Wonder Woman Rebirth: The God-Sized Elephant In the Room
Ok I was a little wrong. We have the Wonder Woman Annual coming out today, and then TWO more issues of Greg Rucka's Wonder Woman run left. Not just one, which is good, because there is a LOT to wrap up and explain before he leaves this title for the foreseeable future.
First of all, I want to mention how utterly BRILLIANT this run on Wonder Woman has been. Seriously, the whole creative team on this book, from writers, to artists, to colorists, letterers, to editors and assistant editors should take a bow and be VERY proud of their work here. In a recent interview, Greg Rucka said that everyone was giving 100%, and it really, really SHOWS. I just really hope to Olympus that this amount of passion and dedication on the title remains. Especially with whomever is going to be the new permanent writer and artist(s) after Shea Fontana's five issue run.
Let's get to it. I have to say how brilliant Ruckas has been at bringing Golden Age themes to the book with a modern twist. Casting Veronica Cale as a modern-day Baroness Paula von Gunther is inspired. Turning the focus of the gods onto mostly Ares and Aphrodite calls back to the Golden Age, but he's also added some modern-day spices to the mix. It's not just Aphrodite acting on her own to benefit the Amazons, it's other gods too, like in the Perez run. Ares, war, has been chained - for who knows how long, and imprisoned on Themiscyra. Instead of Ares, we've actually been dealing with his two sons acting in his name (and anagram - the Sear Group is an anagram of Ares), Deimos and Phobos, the gods of fear and terror. This is so unbelievably brilliant, because in today's world, it's not world wars that are the big problem - it's terrorism and fear-motivated bigotry. Terror and fear. As always, Wonder Woman's core values of love and wisdom are the true path to defeating these destructive forces, as we saw in issue #23, where she subdued terror and fear with love and truth in her wisdom.
Rucka has done some very interesting things with the gods in this run. Except for Deimos & Phobos, and Ares and Aphrodite, the gods have been portrayed through animal manifestations, especially in the Year One story drawn (masterfully) by Nicola Scott. Aphrodite has appeared frequently as a dove. Hera as a peacock and Athena as an owl, of course. We have a falcon, which is likely used to represent Artemis, goddess of the hunt. Demeter is mentioned, and the only animal that fits her is the grain-eating deer. Fleet-footed Hermes is represented by a turtle...ok, but Rucka didn't do that one, that symbolism has been around before this story. That's from mythology. Apparently, the ancient Greeks thought a lot more of the turtle's speed than our modern stories do. And Hephaestus is represented by the mouse. These sum up the Patrons that have been shown to help Diana and grant her powers. Interesting that Hephaestus should be chosen, especially in light of his role in the Azzarello run of not being especialy warm and involved in the raising of boys who were the products of "Amazon" rape runs on ships to further the Amazon population. Rucka is kind of redeeming Hephaestus here. It is Hephaestus who provides the chains that bind Ares.
So far, we learned that Steve Trevor was involved in a mission (an unsuccessful one) to combat the Sear group when his plane was allowed to crash on Themiscyra. What we don't know is why the gods allowed Steve's plane to crash. Which gods were involved in allowing the plane to crash, and why at that time? Was it the advancements that the Sear Group was making - advancements of Deimos and Phobos?
Diana comes to Man's World, and the Patrons grant her special powers while she is there. She manages to thwart Deimos & Phobos' attempts to learn how to get to Themiscyra for the purpose of either freeing their father to serve him or murder him and take his place. Those two have been thwarted, but there are still some BIG burning questions left that were asked in the very first issue of Rucka's Rebirth run. Diana was not allowed to learn the location of Themiscyra when she left her home, yet the gods worried that she would learn the location, and thus it was decided that she would be lead to believe that she had found the way home. A fake Themiscyra was created with a colder, blond Hippolyta and more aggressive Amazons who went on rape runs on ships at sea to propogate the Amazon population. WHO created this fake Themiscyra? Which of the gods were involved in this abomination - that wasn't Deimos and Phobos???
