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Harley Quinn S3 E7: Another Sharkley Adventure
727 Plays3 years ago
Andrew and J Scotty offer their thoughts and takeaways from this latest,King Shark focused episode of Harley Quinn Season 3, now airing on HBO Max.
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Transcript
Exploring Mississippi's Outdoor Adventures
00:00:00
Speaker
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Harley Quinn S3E7 Introduction
00:00:30
Speaker
On another exciting edition of Animation Deliberation, we continue our coverage of Harley Quinn season three with episode seven, Another Sharkly Adventure. We will dive right into that after some ads we have no say over whatsoever. You're invited to explore cypress swamps and magical gardens and float along the rushing waters of an old-fashioned swimming hole. Plan your journey at visitmississippi.org slash outdooradventure. Mississippi. Wanderers welcome.
00:01:11
Speaker
Sing along if you know the words. One, two, three, it's time for animation deliberation. A conversation and a celebration of our favorite action animated series. Yeah. Yeah. Welcome back, J. Scottie. Thank you. Thank you. It's good to be back. And welcome back to the listeners to Animation Deliberation, the podcast where we take action animation and cartoons seriously, but not too seriously.
00:01:40
Speaker
As Andrew just introduced me, I'm J. Scottie St. Clair, and I am joined by...
00:01:45
Speaker
And as Jay Scottie introduced me, I am Andrew Rogers. Right. If you couldn't tell, it's been a couple of weeks since I've been here. So I'm shaking off the rust a little bit and some of the dust. But it is really good to
Jay Scottie's COVID Experience
00:01:59
Speaker
be back. I'm excited to be here. Yeah, no, we definitely missed you. And it wasn't quite the same, but Harley Quinn is Harley Quinn. So the show must go on week to week. But yeah, what did you get up to in these couple of weeks that you were gone?
00:02:15
Speaker
Yeah, so I will share with the listeners just kind of as a PSA, after two and a half years of dodging COVID, I did finally contract COVID and it's still out there. So, you know, be careful.
00:02:30
Speaker
If you're in a large, crowded space, maybe try to keep some social distancing in mind. If you have any symptoms whatsoever, I encourage you to keep wearing the mask and just keep your head on a swivel, be safe. Obviously, it's up to us as individuals, but it's still a thing. I just want to be fully transparent and have a note of caution there.
00:02:54
Speaker
As difficult as it was to have to sit back and not do anything for a little while, it did afford me the opportunity to watch some stuff, which is always a little bit of a nice reprieve.
Watching 'Disenchantment' on Netflix
00:03:05
Speaker
On the animation side of things, I checked out Disenchantment on Netflix, which is from Matt Groening.
00:03:13
Speaker
Uh, I had finished up my, yeah, I had finished up my watch of rewatch of Futurama on Hulu in preparation for the new season that we're going to get next year. And I'd never watched disenchantment. So I finally took the plunge there. I watched all four seasons and had a really good time with it.
00:03:32
Speaker
It's different from any of his other outings and the fact that it feels like there is much more of an in-game insight. And I don't know how close I am to that after finishing up Season 4, but it's just a great parody of all things kind of fantasy and steampunk and that whole kind of Dungeons and Dragons role-playing kind of scenario. So if you haven't checked it out and you're a fan of those other properties like the Simpsons or Futurama,
00:03:59
Speaker
Definitely recommend that. Okay. That's a lot of fun. Yeah, yeah. Have you watched it at all? I watched the first two seasons, I believe. Okay. And then after that, Netflix just kind of got away from me in all capacities. It wasn't like I ended because I wasn't enjoying it. I was enjoying the crap out of it. It just, the next season came and I was not keeping up with the times at that point.
00:04:21
Speaker
Yeah, it was a lot of fun what I saw those totally right. Okay, cool. Cool. Yeah, I totally understand that there was a couple of years that I went without like watching Netflix at all. So now that I have it again, there's definitely a lot of ketchup I'm doing. But I did spend a little bit of time with HBO Max as well, outside of Harley Quinn.
Anime Talk: 'Tokyo Revengers' & 'Assassination Classroom'
00:04:40
Speaker
There is an anime I know, Zuhair and Andrew are typically the
00:04:44
Speaker
Anime aficionados where I'm a little bit more of a casual filthy casual I'll say But there was there's a series called Tokyo revengers. Have you watched that one at all? I have not had a chance to watch that yet, but I have a good thing So please spout it off as much as you like
00:05:00
Speaker
Yeah, I'm probably about a quarter of the way into the season so far, but it's a lot of fun. It's kind of a mashup of genres. It has some sci-fi elements there with some time travel, but then it's also kind of a coming of age story. It's kind of this disaffected 26-year-old guy who's not really happy with where his life's gone, and he kind of gets the opportunity
00:05:23
Speaker
to go back and re-experience his middle school and early high school experiences. And just kind of reminds me of Akira in some ways with the biker gangs that kind of permeate the culture there in Japan. But it's a lot of fun, excellent animation, great action, a lot of drama, and the vocal performances are really on point. So I definitely recommend checking that one out, Tokyo Revengers. That's super cool.
