Wonder Woman is Not Lame
There has been a lot of talk around the internet this past week on the subject of Wonder Woman and how lame she is. This is thanks to Hollywood it-girl Megan Fox’s recent dismissal of rumours that she will be cast as the Amazon Princess. Her response:
“Wonder Woman is a lame superhero… She flies around in her invisible jet and her weaponry is a lasso that makes you tell the truth. I just don’t get it. Somebody has a big challenge on their hands whoever takes that role but I don’t want to do it.”
What weaponry do you have, Megan Fox? And what colour is your jet?
I sincerely hope that no one in Hollywood offered the role to Ms. Fox. As nicely as I am sure she could fill out the costume, I don’t think she has the acting abilities to pull off a lead role, let alone a character as iconic as Wonder Woman.
Noted internet mega-douche Rich Johnston recently submitted a post about Wonder Woman by Adisakdi Tantimedh to BleedingCool.com. It includes absurd statements like:
"She only does two things: hit people or tie people up."
"Frank Miller found some spark recently by depicting her as a ball-busting bitch who secretly wants to be taken, preferably by Superman (since he’s the only one strong enough to be able to beat her up)"
"So for more than half a century, DC Comics has been marketing a scantily-clad dominatrix to children. She’s a heroic dominatrix, and she does it for free, so I guess that’s all right."
Most of the post seems to be arguing that, because Wonder Woman was created by a man with a bondage fetish, she is not capable of being developed past that point. Much like fans don’t hold Superman’s silver age dickery against him now (because it was the god damn 1950s and 60s), I think we can look beyond the flaws of Wonder Woman’s early comics. When I say we need to overlook the bad Wonder Woman comics, I realize that this means overlooking a lot of comics, but that’s ok because by doing so we’ll discover the delicious centre of this character. With regard to her costume being silly…is it? Really? Is it more ridiculous than any other super hero costume? Is that really an obstacle to enjoying the character or taking her seriously?
Like ANY character, Wonder Woman is as good as the person writing her. When she is written well, she is a compelling and inspiring heroine.
Wonder Woman is a lot of things, but she is certainly not lame. Here’s a run-down:
Wonder Woman is Royalty
She is Princess of the Amazons, carved from clay by her mother and given life by the gods. Joining her in this category are non-lame heroes such as Namor the Sub-Mariner, Aquaman, Orion and Black Panther. Not only is she royalty, she is on a first-name basis with the gods.
Wonder Woman is a Leader
Like Superman, Batman, or Captain America, Wonder Woman commands awe and respect when people encounter her. She has gotten this reaction from children, the citizens she rescues, the villains she beats up, and fellow super heroes. She can not only lead an army into battle, she can also take on the role of a teacher to her fellow Amazons, and to some of the younger heroes in the DCU.
Wonder Woman is a Warrior
I feel that this, above all others, is Wonder Woman’s defining characteristic. Her instinct is to fight, to kill if necessary, and to lead her army into battle. She is not a detective, a scientist, or a mild-mannered reporter. She is the DC Universe’s most ruthless warrior and most capable battlefield commander. She makes the hard decisions that Superman and Batman don’t want to know about. She has a magic lasso and an invisible jet, and she also has a shield and sword, bullet-deflecting wristbands, and, oh yeah, superstrength, stamina and the ability to fly.
Wonder Woman is a Government Agent
It’s easy to forget that Wonder Woman has a pretty impressive day job. Like Sgt. Fury, Mr Terrific, or Iron Man, Diana Prince fights to protect humanity even out of costume. And let me remind you that she is working to protect a world that she doesn’t have to care about at all. She could be home on Paradise Island, eating grapes and lounging beside the pool. She is a princess, afterall, but she is a princess with a punch card.
Wonder Woman is an Outcast
Like Superman, Captain America, or Martian Manhunter, Wonder Woman is living outside of her comfort zone. She was sent as an ambassador to "man’s world," she fought in World War II, she was banished from Paradise Island for making a difficult decision, she was shunned by the Justice League for making a difficult decision more recently. Now she has chosen to isolate herself from her fellow Amazons once again. Wonder Woman has long suffered for her habit ignoring the rules in favour of doing what needs to be done.
Wonder Woman is a Hero
Wonder Woman doesn’t have to waste her time at boring Justice League meetings, but she does it anyway. She is often given a third-place standing in the DC Heroes Trinity, but when you really think about it, an Amazonian princess sculpted by the gods clearly outranks an alien who has super powers by fluke chance and a miserable billionaire with too much time on his hands.
I love Wonder Woman because she doesn’t brood. There is nothing emo about her. She is, in fact, one of the toughest sumbitches in comic books, yet still manages to have a comforting motherly aura.
Wonder Woman is loved. By me, by her fellow super heroes, by her fellow Amazons, and by the world. Her importance to the DCU cannot be overstated.
