The Big Picture: All The World Is Waiting

[Fuloqwam]

Interesting. I'm usually on top of all things superhero, but this fell under my radar.

Two things though; I don't want a Wonder Woman movie until I know Megan Fox won't get the part.

And Wonder Woman's new costume is awesome, if not absolutely necessary. Good lord, nobody will ever take comics seriously while she's in the patriotic one-piece. Come to think of it, can you even legally DO that to the American flag?

 

[CronoT]

...like all great women, only gets more interesting the more you find out.

[sarcasm]
Unlike normal women, whom you find out rather quickly are shallow, petty, horrible examples of their gender and our species as a whole.
[/sarcasm]



Honestly, I've only met one woman who really defies that description, and my family pretty much f***ed that up for me.

:-/

 

[Primus1985]

The origin described in the video is the original one from Marston's original run on the title, a lot of the details have since changed. Stephen Hawking couldn't keep functional track of DC history, at this point

Hippolyta time-traveling to the 40s was a late-90s retcon from a John Byrne book to patch fix the continuity hole left by WW's post-Crisis reboot in the mid-80s, subsequently undone by Infinite Crisis bringing back the Multiverse and then undone again by the current Stracyzinski series (which is probably going to "erase itself" at the conclusion.) Likewise, the bracelets being just another weapon from the gods is from the same George Perez reboot, post-Crisis.

Still its not her actual story, im a stickler for comic character history



Still, post crisis is like a long time ago. I mean if your doing a video for a web magazine do your freakin research.

 

[Primus1985]

Bob....You really need to take a course in DC history bub.


The first Wonder Woman was Queen Hippolyta who had traveled back in time to the 1940's and taken up her daughters mantle after her actions lead to Diana's death..





Also...WTF her bracelets, tiara, and lasso where forged by the gods to protect her and where givin as rewards for her beating out all other amazons in combat. They wherent chains.

The orignal origin was what bob said. Since then DC has all sorts of ass hat fuckery with their time line. What you said was true, but so was what bob said.

We're both right but the differance is Im actually up to date with the facts.

 

[rddj623]

Could you imagine a David Fincher directed Wonder Woman movie...I can...it's all sorts of awesome!

 

[Redd the Sock]

I thought the costume change was to pimp the (now canceled) attempt at a live action TV show. I didn't think it looked any worse than most hero costumes (and in many cases much better).

I never got into Wonder Woman, less due to concept than execution. I seemed to find the Wonder Girls more interesting than a character that was pretty much always in super hero mode. The icon for female empowerment is struggling to find a place with other icons like Buffy, Lara Croft, and countless others, and purpose in a world that is infinatly more prone to overlook the gender barrier. Her most interesting thing recently had litte to do with gender, but in the old "should superheoroes kill" debate.

A movie that actually disected the character and her motivations would help a lot for a character that was largely just another funny suit fighting other funny suits.

 

[Urh]

Diana got less weird over time?

Her current iteration is that she is Pygmalion, made of clay and was given the powers of Shazam, I mean the gods. This was after her mother got her soul from a caern of souls.

Back in world war two, she was a flesh and blood human that was just better than everyone else.

I was under the impression that the whole clay thing (which can be interpreted as meaning that Wonder Woman is, for all intents and purposes, a golem) was always a part of the origin story in order to explain how an island populated entirely by women survived beyond the first generation.

 

[brainslurper]

There's definitely an interesting story to be had here - it's a shame Warner Brothers can't be bothered with good writers and film-makers for their superhero gigs outside of Christopher Nolan.

with all the money that is going into these movies you would think that they could get someone OTHER then christopher nolan to make good superhero movies. lets just hope that dark knight rises doesnt end up like spiderman 3

 

[Orcus The Ultimate]

I consider this one of your best big pictures ! it was very enlightening, and as you said marston is an "interesting fellow" hahaha

 

[copycatalyst]

As someone who has pretty much always been on the periphery of comic book culture but never really gotten into it, I enjoy all of these expository essays that come under the "Comics Are Weird!" banner.

Thanks Bob.

 

[Dana22]

I dont like superhero comics, but yet Ive found this very interesting.

Lisa Edelstein would make good Wonder Women ^^

 

[droppingpenny]

No Bob, comics are not weird, superhero comics are weird, or to be more precise very immature. Sure you got more violence now and occasional good stories about the characters. But in structure, the way they tell the story, and the stories themselves are like they are made for specifically children, or man-children in this case.

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

Members of the Escapist Community, hear thee well:

Wonder Woman as written by Gail Simone is golden. Pass it on.

Thou speaks the truth. I have read The Circle, and it was good.

Truthfully, most superhero concepts are patently absurd:

Superman: a baby from another planet given his superpowers by the sun
Spiderman: Bitten by a radioactive/genetically modified spider
Green Lantern: Given a ring that allows him to create anything in hard light thanks to a glowing green thing.

etc


Wonder Woman's origins are no sillier, though I liked the one they used in the animated movie: sculpted from clay, a drop of Hippolyta's own blood, and blessed by the Greek Gods with strength equal to Hercules, the speed of Hermes, the wisdom of Athena and the beauty of Aphrodite (though that is never said, its the most popular theory I'm aware of). The scene is very beautiful and has wonderful music.

