First Strike: The Invasion! Podcast Ep.9: Wonder Woman #25

Bass and Siskoid cover Wonder Woman #25, the reverse coin of the events in Fiji seen in Justice League International #22 just a couple of episodes ago. Thanagarians and Khunds and Amazons, oh my!

Listen to Episode 9 below (the usual filthy filthy language warnings apply), or subscribe to First Strike: The Invasion! Podcast on iTunes!

Relevant images and further credits at: First Strike ep.9 Supplemental

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49 responses to “First Strike: The Invasion! Podcast Ep.9: Wonder Woman #25

  1. Great discussion on Wonder Woman! The Invasion tie-in discussion was good, but I really enjoyed the thoughtful examination of Diana’s history. Fantastic stuff fellas!

    Chris

  2. When Bass mentions that Wonder Woman is part of the “Trinity” at DC, I smirk at the common, idealistic sentiment. I’ve championed the concept myself, despite its being something of a modern invention. When Matt Wagner used that term for a mini-series in 2003, it still felt odd and unfamiliar.

    From her very beginning, published at Harry Donnenfeld’s side company, created by a prospective Frederick Wertham who was lured into the fold with the promise of creating a philosophically educational heroine, Wonder Woman has been adjunct to the DC Universe. The book was highly successful quasi-porn bondage fantasy that bridges the gap between little girls and randy servicemen (that didn’t come out right.) Once All-American was folded into National and the witch hunts began, I’m confident Jack Liebowitz was embarrassed by the title and would just as soon have cancelled it. However, Marston had a rights reversion clause in his contract, and DC would be damned if they allowed one of their assets to slip away.

    Let’s not forget that Wonder Woman has never had her own cartoon, only held one popular TV show forty years ago that wasn’t revived despite solid ratings, and made her cinematic debut in a cameo on her 74th anniversary. Her book hasn’t sold well since the Golden Age, and if DC’s rights weren’t tied to its publication until sometime in the 1990s, she might have slipped away into obscurity. My understanding is that DC finally bought out the Marston stake, and she’s been a titan of merchandising for the company, so it’s only in the last couple decades that she wasn’t the most notable red-headed stepchild of comics. Hence Superman, Batman, and Robin were DC’s World’s Finest trio across all media and licensing until just the last few years. Remember, Robin has appeared in four movies, the most recent being The Dark Knight Rises (if you don’t count deleted scenes and his costume being on display in Dawn of Justice.) Robin still co-stars in most Batman cartoons, and is the lead on Titans shows. Diana just now branched out of Justice League/Super Friends appearances in Super Hero Girls, a glorified web series whose title challenges the English language.

    End Comment Part 1.

    1. You’re unfortunately correct, Frank. The Trinity is a concept that only really exists because Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman were the 3 biggest DC stars to survive the interregnum between the Golden and Silver Ages unimpeded. The weekly Trinity series by Busiek and Bagley (principally) made a good case for the trio’s thematic place in superhero comics. But yes, Diana has hardly known the success the other two have had, which is a damn shame.

      Which is part and parcel of why I like her. I’m a sucker for underdogs and under-estimated/loved superheroes.

      1. “Surviving the Golden Age” may have played into the notion of the Trinity in fandom, but I meant from a practical, publisher initiative sense. If George Perez hadn’t volunteered to take her on in 1987, we’d have probably had a dire, perfunctory Post-Crisis volume by Greg Potter and whoever they could rope into doing the art. George cared. DC Comics, their talent, and their fans did not. Only when Mike Deodato Jr. showed that the book could be sold did DC put any real effort into the title again. Even still, it didn’t become a clear imperative until the third volume for DC to make something out of Wonder Woman as a comic book, foreseeing the need to properly back comics’ most famous heroine as they looked to broader audiences and multimedia representation. Hence, popularizing the concept of the trinity as a brand through regular grouping of those specific three characters in the 21st century, including the maxi-series, Superman/Wonder Woman, Wonder Girl/Superboy, and a newfound wealth of cross-pollination with the Batman Family.