We don’t need a Wonder Woman movie. I’d love to see one, but not so badly that I would settle for Megan Fox.
Thank you.
Wonder Woman kicks ass and I totally read her monthly in public.
Thank you SO MUCH.
I’m so sick of the recent WW bashing, and it really surprised me the wrong way to read Rich Jonhston’s column on her.
I’ll second what Sebastian said: Wonder Woman kicks ass and I totally read her monthly in public.
Can I come to your house and throw roses at your feet?
“What weaponry do you have, Megan Fox?”
Ah-…… No never mind. Too easy.
When did people start listening to Megan Fox anyway?
I’ve never understood what people have against WW’s costume. Some artists probably push it further than intended, but the basic idea isn’t anything out of control.
Nicely said, and some well-deserved respect for an important character.
Megan Fox can’t act at all. Sure she may be hot and people will say who cares, but other than that what does she bring to the table. She is talentless. If she’s hot then buy a magazine.
Wonder Woman is hot and has talent. I did enjoy reading WW for a while there, but it got a little boring for my tastes. I hear great things about the Gail Simone stuff, but currently don’t have the room on my comic reading platter.
I would rather watch the TV series with Linda Carter than see Megan Fox as Wonder Woman.
Just to note — and I know you didn’t originate the use of the term in this context — “lame” isn’t a particularly cool word to use since it’s got ableist nuances.
Otherwise a great post. Wonder Woman is awesome.
She’s also a queer icon — and I wonder if some of the backlash isn’t thinly veiled antipathy against LGBT fans.
I would like to echo the THANKS on this page. I do believe that it was this very quote by MF that set off my intense dislike for her. WW has been a hero to COUNTLESS women around the world for decades (myself included) ~ and that will withstand hopefully the dim-witted thoughts of a plastic actress.
Thank you! Megan Fox is so off my “must see” list… not that she was ever more than a “must look at.” For the record, I never wanted her to be Wonder Woman… I was hoping for an ACTress.
Incidentally, Megan Fox is lame.
I wasn’t much of a DC reader growing up, so my impressions of Wonder Woman were based on Lynda Carter cheesiness and Superfriends idiocy. That lasted until the first season of Timm’s Justice League series. Great version of the character, which highlights all but one of the points you’ve illustrated.
::appluading loudly:: Here, here! Wonder Woman is the whole reason I became a comic book junkie. I’ve loved her since I was 5 years old and I’m 34 now and still look forward to the new issue every month. And as much I would love a WW movie, who wants some little no talent twit playing our princess?
Besides, Emily Deschanel has already proven she can fill out the costume much better anyway. ;)
One interesting thing I think you missed about Wonder Woman in your fantastic essay is that, despite being such a ruthless warrior, she, with a single, notable, exception, refuses to kill and preaches a message of peace she seems very genuine about. She’s a preacher, the most religious of any major character in a foreign religion (to us post-moderns). She’s amazing.
She’s a fascinating and complicated character. This debate has me pumped up about everything Diana.
*sigh* Thanks, Rachelle :) Wonder Woman is not lame, she’s AMAZING!
Megan Fox is a pretty, talentless bitch.
Because of this I now want to get the first trade of her new monthly.
Also, have you ever read any of those Golden Age Wonder Woman stories? They’re a hoot!
Bondage, proto-feminism, misogyny, misandry… by far the craziest olde tyme comics that I have read.
I agree with all the points you’ve raised, all the ways in which Wonder Woman is absolutely amazing. The crux of it for me is the range of the character: teacher and diplomat balanced by royal warrior. Love Batman though I might I don’t always see that sort of complexity to the character.
I put Wondy in the category of making a faithful adaptation as a Hollywood feature film is almost impossible when playing by their rules. That doesn’t mean she doesn’t have great comic stories in her history it just means everything doesn’t translate to other mediums. Alan Moore is right when he says most comics don’t translate and shouldn’t try and don’t need to try to validate themselves beyond their intended medium. But that doesn’t stop Hollywood with other comic properties so I have no doubt there are people actively trying to get this film made. I honestly wish they wouldn’t and just move on to other properties.
I don’t blame Fox for her comments. Anyone reporting on the comic industry should have a lot more knowledge and respect for the characters history in that medium. But why expect someone who isn’t a diehard to pull out anything other than what they saw on the Superfriends? Batman still gets shit for the campy tv show, if the person asked didn’t see the awesome JLU cartoon why would Wonder Woman have a good mainstream rep?
Well said!
Megan Fox as the Amazon Princess would be an insult to the character. Wonder Woman, especially Gail Simone’s depiction of her, has a complexity that Fox’s feeble excuse for acting could never portray with even a hint of accuracy. She would be a detriment to the character.
I’m with Brian- I’m to the point where I don’t want them to make a Wonder Woman film. The animated feature that came out this year was enough for me.
Megan Fox should stay right where she is: Screaming and jiggling while she runs in “B” movies with over-inflated budgets. That’s about the depth of her “talent”.
