About Damn Time… I’m giving Wonder Woman Mad Props

Let me preface this with, “I am pretty ignorant of Wonder Woman’s character and continuity.” My whole understanding of the Wonder Woman character is deep rooted within DC’s Animated Series’ Justice League and Justice League Unlimited as well as the half dozen or so animated features like Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths and New Frontier. Wonder Woman to me is a strong-willed, bull-headed, prideful feminist warrior princess from the isle of the Amazons that doesn’t take any shit and can give Superman a run for his money. My understanding of Wonder Woman isn’t much more than a comic book stereotype. It’s rather kind of sad. Wonder Woman is the most recognized female comic book character in the world, a staple Justice Leaguer and a part of DC’s Trinity and yet I don’t really know anything about the character. While I have tried my hand at reading Wonder Woman a few times before, the title has never really held my interest. But when I heard that Brian Azzarello was taking on Wonder Woman for the New 52 re-launch I was intrigued. Brian has a penchant for outside the box storytelling. I knew that his type of approach on the character could make me care about a Wonder Woman title. I’m pleased to say, I couldn’t have been more right.

I’ve been giving so much ‘Mad Love’ to Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo‘s Batman, that I haven’t taken the proper time to give Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang‘s Wonder Woman title the credit it truly deserves. It’s out right fantastic! The Art is sooo attractive. Only one word can describe Cliff’s ‘less-is-more’ approach to the artwork on the book and that word is ‘beautiful’. Brian has done ‘Wonders’ with Wonder Woman’s origin. He’s added volumes of depth to the character by brining out Hippolyta’s closet full of skeletons.

Drawing on Greek Mythology:

Azzarello has grabbed Wonder Woman and plunged her right into the meat of the Greek Mythology, immediately lining up  a host of characters at his disposal. He has drawn on the well known Greek Mythology characters like Hera, Poseidon and Hades as well as lesser known gods like Eros and Eris to build a rock solid supporting cast of allies and would be villains.

Zeus gets around: It’s no secret, Zeus has a ton of children, via his wife Hera and uh…erm… other women, mortal and immortal alike. Zola is young mortal women who has an uh…erm… encounter with, unbeknownst to her, Zeus. While being attacked by some scary centaur creatures, Hermes appears and transports Zola to Wonder Woman for protection. Later Zola finds out from Hermes, that she indeed is carry a child of Zeus.

No room for compassion: Wonder Woman zero gave us the origin of her combat training with Ares and how he dismisses her as his star pupil after she would not deliver the final death blow to the beaten and helpless Minotaur of the labyrinth. Prior to Ares’ disappointment with the young Diana, he claims a bit joy in knowing that he has found his future replacement as the god of war in her.

The Real Scheming gods of the DC U: Literally thrust into the middle of the pantheon of family feuds, Wonder Woman has to not only defend Zola’s unborn baby, but herself, Zola and Hermes from several scheming gods, godesses & demi-gods, who believe that a child of Zeus will rise one day and slay one of its own kin to overthrow the throne  and take it for themself. You never know who is in kahoots with whom, and who is leveraging whom against whom. It’s an inter-tangled web of deceit that puts the likes of the Real Housewives of New Jersey to shame.

Dirty little secrets:

Azzarello has put in a lot of thought into those second nature fan-boy questions that are raised when you start to talk about an isolated island of beautiful amazonian women. We’ve come to find out, that the island has more than a couple dirty little secrets.

The Birds and the Bees of Paradise Island: In a land with no men, how do they populate paradise island? Well the story goes like this… Every now and again, when they decide they need more children (or just what to fuck?), the amazons head out to sea and raid ships, forcing sailors to procreate with them (hey I wouldn’t be complaining) and then they murder and dump the bodies. (ouch) and thats where little Amazonian boys and girls come from.

Where are all the Amazonian Boys?: So we now know where Amazonian babies come from and we know where all the girls are at, where are all the boys? Hephaestus fills us in the backstory of the Amazonian boys. To Diana’s dismay she learns that they are sold into slavery! Hephaestus, himself, buys the children and puts them to work helping him build the legendary weaponry of the gods.

Zeus REALLY gets around: The origin story of Diana starts with Hippolyta building the clay form of a baby girl and praying to the gods to bless her with a daughter. BOOM! Prayers are answered and the clay comes to life. LIES! LIES! LIES! Diana learns that the clay story was fabricated to protect her from the truth. Hippolyta actually had a soiree with Zeus (Zeus gets all the ladies) and Diana is actually the illegitimate daughter thee Greek god of gods himself… Zeus!

My hat’s off to the boys at DC that allow Brian Azzarello to do what he does. They put together a fantastic team that has made me care about a character that I never cared about before. Wonder Woman is easily my second favorite title to come out of the New 52 re-launch.

Until Next Time… I love what Brian and Cliff are currently doing with Diana. Something a little concerning to me is how Diana is being handled in the pages of Justice League. Justice League (not my favorite) is giving us stereotypical Wonder Woman. While I’m not concerned with her relationship status of Supes or Trevor, I could care less (whatever serves the purpose of the story). I just think that there is more depth to Diana outside of a hot and bothered super-hero love triangle. Brian and Cliff are delivering more.