00:05:51
Speaker
Yeah, I I mentioned last week I have been watching assassination classroom and I am up to the I believe it's the show finale. It's only two seasons long and there's like two episodes that I have left and it is just
00:06:08
Speaker
it is an awesome show all the way around like the first season was very okay this is kind of a fun high school anime with very action heavy tropes as you could guess from the name assassination classroom and then the second season has just been one of those okay we're gonna flip it on its head it's a totally different genre like
00:06:28
Speaker
almost my hero in nature, the direction that it took in the second season as for the like how intense they're going with things. So it's been a lot of fun. It's weirdly emotional for a show that like pretends that it's not trying to be emotional as well. Okay, so I have been enjoying the crap out of that. And probably will be able to say about the finale after tonight when I inevitably watch it. Okay.
Playing 'Superliminal' on Xbox Game Pass
00:06:52
Speaker
So yeah, that's been my anime and I've been gaming a little bit as well. Nice. I got Xbox Game Pass and then my girlfriend and I sat down. She doesn't like video games, but one night she was like, hey, you want to play some games? I was like, yes, what can we do? Let's, you know, do all this. And we played a game called Super Liminal, which is the most bizarre puzzle game I've ever played. It's like, OK, portal meets. I don't even know what to say that it meets because it's very self-aware, but very much
00:07:22
Speaker
like gets in your head because it's a play on supernatural and subliminal. That's why it's called superliminal. So it was just a ton of fun. If you're looking for some way to kill a couple hours, because I think we beat it in like two nights of playing for like two or three hours just together on the couch. So it's not a super long game, but it was definitely something I was like, this is fun. And I think I'm going to talk about it because the graphics were very homey. It felt like a couch game. So I was like, yeah, this is animation adjacent.
00:07:51
Speaker
Yeah, I always appreciate how you're able to kind of loop in video games under the caveat of animation there. So I know Gamescom 2022 just happened this last weekend and week. So I know there was a Gotham... I think it's still going on. Okay. I didn't know for sure, but I know there was a Gotham Knights trailer that dropped. So I thought of you, of course. Yeah. But yeah, Superliminal sounds super cool. I'm going to have to check that out, especially with the, you
00:08:16
Speaker
providing the adage there that your girlfriend is more of a casual gamer and she was able to just pick it up with you and enjoy it all the way through. I was going to ask though, you mentioned Xbox Game Pass. Are you playing on Xbox or are you playing on PC through Game Pass?
00:08:30
Speaker
I am playing on Xbox because my lovely laptop that does all of our hardcore podcasting here can run any game pre 2016 and then at that point it's just a hard cut off where it can't do anything beyond that point. Gotcha. Everything else is on Xbox. Well, that's good to know because I'm a fellow Xbox gamer. I'm taking a little bit of a break from gaming right now, but when I get back into it, I'll have to keep you in mind. We'll have to exchange gamer tags because we are few and far between. I feel like everybody
00:08:58
Speaker
is a PlayStation owner. I don't have extreme brand loyalty or whatever, but I've had Xbox since the original Xbox, so it's kind of like I don't want to lose my gamerscore. I don't want to lose all the movies and TV I bought through Xbox. That's exactly it. Yes. The last little thing I'll touch on that you brought up is I did hear you talk about assassination classroom last week.
00:09:23
Speaker
I checked it out for the same reasons, kind of feeling a little bit of a hole after finishing My Hero Academia. And I can't remember why I fell off, but I assume you're watching the sub rather than the dub, right? Correct. Yes, I'm watching the sub. Okay. I think that might have been the factor there.
00:09:49
Speaker
kind of lean towards dubs if they're available. But I think this is one instance where the dub just was not up to snuff. So maybe I'll have to go back and check out the sub. But then the other thing I have to ask you, you mentioned you finished the first season. Does the opening theme song ever change? Because that was just one thing that I found incredibly cheesy was the opening theme song with the kids jumping in the classroom for whatever reason. It always made me nervous.
00:10:13
Speaker
I know it does the second season. I can't remember if it also does halfway through or not, but this is one I'm going to call her out a little bit. My girlfriend hates intros and outros, so whenever we're watching anything together, we just skip through them entirely. Interesting. I have her watch the first one or rather I let her or I have her let me watch the first one because I always want to at least get some enjoyment out of it, and
Subtitled vs. Dubbed Anime: Preferences?
00:10:37
Speaker
then after that, we're always skipping through it.
00:10:39
Speaker
I can't remember when that change was because it happens at some point, but it does change. And that's the one thing that I will say. And then we'll switch gears to Harley Quinn. I never want to claim the sub versus dub superiority or anything like that. But the main reason that I think.
00:10:55
Speaker
sub is a lot of times better comes down to high school anime and different things like that a lot of times when they try and give them the very childish voices in English it just yeah it makes it seem too kitty and goes to the whole reason so many adults don't like animated things
00:11:12
Speaker
Whereas when it there are some of the high schoolers in those anime when you do it in Japanese That is a full-grown 40 year old man giving his roughest possible voice And you don't care because he's the bully and like it just kind of fits in So that is a little bit of the reason that it I like the sub a little bit better when it comes to the younger shoes when it comes to things that are you know? Older I don't really mind
00:11:35
Speaker
But like a lot of the other stuff, it helps a little bit get rid of the nuance of, oh, right. These are middle school kids. Sure. Sure. Totally valid. Totally valid. I know most people that are hardcore anime fans do prefer the sub over the dub. So duly noted, I'm trying. And like I said, not even a thing that I'm trying to call anyone out. It's just when you're watching some of the things where it's kids is where I think the gaps lay a lot of the time. Yeah.