          1. Well I liked it. I think many were by then tired of weekly comics, but then I was out of comics during 52 and skipped Countdown, so that didn’t play into my appreciation of it.

  3. Fun episode, fellas.

    I remain resistant to the whole INVASION! crossover, but I’m getting a decent sense of it thanks to the show. You’re performing a public service!

    1. That’s why we make it a point of talking about the various characters/titles of the era, in addition to the the Invasion story. Thanks Rob.

  4. This is my opinion, so take it or leave it.

    If you have a Wonder Woman, in her classic “bathing suit” who is bending over at the waist towards the reader, this can be handled in 2 ways.

    Good way: Hand out with compassionate look on her face, asking “How can I help?”

    Bad way: Squeezing her breasts together and giving you a “Come hither” look.

    George Perez is the master of the good way of handling it, which is why she was sexy but never sexual.

    1. Nice comment Gene and since we love George Perez’s run on the series, I can confidently say Ruth and I both agree completely!

  5. Great job, Canadians! WW has always been a favorite of mine, and it’s a treat to hear my favorite era of hers being reviewed. I don’t think she was ever written as well as she was during Pérez’s and Messner-Loeb’s eras.

    But back to Invasion! I continue to love this series and it’s tie-ins. Thanks for covering them, fellas.

    Sloan rules!

  6. While I like the Simone and Rucka runs, I really enjoyed the New 52 Azzarello run. It’s one of the few new 52 books that was both good and something that could not have been done without the flashpoint reboot, a sort of Eddie Campbell’s Bacchus-inspired “what if Wonder Woman had been made a Vertigo book back in the 90s” approach, although the fact that it bore almost no resemblance or relationship whatsover apart from the shared name to what has happening with the character in the JLA and Superman/Wonder Woman books was a bit odd considering the goals of the reboot in the first place. I didn’t have a problem with the length of the story, although I’d say it was a big mistake for the next writer to have their plots continue so directly out of it.

    1. You guys went a lot more deep or earnest than I expected on WW. It’s appreciated.

      I’ve bought just about all the Wonder Woman runs post Crisis, and for me my favourite is the Azzarello/Chiang.

      Probably the best of Rucka’s efforts was The Hiketaia graphic novel. No one can complain about the JG Jones art on that. I believe it has just returned or is about to return to print. Unfortunately the thing that eroded the quality of the Rucka run was his premature departure from the title after editorial interference. Infinite Crisis truncated his wrapping of the Diana kills Maxwell Lord plot which was intended to have Diana on trial and refusing Bruce and Clark’s offers to break her out.

      1. I hated the Hikky book, the idea that WW would tell everyone else to go to hell, foreswear all her alliances because some stranger sicced a god-vow on her… horrible. She’s Wonder Woman, not a good soldier who does anything the boss tells her to because she signed a contract.

  7. Completely forgot about Azzarello and Chiang’s run. I loved that one too.

    Drew Johnson drew a beautiful book, though. So did Dodson and Lopresti. I was just not big on the writing during that time.

  8. Great episode.

    I am definitely a Wonder Woman fan. You can tell by the trades on the shelf and the smattering of runs I have in my collection. I want to love Wonder Woman but only a few have captured her character the way I want. So I have samples of many creators but extended runs of only a few. You have to balance the ‘warrior’ Diana, armed with sword and shield with the one preaching peace and love. The New 52 and prior has been way too stabby for me. All DC has known recently is the warrior. Diana deserves more. I am hoping the Rucka Rebirth book balances things out.

    I like the Messner-Loeb run and have the Deodato issues. This is probably the most sexualized run that I own with Deodato really laying it on thick. But the story and Artemis’ arc was interesting.

    I liked the Rucka run a lot. I liked Diana as ambassador, trying to preach peace and loving submission first, striking with her fists second. I liked Drew Johnson’s art where Diana really looked Mediterranean. I liked Rucka’s updated take on the gods. Ares as God of Discord. Athena as God of Knowledge, armed with a laptop and in her sharp business suit. While I don’t love Veronica Cale as a foe, I thought she was adequate.

