12 Harley Quinn Fan Theories That Actually Make A Lot Of Sense

Most DC fans are used to the idea that Harley Quinn was transformed from a doting psychiatrist into a psychopath by the Joker. However, Redditor u/delusionaleyes believes that Harley was always the maniac fans know her as today and she was only a psychiatrist in order to enable her hybristophilia:

She became a psychologist to satisfy her own needs as a hybristophiliac, hide her own abuse, and to use her title to get into Arkham Asylum.

For starters, when we are first introduced to her as Dr. Harleen Quinzel in Batman: The Animated Series, she talks to the head psychologist at Arkham Asylum. The dialogue goes as follows: Head Psychologist: "I must admit, I was a bit surprised that you wanted to work here at Arkham." Dr. Quinzel: "What can I say, extreme personalities excite me."

She then proceeds to walk by The Joker's padded cell, and it's as if immediate attraction occurs. Later in the episode, she proceeds to be The Joker's therapist, and ultimately falling deep in love with him and helping him escape.

Here's where we must analyze what occurred:

I doubt that the head psychologist at Arkham would have just let Harley on the loose without first letting her know of the criminals being held there. As such, she probably would have shown files kept on them all, telling her of why they are there in the first place and the things they have said and done to merit being there.

And as someone as well known as The Joker, it would have been impossible for her to not know who he really was.

She must have known of all the horrible, psychopathic things he's done.

She knows this, and that's why she's attracted to him in the first place.

She is so willing to meet him and cozy up to him.

Almost as if she's heard of him before, like meeting your favourite celebrity.

While Birds of Prey is a very entertaining movie, there are some inconsistencies in plot and tone that many fans have pointed out. However, Redditor u/OlympusMan suggests that the lack of cohesion is intentional:

When I watched Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey, there were several elements that stood out to me. Gotham, the waywardness of the narration, the tone of the film, and the amount of plot armour given to the main characters.

Many scenes take place during the day, and Gotham is shown to be a bright and colourful metropolis. All in all very a stark contrast to the Gotham shown in other based in the same city.

Harley Quinn's narration leads the audience to various places at different points in time in order to fill in the back story of the main cast. At times it seems to lack cohesion.

The tone of the film skips from light-hearted comedy to deathly serious without a moments notice, repeatedly.

The main characters don some heavy duty plot armour. Harley is able to storm Gotham PD single-handedly, the goons she comes up against forget that their weapons can fired from more than a couple feet away. A particular scene in the third act sees a gang of bad guys firing a lot of machine-guns at length to no effect, Huntress fires a single crossbow and hits her target. The Bird of Prey member that that does get shot is fortunately wearing body armour given to her moments before by Harley.

And I think there's a reason for all of this. The whole film is Harley's recollection of the events that happened following her break up with Joker. Gotham seems like an appealing place because it's seen through her eyes, it's a place where she lives without fear and actually has fun. So to her, Gotham is a bright and cheerful place. The severe shifts in tone and narrative weave reflect Harley's character and personality. The plot armour is a product of Harley's poetic license in retelling the events.

At the end of Suicide Squad, Harley Quinn goes through with actions that many fans of hers felt were very out of character. However, Redditor u/TheUnAustralian believes that the inconsistencies of Harley's character at the end of the movie was intentional:

One of the less believable parts of the recent Suicide Squad movie was Harley Quinn's act of saving the rest of the gang from Enchantress at the movie's climax; she says something along the lines of "you messed with my friends" and essentially distracts her so she can be killed. This is totally out of character. Enchantress had promised her what she desired most: the Joker back after his supposed death, making her taking this action essentially an act of choosing the Suicide Squad over him. But what if the Joker wasn't what she really desired?