00:12:02
Speaker
Totally valid, totally valid. Well, we are about 10 minutes, 11 minutes into the episode, so we should pivot to Harley Quinn. That is the title of the episode here, but I will make mention, we did have some feedback and we'll bring up some other things in the world of animation towards the end of the episode here. But let's go ahead and dive right into Harley Quinn. Again, this is season three, episode seven, titled Another Sharkly Adventure.
00:12:27
Speaker
So I've got the episode description here and then we can go into our reactions, thoughts, and all the little things we noticed. While Ivy recovers from the side effects of using the green, Harley volunteers to kidnap Bruce to find out where he is keeping Frank. She sneaks into a charity gala Bruce is hosting at Wayne Tower, but Batgirl tries to stop her despite genuinely wanting to be friends with Harley. After a short fight, they both get caught by the Mad Hatter who wants to kill them, especially Batgirl for interfering with his plans to mind control Gotham's citizens.
00:12:57
Speaker
Harley talks her way out of captivity but feels guilty for leaving Batgirl behind and eventually goes back to save her, killing Mad Hatter in the process. Meanwhile, King Shark returns home for his father's funeral only to learn that his newly crowned brother Kamea plans to sell the Shark Kingdom to their archenemy ocean master. After failing to change his mind, they get into a violent fight ending with King Shark unintentionally killing his brother. Back at Catwoman's apartment, Ivy fully recovers and gains new plant-based powers while Harley returns with the kidnapped Bruce.
00:13:27
Speaker
Okay, so with that out of the way, Andrew, what did you think about this latest installment of Harley Quinn? It was weird. I didn't know quite where it was going at any given point. And then like this Batgirl and Harley interaction, I kind of forgot they were friends. So I was like, wait, why are they texting each other? What's going on here? I was just
00:13:49
Speaker
all sorts of confused going into this episode, and then throughout, you had some fun action, and I definitely got my enjoyment out of that, but it was just, it was a lot of back and forth, like I said. Yeah, it's interesting. I wasn't here last week to share my thoughts, but I did listen to a lot of what you and Zuhair brought up about episode six, and that was pretty much entirely focused on The Joker with, I think, Ivy and Harley maybe showing up for a scene.
00:14:17
Speaker
So when I saw the title, I thought maybe we'd be going in the same direction, just focusing on King Shark, but I'm kind of glad it didn't go in that direction. It's nice because a lot of these characters that we've kind of grown attached to like Clayface, like King Shark, and it feels like King Shark, especially for this season, has kind of been relegated to a background role.
00:14:37
Speaker
So I was pretty happy for him to be able to go off and do his own kind of adventure and to also get some traction and some progress with the story that Harley's focusing on in terms of knowing that Bruce was the one that kidnapped Frank. Other than that, they treated Batman like a total punching bag this episode, and I am totally okay with it. That's one of the things I love about this show.
00:15:02
Speaker
No one is safe from being treated absolutely irreverently and having the gas kind of taken out of their wings or their flight, what have you. And I thought there were some fun references too. So I had fun with it and the animation actually surprisingly
00:15:21
Speaker
uh, impressed me, especially the underwater stuff. Like one of the other DC shows we've, we've tackled here, um, with a lot of love is young justice. But in some ways I, I, even though the animation here is a little more simplistic, I did find myself being really impressed with not only the, the blood effects in the water when King shark and his brother were having their fight, but also, uh, this is something I just recently learned about. And I know you probably
00:15:49
Speaker
I saw this as well, Andrew, being a fan of Corridor Digital. They recently did a video on caustics, the patterns of light that you'll see when things take place underwater. So I appreciated all the caustics that were taking place. They weren't super complex, but having those be an element definitely sold me on the underwater environment.
00:16:09
Speaker
Yeah, that's exactly what I was going to say. You beat me to the punch. Their lighting, I think, was the part that really made that portion of the episode stand out so much more than the rest of the episode because you just had amazing water features going on in the background and this attention to detail of, oh, let's do lighting. Let's make it so that when they punch each other, the blood floats up. It was a lot of attention to detail that
00:16:33
Speaker
I didn't know that they needed, but I was really happy that they did decide to put all that in. So it was really good. And then the only other part of the animation that surprised me was later on more blood when the blood splattered the camera. That also was a moment of like, oh, OK, we're animating it this way. That was it was it was a touch that they've done before, but always surprises me a little bit when they do.
00:16:56
Speaker
Okay. Was that during the King Shark fight or was that when Harley killed Mad Hatter? That was when Harley killed Mad Hatter, which also she killed Mad Hatter. We're just going to gloss over that, that she killed Mad Hatter. That girl wasn't going to like chastise her or do anything. It was just like, oh, he's dead now.
00:17:17
Speaker
Well, he was a perv, so I guess they'll let it go. What is her kill count up to at this point? She's killed some major players in the Gotham crime scene at this point. Is it four?
00:17:32
Speaker
Because there's Penguin. Yes. Then she is technically responsible for Freeze's death. Correct. And then was it Madame Storybook? What was her name? It wasn't that what I just said was definitely wrong.
00:17:51
Speaker
Queen of what was it queen of fables queen of fables queen of fables did she kill her did she get away. I feel like that was the whole and the bloodline thing in the last season.
00:18:03
Speaker
Yeah, I wish I could recall, but I can't recall. Assuming those are the only major players she killed her, kill counts at least at four, and then there's plenty of goons and other things, and the guy she hit with the cancer ray in the first season. She's got a lot on her conscious at this point. Yeah, yeah. With that in mind, it was nice to get the
00:18:27
Speaker
reflection in the elevator, speaking of her conscious.
