gangster Black Mask), Harley is forced to team up with other women that have, intentionally or not, also crossed Roman, including Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez), hardass Gotham PD detective; Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell), a singer with a killer voice; Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), a deadly vigilante with poor people skills; and Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco), a young pickpocket.

Yan chatted with GQ about working in DC’s increasingly loose cinematic universe, reinventing Gotham City, and why hyenas are bad actors.

GQ: Ever since Justice League, it seems like DC has taken on kind of a pretty fast and loose approach to its shared universe. Movies like Shazam!, Aquaman, and Birds of Prey, could pretty much be standalone rather than a piece of a larger narrative or setting up the next movie in the series. Did you feel a sense of freedom while making Birds of Prey, in terms of the larger scale of the cinematic universe?

Yan: It was pretty liberating to be able to create my own version of Gotham and know to not be so tied to the way that any other director had done things and to be able to really pick and choose and honor the comics, honor what's come before. Certainly Suicide Squad existed and introduced Margot's version of Harley Quinn, but we were also able to take liberties from there. And that was extremely liberating. I think that for any director, it seems like a lot more fun than the reverse—being told “you have to do make this perfectly connected to something else.” I think the success of these standalone movies has really proven something.

There really aren't any serious references to Suicide Squad in this movie other than one offhanded line from Harley about line about saving the world with a bomb around her neck. Were there things you decided to pull from Suicide Squad, and where did you decided to go into your own direction?

I think there are certain elements of Harley that we kept. We weren't completely reinventing that character. We kept all her tattoos, but then we changed them according to her character and where she's going because in this movie, you know, Harley is figuring out who she is when she's no longer the girlfriend. And that was important. The “J” tattoo on her arm becomes a mermaid. You see her at the very beginning of the movie turning “puddin” into “pudding cups.” That was a cheeky nod to where she was and when she's going from a character development perspective. We gave her slightly different haircuts, letting the dye grow out and get a little bit more diluted.

I really love the look at the mallet and the bat and the bat from Suicide Squad. We ended up keeping that. I love the way that David Ayer created a world that felt a little more grounded, that was a bit more inspired by street style. I appreciated that. I felt that was the world of Harley Quinn, in a way, because she doesn't really have a superpower besides her crazy mind. So I definitely took a cue from that world and then I pushed it even more and made it our own.

Was there ever any attempt to get Jared Leto to make a cameo or otherwise appear as the Joker again or was that intentionally never considered?

Basically, yeah. It would be such a small little moment anyway with him. The movie is just about Harley, and Harley doesn't need the Joker. So, we didn't feel like we really needed Jared.

continued next post

[GeneChing]

We've seen a bunch of different Gothams in various movies. If we normally see the Manhattan equivalent of Gotham city, Birds of Prey felt more like this was Gotham’s Bronx or Queens.

That was definitely by design. Harley just felt like a bit more of a scrappy character who isn't always necessarily in the center of power. And a lot of our characters were as well. Even Roman Sionis—he aspires to be, but maybe he's not quite there yet. And I liked that.

From a world-building perspective, I really wanted to make a world that felt like the Gotham that you know. Like, nothing quite works. This is why it's so fun. You have all these villains, you have the heroes that come and save the day. It's crime-infested, it's a broken system. But at the same time, I really wanted to show a Gotham that had hope and still had fun and creativity, and crazy characters.

I was really inspired by New York in the ‘70s and ‘80s as well, where you just have both those bad things and the contrast of a real burgeoning art scene and creativity and crazy stories. Take Harley. She's very capable of darkness, she's capable of a lot of violence, but at the same time she loves glitter and pink and she's quite the manic pixie girl. There’s a duality in her, and I tried to reflect in the duality of Gotham as well because everything is told through her eyes a bit in this movie.

It felt like you had a pretty grounded Gotham, but every once in a while you’d just throw in a detail like an abandoned funhouse or spooky pier that seemed like it was straight-up out of a Tim Burton or Joel Schumacher Batman, where it's just kinda silly for silliness sake. Not at all practical, but very fun.

