There’s no question Darth Vader is feared and hated throughout the Star Wars saga. Which makes the idea that he could actually have a lovesick, infatuated stalker seem absurd. But that’s exactly what’s revealed in Marvel’s Star Wars: Vader – Dark Visions, when the Sith Lord catches the eye of an Imperial nurse, who bears more than a passing resemblance to DC’s Harley Quinn.
While the modern Harley Quinn has gotten new origins in comics that paint her in a more sympathetic, troubled, or simply respectful light, this nameless nurse of the galaxy far, far away is a callback to the Harley introduced in the classic “Mad Love” story from Batman Adventures. Obsessive, delusional, and downright creepy, this Imperial underling is a perfect example of how an unhealthy fixation can lead a person to a state just as damaging and tragic as the one offered by the Dark Side.
Told from the point of view of the nurse in question, the story from Dark Visions #3 “Tall, Dark, And Handsome,” follows a woman who is in need of some serious help, even by Imperial standards. As orderly Stormtroopers line up in perfect rows for Vader, the nurse skitters around the Death Star wearing a desperate smile. Her white hair and pale complexion (which grows even paler as the story progresses) reinforce the parallels, and just as Dr. Harleen Quinzel admits to being fascinated with Arkham Asylum’s super criminals in “Mad Love,” this nurse’s dream of being swept off her feet is made real by Vader shoving her aside using the Force, convincing her that “we connected.”
It’s a return to the earliest (and today, most heavily criticized) treatment of Dr. Quinzel, flashing back and forth from the nurse’s everyday duties to the dream sequences in her head, where Vader courts her like a Harlequin Romance lover. It’s disturbing and laughable – and identical to Harley Quinn’s own impossible dreams of a domestic home life with the Joker. Unfortunately, the nurse’s real life fails to measure up to this dream, when her role as merely an assistant to Vader’s personal physician is revealed. Resenting the doctor for constantly ordering her to do menial tasks and keeping her away from her “beloved,” the nurse nevertheless relishes her position, as it provides her a way to steal tiny pieces of Darth Vader’s bloodstained armor and cybernetics, hiding them away like romantic keepsakes.
Vader’s doctor also finds a place in the nurse’s fantasies – as a Batman-type rival constantly standing between her and Darth Vader. When the nurse’s unwelcome entrances into the medical bay cause Vader to lash out and Force choke the doctor in a disciplinary action, the nurse immediately interprets Vader’s actions in a different way, believing, “He punished the doctor instead [of me]. Protected me. Couldn’t bring himself to hurt me.” As Vader takes on a more heroic role for the nurse, she also sees him in a highly sympathetic light, believing him to be lonely like her. Just as Harley Quinn foolishly believed the Joker to be a tortured soul who desired love, the nurse sees Darth Vader and herself as “kindred spirits drawn together by fate.”
In a later scene eerily reminiscent of Harley Quinn’s “Mad Love” origin story – which saw Dr. Harleen Quinzel rush to take care of a battered Joker after the Batman foils another one of his plots and delivers him to Arkham Asylum – the nurse sees Darth Vader stagger into the medical bay gravely injured after a battle. Thoroughly convinced they were meant to be together, she hooks him up to the medical bay’s machines and, like Harley Quinn, becomes gripped by a twisted form of the Florence Nightingale effect (which causes caregivers to develop romantic feelings for their patients).
Had the story continued to follow the beats of a Harley Quinn story, one might suspect the nurse would end up as one of Vader’s personal servants (similar to how Vader trained Starkiller to be his personal assassin in the now-Legends Star Wars: The Force Unleashed). However, writer Dennis “Hopeless” Hallum opts for a different angle. Shortly after Vader recovers, the nurse finds his cape (which she naturally believes was left for her), only to be discovered by the doctor. Finding her collection of the Sith Lord’s broken parts, they’re dumped into the trash, with her following after. She wanders the Death Star, eventually staggering into Vader’s personal quarters. As Vader turns his scarred, unmasked face toward her, the enthralled nurse proclaims her love, dreaming of taking her place at his side, as effectively the female version of Vader…
Only to discover that while she may be a perfect doppelganger of Harley Quinn, Darth Vader is decidedly not the Joker. Staring impassively at the nurse as she delivers her speech, Vader impales the woman with his lightsaber before ordering the bridge to “get this garbage out of my quarters.” It’s an abrupt yet appropriate ending, given what fans know about Vader’s ruthless personality. Leaving fans to decide: out of both of these monsters, is it Joker or Darth Vader revealed to be the bigger monster through their Harley’s obssession?
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