Harley Quinn's Psychological Portrayal
00:18:30
Speaker
I feel like it's been a while since we've seen that visual representation of the Harleen Quinzel that still exist inside of her and has this like PhD in psychology and psychotherapy and actually can address some of these
00:18:45
Speaker
I mean, the show is not, you know, doing a deep dive onto any of these issues, but just in the span of this episode, like clinginess was brought up codependency, childhood trauma and abandonment issues. So it's it's nice that they respect the character enough to acknowledge that she has a working knowledge of of these issues. I like that elevator scene a lot. You know, the elevator scene, it was interesting in it. It goes back to majority of the characters that they have shown in these shows.
00:19:16
Speaker
They are a love letter. They have done their homework. They understand their background. They remember, oh, yeah, she is a psychologist. She would probably have some sort of, you know, mental issue with what is actually going on from an understanding. And there are so many interesting comics when it come down to it that I'm not going to get into when they start to go into her psychology background that it just becomes super interesting.
00:19:39
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And it really does kind of feel like the episode, like sometimes we have A, B and C storylines, but it really feels like there was just kind of the A and B storyline with Harley and King Shark, you know, giving it the fitting title of
King Shark's Character Arc
00:19:58
Speaker
another sharkly
00:20:00
Speaker
Adventure there where I appreciated the animation and the action on the side of King shark and just kind of getting to spend some time with him and He's always been a little bit more of like a sentimental and not really He his intentions never seem that bad. He's just kind of a light-hearted
00:20:17
Speaker
He's kind of a lover, not a fighter, but once you unleash that shark, he's pretty devastating. But I found myself really appreciating a lot of the references that occurred with Harley's storyline.
00:20:32
Speaker
The Mad Hatter, which I have to bring up. The Mad Hatter was voiced by Griffin Newman, who also voiced Orko, which was a show that we covered at least in part on the show, Masters of the Universe Revelation. And then he was also in the live action, the second attempt at a live action adaptation of The Tick on Amazon Prime, which had a couple of seasons. He was Arthur in that show. So I thought he did an excellent job tapping into the kind of creepy and kooky
00:21:03
Speaker
machinations of a guy like Matt Hatter. He's kind of hit or miss for me in terms of Batman villains. He's kind of like just ripped from the pages of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland, but there have been some cool adaptations that I appreciate. Arkham City, I think, had one of the better adaptations.
00:21:22
Speaker
Yeah, and that was going to be my little asterisk on the comment I made earlier of most of the characters, they are a love letter to who they are in the comics. I feel like Hatter was just kind of there. And then we killed him like they didn't really develop the interesting side of, okay, what's wrong with you? Why do you only care about this? Like,
00:21:42
Speaker
He could have called the girls Alice like he does in the comics. He could have done the rhyme scheme like in comics. He just doesn't stop rhyming the whole time. And I wanted to see that and have Harley get annoyed and be like, can you just shut up for five seconds? Like, OK. And that's my only from a comic fan background, my only nitpick of what Matt Hatterbrough. I do agree. His voice performance was fantastic for making this trying not to be creepy, but slightly off putting character, you know, to life.
00:22:11
Speaker
But there just wasn't enough of the Lewis Carroll for me personally to be like, oh, I love the character. It was he did a good job. I'm never going to fault the voice actor for a writing decision such as that. Certainly, certainly not now.
00:22:24
Speaker
Outside of the Mad Hatter, one of the references that I kind of like, I'm not 100% sure if this was a reference, but I kind of think it was there if you wanted it. When we first kind of got introduced to the storyline with the cow news boy boy hat, and Bruce is kind of sitting there wallowing in his self pity and his depression.
00:22:46
Speaker
Batgirl offers to give him a hug. She's like that always makes me feel better. Oh, we don't do that. And it's a really awkward moment I wondered like this season in particular has had a ton of references to the killing joke and there was that animated adaptation I was wondering are they playing at that the most awkward part of that that adaptation with their relationship
Batgirl & Bruce Wayne: An Awkward Moment?
00:23:05
Speaker
there? Is that why they were just kind of? Moved away from it very quickly. I don't know I might be you know
00:23:12
Speaker
extrapolating things that aren't there, but I kind of think it was there if you were looking for it and wanted it. I can't see it. We ignore that storyline. For the most part, it didn't happen. It's fine. Because the whole time you were saying there were references, I was like, what were the references this week? I'm usually pretty good at picking up on them. But now that you've said that, it's just staring me in the face. Yeah, that was almost 100% why we were going
00:23:40
Speaker
somewhere in that realm. Sure. I guess a ton of references might be a little bit of a stretch now that I'm kind of looking at my notes. I guess this is more of a cameo, but I did think it was worth mentioning that Ratcatcher made his debut.
00:23:56
Speaker
Uh, again, not a love letter to the character, but it's good to see him. An Aquaman level reference at this point. For sure. For sure. I mean, we also had shark Jesus. I mean, that could, that is a cameo in and of itself, I suppose. Yeah. Yeah.
00:24:15
Speaker
And then, yeah, thinking about Shark Jesus and that whole scene in the underwater chapel there. It was nice to see some background characters, but I wish they would have thrown them a line or two like you had the little shrimp guy that was clearly based on Sebastian from The Little Mermaid.
