If there is any part of the story that stands out, it’s the “oh $&#%” cliffhanger. I’ve read plenty of stories with such cliffhangers, but this one is a real gut-punch. Not because it’s shocking for this arc, but when you realize next issue is the finale for Robinson’s run for the time being. From the moment Diana sought out Jason, it built to this moment. It got me excited for next time, despite its failures this issue.
Wonder Woman had its world premiere on May 15, 2017, in Shanghai. It premiered on May 25, 2017, in Los Angeles.[146] The film's London premiere, which was scheduled to take place on May 31 at the Odeon Leicester Square, was cancelled due to the 2017 Manchester Arena bombing.[147] The film had its Latin America premiere in Mexico City on May 27. It was released in most of the world, including in IMAX,[148] on June 2, 2017, after originally being scheduled for June 23.[149][150] Belgium, Singapore and South Korea received the film first, with May 31 openings.[151][152][153] On April 17, it was announced that Wonder Woman would be released in China on June 2, the same day as its North American release.[154]
When last we left Wonder Woman #49, the battle brewing ever since DC's METAL cracked open the Multiverse seemed to be reaching its climax. With the Dark Gods playing similar roles to the Greek pantheon, but with all-powerful demands, enslaving humanity, Diana and her twin brother Jason were splitting up to oppose them around the globe. Just as they seemed to knock back their leader, King Best, the Dark Gods launch an assault on Jason.
One of the things I love about event comics is that sometimes even a middling to bad event can lead to a great spin-off or post event tie in. Day of Judgement gave us J.M. DeMatteis's run on The Spectre. Infinite Crisis gave us Jeff LeMire's great run on Superboy. While not a new series, Dark Nights Metal allowed James Robinson to have the near perfect ending to Jason's story in Wonder Woman.
It introduces us to the character of Diana in a new and important way, tying her origin to a larger overall story and presenting her as a character that both shares our weaknesses and possesses strengths we can't have. This book is a nearly perfect DC Comics story. You'll find the only thing that's disappointing about it is that it got canceled too soon.
Diana is a very kind, loving, compassionate, and strong-willed person, who, while initially somewhat naive, has become all the wiser through her time in Man's World. An outspoken egalitarian, she fights for what she believes in and generally for the betterment of mankind through love and mutual understanding, as taught to her by her mother and fellow Amazons.[9] Growing up, Diana also proved herself headstrong and determined to do what she wanted, such as training in hand-to-hand combat under her aunt Antiope's tutelage despite her mother initially forbidding it. In this way she is quite stubborn; if she believes something is the right thing to do, then she will do it - as evidenced by her attempt to leave Themyscira without her mother's permission and insistence in attending Ludendorff's gala despite Steve telling her not to. Alongside her kindness and compassion, however, Diana was also a very naive idealist when she first arrived in "Man's World", blindly believing that all men were corrupted by Ares and that the World War I Central Powers would simply abandon their sinister ways if she killed him. This blind naivety also translated to explicit indignation whenever she was treated with disrespect due to her status as a woman, such as when she was ignored by members of the War Office. Alongside this, Diana also voiced her opinions rather bluntly upon her arrival, such as when she perceived Etta Candy's job as Steve Trevor's secretary to be akin to slavery (which earns Diana Etta's admiration). Despite her outspokenness and behavior in Man's World, however, Diana remained caring and compassionate, as demonstrated by her initially rocky relationship with Charlie and willingness to step into No Man's Land to save the village of Veld.
Diana and Trevor arrived at the British War Council's meeting place. Trevor told her to stay behind while he retrieved one of his superiors from the war room. Curious, she followed him into the room, where dozens of men argued with each other while Sir Patrick Morgan struggled to be heard. The room fell silent as the men noticed Diana, as women were not allowed in the room; Trevor quickly escorted her out.
