Harley: Year One

Updates from the desk of Stephanie Phillips, including publication news and upcoming projects.

Happy Friday, readers! It’s been a week full of working on A Man Among Ye and wrapping up the current (second) arc of the series with artist Josh George, and working on a new secret book that won’t be out until summer of 2022. I also signed a new contract for a book that I can only be super vague about at the moment. I can at least say that it’s spooky and I get to work with an artist I really admire. It’s also with a company I haven’t worked with yet, but they’re putting out some of my favorite books at the moment. Really excited to get that rolling and I’ll talk more about it as I can!

As promised in my newsletter from last week, I’ve been thinking a lot about Harley lately and the responsibility of writing her current ongoing series. It’s been a little over a year since I wrote my first Harley script for the Future State event, and really fell in love with her. I’ve always liked Harley, but I think you get to know a character far more personally once you’re really in their mind (or… allowing them in yours??).

In the last year I’ve written 2 issues of Harley: Future State, 12 issues of the ongoing series, the 2021 Annual, an appearance in Detective Comics, and another small Harley thing that hasn’t been announced yet (soon!). I’ve worked with about nine different artists, not including all our amazing variant cover artists, and I’ve gotten to have Harley interact with some of my favorite Gothamites - Grundy, Hugo Strange, Catwoman, Batman, and more. We have an arc with Poison Ivy happening as we enter Fear State, which also includes a Gotham City Sirens reunion, and Riley and I have created multiple new characters for the book, including Keepsake and Kevin.

Whew. As Harley might say - that’s all really ******* cool. Okay, I would say it that way, too. Harley and I share a penchant for strong language.

Last week I wrapped up edits on issue #12, which will see the conclusion of my and Riley’s first year in Gotham. It’s got a lot of action and some moments that will help propel us into the next arc. I can promise that our next arc will have more guest appearances and will challenge Harley in ways she might not be ready for…

We’ll also have a new character to introduce in issue 12. Riley and I have been working on this character since the beginning of this series… just building up to their reveal in Gotham City. I have to say, this is one of the coolest designs I have ever seen. Riley knocked it out of the park and I wish I could show you all now!

But, instead of looking too far forward, I want to say that something that was really important to me in this first year of Harley was looking at apologies and how different they can be for different people. Saying sorry and being accountable for mistakes is incredibly difficult. It’s so easy to turn into someone like Keepsake who is constantly looking for someone else to blame - it was something in the water, he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, “Joker made me do it.” Unlike Keepsake, Harley is making herself vulnerable. She’s being accountable. And she’s dealing with the fact that not everyone is accepting her or her apology (Croc still hasn’t shared his Netflix password, by the way).

If you’re interested in more thoughts on Harley and mental health, I recently talked with F(r)iction about this topic in depth. This is a topic that’s really important to me, important to Harley, and something we’ll be continuing as we move forward in this series as well. Check out the full interview here.

All of this is to say… THANK YOU. Thank you for reading this book and supporting us. We’re loving every second of it and have so much planned for Harley, Kevin, and Waffle!

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FINAL ORDER CUTOFF

Harley Quinn #8: Fear State part 2, is up for final order cutoff this Sunday (10/3). It’s got the Gotham City Sirens and Harley’s reunion with Ivy!

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EVENTS

NYCC is next weekend and I’ll be there all 4 days. I’ll have tons of books with me and “I Killed Comics” pins. I’ll be on three panels throughout the weekend as well:

• Thursday 12:30-1:30 in conversation with Philip Kennedy Johnson and Josh Williamson in room 1A21

• Thursday 4:15-5:15 pitching comics panel room 406.3

• Sunday 1:30-2:30 AfterShock panel room 406.3

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WHAT’S OUT IN OCTOBER?

October is a really busy month with tons of new releases!

• 5th Sensational WW TPB

• 5th WW 80th Anniversary

• 13th Nuclear Fam TPB

• 20th AMAY #7

• 26th Detective Part 1, #1044

• 26th HQ #8

• 27th Grimm horror anthology

Thanks for reading! Next week there won’t be a newsletter since I will be in NY, but things will continue the following week like normal!

-Stephanie