00:24:34
Speaker
In the past, I remember he was always a funny character, but he didn't really get a line this time around. And then they kept cutting to not always, I guess, his arranged wife or his wife in the arranged marriage there. And she kept she kind of like her face lit up when she thought he was going to take the scepter and be king. But I kind of forgot who she was until I did some research and that was Tabitha. So I mean, there was an opportunity to throw her a line there, too. But I understand why, you know, they kind of had to move the story.
00:25:03
Speaker
at a brisk pace.
00:25:05
Speaker
Yeah. And I mean, it just really needed to get to the point of, OK, this conflict, because when that first that scene first started, I was like, where are we going with this? The show always has a reason in mind. And then once we got to, OK, he doesn't want to be king, he's going to sell it off to the land developer that we just decided is going to be Ocean Master in this story because it makes sense that way. Ocean Master was a very fun caricature of, you know, hardcore comic character that we're so used to.
00:25:35
Speaker
Yeah, I enjoyed him and I liked the fact that he didn't end up being like the big bad. He was just kind of a comedic foil there for a brotherly rivalry, brother rivalry rather.
00:25:47
Speaker
Yeah, I will say his style in this show was pretty great. They had him rocking that full armored outfit, the quill hiding inside of his helmet. That was like the specialized metal. He was really rocking out fully. And then to have the joke of him have male pattern baldness underneath the helmet when you take it off was just that extra level of like man's got style. But that doesn't mean he's not trying to compensate for something.
00:26:16
Speaker
Fair enough. And he's not getting that helmet back any time soon. He doesn't want it back. So he's going to have to.
00:26:24
Speaker
You know, live with that. I was going to say, I'm kind of glad that they use the helmet, though, because I thought they were foreshadowing that he was going to eat his brother when he mentioned that he ate all of his other siblings prior. Right. Yeah. I was like, oh, is this just going to end with Nanue taking a big chomp out of him? Right. Right on the head. I was I was a little happy that we didn't go that route, but I thought that was the foreshadowing they were stretching for as they gave us the
00:26:54
Speaker
Apologies. Gave us the not so subtle reminder of what happened to his siblings in the past. Yeah, what do you say? You know I have hypoglycemia. I black out. It's like all 13 times. Look, it happens. You get hungry, you get a little hangry. Next thing you know, it's a little shark tartare. It's fine. Yeah. Get that shark a Snickers rather.
00:27:18
Speaker
Now I want a fake Snickers commercial with King Shark in it. You're not you when you're hungry. Yes. Yes. That'd be great. That'd be great.
00:27:27
Speaker
Another standout line for me. It was a little bit of lowbrow humor, but that's to be expected with this show, I think, at this point. The whole talking about how Kamea was the one who stayed behind and took care of their dad, especially the diaper stuff. When they finally come back to that, it's like, if you have to wear a diaper down here, because we shit in the water, you know things are messed up then. I don't even want to think about what that entails.
00:27:55
Speaker
Yeah, that no that shark was ready to become a pelt as he did. That was it was it was his time to go if he had to have a diaper on. Mm hmm. Another line that kind of stood out to me that was going back to the Mad Hatter scene is right before Harley abandons Batgirl before she comes back. He's talking about how they they seem like they would be friends and she's like, No, I'm nothing like her. I'm like you.
00:28:25
Speaker
in the broadest of senses. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They weren't really like laugh out loud lines, but there were a lot of good, clever lines just sprinkled in there. Like there was the point when they were talking about kidnapping Bruce Wayne and she was like, what's he going to do? He's not Superman. Like, yes.
00:28:48
Speaker
Yeah, of course, he's not Superman. He's, you know, Batman. And I'm really curious how that is going to resolve itself when Bruce wakes up and has to fight back without seeming like Batman. That's probably going to play out in some interesting capacity, especially being at Selena's house while Selena knows that he's Batman.
00:29:07
Speaker
But yeah, there was that line. And then there was another line where Harley was going through what she had in her bag. She was like, oh, yeah, I got duct tape. I got sanitizer. I got wire cutters. I got a people cutter. I was like, is that a knife? You just have a knife in her bag and she just called it a people cutter. Nice. I didn't catch that one. That's good. No, that was just one of those moments. But yeah, like I said, they were sprinkled really.
00:29:31
Speaker
well in there, but they weren't laugh out loud enough to like actually get me going. But I took note of wow, this is they're trying their hardest to get this out there. Yeah, yeah.
00:29:43
Speaker
I think that's pretty much what I have for the most part, as far as the episode goes. But I did want to pick your brain a little bit about where we're going from here, because this was episode seven.
Harley & Ivy's Evolving Storylines
00:29:53
Speaker
We know we've got 10 episodes this season, so we're kind of getting close to that endgame there. Now, with Ivy, she was kind of relegated to an incapacitated role for most of the episode. And I found myself wondering, is she actually going back into the green? Because it looked like she was with her eyes glowing green.
00:30:12
Speaker
they do. But we saw the opposite of what was happening in the beginning of the episode where the plants were kind of withering and dying. Now the plants are kind of going full on out of control to where Catwoman's whipping at them with her whip. She's trying to vacuum around them. And by the end of the episode, Ivy seems like she's fully recuperated, but she might be even more powerful than ever. So when you brought up, you know, Bruce kind of having to fight his way out, that was definitely something I considered there. He might have to be rescued.
00:30:41
Speaker
by the Bat family and this might put Bat, Girl, and Harley directly against each other again after having made a little bit more of a friendship here. What do you think?