Totally. I love those Batmans. We sort of forget that because Gotham has been so serious for quite some time now, but I always really appreciated those. Joel Schumacher is a great filmmaker, you know, and, and of course, Tim Burton is too. Those were the things that I grew up watching.

Birds of Prey reinvented a lot of classic characters compared to how they traditionally appear in the comics—especially someone like Cassandra Cain. What was the adaptation process like, and how did you pick these characters from DC’s stock and shape them to what you needed for this story?

With our villains and all the women and specifically with Cassandra Kane—this is an origin story for everybody. None of them has become the superhero version of themselves yet. They're all women who are struggling to figure themselves out, struggling against the system. It's only at the very end that they come together and some of them become the Birds of Prey. I liked that. I feel like we really understand them as humans first, and then they gained power later.

What does it mean to you that this is a superhero origin story, but all the characters are women?

We meet all these women individually and they may not be, let's say, living their best lives. And oftentimes when they do interact, it's not pleasant. Renee and Harley are in complete conflict, and even with Harley and Canary, Canary finds Harley to be the most annoying person in the world at the beginning of the movie. It's only at the end that they sort of have to work together. And I've always liked that as a story because I think it shows that as women we are stronger together than we are apart, and we may have to unteach ourselves a little bit in terms of the instinct to be more competitive or not fully trust someone else.

Throughout most of history, it was like, well, there's that one woman who got the CEO part, and that’s it. Or women of color walking into an audition room and seeing only other women of color and understanding that there's only one woman of color that's going to get this role, and the tokenism of that. That no longer has to be the case, and if we all band together, we can really make it not the case and change the entire system. So that’s something I can really relate to.

What was it like working with the hyena?

We had very much considered working with a real hyena because so much of the movie was practical effects and that was something I really wanted to try to focus on. But we ended up meeting a hyena in the Valley named Fonzi. And while he was lovely, we soon found out that hyenas are probably the worst animals to try to actually bring onto a set. They’re practically untrainable. What we wanted out of Bruce, the hyena in the movie, would've been pretty much impossible with a practical hyena. We ended up having a German shepherd named Clark—who was adorable—on set, and he was trained to do everything that Bruce did. Then we were able to map on a digital hyena on top of him. In the Twizzlers scene, for example, that's actually Margot sharing a Twizzler with a German shepherd. We have to thank our amazing VFX supervisor, Greg Steele and a WETA Digital for that.

Design Sifu and I caught the screener last night. Watch for our Fantabulous Fight-focused review this Friday.

[GeneChing]

Fantabulous! READ BIRDS OF PREY: Birds, Bats and Badass Broads by Patrick Lugo and Gene Ching

[GeneChing]

I've been tracking the female-strong trend in films with my recent string of reviews.
BIRDS OF PREY: Birds, Bats and Badass Broads by Patrick Lugo and Gene Ching
THE RHYTHM SECTION: First Female-Strong Film of the Decade by Gene Ching
CHARLIE’S ANGELS: Female-Strong and Woke by Gene Ching
THE WARRIOR QUEEN OF JHANSI: Furious Female Freedom Fighter by Gene Ching
So far, they've all underperformed (except for Jhansi which was a limited release - I just did that one because I'm familiar with the subject and I was hoping to get a shot at an interview with Devika Bhise - that was offered but I was denied )

It's the next one that I'm really watching - Mulan. I really hope this one doesn't flop. It could be the bump that our industry needs right now.

How 'Birds of Prey' Deconstructs the Male Gaze
FEBRUARY 08, 2020 6:15AM by Ciara Wardlow


'Birds of Prey' | Claudette Barius
In the new film, as opposed to in 'Suicide Squad,' the camera follows what Harley Quinn is doing, not how good she looks in the process.
[This story contains spoilers for Birds of Prey]

Birds of Prey is a comic book film that is quietly yet profoundly different, not in the story it shares but in how it is told. From director Cathy Yan, screenwriter Christina Hodson and star and producer Margot Robbie, Birds of Prey is one of the more cognizant and thorough deconstructions of the male gaze to hit recent mainstream cinema, particularly as it relates to the superhero genre.