    And I loved most of Simone’s run. It was fun. It felt like a complete Diana. I loved the Lopresti art. I looovvvved the End of the Earth arc which brought back some of my favorite DC characters – Beowulf (!!!!), Stalker, and Claw. I thought the team-ups with Black Canary and Power Girl were wonderful. I thought Simone lost her way a bit with the Olympian and Genocide. But still that was a solid run.

    I thought the Azzarello/Chiang run was different and sort of an Elseworlds take. Enjoyable if, as you say, overly long. And that Diana did not jibe with the one in Superman/Wonder Woman or Justice League. So things felt unfortunately discordant.

    One thing I will say is that, in the recent years, DC has put some of the best artists on Wonder Woman’s covers. Brian Bolland. Adam Hughes. JG Jones. Just incredible.

    1. Hi Anj!

      Thanks for the reminder about the Messner-Loeb run. I haven’t read it in years, but usually like his stuff, so I’ll have to pull it out for a reread.

  9. It was an interesting observation that the comic industry can be perceived as left-leaning. Many years ago, I was reading an interview with Tim Truman where he talked about not being comfortable with super-heroes because the concept is inherently fascistic, which drove his interpretation of Hawkworld (even though his Katar Hol was the least right wing of them all.) Despite mostly being produced by impoverished New York minorities, super-heroes were still by a vast majority white male vigilantes battling crime with physical force in a rather violent fashion. When non-whites appeared, they were usually gross caricatures or demonized, as were any philosophies outside democratic capitalism (with massive support for what Eisenhower would dub “the military-industrialist complex.” Nothing bad ever came out of those bedfellows!) Before The New Deal and The Southern Strategy, republicans were the party of The Great Emancipator and democrats were the corrupt racists. The Silver Age is also flush with deputized super-WASPs and their occasional token colored man-servants defending the status quo against bank robbers and communists, an obvious priority of the working man.

    Between the coming of Camelot and the crumbling of The Great Society, there was both a surge in comic book readership and liberal values among the nation’s youth, whose eyes Stan Lee actively and quite successfully campaigned to capture. Aside from embracing camp in the mid-60s, most every company but Marvel hadn’t changed a bit across the Silver Age, which defaulted them into tools of “The Man” promoting a social ethos left behind amidst cultural revolution. Even Marvel Comics were still about idealistic young white men beating up compromised older white men, but they couched their sociopolitical Oedipus plays in the progressive terms of the times. The main difference between Marvel and everyone else was that they were systemically unafraid of acknowledging that other races existed with some measure of equality that could even be heroes themselves, and were also willing to graze societal concerns the more puritanical elements of the readership deemed unfit for the idyllic four color world. Marvel’s was the more inclusive and profitable formula, so to varying degrees of aptitude and authenticity, everyone tried to be more like Marvel, which relative to everyone else were leftist (but in the overall social context, centrist.)

    Shifting demographics and increasing globalization have radicalized the Republican Party over the past forty-odd years, but despite what the Trumpkins might lead folks to believe, the true silent majority are decent, tolerant, compassionate human beings. I used to be a republican before a massive shift in perspective about fifteen years ago, and m’boy Illegal Machine still is one. Comics in general are by and large apolitical, and unless you buy into stereotypes, it isn’t hard for people of any political persuasion to find themselves in their favored super-heroes. I personally could never understand how folks could see Captain America as anything other than a Roosevelt democrat (even when I was a pro-gun red stater,) but I just recently read a screed about his “obviously” being a Randian libertarian. Ooooo-kay. Some heroes are more obviously of a certain bent, with Iron Man balancing precariously on the fence despite actually being a military-industrialist, The Punisher being unambiguously on the right, and Guy Gardner being so obnoxiously gung-ho that he could only be a satire of gonzo conservatism. Ultimately I agree with Tim Truman about super-heroes being fascistic, but they’re also empowerment fantasies for people of all walks of life. Despite favoring our better angels, the majority of people would like to see Wonder Woman slap Donald Trump across his stupid orange face, and that cover would be huge; it would be the best seller.

