Curb your fanboy!

I love Mikey but he’s right-Dan reached that level most dream of and never achieve. He gave voice to the cognitive dissonance that was the first Suicide Squad movie. He may have peaked with that video.

Mikeys theme music always gives me a feeling of crazy joy for the oncoming soliloquy. That could be some measure of quality. The jingles of reminders of good viewing, nostalgia in the making.

Suck up

For real though. I will go back and watch Movies with Mikey videos a dozen at a time sometimes. They're great! Some of my favorite KZfaq comfort food

Well, to be honest, in Batman & Robin, we have both. We have the tragic, somewhat relatable villain, *combined* with the campy ice-themed jokes. Sure, he enters with "What killed de dinosaurs? De EIS AAAAAAGE", but his whole motivation is rooted in his wife being in cryostasis through the McGregor-Syndrome. ALthough - to be honest - I gotta admit, I sometimes am against "turning all the villains in relatable people". Sometimes you still need your "Snidey-Whiplash"-Moustache-Twirling-Villain, because if you turn each and every villain into a relatable character, the whole thing falls apart. In especially, that counts for comic-book-movies, since if you try to turn them into realistic movies, other things, maybe staples of the franchise, will be noticed as kinda stupid. In especially: the batman franchise. One of the staples was the Bat-signal in the sky, but isn't that signalling the people of Gotham, that their own police force is incompetent? If so: Why are still so many people living there? Say about the 60s Batman what you want, but at least the communication between Bruce/Bats and Comissioner Gordon was stealthy. No one - except maybe Aunt Harriett - would notice, that the Police basically said "We don't know how to handle the situation, so... come, big, bad Bat, come and help us." Same with Bats itself: How can any criminal be put into Arkham Asylum, if one question would suffice, to get everyone out? Harvey Dent should just ask the Judge: "Who put me behind bars? And before you say the obvious: Who *is* Batman?"

@@deraltetrekkie6088 >Well, to be honest, in Batman & Robin, we have both. We have the tragic, somewhat relatable villain, combined with the campy ice-themed jokes. Sure, he enters with "What killed de dinosaurs? De EIS AAAAAAGE", but his whole motivation is rooted in his wife being in cryostasis through the McGregor-Syndrome. True, I almost mentioned that they tried to keep the B:TAS motivation but I still felt they did a terrible job of it. It's probably best if we just pretend that B&R never happened. > ALthough - to be honest - I gotta admit, I sometimes am against "turning all the villains in relatable people". I totally agree with you, but bear in mind that this Mr. Freeze update was done in the early 1990s, long before the current trend of doing so. And they did a really good job of it at the time.

@@deraltetrekkie6088 I do believe Freeze being relatable is why Ivy was kept cartoonishly evil in B&R. We sympathized with Freeze (and tbh, I kinda loved the ice puns), so Ivy was the villain you rooted against.

@@darkecofreak23 Hehe, "rooted" - I see what you did there. ^^

I only learned recently that his design in BTAS, which was also very different from any previous version, was done by Mike Mignola!

My ranking of the DCEU movies is Birds of Prey, then Aquaman, then Wonder Woman, and I guess the others also exist. Birds of Prey was a good fucking movie, and easily somewhere in the top 10 of "superhero genre" movies.

Unfortunately, the Snyderverse almost killed variety (in world-building, sub-genre, artistic style, point-of-view...) in truly unique DC movies by steering them towards Marvel-oriented, soap-opera uniformity instead. My favourite DC movies are: 1. Batman Returns 2. A History of Violence 3. Batman Begins 4. V For Vendetta 5. Shazam! 6. Wonder Woman 7. Birds of Prey 8. Watchmen ...and I am really looking forward to watching Wonder Woman and The Batman next.

I wanna know who is reading it because my mind thinks it's an amalgamation of Jesse Eisenberg and Michael Cera and I'm sure that's not just me reading into things and filling in blanks

@@strudelninja It sounds so much like BDG to me.

@@strudelninja The voice of Puck is credited at 16:48. Riley Silverman.

💯

Yessss

You sure about that?