Both films and comic books have a long history of being dominated by the male gaze, a term coined by film theorist Laura Mulvey in the 1975 essay "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" to describe how the male viewpoint in cinematic storytelling, both behind the camera and on screen, directly correlates to the consistent objectification of female characters. Birds of Prey acknowledges the existence of this gaze and adamantly rejects it, providing an entertaining but still thoughtful alternative. Female authorship is prominently and proudly on display in the film, both in how it was made and in the evolution of Harley’s character.

The plot of Birds of Prey isn’t necessarily innovative — scheming crime boss Roman Sionis (Ewan McGregor) seeks a special diamond, teenage pickpocket Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco) pinches it off one of his goons in transit, a manhunt ensues, the newly single Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) gets tangled up in the mess. It’s colorful fun with minimal substance, like a blast of confetti in story form. But when viewed as commentary on agency and the nature of authorship, Birds of Prey is something far more remarkable.

While prior female-helmed, female-led superhero films — namely, Patty Jenkins' Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel (co-directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck) — have already said a good deal on the subject, none have been so thorough in their deconstruction of the components that contribute to the male gaze. Birds of Prey is refreshingly aware of its identity as a story from a lineage and being told in a medium that has overwhelmingly, intentionally or otherwise, objectified women, and engages directly with that troubled history.

It is in the subtle, thoughtful details reinforcing the concept of Harley’s self-ownership throughout Birds of Prey that ultimately speak the loudest. The film puts its money where its mouth is in ways that reverberate through all aspects of production, from the sets to the costumes to the cinematography. It is not merely a story about Harley, but hers to tell, not muse but author. This authorship is present in the film’s full title, with (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) scrawled in what is clearly supposed to be her own handwriting. It is pervasive in the telling, in her character narrating the film, in the gleeful scrambling continuity, jumping back and forth, starting and stopping. And the villain Harley has to outwit? A crime lord who lives in an apartment where the wallpaper is patterned with bound, naked women in repose.


Suicide Squad | Warner Bros.

The single most telling example of Birds of Prey’s consideration on this front boils down to a tale of two shirts. In Suicide Squad, Harley Quinn’s main look features a red-accented baseball tee with “Daddy’s Lil Monster” stamped across the chest. The shirt debuts in a long leer across Harley’s body as she strips down in front of an overwhelmingly male crowd in order to put on the item of clothing; an outfit and a performance designed with the fantasies of a specific sort of viewer in mind, first and foremost, as opposed to the character actually wearing it. Harley’s basic aesthetic in Birds of Prey is consistent—shorts, t-shirts, heavy makeup—but the details and the subtext of director Cathy Yan’s installment could not be more different than Suicide Squad filmmaker David Ayer’s. For most of the film Harley wears a loose-fitting t-shirt patterned with her own name—all caps, bolded font. She is her own.


Birds of Prey | Claudette Barius

In Birds of Prey as opposed to Suicide Squad, the camera follows what Harley is doing, not how good her ass looks in the process. When these two variables are at odds in the earlier film, the latter consideration consistently wins out. One need look no further a scene from a Suicide Squad trailer. There’s a moment where Harley steals a purse from a busted window display. You can barely make out what the accessory looks like because it’s out of focus. The purse might be what her character cares about in that moment, but the shot cares about the figure she cuts when she bends over in leather booty shorts. That is what is in focus, front and center. That’s what the film is saying matters.

When you’re a girl growing up caring about superhero movies and you see girls and women in those films treated in this fashion, it leaves a profound impression. It is not the existence of this gaze that does the damage but seeing it in constant repetition.

The point is not that straight men should not be allowed to fantasize or that all the male gaze laden comic book films of yore — and all those undoubtedly yet to come — should be burned in ceremonial pyres. The “Daddy’s Lil Monster” shirt makes a cameo in Birds of Prey; Harley insists on keeping it. For sentimental reasons, she says. That shirt and all it represents do not need to be destroyed. It can be kept and even recalled fondly. The point is that there needs to be room at the table for everybody else. The superhero genre has privileged one specific gaze for a long time, but these stories appeal to and owe their success to audiences spanning every demographic under the sun, and that deserves to be better reflected in who gets to tell them.

[GeneChing]

I guess 'fantabulous' was too much of a mouthful.

