Weeks after announcing a comic book series exploring the relationship between the Joker and Harley Quinn, DC has unveiled a new project launching in September examining the same space — and telling a new version of the origin of Harley in the process.
“Harleen is a story of a flawed person who meant well, a doctor who fell in love with her patient,” Stjepan Sejic (Sunstone, Aquaman) said in a statement about the series he’s writing and drawing. “It is a story of her road to hell — paved with good intentions — and a smile that cost her her soul. More than anything it is a tale about good people falling. Falling in love, falling from grace, and falling apart.”
The three-issue series repositions Harleen Quinzel as a scientist who aims to end what she sees as a growing apathy amongst those living in Gotham City, only to find the city’s medical and legal establishment pushing back against her plans. Neither side of the conflict was prepared for an attack by the Joker, however, which changes Quinzel’s life for good.
Like the already announced Joker/Harley: Criminal Sanity — scheduled to launch in October — Harleen will be published under the DC Black Label imprint; the series will be released in an extra-length, oversize format on a monthly basis, beginning Sept. 25.