Yep. The Batfleck fight in the warehouse is phenomenal, but this one was amazing.

Yeah, my favorite part was how they all waited their turns, to go at her one-by-one, & didn't take shots, even when they had clear opportunity -- that's the kind of polite behavior I love in an action movie... :/

It’s feminist crap. It’s downright awful.

@@jacobq.2204 Okie dokie Buckaroo

I, for one, found a lot to appreciate about the movie, even if the end result could’ve been a lot better. Cathy Yan had only made one other movie before this one, and that one is much, much, MUCH better... but this one is, at the very least, not bad.

@@jacobq.2204 no, it’s a pretty fun movie.

Birds of Prey was a really fun movie!

It has no reason for being as great as it is. Also, the second season has some of the best Batman related content in a long long time

The Harley Quinn show is a VERY nice breath of fresh air; it’s shockingly violent, oddly humorous at times, has a bunch of great characters working off of each other perfectly... Not a masterpiece, but I definitely like it! :)

@@jamesburgess2k they have the PERFECT sort of Batman for what that show needs him to be. Just this one, comically-stern guy refusing to go along with the silly, amoral spirit of the show

UPDATE: apparently this Batman is contractually-forbidden from going down on anyone, so I have to dock him a few points now

@@jamesburgess2k where's my goddamn electric car, Bruce?!?

True, true.

Genius Bonus here: Fried food is seen as a hangover cure, which can imply Harley liked hitting the booze hard.

Dope in the sandwich? A whole new hypothesis on the origin of Harley's psychotic mindset emerges...

Plus, if someone wants a Harley love story, the Harley Quinn animated series is amaaaaaaaazing.

At first I wasn't sure but the Puck gave it away. Early fourth-wall breaker I guess.

Here I was thinking it was Brian McElhaney and Mikey was giving a nod.

I mean, if Good Omens can have their intro 30 minutes into an episode, Mikey can definitely get away with this.

It's good to see you're still around, Penny Lane.

@@brandonthesteele wait, when did we last talk?

Oh, it's still there?? Thank god, when the title of the movie came up I was very sad. I paused and went to soundcloud just to listen to it. Iconic.

@@peggy7744 haha, it's on Soundcloud? =) Not the same though, the editing along with the music is so good! 😚👌

Keep dreaming, son

Stop calling it birds of prey.

@@beaustoker3466 That's the title of the film? Also typing out "Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)" takes a bit too long.

@sunbro of astora And even though I do understand how the climax isn't everyone's cup of tea, I'll take Harley roller-skating behind a car over another blue laser shooting up into space any day of the week.

It is wonderful. Best film of 2020.

Same. It was literally the last time I went to the theatre.

@@joseaguilar3323 me too!

Same here; like José, it was the last thing I saw before The Dark Times™

@@oldmanramblingatclouds Also me! Glad it was a good one!

I know, right? 2020 was another world-changing event. It was either this or Charlie’s Angels, another movie made by women for women that was really good but didn’t make as much as it should have because of that, that was the last movie I saw in theaters before the suck.

wait NOOOO i was so sure it was BDG i feel so lost.

So far the only two real hits of the DCEU are BoP and Shazam. With Wonder Woman and Aquaman both being servicably enjoyable in different ways (WW was competent and solid with a weak ending, and Aquaman was kinda bad but like in a good way, but that's just kinda Justin Lin's thing). And probably, "The Suicide Squad" will be very good.