    End Comment Part 2

    1. As a moderately conservative person of a traditional religious faith, I don’t expect my views to be represented well in most media. Does it annoy me when people with my general views are mocked, misrepresented, or just outright dismissed? Sure. But I’ve learned to treat these situations the way I treat my colleagues at faculty meetings … to just ignore them as much as I can, and not take them too seriously when I can’t ignore them. Even when the comments get personal.

      Like the time a podcaster (whom I’ve done shows with, before and since) posted on Facebook that a celebrity with views pretty similar to mine should just kill themselves, pretty much for expressing views pretty similar to mine. Bummer? Yes. Did it anger me for a while? Sure. Did I get over it? Of course.

      So for me, it’s a matter of expectation and of perspective. If the worse thing that happens to me in a day is that my political, social or religious views are not supported 100% in a comic book, or on a TV show, or in my Facebook feed or a comment thread … then I’ve had a pretty good day!

      1. As much to you as to Frank…

        There’s nothing wrong with being a conservative or a person of faith. It’s just that sometimes, the only ones that get any media attention are at such an extreme, it’s not only easy, but desirable to dismiss them. The same is true of leftist caricatures (those filthy hippies). The truth is, a person can be on the right on some issues, on the left on others (as they are only “technically” on either side). I consider myself a secular humanist and a socialist (think Star Trek’s utopia and that’s kind of it), but I find I have many disagreements with traditional leftists when it comes to unions, drugs, etc. Where we stand on the spectrum is due to upbringing (either embracing or rejecting it); how we interpret those values is where things may get sticky, but then it becomes about being good or bad, not on the right or the left.

        And Frank is completely right in his history lesson, of course. The only thing I can really say is that we see what we want to see in these symbols. For me, the superhero ideal seems liberal. For someone else, it may seem conservative. Both sides (as if there could only be two sides to anything) have their values, and we might perceive them both (and embrace both as our own) in that idea. That’s my take-away anyway.

        1. This discussion leads to a pet peeve of mine: the influx of east coast liberal Marvel Zombie fanpros into the industry in the 1970s, alienating conservative readers. Quality artwork flourished in that decade via the influence of the original sequential panel masters still being alive and in print combining with broader access to classical and contemporary “proper” artists. Unfortunately, mainstream scripters were so indebted to a single template, Stan Lee’s, that his specific sensibilities were imposed on everything. The melodrama, the emotional immaturity, needlessly protracted plotting, major inexplicable changes in persona, and naked opportunistic quasi-hip pandering to the zeitgeist, in virtually every comic, all at once. Coupled with a sad, misguided appropriation of the superficial quirks of comix and shrill liberalism perhaps best exemplified by period Denny O’Neill, I think the bent created a hostile reading environment for conservatives that remains to thus day.

          Not only did comics read as “left only,” but the emphasis on newer, “enlightened” creators also saw most of the old guard openly mocked and marginalized. Is it any wonder Steve Ditko isolated himself in an apartment and cranked out objectivism-flavored works to stem the tide as best he could? Even as the nation itself shifted right in the 1980s, comics remained doggedly left of center, chafing and preaching at its conservative readers.

          To this day, there isn’t really a safe space to be right wing. The few openly conservative creators have been driven out with torches and pitchforks, with even the once revered Frank Miller now treated as a punchline. Is it any wonder that the size of the comic book audience continues to shrink, as we’ve not only pushed out roughly 50% (more?) of the potential readership most in sync with the core principles of super-hero comics, but also been very slow to embrace anyone else outside of white middle class Judeo-Christian democratic centrists? That a rather narrow target audience.

          1. A narrow political point of view as the reason for comics’ decline? Interesting. Would you say the movies are doing well because they lean more to the right? (Superheroes in more paramilitary roles – though again, Cap’s speech about freedom/fear in Winter Soldier is a leftist high point – Stark as capitalist hero, etc.)

