Not All Women (Are Museless)

 The Legend of Wonder Woman is a 2016 series by writer/artist Renae de Liz and artist Ray Dillon which tells its own version of Diana’s entry into the world. The style is a bit too 3D for my taste, but that is now a common style and does not detract from the story. I have the issues for about half the series; unfortunately, I misestimated where it ended and at the time I did not have it on my pull list. When I saw it in the local branch, I immediately grabbed it.

In this version of Themyscira, the Amazons believe themselves to be the survivors of an apocalyptic Titanomachy, although with one “Titan”. The rest of the world is seen as barren wasteland. The majority of the Amazons are mortal. So why are there still Amazons? Some Amazons, those whom the gods deem most suitable for the task, are designated to be mothers to the souls of girls, presumably from the pool of all women. The race of Amazons is small enough to avoid psychic recycling.  These mortal Amazons live their best lives in paradise and die happy. A few Amazons, including Queen Hippolyta, are immortal, but immortality always comes with a price. In this case, the price is childlessness. The other immortal Amazons can accept this, sometimes reluctantly, but Hippolyta cannot. Hippolyta molds a statue out of the clay of Themyscira and prays to the gods to give her a daughter. The statue comes to life as Diana, an immortal child. These details are important to Diana’s childhood. Although she is not the only child, she is the only immortal one. She has a destiny, like all Amazons; hers is to become queen after Hippolyta. This destiny, unfortunately, suffers from a breakdown in logic: if Hippolyta is immortal, then Diana will never become Queen. Although Diana is referred to as a Princess, it does not have the same connotation on Themyscira, since the two functions of an only child of the monarch, succession and marriage, are not relevant. When Etta Candy later describes Diana as a princess, she must think about it for second; this would be a strange reaction from a mortal royal. Diana, the immortal child, but fortunately not in the vampire child way, is an anomaly, and her anomalous nature enables her to detect other anomalies.

Paradise never lasts, much like childhood, and disturbances begin to gnaw at the peace of Themyscira. The rot is reminiscent of that found in Disney’s Moana. The inevitable plane crash occurs with Steve Trevor as the pilot. The Amazons in charge of the defense of the island want to kill him, but Diana nurses him back to health. This recuperation, of course, means someone must pierce the veil to return him to Man’s World. There must be a contest of volunteers to determine this. The point of contention here is that passing through the veil causes amnesia for intruders and a ban on returning.  Diana wants to enter; her mother forbids it; she enters anonymously; she wins; her mother gives her the paraphernalia. This is as inevitable as Krypton exploding (since Thomas Wayne is now a Batman).

Diana passes through the veil, but she manages to lose Steve, presumed dead. Diana is now depressed because she both failed on her first mission objective and can never return home. She is, however, pleasantly surprised at the non-wasteland of the outside world. She is welcomed, despite being a stranger in wartime, by a kindly elderly couple, who may be an oblique reference to the Kents (the wife certainly exudes Ma Kent vibes), but its coastal setting suggests Aquaman. After she has recuperated, she heads into town, which includes Holliday College. Her youthfulness and Greco-roman outfit lead the college students to assume she is one of their peers (and possibly drunk, since she falls out of a tree in the make-out corner of campus). Etta Candy, in all her Forties campus gal glory, rescues Diana by claiming she is her cousin from Gargantuania; this is both a reference to the villain Gargantua and the way that Diana replaces the member of the Golden Age Holliday Girls whose personality was being very tall (the very short one is present). A reference to Gargantua and Pantagruel seems a bit deeper than this series would go.

This story is about Etta and Diana, not Steve and Diana. If they are more than friends, there is no explicit reference – but it seems less likely in the Forties (pace fans of a certain author). Etta directs her characteristic enthusiasm towards boys, and Diana would like to hook up with Steve, but the mission takes precedence. This version of Etta is an update of the comic sidekick, stripped of some of the elements that would appear mean-spirited today. Etta’s comedic plot is her life-long rivalry with her hometown nemesis, Pamela Smuthers, now expressed through musical competition; the Holliday Girls are not just sorority sisters, but a musical group (thankfully this time without the Mexican stereotypes) who are this world’s Andrews Sisters. Smuthers naturally shows up every time Etta is about to perform.