@@QuintessentialQs You mean James Wan

Several standalone DC movies that are only loosely connected to the Snyderverse DCEU but done by other directors given free reign (as opposed to Suicide Squad) are actually quite good: "Shazam!" (oldschool adventure film styled family movie) "Wonder Woman" (period piece coloured fish-out-of-water tale) "Birds of Prey" (unreliable narration tall-tale of growing towards responsibilty / bidungsroman parody wrapped into a gratuitous beat-em-up). I love that diversity, which the tonally uniform Snyderverse threatened to destroy before it finally got pulled the plug on. I have no need for a just as monotonously grim-dark shadow universe to the fluffy-bright Marvel serialized-battles-to-infinity soap-opera. From what I've heard, "Wonder Woman 1984" fully embraces the nostalgic campness of a 1980s styled superhero morality play. So at least that's something else again instead of just a rehash of the first Wonder Woman formula. As I said, I am all for honest and unique diversity without restraint. Heck, I even am happy for the Whedon fandom to get an unabashed Marvel clone with DC characters, and for the Snyder fandom that they finally got the full-on, over-the-top, uncompromising, epic-scale, director's cut CGI-slo-mo-battle-fest that they so long desired (although, personally I didn't care much ZSJL). I just find it sad that for the latter it took four mediocre to half-assed expositional movies (corny-kitschie Aquaman with at least more cute little fishies than Arielle, overly serious Man of Steel with its empty Space-Jesus imagery, Batman vs. Superman with more plotholes than collateral damage, and the one butchered by studio head honcho interference: Suicide Squad). If that's the price to pay for something outside the one-size-fits-all Marvel box, give me hit-and-miss DC any time! No offense to Marvel fans, gotta respect their favourite line of products for having tied up any loose ends (...as far as I could still be bothered to keep track of them, at least). In my opinion none of last decade's superhero/supervillain movies can hold a candle to "Joker", though: Such beautiful set-pieces. Such melodramatic tragedy. Such intricate plot development. Such New Hollywood aestheticism. Such multi-layered unreliable narration.

@@elfsieben1450 I actually did like Shazam, I'd forgotten that it was connected to DC. I have very mixed feelings about Wonder Woman. Objectively I can see that it's a great movie, but I harbor a massive amount of hatred for Greek mythology being christianized. It's a big pet peeve for me and the whole time I was watching that movie I couldn't get past it. I haven't seen the new one, I can't decide if I want to.

@@chandravice2267 Where is the Greek mythology being christianized in Wonder Woman? I don't have strong religious sensibilities, so stuff like that tends to escape me, unless Zack Snyder hits me over the head with Space Jesus imagery in Man of Steel (who I heard or read somewhere was rather based on the Jewish Moses myth in his comic book origins).

I recomend to you, birds of prey is my fav movie now, love it

The DCEU did stumble hard at first, but between Aquaman, Shazam, the first Wonder Woman, and Birds of Prey, I felt it was getting on the right track.

I am engaging with this content.

I don't think you are engaging with the content enough. I'm creating conflict in the comments to cause further engagement.

I'm replying to your comment and creating more engagement by doing so

I am engaging with your engagement because this video promotes discussion

I would like to encourage engagement with the content

Try Tank Girl next. I think it was made for people like you. And you might as well see where Birds of Prey came from. Enjoy.

I guess people felt it did the right things for the wrong reasons, and honestly? While I won’t say the movie is great (just because superhero movies don’t do anything for me), I at least feel it does exactly what it sets out to do; I got exactly what I was expecting.

The funhouse fight scene lost me, if this is Quinn having some kind of episode it wasn't conveyed.

Maybe because the writing for Harley is all over the place, it does nothing with most of the Birds and it has pacing issues and terrible action choreography. I am disappointed more than anything else, I am a fan of Harley (especially her recent series) and the female members of the Birds of Prey but this film just like Suicide Squad, squandered an opportunity to make something actually good.

@@nathanthom8176 Oh yes, I agree. While not an awful movie, I agree that it could’ve been SO much better, had it been written better and been more balanced.

Maybe because they made Cain, one of the best fighters in DC universe and a mute with no social skills that was an expert in reading body language, a freaking chubby kid with stupid lines.