00:30:52
Speaker
Yeah, I think we brought Nightwing and Batgirl into this season for a reason, and having them have to rescue, and we can't forget about the macaroni as well. Having all of them have to come and rescue Bruce would make sense. I could also see some weird, we're layering in, okay, do they get back together? Is this a weird bat and a cat situation where Selena has to save him instead of choosing? There was also almost a little bit of imagery
00:31:22
Speaker
of her dress that the flowers were making almost felt like a wedding dress. So I don't know if we're going into her and Harley are going to have second marriage or she's going to marry to the green and be gone from Harley.
00:31:37
Speaker
I feel like there may be some conflict coming as for you know Ivy going back into the green or becoming too powerful or something along those lines or for all we know Frank could just be taking over from the shadows like he's still out there being all powerful so it's left enough questions that I don't really know what the answer is and you know we love speculation that is not necessarily correct because
00:32:04
Speaker
Of course. That means we're in a good place of, okay, what's next? What else can we see? And this was the first episode that it left me wanting more because I felt like not enough happened. So it was just like, oh, wait, we're dropping Bruce on the floor? Where's the next thing? I need to know what happens to Bruce because Bruce doesn't drink. Why was he drunk? What happens now that he wakes up and he's drunk in someone else's house? This is going to be interesting. How do we play this?
00:32:29
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, definitely. I like what you brought up about Catwoman. It'll be interesting to see if that pushes the envelope on their relationship or lack of one there. But there's still a lot of other cards still left on the table, like the fact that
00:32:43
Speaker
Joker is the mayor. We saw that in the last episode. Batman hasn't really had an opportunity to react to that. I'm surprised they didn't touch on that at all. I'd be sorely disappointed if Bane does not at least factor in at least a little bit in these last few episodes. He still has not gotten that spaghetti or that pasta maker back.
00:33:03
Speaker
Plus he's got his therapy going on. What if Harley becomes his therapist? I don't see it happening, but just- I don't either. Yeah. I guess he's got one already. We were negative a couple podcasts ago and I'm trying to be very positive, but this is going to be...
00:33:19
Speaker
a little negative. It feels like they're they have a through line that they want to get to of Harley wants to terraform. She is powered up Frank and okay, something bad is going to happen here at the end of the season. But they put in a lot of interesting threads.
00:33:36
Speaker
that I don't feel like they're going to pull on. Like the whole Clayface taking over Billy Bob Thornton in the movie has never gone any further than that one episode. Like you said, Bane and the Pasta Maker was set up to be such a funny recurring joke that has then been left behind and we haven't seen Bane. That Joker episode might be a one-off. What happens to Gordon now that he can't be a cop anymore. They're doing these little side bits
00:34:03
Speaker
that I feel like in previous seasons, all of their side bits were coming to a head like I would have expected to see the Mad Hatter's big weird hats in like the first four episodes and be like, why are people in the background wearing big hats? What is going on? And then have this episode be, oh, it was Mad Hatter the whole time. I feel like they were almost rushed this season. I don't know if that's actually the case.
00:34:27
Speaker
But they're doing a really good job with that main through line. I think that through line is great. It's just the side stories I want more of. They're not doing a bad job with these side stories, but like, let it give me all of it. No, I think you bring up some valid criticisms. And I don't think you're being too negative at all. And I mean, that's, that's a whole part of the show as much as we love to celebrate these shows.
00:34:50
Speaker
It is a deliberation. We have to bring up, you know, some of the things that might not resonate with us as well. And I do agree with you. I really hope, excuse me. I hope that a lot of these threads don't just get dropped or maybe they're saving them for a four season, but I have to imagine that one of the reasons we're kind of feeling that rush is because this season's only 10 episodes, excuse me, 10 episodes. Whereas I think the previous two seasons were at least 12 episodes each.
00:35:18
Speaker
I forgot about that. Let's take a look here. Yeah, the first one was 13. The second one was 13 as well. So if we are confirmed as actually only getting 10, that would make a little sense that they had to, you know, leave some stuff on the cutting room floor. Sure, sure. Yeah.
00:35:40
Speaker
And maybe we'll get an extra three episodes that we just don't know about yet. That'd be a nice surprise. They could pull a Sandman on us. I mean, I would like some pleasant surprises out of Warner Brothers because all of the news that I've been reading lately has not been pleasant. So let's give us something. Let's give us something nice here, folks. Yeah, yeah, for sure. But I'm still having a ton of fun with the series. It's a nice little
00:36:03
Speaker
step away from the DC universe that as much as I love sometimes can take itself a little too seriously. Joker said it back in the dark night, why so serious? It doesn't always have to be so dark and serious. But yeah, I think that's everything I've got to say about this episode. Did you have anything else you want to highlight about episode seven here, another Sharkly adventure? No, like I said, I'm very curious to see what's going to happen next week. Awesome, awesome.
00:36:32
Speaker
Well, while we're winding down here, as I mentioned before,
00:36:37
Speaker
did our deep dive into the Harley Quinn coverage here. We had a piece of feedback. Did you want to bring that up for us, Andrew? Yes, I did. Like we said, it's not Harley Quinn related, but it is She-Hulk related. So Marvel has given us another gift, as it were. And this is a feedback email from Andre Sparks, who wanted to email us and just said, hey, guys, just wanted to say between Ms. Marvel and She-Hulk, they are killing it with their animation slash art during their live action shows.
