The Diana Princes’ Diaries

WONDER WEDNESDAY

On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.

Man, General Douglas MacArthur’s a dick.

Wonder Woman #237, DC Comics, November 1977.

As you may recall, in the last issue, Wonder Woman’s unbreakable bracelets got cracked by some Nazi saboteur’s vibro-boots, which is a problem because without their bracelets Amazons always fly into berserker rages. (I’m sure there must be some way in which that’s not sexist at all, but it escapes me.) This issue begins with her doing some DIY repairs at her mom’s house, because only Queen Hippolyte’s “atomic-stoked furnace” burns hot enough to forge Amazonium. But just like a college student doing her laundry at her mom’s, once she’s done her thing she’s out of there. She’s got things to do, man!

It still feels so wrong to see the Earth-2 Hippolyte with blond hair.

But as soon as she gets back to Washington and switches back to her Diana Prince secret identity, who does she find lying in wait for her but….Diana Prince! With a gun! And no, this isn’t some crazy imposter or robot duplicate. This is the real Diana Prince!

You see, when Princess Diana of Paradise Island came to save Man’s World for itself, she didn’t just put on some glasses and come up with the fantastically uncreative alias of Diana Prince. No, she just happened to find someone who looked exactly like her and stole her identity, giving the other Diana some money to get lost.

Well, it looks like Diana Prince has forgotten all about that—literally. All she knows is somebody’s posing as her in a sensitive position in military intelligence, so she must be a spy! So our Diana feels the need to show the mortal one how wrong she is by revealing that she’s Wonder Woman. Not only that, but she tells her whole life story, as a helpful recap of her origin for any new readers out there. I guess that’s why this story (by writer Gerry Conway and artist Jose Delbo) is called “The Secret Origin of Wonder Woman!”

Wonder Woman quoting Christian scripture is just bizarre.

The story is pretty much as we remember it, but there are some odd moments in the banter, such as Wondy spouting Christian sentiments in the middle of telling how she was given life by the Greek gods, or Diana Prince’s out-of-nowhere attempt to use Yiddish: “That’s really chutzpah, Wonder Woman!”

Meanwhile there’s some kind of were-beast out there that keeps talking about “this humble one” and “honorable opponents.” This being a 1970s comic book (albeit one set in the 1940s), you know what that means: It’s going to turn out to be an Asian were-beast.

Well, at least he kills ’em polite-like.

And apparently this shapeshifter doesn’t limit himself to clawed beasts. He attacks a cop as some kind of giant mantis thing (as seen on the cover), and even disguises himself as a woman worker in a munitions factory, while lying in wait for his actual prey: General Douglas MacArthur, commander of US forces in the Pacific! Diana had better wrap up her life story and go stop him!

As it happens, she’s just gotten to the point in her story where she explains how she wound up taking Diana Prince’s place when the giant mantis-man bursts through a nearby fence to attack MacArthur. So now that she’s finally refreshed the real Diana’s memory, she has to brainwash her into forgetting the whole thing again, so as not to mess up this sweet deal of being so near her man…er, I mean for national security. Anyway, it’s probably a good idea considering what happened last time Diana Prince returned.

Glad Mantis-Man got the memo about green creatures having to wear purple pants.

As soon as Wondy engages the shapeshifter in combat, he feels it only polite to introduce himself. He’s a Japanese assassin named Kung, and all these transformations aren’t some special mutation or anything—it’s just that he’s such a good martial artist that he knows how to change into animals the way lesser masters only assume their poses. Okayyyy. Oh, and he has a big tajitu (you know, the yin/yang symbol) on his chest. This is Kung’s first appearance but by no means the last, as he’d turn up now and then in other World War II-set stories.

Meanwhile, the fight’s not over, because Kung turns into some kind of panther-man to fight Wondy to the death, but this issue is over, so that’ll just have to wait. And what’s Kung’s story, anyway? We’ll have to wait for that too. Next issue: Well, looks like there’s going to be some Orientalism and a whole lot of “humble,” “honorable” and “ancestors,” I can tell you that much.