Harley Quinn has better SEO, so Birds of Prey is getting a new name
Birds of Prey is now Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey
By Julia Alexander Feb 11, 2020, 9:47am EST



Warner Bros. learned this past weekend that Birds of Prey, otherwise known as Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn), isn’t exactly search engine optimization (SEO) friendly. The sequel of sorts to Suicide Squad barely made a dent in the box office due to many marketing issues involving the film, and, as a result, Warner Bros. has changed the name of the movie to Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey.

The title change appeared last night on ticket sites for major theaters. A Warner Bros. representative told The Verge that the name change is part of a “search expansion for ticket sites,” making it easier for people to find the movie. Adding Harley Quinn’s name to the beginning of the title also gives moviegoers a better understanding of what Birds of Prey is about, an issue the movie has faced in recent weeks.

Birds of Prey’s opening weekend wasn’t the success that Warner Bros. had planned for a movie about a popular DC character being portrayed by Margot Robbie. The film only generated $33 million domestically, coming up short against investors’ $50 to $55 million projection. The low box office return came as a surprise to industry insiders who noted that Birds of Prey was one of the best-reviewed DC movies in recent years, earning high scores on Rotten Tomatoes.

ONE INDUSTRY EXECUTIVE WITH KNOWLEDGE OF THE MATTER REFERRED TO THE ROLLOUT AS A “DISASTER”
So what went wrong? One industry executive with knowledge of the matter referred to the rollout as a disaster. Like a domino effect, a few things went wrong at once: bad marketing, bad trailers, and bad title decisions.

A few trade publications have compared Birds of Prey’s rollout to Fox’s terrible marketing of the X-Men installment Dark Phoenix. Like Birds of Prey, Dark Phoenix didn’t have “X-Men” in it. And for people who might not be aware of Jean Grey’s character, Dark Phoenix looked like a random sci-fi movie, not the final chapter in an X-Men series. The poor marketing and heavy criticism the film received led to a major box office bomb, only generating $65 million domestically. Disney CEO Bob Iger even referenced the film’s box office failure in a call with investors, pointing to it as a reason the studio division of Disney’s company took a hit that quarter.


Harley Quinn is an extremely popular character with major name recognition, much like Wonder Woman, Batman, Superman, and Joker. The decision to forgo using her name in the first place baffled industry members.

What’s unclear is how much of the lengthy title came from Warner Bros. and how much of it was a creative decision from director Cathy Yan. The studio has been criticized for swapping out names on directors in the past: director Doug Liman originally wanted to name his 2014 action movie starring Tom Cruise Live Die Repeat, but Warner Bros. went with Edge of Tomorrow instead. Much like Birds of Prey, the film was considered a financial disappointment despite the critical acclaim it received. Liman insisted part of the reason was the generic-sounding title Warner Bros. decided to go with. The marketing for the film eventually emphasized “Live Die Repeat” as a tagline.

THE DECISION TO FORGO USING HARLEY QUINN’S NAME IN THE FIRST PLACE BAFFLED INDUSTRY MEMBERS
It’s not just the title, though. A person with knowledge of the situation also noted that none of Birds of Prey’s trailers explained what the film was about. Instead of leaning into the R rating and releasing a series of redband trailers (like Deadpool and Amazon’s The Boys did), Birds of Prey’s trailers played it safe. Normally, that would be fine, but Birds of Prey is a movie that works because of its utter ridiculousness and R-rated qualities. To not show off that side of the film in the trailers and marketing leading up to its release is seen as a failure by many in the industry.

At the end of the day, Warner Bros. is trying to fix its rocky rollout with a new SEO game plan. There’s a good chance that Birds of Prey can find more success over the next few weeks: there’s little competition at the box office, and with Harley Quinn at the front of the new title, there’s a better chance people will know what Birds of Prey is about.

[GeneChing]

Simu has a pretty good handle on social media. That'll serve him well.

Marvel's Shang-Chi Star Praises Birds of Prey but Blames Suicide Squad for Creating a Nightmare for Him
By MEGAN PETERS - February 11, 2020 03:22 pm EST

Simu Liu has had a busy six months. Last summer, the world learned the actor was cast to bring Shang-Chi to life at San Diego Comic-Con, and he has been riding a high ever since. However, that doesn't mean Liu has to forget about superheroes outside of Marvel. In fact, it turns out the star has a thing for Birds of Prey, but he isn't so generous towards Suicide Squad.