            The irony either way, of course, is that regardless of story content, the Big 2 are companies owned by megacorporations whose business philosophies are de facto right-wing. I don’t think conservative writers are being “driven away” so much as it’s the wingnuts spewing hate who are being called out on their bull (can’t name a comics creator here, but Orson Scott Card is my example, though Chuck Dixon’s Wall Street Journal article is probably what you evoke, and I thought his argument was quite a bit silly). A guy like Nathan Edmondson has been having a productive career, for example, so let’s not call mainstream comics a conservative dead zone exactly. At the same time, the Big 2 have had the hardest time being equal opportunity employers (a leftist ideal), again, no matter how much they’ve tried (full or half-heartedly) to provide more diversity in content.

            My conclusion is this: Most comics’ content is values-driven, but not partisan. You’ll see what you want to see. Example: A righty might see the Punisher as a validation of gun culture, a hard stance on crime, etc. A lefty might enjoy the same comics as an ironic condemnation of the same. This stuff is happening in our heads as much as it is on the page.

          2. Super-hero movies have such a confusing or vague political bent that viewers can project their values onto the heroes with a single scripter’s voice telling them what to think. I still can’t tell you whether the Nolan Dark Knight trilogy was pro-Patriot Act/warrant-less surveillance/extraordinary rendition, or if Bruce Wayne’s repeated hobbling and ultimate retirement refuted his criticized-in-text methods. Is The Winter Soldier about a leftist hero fighting a fascistic terror cell embedded in positions of power, or is it about a libertarian preventing his corrupt government from infringing upon liberty? Listen to commentaries about Civil War debating whether Captain America or Iron Man was the hero/villain of the story, and which philosophies each represent. The only thing crystal clear is that they both favor African-American sidekicks with military backgrounds, which in itself can be claimed as a victory by both Black Lives Matter and I Have A Black Friend camps. Was American History X about a guy warped into becoming a skinhead and his struggle to restore his humanity, or about a race-traitor visited by tragedy at the hands of the people he sold himself out to? It can be read either way, and there’s an art to that, but it can also be seen as a muddle. Corporations prefer a muddle to maximize their market, so I have no illusions that partisanship will ever be explicit in the movies.

            As for the comics, my argument was that the majority of writers at the big two were overtly leftist in the 1970s, which bled into their stories and bled out readers and writers with more conservative views in the newsstand era. Also, in their time, our most revered and reported stories were of a liberal nature, especially the more gratuitous material at a time of fierce social conservatism and censorship. I think this was much less true going into the Chromium Age and following the broader cultural impact of Reagan era jingoism, but the damage had already been done. The Bronze Age market had been shaped by preachy liberal scripters, had abandoned the casual reader of non-superhero material, and had framed the market as too “mature” for younger readers. By alienating social conservatives, we contributed to the loss of the newsstand to the direct market ghetto. It wasn’t the only factor, and it wasn’t even a major factor, but I believe it was one of the thousand cuts that segregated sequential comic art periodicals from the greater culture.

            At the same time, I think a lot of comic artists are more conservative than they let on, always have been, and I think that fed into the writer versus artist strife. All those hours at a drawing table with the radio going in the background, all the A.M. talk radio filled with increasingly extreme right wing rhetoric. It’s no wonder Frank Miller went insane while being being emboldened by his iconic status to spew the most addle-brained garbage in recent years. I bet a lot more of the old guard think the same way than we want to know about. Combine that with decades of repression/resentment, an incoming generation of social liberals in all disciplines, and the unfiltered soapbox of social media… It’s no wonder we’ve had so many flashpoints in recent years, in both the pro and fan communities. And yes, expressing unpopular views has hurt careers in this industry. Chuck Dixon was a top writer before his move to CrossGen, but unlike Mark Waid and Ron Marz, he never seemed to get the same opportunity to get his career back on track. I remember having a heavy email exchange with Mike S. Miller after he came out against homosexuality back when he was drawing JLA, and despite holding an opposing view, I still felt bad for him as the work dried up quick. Bill Willingham’s one of the few open conservatives who gets by okay, but even with Fables, he never seemed to get top tier offers. I think there’s something to that. Comics and Hollywood are both small enough ponds that the talent can be punished for their views, even as the faceless puppet masters do whatever they please.

