Meet the B-Sides
WONDER WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
Lose Your Illusion
WONDER WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
The Twelve Labors of Wonder Woman continue, as she earns her way back into Justice League membership by having various Leaguers monitor her adventures and judge whether or not she’s worthy to return. Last issue Black Canary was on Wonder Woman monitoring duty, and this time it’s her boyfriend Green Arrow’s turn. Read more
I’m Henry VIII, I Am
WONDER WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
The Origin of Everything
WONDER WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
Having exhausted the ostensibly original content in Wonder Woman #211
last week (actually slightly tweaked and reillustrated stories from the late 1940s), we turn our attention to the wealth of reprinted material that filled out that issue’s 100 pages. Most, but not quite all, of these stories boil down to “How Wonder Woman got” this or that item associated with her, and many of those stories boil down to young Diana being assigned three daring feats to perform to prove her worthiness. But enough generalizations—let’s take a look at the stories! All of these were written by Robert Kanigher during his 21-year original run as writer-editor of Wonder Woman, from creator William Moulton Marston’s death in 1947 up until the start of the “mod” era in 1968. Read more
Twice Told Tales
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
WONDER WEDNESDAY
It seems like we just had the end of an era, but here we are at the end of another one. When DC abruptly decided to call it quits on the Emma Peel-like, fully human “mod” Wonder Woman of the late ’60s and early ’70s, longtime old-timey WW writer Robert Kanigher was put back in charge. After hastily disposing of Diana’s erstwhile supporting cast, he quickly gave her the powers and costume back, wiped her memory of the “mod” years, and put her back into the mousy Diana Prince secret identity. But then he promptly ignored the new status quo he’d set up to just retell his own stories from the 1940s, with new art by Ric Estrada. In the letters pages he made it pretty clear that this was just the way it was going to be, and when people asked if WW was going to rejoin the Justice League, his answer was a clear no.
The Littlest Amazon
WONDER WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
We now continue with our look at the weird period in the mid-1970s when writer/editor Robert Kanigher
reclaimed control of the Wonder Woman comic book after the ill-fated “mod” experiment of a nonsuperpowered Wonder Woman. Kanigher not only went right back to basics with the old powers, costume and secret identity, but he even started retelling his own stories from the late 1940s, with very slightly updated (but still retro by ’70s standards) art by Ric Estrada. Read more
Winter Wonder Woman
WONDER WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
It’s that time again. ’Tis the season to dig up another one of Wonder Woman’s very special Christmas stories from the 1940s, by Wonder Woman creators William Moulton Marston and H.G. Peter. This one’s from 1945’s Sensation Comics #38, reprinted in the hardbound Wonder Woman Archives vol. 5.
Till Kanga Come
WONDER WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
Wonder Wall of China
WONDER WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
Now that Robert Kanigher was back in charge after the
sudden end of the mod Wonder Woman experiment, the first thing he did was restore the old status quo: star-spangled outfit, magic lasso, invisible jet, the works. He also gave her a new job as a guide at the UN, nameless Asian and African-American roommates, and even a long-lost black sister. But no sooner did he set all that up than he abruptly wiped away even that little bit of newness and started presenting the same style of stories he used to write when he took over the Wonder Woman series in the late 1940s, after the death of creator William Moulton Marston. Suddenly Wonder Woman was the most old-fashioned comic that DC was putting out. Read more
That Spyin’ Lion
WONDER WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I look at various chapters in Wonder Woman’s history. Click here for previous installments.
Just a quick one this week—too busy with other stuff. I have to say, too, that DC isn’t making it easy for me to write happy shiny things about its (and comicdom as a whole’s) most prominent superheroine when the company itself keeps making dick moves that look and quack a lot like misogyny.
There’s only so many times I can read about the latest DC debacle or the ongoing frustration with the lack of a Wonder Woman movie before I start to feel pretty glum in my fandom. And sure, I can write angry, but that’s really not where I want to be.
So! It’s time to hop in the wayback machine and head way, way back to 1943. Let’s take a look at the very last story in Wonder Woman Archives vol. 2: “The Talking Lion.”