Wonder Woman managed to stabilize the plane when it was hit by the shockwave. Hermes and Artemis also arrived at Olympus, where Artemis discovered that Apollo had died in the attack. Among the ruins of the tower, the First Born claimed the throne of Olympus. Wonder Woman confronted the First Born, but he gained the upper hand. However, Hera arrived at Olympus, having regained her Olympian powers, revealing that Apollo had restored them before dying. Hera teleported Wonder Woman and her allies to Paradise Island. There, Wonder Woman found Zola, safe. Hera had also restored the Amazons back to life. Wonder Woman chose to lead them to battle as the new God of War.[42]
Gaines decided he needed another expert. He turned to Lauretta Bender, an associate professor of psychiatry at New York University’s medical school and a senior psychiatrist at Bellevue Hospital, where she was director of the children’s ward, an expert on aggression. She’d long been interested in comics but her interest had grown in 1940, after her husband, Paul Schilder, was killed by a car while walking home from visiting Bender and their 8-day-old daughter in the hospital. Bender, left with three children under the age of 3, soon became painfully interested in studying how children cope with trauma. In 1940, she conducted a study with Reginald Lourie, a medical resident under her supervision, investigating the effect of comics on four children brought to Bellevue Hospital for behavioral problems. Tessie, 12, had witnessed her father, a convicted murderer, kill himself. She insisted on calling herself Shiera, after a comic-book girl who is always rescued at the last minute by the Flash. Kenneth, 11, had been raped. He was frantic unless medicated or “wearing a Superman cape.” He felt safe in it—he could fly away if he wanted to—and “he felt that the cape protected him from an assault.” Bender and Lourie concluded the comic books were “the folklore of this age,” and worked, culturally, the same way fables and fairy tales did.
During the fight, Steve approaches Diana who can't hear him speak due to an explosion temporarily rupturing her eardrums. Steve, after much talking, departs and leaves Diana with his watch before boarding the plane which is taking off with the mustard gas. Ares eventually restrains Diana, imploring her to surrender and realize the futility of their fight. Diana notices the plane in the sky as she's pinned to the ground and watches in horror as it explodes with Steve sacrificing himself to save billions of lives.
I read these last few volumes of Wonder Woman because I wanted to stay caught up before Steve Orlando and ultimately G. Willow Wilson take over the title. I've liked James Robinson before (his Starman comic is great), but this run on Wonder Woman was boring and by the numbers. It ended with the new character he had introduced sacrificing himself so the next writers could do their own thing with the title and not worry about this new wrinkle. Which honestly is fine by me because I didn't find the ...more
Wonder Woman and the other heroes were finally released from the Firestorm Matrix when Batman used the Lasso of Truth on Firestorm. Superman was still infected with the Kryptonite shard inside his nervous system, but Lex Luthor was able to extract it, saving Superman's life. Luthor also assembled a group of villains that defeated the Crime Syndicate. Later, at the Batcave, Wonder Woman and the Justice League talked about the enemy that destroyed the Crime Syndicate's world and came to the conclusion that Darkseid would return.[74]
Although she initially forbids Diana to be trained as a warrior, Hippolyta reluctantly agrees to let General Antiope, Hippolyta's sister and Diana's aunt, train her, only more rigorously than any other warrior. In 1918, Diana, now a young woman, rescues US pilot Captain Steve Trevor when his plane crashes off the Themysciran coast. The island is soon invaded by German soldiers that had been pursuing Trevor. The Amazons kill the crew, but Antiope sacrifices herself to save Diana. Steve is interrogated with the Lasso of Hestia and reveals that a great war is consuming the outside world and that he is an Allied spy. He has stolen a notebook of the chief chemist Dr. Isabel Maru, who is attempting to engineer a deadlier form of mustard gas under the orders of General Erich Ludendorff from a weapon facility in the Ottoman Empire. Believing Ares to be responsible for the war, Diana arms herself with the "Godkiller" sword, the lasso, and armor before leaving Themyscira with Steve to locate and stop Ares for good.