00:37:05
Speaker
And he sent us a awesome picture that I'm gonna put up on our Instagram story. I'll make sure that it's up when this podcast goes live. And it's just a culmination of all of the art from the She-Hulk credits episode one. And I really can't agree more. I wanna say the Mandalorians started this idea on the Disney Plus shows when they had the concept art in the credits, which I absolutely adored. And since then, they've just had so much fun with it. But the She-Hulk ones,
00:37:34
Speaker
I love because I kind of forgot that courtroom art was still a thing. Like I know it used to be a thing back when cameras weren't allowed in the courtroom, but then they had that sprinkle Easter egg in that first episode where we saw someone on a Cintiq doing the courtroom art right at the end. So then to have the credits in that courtroom style, which is honestly a just beautiful style to do anything in because they're capturing such raw moments in the courtroom.
00:38:03
Speaker
Sure. And then, you know, to have it as a Marvel show, I couldn't agree more. They they're doing just this love letter to the artists that are definitely working very hard behind the scenes. Oh, certainly, certainly. Yeah. And I'm glad you brought up the Mandalorian because that's immediately where my mind went as well. It's it's definitely the most similar in terms of all these Marvel shows that we've gotten and I've enjoyed them all. But
00:38:26
Speaker
I agree in terms of like the artwork here. I really, I've not skipped the ending credits once for She-Hulk so far. And I believe he brought up Ms. Marvel as well. And I really liked the artwork for Ms. Marvel as well, especially in that first episode. And I haven't really had a chance to talk about Ms. Marvel too much, but I will say it's my favorite, if not my second favorite of the Disney Plus series so far.
00:38:51
Speaker
And if I had any criticism whatsoever, I kind of wish they would have continued that through line of her imagination and her YouTube channel and her envisioning her heroes kind of like dancing along the landscapes and whatnot. I love that so much in the first season. It would have been cool if that persisted through the show a little bit longer. And maybe there's an opportunity to incorporate it in the Marvels when she shows up in that.
00:39:15
Speaker
So I have some very specific thoughts on this. And is a feedback email that I'm planning to write to the MCU cast at some point when they're done with She-Hulk and they're doing roundups. And it comes down to, and we're going to talk Marvel here, ladies and gentlemen, so buckle up. He comes down to the direction of the shows. And when I say direction, I mean who is in the director's chair.
00:39:36
Speaker
Sure, I don't necessarily think that any of these Marvel directors are doing bad. But I feel like the fact that they're bringing in multiple directors to direct what is essentially a six episode movie leaves us with those weird moments of why did this episode completely change in tone compared to the others like it has happened just about in all of the shows. At some point, there's an episode that doesn't quite feel like it fits.
00:40:03
Speaker
And Miss Marvel is the easiest one to point out of the first and the last episode are both directed by the same person because I wasn't prepared for this rant. I don't have that director in front of me, so I apologize. This is something I just want to hear the MCU cast thoughts on of.
00:40:20
Speaker
do we think they should be locking down one director for a six episode contract because Miss Marvel, I think would have been amazing to have that one in six episode energy through the whole thing where it's her imagination and the planning and the bouncing around because those two episodes are
00:40:36
Speaker
hands down my favorite and I think a lot of people's favorite of that show. Yeah. So I just wonder should they be doing something a little different because I'm almost worried about that with She-Hulk of I enjoyed the heck out of this first episode. But I have yet to see the second episode it comes out today if anyone was wondering for when we're recording it is that Thursday so I haven't had a chance and I'm curious is the tone going to change again and am I going to feel this weird
00:41:01
Speaker
gap in my heart as I watch the second episode. And I don't want to feel that, but I just wonder when it comes to these live action things, a movie always feels the same. What happens with these shows? And, you know, I think that's part of why it all feels differently. So, yeah, that's my big, you know, conspiracy theory, what I think should change going forward in Marvel. And I'm curious to know your thoughts on this as well. No, I think it's an excellent point to
Director Consistency in WandaVision & Marvel Shows
00:41:27
Speaker
bring up. And I
00:41:29
Speaker
To my knowledge, I know for a fact that Matt Shackman directed every episode of WandaVision, and I think it shows. That's one of the best series that we've gotten so far. When I said Miss Marvel is either my first or second favorite, it's going back and forth between WandaVision. I think WandaVision probably edges it out overall. But then the other series, I think, was Falcon and the Winter Soldier. And that one, while it was all six episodes, were directed by the same person, I think,
00:41:56
Speaker
the change up in the shooting schedule and some of the restrictions and the story changes that had to take place as a reaction to the pandemic. I think that's what affected that show more so than the direction per se. So I think it's a great point you bring up and I for one
00:42:12
Speaker
do think they should be locking in a single director to see these shows through. I think it would result in more cohesion and just a better pacing because like I don't get me wrong. I've gotten a fair amount of enjoyment out of every single one of these series. I think the series are in some cases kind of
00:42:33
Speaker
exceeding what some of the movies are doing. I tend not to talk about things that I don't like that much, but I get some level of enjoyment out of every single Marvel movie, but I guess I'll just come out and say it, because I haven't really had an opportunity to talk about it. Thor Love and Thunder wasn't my favorite. I think Christian Bale was the best part of that movie, but outside of that, I don't think it's one that I'm gonna go revisit a bunch. But yeah, all that to say, I think,
00:43:00
Speaker
I think that's where Marvel, I don't want to say they're losing their way a little bit, but they've got so many balls in the air right now. They need to lock down these directors and kind of have a single person see it through much like Kevin Feige did for the MCU for such a long time. So I appreciate you bringing it up. It's a great point. We're kind of on a tangent here that doesn't relate to animation per se, but all these movies incorporate special effects and there are artists working on them on every single frame that you see. Yeah.