          3. I heard an interview a few months back with an artist who, among other things, had worked for a while with Bill Willingham on a property in the Fables-verse. The artist’s views were quite different from Willingham’s, but he came to respect him, and even feel a bit sorry for him. In the artist’s words, Willingham is working in an industry where 95% of his colleagues hate him just for believing that the world works a bit differently than they do … and that most of the 5% of who do agree with him have to do so quietly, because they aren’t at Willingham’s status and have careers to worry about, and can’t afford being blacklisted. Getting to know Willingham did not change this artist’s political bent, but it did seem to give him pause about the lack of partisan diversity in the industry.

          4. Not that comics need to push a political agenda. Most don’t. Part of the problem is viewing politics as entirely bipolar, as if it could really be summed up as Right/Left. It’s not the case. It creates a lack of discourse when it’s just about taking tribal sides, when each issue should actually be debated on its own. Why can’t you be pro-choice and a fiscal conservative? Or for the death penalty while also pro-marriage equality? Instead, we’ve decided that certain values and positions are associated with one tribe or the other, and you better toe the line boy, and believe everything your tribe believes in. Which really isn’t how people work, or ought to work. Our impressions of one tribe or the other are very often predicated on whatever leader or high profile spokesperson represents that tribe (and all its derived positions), which creates a false belief that all Tribesmen are the same. You have an election coming up, but I doubt all Conservatives are Trump and all Liberals are Clinton. And that’s where I get in trouble calling Conservatives out, because the leaders who get the most media coverage are clearly, to me, not on the Right, but on the side of Evil. And that’s not you, or anyone reading this. It’s the toxic Governor of Michigan, it’s Trump and his hatemongers, it’s people who are only in it for themselves and who wouldn’t know what public service means if it came up and bit them on the ass. The trap is thinking they represent anything but themselves, and I think that’s true of detractors and supporters alike.

            Back to comics, while I certainly don’t share Willingham’s politics, I did enjoy Fables quite a lot, and have recommended it to many. Just like, you know, I’m not a Puritan, but I sure do like Milton’s Paradise Lost. So politics isn’t a deal breaker for me when it comes to art. There’s the person and there’s the work, even if I ever made a value judgment on Willingham, which I don’t think I ever have.

            Oh man, is this discussion getting a little heady?

  10. Lots of interesting social commentary above. My sole contribution will be to say that an interesting review of the origins of Wonder Woman, the creators behind them and the history of feminism at that time. It is a very interesting read and one of the reviewers whose comments are included in the UK printing of the book is our own Martin Gray, so highly recommended!

    I started reading comics around the time that Perez was writing Wonder Woman but never got around to collecting the title (although I managed to get the Invasion issue in the back issues, probably because it featured the JLI). I started collecting the title in earnest when Eric Luke began writing (as it seemed a good jumping on point), and I continued with the series ever since, picking up some of Byrne and Messner-Loebs run. Of those runs, Gail Simone, Brian Azzarello and Greg Rucka’s were probably the best in my opinion, but there was no one story that really grabbed me from any of the runs. I also have a couple of the Showcase Presents Volumes from before the White Suit era and they were…….zany! (Egg Fu anyone?). I know the Perez run has been collected in a number of TPBs so will try and check those out when money permits!

    Great show Bass and Siskoid and look forward to the Superman episode – as I remember it, you may need a bit of a prologue to discuss the state Superman was in at the time of that issue!

    1. I love me some Egg Fu! Ever since I discovered the character in Ambush Bug #3!

      Yeah, we talked about Superman’s status in past episodes a little bit, but full low-down in the next ep!

  11. Hi Siskoid and Bass,

    Fabulous episode with your great focus on Wonder Woman in the latest episode. I’ve been a fan of the character my whole life. Lynda Carter’s version of the character is timeless. I watched the show every week with my mom and dad and really appreciated your comments on her performance and agree with the comparisons to Melissa Benoist’s Supergirl. It’ll be fantastic when Lynda Carter shows up on Supergirl next season.