After the domestic comedy, including Diana’s poor taste in clothes while shopping, her unfamiliarity with the concept of movies, and her anger at the misrepresentation of her mother in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, it is time for Etta and Diana to go to Europe. This is not easy in the middle of a war. Etta’s impetus to leave for the front is an unflattering ad from the Candy family business featuring Etta; she hopes that she can both avoid the embarrassment at home and make her name as a singer on the front. Diana’s impetus is to find the Duke of Deception, whose jewel she recognizes and whose existence is guaranteed by a news reporter named Perry. Diana signs up solely as a nurse so that she can have access to the news from the front. Steve is around and teaches Diana important Chekov’s skills, but Etta is still more important.

The treatment of race in this book is interesting. The appalling excesses of the Golden Age comics are thankfully absent, but the presence of an integrated campus and military with the absence of any comment on race is a bit odd. It is true that later war stories projected integration back on World War Two, and Etta’s libido is as outsized as any of her other appetites, but the only reasonable conclusion is that focusing on race would be a different Wonder Woman story with a different villain.

When the Duke of Deception starts raising the dead, which itself could be a reference to a real incident on the Eastern Front, Diana springs into action as Wonder Woman. This heroism leads to the troops regarding her as their hero. Although this is a Wonder Woman story, superheroes do exist – enough that there is a JSA, which includes at least Hourman; thus she is not the lone hero of this earth. Why the other heroes are not in Europe is not answered; but perhaps the sole mention of Hourman suggests no mystical or mythical heroes, and Clark Kent failed his eye exam.

Wonder Woman is on an upward track until Zeus, who has apparently finally noticed Diana using Hippolyta’s paraphernalia, summons Diana before him. Zeus offers to make her his champion against the Titan, whom Ares is attempting to raise using the Duke of Deception’s campaign of death and misery. Zeus is best known for being a lecher, but his most relevant quality here is his unbending authoritarianism. If Diana agrees to be his champion, she will receive greater power than she already possesses, but she must abide by Zeus’ rules. Since this is a duel, if the Titan wins, Diana’s friends are fair game for the Titan. Diana does not mind dying for her friends, but she is not willing to abandon them and the rest of the world to destruction. Zeus, who is petty in all the ways that a being of immense power can get away with, strips Diana of all her powers save natural Amazonian athleticism.

The Titan rises. The air corps flies off to meet their doom. Diana steals the invisible jet on which Steve trained her in one lesson, with the Holliday Girls as her crew. This chutzpah is true to the spirit of the Golden Age Holliday Girls. Diana confronts the Titan without her powers but is summoned again before a god. This time Gaia, the Earth, reveals that Diana is the last child of Gaia and bestows upon her the powers which Zeus had removed. This reveal is interesting because in Classical Greek mythology Gaia was the mother of monsters rather than the mother of the champion against monsters. Gaia was the mother of the Classical Titans, but this Titan is not the child of Gaia, but rather a being from the stars, a robotic Manhunter. These Manhunters began as just, but they became corrupted over time and more dogmatic. The Manhunter that fell to Earth tried to purge it, but Zeus’ attempt to destroy the Titan through control of his champion decimated Earth almost as much as a Titan victory would have done. The Amazons’ isolation preserved a piece of paradise, but stagnation was the price of immortality. Redemption required a mortal impulse from an immortal made immortal rather than a natural immortal; this mortal impulse produced a member of the immortal society who could not fit in, and therefore would experience both worlds in the way that Zeus could not and Hippolyta would not. The champion of both worlds needed to care about both portions to defend the entire Earth from a threat beyond the stars.

On a more personal level, the Duke of Deception turns out to be a regular human, Thomas Byde, who sent his little brother away from present danger. He dies in a bombing anyway. Thomas feels guilt over this, and Ares exploits this guilt to manipulate him. Thomas flies to Mars and lives there alone in the former habitation of his master; a cruel fate, but one that contrasts with the communal life on Themyscira.