Art & Animation in Marvel Shows
00:43:29
Speaker
It's all good conversation because, you know, we talk about direction and writing plenty on this show as well. You know, animation is not just what's on the screen, but there's so many other layers to animation that we get to talk about. So I love doing it all. Yeah. Thank you, Andre, for writing in and affording us an opportunity to talk about something else a little bit there. The last thing I want to bring up is that
00:43:54
Speaker
Dragon Ball Super made some waves and made some history this weekend. It took the number one spot at the box office with a whopping $20.1 million debut beating out the Idris Elbow dead vehicle beast.
00:44:09
Speaker
it's been one of those things we've seen more and more that anime films have a strong foothold here in the United States and all across the world. So it's, I love Dragon Ball, I love Dragon Ball Z. I've seen both of those sagas in their entirety at least a few times through, but for whatever reason, I have not made it past that point. So I haven't watched Dragon Ball Super superhero yet, but with numbers like these, I might just have to check it out.
00:44:37
Speaker
Yeah, Zuhair would be remiss if we didn't talk about this because I know he saw it Thursday opening night. He was super excited. And I believe he's positive on it. He hasn't talked to me much outside of he is trying to work on getting a podcast guest of some kind that has seen it at this point. OK.
00:44:53
Speaker
because he does want to talk about it. But unfortunately, I've never seen an ounce of Dragon Ball and my schedule has been busy as could be this week, or I was going to at least try and see it so that I could say, hey, the art's good and give a thumbs up while he went on the tangent. But hopefully we'll get something locked down with some schedules soon enough, as you can tell by the fact he hasn't talked at all. Zuhair's not here this week because he's busy. So hopefully he can get something worked out with the schedule at some point so we can hopefully talk more about Dragon Ball with you guys.
00:45:21
Speaker
But the interesting statistic that I posted up on our Instagram, I don't know if you saw that Jay Scottie, then this is the first movie. This is the first animated Japanese movie to take the number one spot at the box office since Pokemon, the first movie in 1998.
00:45:37
Speaker
Wow, that's, that's legendary to be up in terms with Pokemon the first movie because that was a big deal like everyone Pokemon around the world and then they made a movie so like it makes sense that that took the number one spot. So for Dragon Ball to kind of come out of left field just in terms of
00:45:55
Speaker
current relevance, because it's not one of those things that's been talked about at length, like Demon Slayer, my hero, sure, but it's just an oldie but goodie for them to come out and do this. Applause to them. I am excited to hopefully get the chance to see it at some point, if it is this good. So yeah, definitely.
00:46:15
Speaker
All right, well, this was a fun one, a pretty full rounded episode, I feel like. Yes. So I encourage all of you listeners, don't be shy, send us some feedback, send us some love. We haven't gotten a review in a while. So if you want to leave us a review on Spotify, Stitcher, Apple Podcasts, wherever you listen to us.
00:46:33
Speaker
And send us in a written review, send us in some feedback. You can do that in the form of a voicemail as well. Best place to do all those things is animationdeliberationpodcastatgmail.com. And Andrew, do you want to let them know about anything else you have going on or the social media stuff?
00:46:48
Speaker
I will say also in terms of what we have going on, we haven't really promoted it because we didn't know when it was going to hit the feed. But yesterday, we had an IAM Group podcast go up. That was Zuhair and myself. We recorded that right after the Harley Quinn episode of last week. But the schedules, like I said, have just been crazy. So that episode is up. If you haven't given it a listen, go do that. We had a ton of fun. And it's not just an IAM Group podcast. If you liked what we talked about with Marvel in this podcast,
00:47:17
Speaker
we probably take about half of our time talking about VFX VFX artists and you know what it actually looks like on the whole scale of things. So it's definitely a informational and super fun podcast. If you haven't watched the IM group shorts, go do that. They're a ton of fun. The only reason that podcast happened is because I enjoyed the crap out of them. Zuhair already had his chance to talk about it on the MCU cast. I was like, No, no, I want my turn. So we're gonna do this again.
00:47:42
Speaker
So ton of fun, go give that a listen. And then as always, follow us on all of our social medias animation to live one on Twitter and animation deliberation podcast on Facebook and Instagram. Right on good stuff. For myself, since I was not here for a couple of weeks, the other podcast I was working on had to take a little bit of a hiatus as well. But Karen huffstetler and I
00:48:06
Speaker
plan on resuming our coverage of what we do in the shadow season for no spoilers, but the most recent episode to come out for that is One of my favorites in a really long time and all I'm gonna say is I called it if you know what it if you know, you know Yeah, that's gonna do it from me this week. Thanks as always for tuning in. That's T double O and I in lol period and Follow us on Wayne Instagram muscle muscle
00:48:34
Speaker
Thank you for listening to the Animation Deliberation Podcast, a proud member of the Strandepanda Network. If you would like to contact us, you can email animationdeliberationpodcast at gmail.com or follow us on Twitter at animationdelib1. For this and other great shows, you can visit Strandepanda.com or join the great community that is the Strandepanda Chat Facebook group at facebook.com slash groups slash svchat. Tune in next time and remember, stay well.
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Speaker
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