"Honestly, I was so excited for "Harley Quinn has to show Gotham's underworld that they need to be scared of her by herself", and I just don't feel like I got that." Yeah that was one of my bigger problems too in fact, I thought the film had Harley bailed out of trouble too many times to take that line seriously like even at the end of the film it was really Cass that kills Black Mask and Huntress kills Zsasz

@@mikemorro140 That's what I like about the movie, that it left you in two minds about the narrator/protagonist and its own story: It made her tall-tale really fun to watch; it also questioned the idea and real-world-viability of an me-singlehandedly-against-the-world attitude. By doing so, "Birds of Prey: The Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn" is also a light-hearted comedy counterpart to "Joker", which pretty much does the same thing by means of a tragedy: Both movies pit the idea of Gotham's City of Evil trying to convert its inhabitants to ruthless killers hellbent to leave their mark against everyone else "because there's nothing else to do" against the arguably more realistic possibility that that's just half of the picture - if not just an excuse made by an immature, unstable character with clouded judgement and a tendency to manipulate their audience. Arthur Fleck succumbs to this nihilistic delusion once his ideals get crushed, abandons any sense of humour, and the city gets worse for it (a downward spiral into even more violence). [Failed emancipation: egotism gone wrong, loss of identity, no healthy replacement, hellbent on trolling/world-burning.] Harleen Quinzel resigns herself to a ceasefire with an imperfect world, decides to take it with a grain of salt, and everything stays as it ever was (imperfect but not apocalyptic). [Some sort of emancipation / functioning coping mechanism: Taking responsibilty for herself and arguably able to relate to others in a meaningful way by taking at least one under her wing, although to highly questionable ends..., developing morally ambiguous trickster personality instead of falling victim to nihilism and hatred.] These films, although very different in tone, would make a great double feature!

I had the same hangup/hiccup upon watching the film. But the more I thought about it the more wholesome I found it to be. Especially after comparing "Birds of Prey" to "Joker". Both films have similar premises: Gotham City being a hellish moloch that is likely to grind down your sense of identity and any last bit of belief in hope for peace-of-mind or peace-with-the-world: A dog eat dog mentality prevails, to a point where it seems to assimilate and corrupt every last citizen to a state of permanent mistrust and warfare. This City's coat of arms could bear the motto: Let the bastards grind you down. Now, Joker is a tragedy; so, the conflict has to be unresolved by the end: Arthur Fleck loses his ideals with nothing but violent chaos and a meaningless (non-jocular Joker-) mask to replace his lost identity. This is a story of becoming broken and losing trust once and for all (in upholding a sense of self and therefore in relation to others). Birds of Prey, on the other hand, is a comedy; therefore, we need some relief from the alone-in-a-purely-hostile world mindset: But as Gotham City knows no rest for the wicked, and wicked you must be to survive there, the only way out is to face the truth that by fighting alone you will never get into a position of a ceasefire or at least a Mexican stand-off. This is a story of regaining a sense of self and therefore also trust in her ability to connect that self to others, a story of mending.

She was Joker’s manic-depressive pixie dream criminal-sidekick-girl. The fact that it became ‘tame’ was because she lost direction since she’d relied on Joker to define her (the whole Harleen->Harley transformation was all for him/by him). So she found herself as a single person, found new friends that weren’t as wild and psychotic, and then kicked ass in her own way. The kind of mania in the beginning wasn’t sustainable or healthy for her. Her becoming somewhat ‘boring’ halfway through was purposeful and informed the story. It wasn’t for you, it was for the people who wanted her to be less of the Suicide Squad sex kitten ‘girlfriend’ character and more crazy and authentic as a character. Personally, I loved the ‘slower’ characters and Gotham changing with Harley was pretty awesome as a story telling device.

@@vysharra Except she ditches those friends at the end of the film

Even Alan Moore later said he regretted crippling Batgirl the way he did. And he's not a man who's apologized for much in the course of his career.

Follow up: Mikey , what was the thesis statement about Birds of Prey in this video? It feels like you spent more time on the build up instead of the actual movie.

In my opinion Harley was all over the place narratively speaking as she has no direction till the last 15 minutes of the film and comes across as not particularly likeable. I however really liked Huntress and Black Canary and like you I would like to see them more, whilst I really am not bothered with this version of Harley (the Harley animated show is my fix now for the character now).

Obviously a the best decision.

This is enough for me to dodge this film like the plague.

@@rafjord1721 Too bad, so sad, don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out

same

Beautiful that we can disagree without devolving into insults.

@stroncal nobody here is trying to argue man please drop it

LMBO, I love this comment. Thanks for thr positivity!

Yup! Same here. Love mikey enough to watch a video about a movie I still don't like.