Mikos delivers Ventouras's dead son to him, presumably killed by the rebel faction. This causes him to seek revenge against the Rebels and Diana. They turn into monsters and attack Diana. Diana fights the witch's forces but is overpowered by the witch herself, but only after retrieving the scroll from Stavros who was already attacked and severely wounded. The scrolls ends up in Julia's hands, and she immediately goes to work decoding it in an effort to save Diana and discover the witch's weakness. Diana is taken to the witch's stronghold, where she is revealed to be Circe, a sorceress possessing the soul of Hecate, the moon god after they had entered into a pact to drive the world into chaos. She tells Diana what became of her aunt Antiope, who was killed by Circe herself after manipulating Antiope's husband Theseus's former wife. Circe explains to Diana that her existence is a threat to her mission, due to Diana's goal of promoting peace and equality among mankind, and therefore she must be eliminated. Circe is about to kill Diana when she is interrupted by Julia and the rebels. Julia had decoded the scroll and knew how to stave off the witch's attacks. But they are beaten by Circe and almost killed when Circe herself is suspiciously summoned off from the island by an unknown force, later revealed to be the god Hermes.
In London, a small group of reactionary terrorists took over the Old Bailey courthouse, taking several hostages including a school field trip. Diana storms the building, using the Lasso of Hestia to compel one of the terrorists to tell her their plans. He reveals that their leader has a bomb powerful enough to destroy several city blocks while the world media watches. Diana takes out the terrorists and neutralizes the bomb. The terrorist leader then tries to kill the hostages with a gun, but Diana protects the hostages by deflecting bullets with her bracelets.[8]
Principal photography on the film began on November 21, 2015,[119][120] under the working title Nightingale.[121][122] Among the film sets were Lower Halstow, Kent,[123] and Australia House[124] in England and the Sassi di Matera,[125] Castel del Monte[125] and Camerota[126] in Southern Italy. Matthew Jensen was the director of photography,[127] filming in the United Kingdom, France and Italy.[128] Production in London concluded on March 13, 2016.[129] On March 20, 2016, filming was underway in Italy. In late April, filming took place at the Louvre Museum in Paris, France, where a Wayne Enterprises truck was spotted alongside Gadot.[130] Principal photography finished on May 9, 2016.[131] Patty Jenkins and director of photography Matt Jensen said that the film's look was inspired by painter John Singer Sargent.[132] Reshoots took place in November 2016, while Gadot was five months pregnant. A green cloth was placed over her stomach to edit out her pregnancy during post-production.[133]
Diana is depicted as a masterful athlete, acrobat, fighter and strategist, trained and experienced in many ancient and modern forms of armed and unarmed combat, including exclusive Amazonian martial arts. With her godlike abilities of incalculable superhuman strength, nigh-invulnerability, speed, flight, healing factor and semi-immortality, Diana’s fighting prowess is enhanced. In some versions, her mother trained her, as Wonder Girl, for a future career as Wonder Woman. From the beginning, she is portrayed as highly skilled in using her Amazon bracelets to stop bullets and in wielding her golden lasso.[165] Batman once called her the "best melee fighter in the world".[166] The modern version of the character is known to use lethal force when she deems it necessary.[63] In the New 52 continuity, her superior combat skills are the result of her Amazon training, as well as receiving further training from Ares, the God of War, himself, since as early as her childhood.[148] The Golden Age Wonder Woman also had knowledge in psychology, as did her Amazon sisters.[167][168]
After Jimenez, Walt Simonson wrote a six-issue homage to the I Ching era, in which Diana temporarily loses her powers and adopts an all-white costume (Wonder Woman vol. 2, #189–194). Greg Rucka became writer with issue #195. His initial story arc centered upon Diana's authorship of a controversial book and included a political subtext. Rucka introduced a new recurring villain, ruthless businesswoman Veronica Cale, who uses media manipulation to try to discredit Diana. Rucka modernized the Greek and Egyptian gods, updating the toga-wearing deities to provide them with briefcases, laptop computers, designer clothing, and modern hairstyles. Rucka dethroned Zeus and Hades, who were unable to move with the times as the other gods had, replacing them with Athena and Ares as new rulers of the gods and the underworld. Athena selected Diana to be her personal champion.[9]