Recently, Liu took to Twitter to share his thoughts on Birds of Prey. The DC Film went live over the weekend, and it earned rave reviews from fans. And as you maybe guessed, Liu is a big fan of the movie.

"Watch Birds of Prey - it's a great film w/ strong comedy, great action and incredible performances - PLUS features kick-ass female heroes," the actor shared.

Simu Liu
✔
@SimuLiu
Watch #BirdsOfPrey - it's a great film w/ strong comedy, great action and incredible performances - PLUS features kick-ass female heroes!!

Also unlike Suicide Squad they DIDN'T block off my condo entrance to film for a week, making my commute a living nightmare... #StillSalty

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Before logging off, Liu did have to make mention of another DC film. A few years back, Warner Bros. was all about Suicide Squad, but it turns out the film had a personal hardship on Liu despite him not being involved with the much-debated movie.

"Also unlike Suicide Squad they DIDN'T block off my condo entrance to film for a week, making my commute a living nightmare...," the actor wrote before adding a salty hashtag.

Clearly, there are still some hard feelings between Liu and Suicide Squad. While the film was a financial success, it was greeted with criticism from fans. These days, Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn is giving his spin on the franchise with a film. He is currently working on The Suicide Squad which has been described as a reboot sequel to the original film, so here's to hoping Liu has better luck with this film than the first!

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[GeneChing]

How 'Birds of Prey' Could Lead to a Poison Ivy Team-Up
FEBRUARY 09, 2020 6:00AM by Richard Newby


'Birds of Prey' | Claudette Barius

With Harley Quinn's bisexuality suggested in the film's animated opening, an exploration of what a healthy relationship with the plant-themed villain looks like is worthy of attention.
[This story contains spoilers for Birds of Prey.]

Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) may be free from her relationship with the Joker, but there’s sure to still be a significant amount of toxicity in her life going forward, because she is still Harley Quinn after all. If there’s one character who can help mitigate some of those toxins, it’s Poison Ivy. Harley and Ivy’s relationship is a long and storied one in the DC Universe, ever since the two first teamed up in the 47th episode of Batman: The Animated Series, fittingly titled “Harley and Ivy.” Since then, the two have frequently found themselves partnering up in the pages of Batman, Detective Comics, Harley Quinn and the recent miniseries Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy and on DC Universe’s new animated series Harley Quinn. They’ve been criminal partners, BFFs and romantically linked, each aspect of their relationship creating a portrait of two women who are more than Batman villains. Margot Robbie has expressed her enthusiasm for the character showing up in the future, and seeing the pair of them onscreen would definitely thrill fans. There’s a scenario that could see Harley torn between Ivy and the Birds of Prey: Enter the Gotham City Sirens.

Gotham City Sirens was a comic book series that began in 2009 and ran for 26 issues. Created by writer and Harley Quinn co-creator Paul Dini and artist Guillem March, the title saw Harley Quinn, Poison Ivy and Catwoman form a team in the aftermath of Batman’s apartment death during Final Crisis. In the series, the three still have their own separate adventures and vendettas, but come together for protection, which leads to them making enemies who would see all three of them dead, and dealing with the presence of a new Batman (Dick Grayson). The trio also found themselves allied with the Riddler, who’d been drugged and seduced by Ivy, and used his base as their headquarters. Warner Bros. saw the potential for the Gotham City Sirens early on and in 2016, following the release of Suicide Squad, director David Ayer signed on to helm from a script penned by Geneva Robertson-Dworet. The project was eventually put on hold in favor of Birds of Prey, but that doesn’t mean the Sirens don’t have a future in the DC film universe.

The cast of Birds of Prey have discussed a scenario that would see the team face off against the Gotham City Sirens, with Harley Quinn caught in the middle. Challenging Harley’s neutral position as an antihero and finding her torn between the world of superheroes and criminals could be a fascinating arc for the character that could allow even more of DC’s women to shine. And with Harley single, and her bisexuality suggested in Birds of Prey’s animated opening, the exploration of what a healthy relationship with Poison Ivy looks like is also worthy of attention.

