Batman: Caped Crusader – Episode 5 “The Stress of Her Regard” Recap & Review

The Stress of Her Regard

Episode 5 of Batman: Caped Crusader begins with Batman saving a man trying to kill himself in the middle of the road. This is Fletcher Demming, a man who has gone completely off the rails. Several weeks back he donated his entire fortune to charity, so the only thing he can afford right now is a one-way ticket to Arkham Asylum. I say one way, the number of criminals that have broken out in that place make it more of a pitstop than anything else!

Batman realizes that there’s something more going on here, and it stems from another of the rogue gallery showing up. It’s Harley Quinn, naturally, but it’s complicated when Detective Montoya and Dr Quinzel end up on a date together

Batman does some digging and finds Fletcher’s hidden office, with a whole bunch of checks made out to none other than Harleen Quinzel. Yep, it turns out Quinzel is actually Harley Quinn. Alongside Mr Hastings who works with her, Harley has a whole bunch of men locked up whom she’s torturing and belittling.

Alfred does some digging alongside Batman who realizes there’s a link with all of these men getting psychiatrist visits and giving away all their fortune afterwards before eventually going insane. When Barbara shows up at Arkham Asylum to question Fletcher, he holds onto Harley’s name before running up to the rooftop and nearly jumping off to his doom.

Barbara does some digging and realizes Mr Hastings is linked to Fletcher. However, she gets nowhere at his place so she decides to break in after-hours. Batman shows and warns her off, deciding to take over and do this himself. While this is going on, Quinzel and Montoya have to cut their date short.

Batman finds all the men captured but Harley Quinn shows up and stops him. She breaks out all the men but despite getting the upper-hand, Batman finds himself captured in one of the pods. Sleeping gas is deployed, while the house is rigged to blow in 5 minutes.

On her way out, Barbara breaks into the basement and finds Batman. With time running out, Harley realizes Barbara is in the house and turns the car around. She grabs Barbara and tells him to leave. She refuses to without Batman, but they’re not able to break him out save for lifting the pod glass slightly.

The house blows up, and Harley falls to her doom. Barbara races to the side to try and see her but she ends up crying, upset over Harley Quinn presumably being dead. While Batman leaves, we find out that Quinzel is still alive, naturally, and she rings Montoya on a payphone and tells her she’s had to leave town for a while.

The Episode Review

Out of all the episodes in this series, this one is by far the worst. Harley Quinn’s character is romanticized and almost played off like she’s an antihero, despite being a psychologically unhinged lunatic.

The “girls get it done” angle is pretty strong here too, with Montoya, Barbara and Quinzel in this weird friendship group that lacks any sort of chemistry whatsoever. I mean before this episode we’ve barely seen these three have banter and form attachments.

The drama involving Batman being captured and then needing to be freed, only to find out he busts himself out basically after the house collapses diminishes the tension in this whole sequence.

While it’s nice to see Harley Quinn back, the writing here is pretty poor, which is a shame.