By now, almost every DC fan knows Harley Quinn. She is one of the most well-known characters in the Batman universe and is now more of an anti-hero than a classic villain. Harley Quinn even separated from the Joker after a while, but he got a new partner.
What happened to Harley Quinn? Harley Quinn was for a long time a sidekick of the Joker, but over the years she developed a large fanbase and DC separated her from her toxic relationship. She received her own stories, teams, and also a much healthier relationship with Poison Ivy.
But in 2020, a new sidekick was introduced to the Joker. Although Punchline is quite reminiscent of Harley Quinn, she is a little more brutal and ruthless than her predecessor.
A Great Obsession
Who is Punchline? On a school trip with her high school class, Alexis Kaye was captured by the Joker in a TV studio. She was chosen to read a text live, but Batman stopped the whole event and saved Alexis. However, she changed after the incident.
She developed an obsession with the Joker and his actions. Initially, it led to a podcast, but later she began to poison people disguised with her own Joker gas. Her test subjects were initially homeless people who couldn’t defend themselves.
In a special comic called The Joker 80th Anniversary 100-Page Super Spectacular No. 1
(Source: dc.com), you can see how she manages to poison her dean with cigarette smoke during a conversation. There, she explains that she got the recipe from the internet.
She killed him, stated that her name is Punchline, and suddenly the Joker appeared from her closet after she said: There is your proof, I am ready to get serious
(via YouTube).
A New Sidekick, But No Second Harley
How does Punchline differ from Harley Quinn? In most origin stories of Harley, she was manipulated by the Joker after trying to treat him as a psychologist. This is completely lacking here. Punchline was not manipulated; she is obsessed with the idea of the Joker.
In the comic where she kills her dean, she herself says:
We grew up being whispered to that we can be anything we want to be, but you never recognized the flip side of all that. Some of us do not want to be the good ones.
Punchline inThe Joker 80th Anniversary 100-Page Super Spectacular No. 1(via YouTube)
She is evil, sadistic, and extremely ruthless. So quite fitting for the Joker. Similar to the Joker, she also has a quite pronounced charisma. She can manipulate people and use them for her purposes. After the major event Joker War
, she tried during her trial to convince people that she was just manipulated by the Joker and is innocent.
She gained a larger following with that. The most fanatic even ensured that witnesses were killed. During her time in prison, she was not only able to gain new friends but became the leader of the Royal Flush Gang.
While Harley always comes with wit and a certain lightness, Punchline is much closer to the Joker. She has no morality and acts evil simply because it is easy.
Over time, the Joker has not only made Batman’s life hell. He also worked on other heroes. For the glorious Superman, he only needed one day, but he managed to turn him into a dictator: The Joker tried for years to break Batman, but it only took him one day for Superman
