TITLE: “The Stress of Her Regard”
EPISODE DETAILS: Season 1/Episode 5
PREVIOUS: “The Night of the Hunters” (S1E4)
AIR DATE: Thursday, August 1, 2024
WRITERS: Halley Wegryn Gross
DIRECTOR: Matt Peters
EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: Bruce Timm, James Tucker, J.J. Abrams, Matt Reeves, Bruce Timm, Ed Brubaker, Sam Register, Jase Ricci
OFFICIAL SYNOPSIS: Someone is kidnapping and brain-washing rich, powerful men in Gotham, and Batman must find out who and why. When Barbara Gordon begins to suspect that one of her friends may be involved in the abductions, her investigation puts her on a collision course with the Dark Knight.
CAST: Hamish Linklater as Batman/Bruce Wayne, Diedrich Bader as Harvey Dent. Krystal Joy Brown as Barbara Gordon, John DiMaggio as Harvey Bullock, Eric Morgan Stuart as James Gordon, Jason Watkins as Alfred Pennyworth, Gary Anthony Williams as Arnold Flass, Jamie Chung as Dr. Harleen Quinzel
REVIEW
After getting to know Dr. Harleen Quinzel during the first half of BATMAN: CAPED CRUSADER‘s inaugural season, I found myself, well, kinda liking her. She’s nice, fun, and also friends with good, upstanding people like Barbara Gordon and Rene Montoya. Hell, she even tried to help Bruce Wayne with his mental health (or did she?).
But we knew that “Harley Quinn” was inevitable, right? And in “The Stress of Her Regard”, we finally meet the good doctor’s villainous (?) alter ego.
Away from her psychiatry practice, we discover that Harleen — as Harley Quinn — has been kidnapping and then brainwashing her wealthy clients. Why? Well, there’s a bit of “Robin Hood Syndrome” at hand and she may want to humiliate these Gotham billionaires along the way. Perhaps she’s trying to create a villainous crew of henchmen as they do take orders from her and carry them out, but I don’t think that’s the case. There’s more going on with Harleen when it comes to her motives, and I do not believe she desires to become a master criminal/mob boss in Gotham.
In addition to the whole reveal of Harley Quinn thing, Barbara Gordon has a BIG role in this episode. Just like The Batman, she suspects that Harleen has something to do with the kidnappings, and her investigation puts her on a collision course with The Dark Knight. Will it hurt or help their relationship? I’ll let you find out for yourself.
“The Stress of Her Regard” was a bit of a gut-wrenching episode that leaves a lot of questions yet to be answered. Perhaps we’ll find out in Season 2. – Bill “Jett” Ramey
GRADE: A
PODCAST: BATMANIMATION Ep. 55
