'Harley Quinn' Episode 7 sees Queen of Fables escape as 'The Line' draws distinction between Harley and Gotham’s villains
Spoilers ahead for ‘Harley Quinn’ Episode 7
Also, come to think of it, trigger alert for the violent and horrific deaths and reimaginings of beloved fairy tale characters. Never has a show left its audience so grateful that the Three Blind Mice remained offscreen.
Humpty Dumpty has fallen off that wall and been broken apart thousands of times, but his breaking this episode may just be the most horrendous of all time. After her decades-long imprisonment inside a book on U.S. Tax Code, the Queen of Fables (Wanda Sykes) has been released, and she is not messing around.
After 6 episodes, one might imagine it’s not easy for a show like ‘Harley Quinn’ to be able to shock audiences with its violence, especially when you consider that the series’ opening scene featured the Joker (Alan Tudyk) wearing the bloodied remains of someone else’s face. ‘The Line’ manages to take things up a notch to such a successful degree you almost wish they hadn’t.
It’s made worse by the fact that nearly all the violence in this episode happens either to, or by, classic fairy tale characters like Humpty Dumpty, a militant mercenary mouse from Cinderella, and the Big Bad Wolf - the last of whom is definitely the most intimidating a character the show’s ever gotten.
It’s all in service to the episode's central theme - the idea that, while Harley Quinn (Kaley Cuoco) is a villain, there are lines she won’t cross. This, more than anything else, might be her biggest barrier on the road to joining the Legion of Doom.
As Poison Ivy (Lake Bell) put it best, Harley Quinn may be a baddie, but she’s not a bad person. The Queen of Fables, on the other hand, most certainly is.
After a judge orders that turning someone into a sentient book on U.S. Tax Code counts as “cruel and unusual punishment” (court cases in the DC Universe must be insane), the Queen of Fables is returned to her former glory - only to be taken into custody immediately, to serve the rest of her sentence as a human being.
Poison Ivy is of the opinion no one deserves to be locked up more than the Queen of Fables, but Harley’s not having it - she and the Queen have developed a friendship by this point, and Harley breaks the Queen out.
Harley quickly learns that the Queen’s methods are far too extreme, even for someone who’s worked at the Joker’s side for years. It’s too bad, because the Queen of Fables serves as a great mentor for Harley, an old hand at villainy who knows how to use the tropes of villainy in her favor - such as ensuring that if you’re murdering an entire family at a picnic, you end the bloodline.
A seemingly small act of mercy brings us Praxis (Phil LaMarr) who is a gloriously over-the-top version of a hero on a mission of vengeance. Phil LaMarr gives the role his all, squeezing every last drop of pathos from the character whose end comes far too quick.
With Harley Quinn’s rise to villainy, ‘The Line’ highlights an important distinction between Harley Quinn and other Gotham villains as she takes her place among them. The line is what keeps Harley in sympathetic character territory, the line that gives us a reason to root for the character. It’s a line that’s a lot farther into villainy than say, Batman’s line, but hey, that’s what makes her fun.
