BIRDS OF PREY: AND THE FANTABULOUS EMANCIPATION OF ONE HARLEY QUINN
HBO, 8:00 p.m. ET
I first noticed Margot Robbie when she co-starred as Christina Ricci’s sister in ABC’s 2011 period drama Pan Am. Two years later, everyone noticed her as Robbie had an attention-getting featured role, opposite Leonardo DiCaprio, in The Wolf of Wall Street. And since then, she’s played movie roles as diverse as Tonya Harding in I, Tonya and Sharon Tate in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. But throughout, she’s taken time out to play DC Comics character Harley Quinn, a role she first portrayed when providing Harley’s voice for a Family Guy videogame in 2014. On screen, she introduced her version of the Joker’s unhinged former girlfriend in 2016’s Suicide Squad – and was rewarded with her own spinoff starring vehicle earlier this year, which premieres on HBO tonight. And it’s excellent timing, because Birds of Prey also showcases Harley’s female partners in crime, who include The Huntress and Black Canary. The Huntress is played by Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who played Nikki in the 2017 season of FX’s Fargo, and Black Canary is played by Jurnee Smollett, whose TV credits include Friday Night Lights, Parenthood, and True Blood. And tomorrow, Smollett stars in HBO’s newest big-splash miniseries, Lovecraft Country. So there’s an awful lot of talent at the center of this particular comic-book movie – and a lot of attitude, too.