Harley Quinn is a dangerously co-dependent personality drawn towards commanding male figures like the Joker. My theory is that, once she bought Joker was gone for good, she latched onto another one of those personalities: Will Smith's character Deadshot, in whom she sees similarities to her love the Joker. This is evidences by their scene on the stairs, in which she says "great, another textbook psychopath." Joker is the original psychopath to whom she is referring, so it makes sense that in her distraught state she latches onto the next best thing and becomes devoted to Deadshot, who we even see stopping her before she goes up to fight Enchantress alone in the climactic final battle. Could anyone else have done that? Would she have listened to anyone else? No, but because she saw him as an authority figure/Joker substitute she chose to lol after him and the rest of the gang, even going so far as to take on some of his personality traits and become more "good" because of him in the same way that she became more "bad" originally because of the Joker.

In The Killing Joke comic, Joker has a pregnant wife who loses her life. Redditor u/-Powder- believes that Harley's resemblance to Joker's late love is not just a coincidence:

Let's take a look at the Joker's origin first. In The Killing Joke we see him losing his wife who was pregnant with his child. He says about this bad day, this situation “Sometimes I remember it one way, sometimes another...” but in the end of Death of the Family, Batman approaches him saying he knows who he was and he freaks out. It seems he does remember, but he's fleeing from this tragic reality. 

Harley Quinn is very childish. Something I'd like to point out is how often the Joker calls himself Daddy when it comes to Harley. He embraces this childish side of her.

She also looks like Jeannie, the wife the Joker has lost. Physically they are two cute blondes. Psychologically speaking, they are very supportive of him, no matter what his decisions are and they also are the two only people on Earth who actually think he's funny. In The Killing Joke the Joker cries while holding Jeannie, in Joker by Brian Azzarello he cries while holding Harley in almost the same position. I do believe he noticed the similarities.

The world of HBO Max's animated series, Harley Quinn, is unlike anything depicted in the DC universe before. Redditor u/Mozorelo believes that this is because the show is shown through the eyes of someone who is hallucinating after being doused with Joker acid:

The new Harley Quinn animated series is supposed to be funny but the world it takes place in is a little nonsensical. Nobody seems to age (everyone looks the same in memories from 30 years ago as they do today), death is a very casual topic for everyone ( citizens are ok with their loved ones dying right in front of them), gore is extremely exaggerated and everyone notices (oh that's a strong bullet, I did not know her head was going to pop off), the good guys are the ones emotionally disturbed (batman, superman and Gordon are evidently unhinged), details of the world change all the time and get more extreme as the series progresses(Harely highway changes from a regular urban highway to a pink car track looping around the rooftops of the city), TV shows regularly partake in villainous acts, evil just has a spot in the world (permits, taxes, dues) and finally Gotham is really clean, golden and glitzy.

We could say that this is just an elseworld centered on Harley but this really looks like one big joke. The world is one big joke. Where have we heard that before? Everyone dunked in the Joker acid seems to say that. This is the world as seen through someone affected by the acid that made Harley and Joker. We're seeing the regular batman world through the eyes of Harley and she's a completely unreliable narrator.

There isn't suddenly a huge statue of her in the middle of Gotham that she shoots a rocket at to stop the bad guys. She just sees it that way. She shoots a rocket at a regular building or statue to stop the truck. The whole series is set in this joke world because that's the world she sees all the time where it's no biggie to kill a man's girlfriend right in front of him and Gordon is clearly sexually frustrated.

TLDR: the joke world of Harley Quinn is the regular world seen through the lens of a permanent joker-acid trip and you can't trust the narrative.

Harley Quinn doesn't always sound exactly the same every time she's depicted on-screen in any capacity. Redditor u/1wildebeest seems to believe that Joker is the actual reason for this occurrence:

I believe that the reason Margot Robbie, an actress that has used a New York accent numerous times is not shown using it in the trailer comes her not being under the Joker's control. Any time the character Harley Quinn has been shown on screen other than this movie, she had been supporting the Joker and maintained her accent. From this I believe that she will turn on the rest of the Suicide Squad and join the Joker but first allude to her changing sides by putting on the accent Harley Quinn is known for.