    Of course, I watched Super Friends as a kid in the 1970s, but I also knew Wonder Woman from the comics thanks to a great hardback collection my father bought me as well as trips to the spinner rack at the local grocery store with my mom.

    I’ve tried out the comic most anytime a new creative team comes on board and agreed with most of your opinions about the best periods including Gale Simone’s and Greg Rucka’s run. I also liked the J. Michael Straczynski run and definitely enjoyed the George Perez run more than the two of you. In fact, I just reread the Perez run recently after getting the omnibus signed by him at a con last year. That omnibus included issues 1-24, so it was perfect to hear you cover issue 25 in your episode.

    I initially liked the New 52 reboot and found the storyline interesting at the beginning, but that story ran much too long and was a struggle to finish in the end.

    As with so many DC titles, Rebirth has given me new hope for Wonder Woman. Let’s hope it’s a nice long run.

    Darrin

    1. Thanks for the support, Darrin (and Ruth, I know you’re over his shoulder somewhere). I thought Phil Hester did his best to rescue JMS’ Wonder Woman using whatever cocktail napkins he left behind, but didn’t manage it quite as well as Roberson had his Superman. I’m sorry, but JMS has never written a comic I liked, either pretentious and dull, or reinventing the characters to suit his story, or both. Depowering Wonder Woman for the upteenth time didn’t do anything for me, and was even duller considering he was de-superheroing Superman in another book at the same time. In the end, he finished neither run and still got his credit on all the books. It bugs me, but I guess mileage can vary.

          1. It kills me that they collected his whole run in HC & tpb except for the last two issues which feature, well no one really important, except the DOOM PATROL and the freakin Legion of Substitute Heroes! Kills me!

  12. I give George Perez a lot of flack for changes he made to the Wonder Woman mythos, but he did help focus both the character and her readership for a steady twenty years. Despite some inter-tribal conflict, he portrayed the Amazons as admirable overall and gave us many “hero” characters beyond just Hippolyta (though no one has ever developed that character as thoroughly as he did.) Gail Simone shook me off her run by offering truly evil, murderous Amazons, and proved that just sharing a gender with Diana doesn’t make a (typically very cynical, sarcastic, and sordid) writer appropriate for the material. That said, Perez also stranded the Amazons on an Ancient Greek time capsule island flush with names no child or adult reader could pronounce without a background in that period. The cartoons rendered it alternately Them-is-care-ah and Thim-ys-Kyra, but we all know Paradise Island works.

    Perez also couldn’t sell Wonder Woman all that much better than anyone else, with average monthly units moved in his first year at 118,550, and in my experience it largely disappeared from the newsstand after the second year. Capital City Distribution reported monthly orders typically in the mid-20K range while Perez was still drawing it, but by the third year was down to the mid-teens and was barely in five figures by the end of his run. Perez’s WW plots were a bit dry and talky, which got worse once he took over scripting, but obviously a lot of this could be overlooked when he was still making the pretty pictures. Chris Marrinan is one of those artists that I can’t stand to look at for long periods of time, and I confess that my reading of the back half of Perez’s run is spotty because of it.

    Wonder Woman met Black Canary during her Post-Crisis debut in the Legends mini-series, and spoke admirably of her in Wonder Woman #8, “Time Passages,” a text heavy collection of journal entries made by characters from the book.

    It’s funny that you guys should reference men imposing their perception of women into the very minds of female characters through their possession of the narrative reins in most media just as it was announced that of the three credited writers on the Wonder Woman movie, none are women. I have no confidence in Zack Snyder, but I think Geoff Johns has some appreciation of the Amazing Amazon’s most iconic state (the TV show, basically,) and the greatest flaw in Allan Heinberg’s brief run was that he tried to pack too much of her career into it.

    I appreciated the use of the Idol-Head of Diabolu podcast promo and your willingness to allow my saltiness to flavor the comments on yet another episode (nice emphasis on the f-bomb!) I suspect you may have been looking for a Diana Prince Wonder Woman podcast promo that didn’t exist until you made me think I ought to make one. There’s only been three episodes across a year’s span, but I expect to ramp up production this fall ahead of her 75th anniversary truly kicking in.