Poison Ivy seems like an easy character to bring into this world, and more than enough time has passed since her appearance in Batman & Robin (1997), in which she was portrayed by Uma Thurman, for her to get a reinvention in the DC film universe. The past decade of comics has seen Poison Ivy, like Harley Quinn, pulled between the status of hero and villain, with occasionally inconsistent depictions, but of late she’s landed closer to the heroic side and may be set to replace Swamp Thing as protector of The Green. Like Black Mask in Birds of Prey, it’s possible for Poison Ivy to already exist within this world, making a retelling of her origin story unnecessary. Instead, the focus could be placed on her and Harley’s relationship, and how their perfect criminal partnership changes with the arrival of Catwoman.

Catwoman’s introduction could prove to be a little more complicated. While the idea of Zoe Kravitz’s upcoming take on Selina Kyle interacting with Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn and the Birds of Prey sounds perfect, the specifics of Matt Reeves’ The Batman are unknown in terms of its place in continuity, if it has one at all. But thanks to Warner Bros.' increasingly leniency on the continuity of these films and greater interest in letting filmmakers tell their own stories, Catwoman, whether portrayed by Kravitz or someone else, doesn’t seem like too much to hope for. Like Joker, Catwoman is iconic enough for multiple versions of the character to exist. And like Harley and Ivy, she’s also found herself transitioning from villain to hero, and seeing those morals play out against the Birds of Prey could make for an interesting conflict, not to mention some stellar action scenes.

Although it’s unknown whether Ayer is still attached to Gotham City Sirens, which he said last month was on hold, it would be more fitting to see him in the role of producer and have Cathy Yan and Christina Hodson take over directing and scripting duties, respectively. Whether the Gotham City Sirens have their own film first or appear in the Birds of Prey sequel that we’ll hopefully receive, it feels as though the same creative team who brought out the unique characterizations and complexities of Black Canary, Huntress, Renee Montoya, Harley Quinn and Cassandra Cain could do the same for Catwoman and Poison Ivy. Birds of Prey feels like the start of something new and exciting within the DC film universe and for those specific characters, a crossover with the Gotham City Sirens feels like the logical endgame.

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[GeneChing]

‘Birds of Prey’ Spinoff In the Works With Misha Green, Jurnee Smollett
A feature project centered on Black Canary is now in early development at HBO Max.

BY BORYS KIT

AUGUST 20, 2021 4:17PM

Misha Green, Jurnee Smollett JEMAL COUNTESS/GETTY IMAGES FOR WGN AMERICA


Misha Green is reuniting with her Lovecraft Country collaborator Jurnee Smollett for a DC movie project featuring heroine Black Canary, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed.

The project, which is in early development at HBO Max, is a spinoff from Warner Bros.’s 2020 DC movie Birds of Prey which featured characters Harley Quinn, the Huntress, and Cassandra Cain. Also in the cast of heroes was Canary, played by Smollett.

Green will write the script for the feature, with Smollett due to reprise her role. Sue Kroll, who produced Prey, will produce Canary.

Prey was not a strong performer at the box office — it grossed only $201.8 million worldwide when released in Feb. 5, 2020 — but did generate fan interest and had actors who were game to play.

No take on the story was revealed, however Canary is one of DC’s long-standing characters, having been created in the late 1940s. Since the 1960s, she has been associated mostly with Green Arrow and is known for her ear-splitting canary cry.

Canary now joins a growing stable of HBO Max movies centered on DC characters such as Batgirl and Blue Beetle, as well as a series focused on a Black Superman.

Green became one of the hottest creators in town thanks to Lovecraft, which became a buzzy and envelope-pushing series for HBO. When a second season was nixed, Green found plenty of other work, including The Mother, an action thriller starring Jennifer Lopez now in pre-production at Netflix, and significantly a Tomb Raider movie project that she will write and on which she make her feature directorial debut.

Smollett is repped by CAA, Management 360, and attorney Nina Shaw.

Cinelinx first reported the news of a Black Canary project.

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