A Blackfoot demi-god,[52] and a smuggler who trades with both sides of the war and knows how to get people across the front lines.[48][53] On his casting, Brave Rock said, "I had no idea it was for Wonder Woman. I lost it when I showed up and I couldn't remember my lines. I didn't take it literally until a month later, I got a call saying I got the role and they wanted me to fly to London for a fitting."[54] Brave Rock raised several concerns with Jenkins over the representation of the character in the film, particularly that he was not comfortable playing into stereotypes and that he was not keen on his character being simply known as "Chief".[55] Jenkins responded by giving him some extra creative control over his character which Brave Rock says was "unprecedented".[55]
Wonder Woman did not keep her identity a secret, and initially did not consider herself a superheroine. Indeed, her character was wide-eyed and naive, innocent and without guile. Diana spoke only Themyscirian, a variation of ancient Greek, and had to learn English when she arrived in the United States. Fortunately, Diana soon met Julia Kapatelis, a scholar in Greek culture, and her daughter Vanessa Kapatelis who helped the Amazon princess adjust to the world of men. However, for all her apparent naiveté, Diana was a trained warrior, and had no compunction against using deadly force when called for. For example, she felled the god Deimos in battle and felt completely justified under the circumstances. Through Pérez's tenure on the book, Diana confronted war, injustice, inequality, death and conflicts involving the Olympian Gods.[9]
Wonder Woman's outfit has varied over time, although almost all of her outfit incarnations have retained some form of chestplate, subligaculum, tiara, bracelets, and her signature five-pointed star symbols. When Wonder Woman was first introduced, she wore a heavily patriotic skirt and red top which incorporated an American eagle and elements of the United States flag, reflecting the comic's origins during World War II. Later artists introduced what would become Wonder Woman's classic ensemble, adding an armored plate to her top whose design recalls a letter W and revealing blue short shorts, whose precise length varied from artist to artist. Other artists have experimented with different looks for Wonder Woman over the years, including an all-white mod jumpsuit, a biker outfit, a variation of her mainstream depiction featuring leather pants and a jacket, and a number of armoured battlesuits. Contemporary artists have attempted to emphasise Wonder Woman's traditional outfit as a red armored top with a blue gladiator skirt.
“As to the ‘advanced femininity,’ what are the activities in comic books which women ‘indulge in on an equal footing with men’? They do not work. They are not homemakers. They do not bring up a family. Mother-love is entirely absent. Even when Wonder Woman adopts a girl there are Lesbian overtones,” he said. At the Senate hearings, Bender testified, too. If anything in American popular culture was bad for girls, she said, it wasn’t Wonder Woman; it was Walt Disney. “The mothers are always killed or sent to the insane asylums in Walt Disney movies,” she said. This argument fell on deaf ears.
Her outfit did not receive any prominent change until after the 2005–2006 Infinite Crisis storyline. Similar to her chestplate, her glowing belt was also shaped into a "W".[194] This outfit continued until issue #600 – J. Michael Straczynski's run of Wonder Woman's altered timeline changed her outfit drastically. Her outfit was redesigned by Jim Lee and included a redesigned emblem, a golden and red top, black pants, and a later discontinued blue-black jacket.[194]
James Robinson is an acclaimed, award-winning writer whose works include Starman, JSA: The Golden Age and Superman. With Geoff Johns, he was co-writer of Hawkman. In addition, he wrote the screenplay to The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, starring Sean Connery, and created the acclaimed young-readers comic series Leave it to Chance. Robinson is currently writing Wonder Woman (Rebirth).
