Diana Prince: Wonder Woman Vol. 1
Originally published at tansyrr.com. You can comment here or there.
I heard about these comics from somewhere and snapped up the first collected volume when I found it in my local library. In 1968, Wonder Woman underwent a major reinvention. All of the elements essential to her character - her powers, costume, and chisel-chinned love interest Steve Trevor, were removed so that Diana could go through a Carnaby Street makeover. Equipped with new martial arts skills, a rugged private eye sidekick, an elderly Chinese mentor and the very latest in hip and groovy outfits, Diana Prince became a new kind of force to be reckoned with.
It’s a little bizarre to see such an iconic character plunged so specifically into the pop culture of the Swinging Sixties. You would be forgiven for thinking these comics were actually created in the 90’s as an Austin Powers style spoof, given how laden they are with cliches of the time period. There are nightclubs full of hip cats, London boutiques full of groovy threads, and people say things like “you better bug out, doll… the fuzz frowns on chicks cruisin’ in this pad solo” entirely without irony.
I’m a big fan of the 60’s adventure series that these are blatantly trying to evoke, though, and it was great fun to pick out those elements, and to see what those creating the comic were trying so hard to do. At the heart of it, there is Diana, a powerful and sexy female action hero, and it was interesting to see such a different side to her. I certainly wasn’t sorry to see her removed from the old “plain, bespectacled Diana sighs wistfully as Steve overlooks her for hot Wonder Woman” format that so drove me batty about the classic Wonder Woman set up, particularly in the TV series.
But. Um.
Well, it wouldn’t be Wonder Woman without being extremely problematic from a political point of view, right? Sad, but true. In between Diana’s powerful poses and Emma Peel-style fight scenes, she regularly descends into tears and self-doubt, usually to do with her angst about Steve Trevor, and/or the new men in her life: rugged private eye Tim Trench and moneybags playboy Reggie Hyde-White. Considering that the story is supposed be about an immortal, powerful woman learning to deal with human frailty, I could definitely have done without quite so much emphasis on how much of a slave she is to her emotions, and the wailing about womanly weaknesses.
Add to this the fact that Diana’s new mentor, who teaches her advanced martial arts in a matter of weeks, is a blind Chinese man called I Ching who fulfils just about every cliche of an elderly Chinese mentor and… well, yes. It’s hard to find a page of text that doesn’t produce a wince or two.
There are some moments of sheer awesome. I did enjoy Diana’s Emma Peelness and especially her glam outfits, even if I found myself saying “Really? Shopping, now? Again? Seriously?” more than once. I also very much enjoyed the final battle in which Diana is drawn back into the world of the Amazons, and goes to war - still as a human - against her grandfather Ares, with the Valkyries at her back. There was a lot of painful misogyny to struggle through to get to the good bits. I’m interested enough to read the follow up volume to see how it all turns out, but I’m hoping for more than this first volume delivers.