And thus we come to the God-Sized Elephant in the room. The one BIG NAME god who hasn't been mentioned since Rucka's first Rebirth Special issue: Zeus. He's been conspicuously absent in the title - especially for when the whole of the New 52 Wonder Woman's existence centered around him. He was the very reason for her powers and her "specialness" among the Amazons. Pretty much all of her adventures were basically a result of Zeus' actions, with him incarnating as baby Zeke, and Hera's jealousy over his affair with blond Hippolyta, and the First Born and all that other nonsense. It's all a result of Zeus's plans and actions, and Diana being a pawn of the gods throughout, not a real character of agency. And yet, we know in Rebirth that the raven haired Hippolyta is the TRUE Hippolyta that Diana grew up with, that she was sculpted from clay and brought to life by the gods. We've seen Diana and Steve visit the fake Themiscyra with cold blond Hippolyta and rape-y Amazons, and have learned it's not real and all a lie.
I believe Zeus is the one behind it. Look at the cover of Wonder Woman Rebirth # 1, and see him behind it all, looking like an evil villain in an issue he doesn't even appear in or is mentioned in. In fact, outside of the Wonder Woman Rebirth Special, I don't think he's mentioned at all in Rucka's run.
I hope this is the direction the story is going in. Mild spoiler for the Wonder Woman movie Amazon's origin.................in the movie, it is Zeus who creates the Amazons (at least, according to articles that I've read), and in Rucka's comic, the Amazons are the daughters of Harmonia and Ares. I'm assuming that Harmonia is another name being used for Aphrodite. The Amazons were created in order to keep Ares locked away - in peace. Rucka's run has been about turning the mythology out in a new way, examining it through a modern, socially aware lens, and finding what really worked best in Marston's approach to the gods and his values he wanted to imbue Wonder Woman with. Zeus is the king of gods, the god of kings. He is literally the god of "I am better than everyone else." He is the god of patriarchy, of authoritarianism and autocracy - and complete contrast to the Amazon's society as we were shown it working in the Year One story. As western readers in a society heavily influenced by Judeo-Christian narratives, Zeus is usually portrayed through the lens of a somewhat benevolent father figure. We're taught to see the "Jehovah" in him. He's the head Patriarch, so he MUST be good - and deserves to be there, leading everyone and making decisions about what is best for us.
But Rucka, I believe, sees Zeus for what he really is - and what he has portrayed as being in comics when you really think about it. He's a rapist. An abuser of power and authority. He uses humans as pawns and tools and receptacles of his various passions, whether they consent or not, whether they "deserve" it or not. When it comes down to it, Zeus is really the god of misogyny. Look at how he treats Hera throughout the myths - as a mere trophy wife, but completely devalues her worth as a person and her autonomy. Even Hera, to Zeus, is just an object to be won and control and dominate. The Azzarello run was rife with Patriarchy. Zeus as the father of Wonder Woman, instead of being created by a mother and brought to life by a (female) goddess. Ares as the mentor of young Diana who trains her from childhood. Diana, eventually becoming the God of War. Diana carrying a sword around - which you noticed, except the cover of Wonder Woman Rebirth #1, is also conspiculously absent in Rucka's run. (Because Wonder Woman is FAR more impressive when she's able to do what she does without a phallic sword, and instead relies on items of yonic symbolism.) In the Wonder Woman Rebirth Special, she crushes the so-called helmet of Ares, and says that she shouldn't be able to do that. Of course, it wasn't really Ares. Ares has been imprisoned since before she was born. All of her interaction with the gods since the New 52 period is cast as a lie and a sham.
If there is a villain yet to be revealed, one who could create a whole fabrication of Themiscyra with twisted values rooted in patriarchal aggression (And the raping! Zeus always loved a good raping!), I posit that the likeliest candidate is the head of Olympus himself, Zeus, and really, one of the gods who really should be looked at as Wonder Woman's enemy, considering that his values are diametrically opposed to Diana's. Wonder Woman challenging the authoritarianism of Olympus, truly freeing herself from the cumbersome gods of these stories, that's a direction I would love to see this title take. I want a Wonder Woman who challenges Patriarchy and traditions that keep humanity unequal. I want a Wonder Woman who is a true free agent in Man's World, showing Man's World a better way (because she comes from a society that truly is better - not just one based on Olympian "values" of do what I say, not what I do), not just a Wonder Woman who is a sort of mythological janitor, cleaning up the mess of whatever boring mythological beast or problem is "unleashed" on Man's World by gods who aren't really even worshipped any more. I want Wonder Woman to continue with its character-focused storytelling who isn't a mere pawn of the gods. But first, she's finally got to cut the cord and see the head of Olympus for what he really is. And he's not good. He's not what Wonder Woman really stands for.