Also, a young Australian based fan artist created this:

HIs renditions of Harley Quinn, Super Girl, Catwoman, Green Lantern are also excellent

From: http://fanartexhibit.wordpress.com/

I say get Gail Simone to write the treatment, strip away the excess nonsense and distill the character into a workable but not bastardized version of herself.

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

I always thought the villians were more important in making a good movie.

I don't know any wonderwoman villians.

Cheetah = an archaeologist who was turned into a cheetah demon cat person thing.

Giganta = A woman who's super power is to grow to gigantic sizes, though the bigger she gets the dumber she gets.

Dr. Psycho = A psychotic psychic who makes people insane, and I think likes to rape women.

Circe = An ancient goddess level witch who is also an extreme feminist. She once took Wonder Woman's powers and went around the world killing pimps, human traffickers and what not.

Silver Swan = Friend turned enemy, also a cyborg, and can scream really loud.

Wonder Woman has two decent villains, two "fun" ones, and a friend turned evil at one point.

Thanks.

Personally I don't think those are great villians (compared to Batmans symbolism) but I suppose its all in the delivery. So they could probably make a decent movie.

Best bet for an origins story villain would probably by Circe, ties into the Greek myth of Wonder Woman's background.

 

[Nomanslander]

Yeah, after my coming of age years spent watching shows like Xena: Warrior Princess, I'm not too fond of the idea of a Wonder Women movie being made...-_-

You see, I know what today's generation of film makers imagine from a strong female leading role. A character like Xena scared me enough with its man-hating "slaughter the whole fucking lot of them Y chromosome carrying bastards" theme, and I really can't imagine them doing anything different with Wonder Women.

If you ask me, it's probably better if they left WW out, for at least another generation.

=/

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

Bob....You really need to take a course in DC history bub.


The first Wonder Woman was Queen Hippolyta who had traveled back in time to the 1940's and taken up her daughters mantle after her actions lead to Diana's death..





Also...WTF her bracelets, tiara, and lasso where forged by the gods to protect her and where givin as rewards for her beating out all other amazons in combat. They wherent chains.

You're forgetting the golden rule of "Comics are weird." Now I don't know anything about the subject myself, but my guess is that due to the way comics are handled, there's gotta be at least six origin stories out there for her.

 

[EchetusXe]

heh, this was an interesting one.

 

[hyperdrachen]

I dunno Bob, I think wonderwomen is suffering the same problem as captain america. Characters born in a specific cultural setting seem quaint and out of place to the modern viewer. I don't think the costumes that big a problem, classic or revamp. I think the classic could work especially if Thor is well recieved. I doubt hollywood would make a movie about Diana fighting nazi's though. However consider this justice league episode:

"Fury" Butch Lukic Stan Berkowitz April 7, 2002 (2002-04-07)
2002-04-14
A rogue Amazonian named Aresia (born in the mortal world, raised in Themyscira) gathers a small group of Luthor's former Injustice Gang including Star Sapphire, Shade, Copperhead, Solomon Grundy, and Tsukuri, and sets out to kill the world's male population, who she holds responsible for the death of her family members in a war.

It's still wierd but I think sourcing the villain from Wonderwoman's background/mythology works better than diggin' the ol' nazi's back up.

Casting issues come to mind. Where's that sevenfoot brunette beauty that can act and is in good enough shape to make me think she can throw a truck. Which brings me to another issue.

If James Cameron's Avatar can be a box office smash, and is almost entirely CGI, why can't we get some CGI/animated love on the box office comic movie side. It was a fairly neato world they created but overall I felt it was a pretty bland movie, I'll spare the smurfs/dances with wolves cliches since my first thought was Fern Gully anyway...

I think comic movies, especially DC ones, need some more love in the animated, cg department. They've dones some great ones, but I want to see it with a box office release/budget.

See: Batman and the Red Hood, Superman - Doomsday, Hulk vs Wolverine, Hulk vs Thor.

On a side note, can anyone think of a more lucky casting break than marvel nabbing RDJ as Stark. It's the part he was born to play I swear.

 

[Vault Citizen]

The origin described in the video is the original one from Marston's original run on the title, a lot of the details have since changed. Stephen Hawking couldn't keep functional track of DC history, at this point

Hippolyta time-traveling to the 40s was a late-90s retcon from a John Byrne book to patch fix the continuity hole left by WW's post-Crisis reboot in the mid-80s, subsequently undone by Infinite Crisis bringing back the Multiverse and then undone again by the current Stracyzinski series (which is probably going to "erase itself" at the conclusion.) Likewise, the bracelets being just another weapon from the gods is from the same George Perez reboot, post-Crisis.

Still its not her actual story, im a stickler for comic character history



Still, post crisis is like a long time ago. I mean if your doing a video for a web magazine do your freakin research.

I've watched the video again and he makes it pretty clear that as he is not talking about the history of the character as it stands today but about the character as envisioned by the original creator.

Your complaint about him not discussing the updated origin is therefore moot.