    End Comments?

    1. I DID in fact look for a WW promo that didn’t exist, but I appreciate how the show’s irregularity hasn’t driven you to make one yet. I’m sure I’ll have call for one again though, so it won’t go to waste!

  13. I’m late to listening to the episode and still haven’t finished yet, but “you called on me so I came”…

    By this time in 1988 when WONDER WOMAN #25 was published, Black Canary had left the Justice League. She had been in Mike Grell’s GREEN ARROW for about a year, though her classic fishnet costume wasn’t prevalent in that series. Where the fishnets look came back was actually in Dinah’s ACTION COMICS WEEKLY appearances published around the same time as the INVASION! crossover.

    It’s a little weird that George Perez bothered to use Black Canary in this issue at all, but I’m glad he did, if for no other reason that it gave us a few small panels of Perez-rendered Canary Classic.

  14. Hola! I’m so late to the battlefield with this one – assume I’ve just escaped Starlag. Anyway, really great show. I remember being super-excited when the Potter-Pérez WW first appeared. I liked the Boston scenes and cast – I still miss Myndi Mayer – but fell asleep every time the Amazons showed up. And soooooo many gods. Even Cheetah suddenly became a mythological type. Also, what’s wrong with the Paradise Island name? Themyscira indeed. Dan Mishkin used that name for something else and I think Perez just liked it; I can never see it without hearing the TV cartoon pronunciation, ‘The Mascara’ – is that where Mac got the idea for a make-up range?

    Thank goodness for Bill Loebs and his space pirates and gangsters, what a hugely underrated run that was, pre-Mike Deodato – suddenly Diana has a personality, and a fun one at that.

    Anyway, I’ve detailed my feelings on the various creative teams that followed in many places over the years, so shall spare you. Suffice to say, whoever told John Byrne it was OK to draw Diana’s costume like THAT deserves to be sent to Reformation Island. Lazy arse.

    Oh, and Diana was created from clay – she was NOT a woman of clay.

  15. I am tardy to this party but wanted to comment on the episode anyway. Wonder Woman is a favorite character of mine that I haven’t read much of beyond the Post Crisis run, some of the Post Infinite Crisis stuff and the first three trades in the New 52. I’m a huge fan of the Perez and Rucka runs and feel like I was way too hard on Jiminez’s run when it was coming out so I really need to revisit that. Byrne’s run was fun and gave us the new Wonder Girl but I think other writers like Peter David and Geoff Johns did better work with her than Byrne. Byrne’s run is mired in so much weirdness that it’s hard to look back on it with any kind of nostalgic fondness even though I dug some of the concepts, like Hippolyta going back to the Golden Age. Rucka definitely emphasized the warrior aspect but I like that he made her different from the other members of the JLA. The Post Infinite Crisis stuff started out fun but then Amazons Attack happened and everything went to hell.

    I understand why people liked Azzarello’s run. I did not. I feel like he was thumbing his nose at Wonder Woman’s audience by having a scene where an Amazon tells Diana that the story of her being made from clay was something they told her as a child to hide the fact that her father was Zeus. It felt lik Azzarello was saying, “All that stuff with being made from clay and all that is silly and your childish for thinking anything else.” It felt like an HBO series not a super-hero book, which is something I expect from Azzarello who wrote two of the worst Superman related stories of the past seventy eight years and has a few Batman stories under his belt that I wouldn’t use for dog paper for fear of insulting my dogs.

    That man needs to stick to his independent stuff because anyone that sees Superman as a threat and Lex as a hero doesn’t get the genre.

    As for the episode it was fantastic as always. I have said a thousand times that INVASION is my favorite DC crossover and that Siskoid and Bass are doing the Lord’s work and I can’t WAIT for the next two episodes as they will be covering two books that are directly in my wheelhouse and have bought property there.

  16. I can’t stand the New 52 series. What Azzarello did to the Amazons by making them into men-hating straw-feminist barbarians who engage in rape, murder, and slavery is simply unforgivable in my eyes.Thankfully it looks like they decided to fix this with Rebirth.

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