And in a related story, Megan Fox is “so sure those grapes were sour anyway.”
You need someone with innate class and dignity as well as beauty to portray wonder woman e.g. I thought Linda Carter was wonderful despite the cheezy 70’s TV stuff.
Ms. Fox is only pretty.
Fantastic post! Well said.
One of my favorite of your posts.
To be honest, I’m not much of a Wonder Woman fan.
But to me, that’s not because the character is inherently bad, or because she can’t work well. Rather, it’s the fact that I feel like her status as one of the “big three” in the DC universe was less about her being really good, and more about DC going “Well, she’s been around for a while, so I guess she’ll do. Let’s write everyone else so that they really, really like Wonder Woman and are impressed by her.”
It’s similar to how I don’t like Storm in the X-men that much, because Claremont would write a lot about how much mental fortitude she had, and how powerful she was. That doesn’t make her a bad character, but it can be very offputting.
Stick to playing hookers, Megan.
well said rachelle. well said.
megan fox dropped a few notches in my book when she decided to open her trap and that stupid ass statement about WW fell out of her head!
she should be so lucky to play WW in a movie!
megan fox isn’t a strong enough female actress to portray wonder woman. I somehow sat through the wreck that was transformers two and the only action megan fox gets into is a male holding her hand and leading her around the entire movie. every time there’s a dangerous situation you can count on out “strong female character” to be led by some man (not even always shia lebouf, even the annoying roommate takes this duty at times) to grab her by the hand and lead her to safety. is this what we want representing strong females to the majority of americans (because that’s who watched the transformers movie, as the numbers have shown)? I wouldn’t want megan fox playing wonder woman either!
Nicely said!
This kind of reminds meof Shia LaBeouf’s reaction to being offered the role in Y: The Last Man, wherein he calls it essentially Transformers 3 and refuses the role.
Who need em?
Must say I am a bit mystified by the sheer venom of the attacks on Megan Fox, her character and intelligence that her remarks on Wonder Woman have provoked here and elsewhere. You’d almost think that she had attacked a real person and not a fictional character. I wonder if Superman fans would react in a similar “blasphemy, blasphemy!” kind of way if some actor refused that role on the grounds that “he wears his underpants outside his clothes and he keeps his identity secret by putting on glasses”. It really is astonishing how many people feel entitled to feel superior to MF and even vilify her because she is not enough of a comic geek to be very familiar with WW and not enough a fan to worship her. (And to an outsider the plethora of “Megan Fox is too bad an actress to play Wonder Woman” posts can’t help but sound like a case of sour grapes since of course outsiders have no way of knowing how the posters concerned felt about MF as WW before she made the statement that launched this storm in a teacup).
A few remarks on a random sampling of the arguments put forward in the original post to explain why WW is not lame:
The problem I have with the argument that one should disregard the bondage etc. aspects of the Golden Age Wonder Woman by referring to the Silver Age dickery of Superman and the Adam West Batman TV series: Re. both Batman and Superman the problem was ultimately solved by reshaping them in ways by which they came closer to their original Golden Age incarnations. Also, a huge part of Wonder Woman’s prestige among comic fans derives from the fact that she is the only superheroine in continuous publication since the early 1940s, so I’d say there is an inherent contradiction in saying “Wonder Woman is great because she’s (one of) the first, but you’d better disregard how she was in her original version and for most of the first decade of her existence”.
Re. the costume: “With regard to her costume being silly…is it? Really? Is it more ridiculous than any other super hero costume?”
Why yes, it certainly is more silly than a lot of other supeheroes’ and superheroines’ costumes. Just compare it e.g. to the much more sensible costumes worn in the Golden Age by Miss Fury or these days by the Black Widow, Spider-Woman, Spider-Girl, Catwoman etc.
Re. “She’s royalty”: She shares that category with Black Panther, Namor, Aquaman, and Orion. The common denominator here is that outside comic geekdom these characters are fairly obscure (with the possible exception of Black Panther). And I’ve seen too many Aquaman jokes to consider him “non-lame”. Bottom line: Members of royalty can be lame. A lot of people certainly thought so in America in 1776.
I love Wonder Woman. She’s my second all-time favorite character, after Batman, and I agree with most of what you wrote. The sad truth, though, is that WW has rarely been handled well in her 60-year history.
Wonder Woman needs a stable supporting cast and locale, like Supes and Bats have. She also needs some better villains. Lastly, and most importantly, DC needs to update her costume which just looks tacky and hooker-ish. Cover up her legs and trash all the stars.
All that being said, I think Gail Simone is doing a GREAT job on WW so far. Lovin’ it.
Menshevick:
I’d say there is an inherent contradiction in saying “Wonder Woman is great because she’s (one of) the first, but you’d better disregard how she was in her original version and for most of the first decade of her existence”.
I never said that Wonder Woman is great because she is one of the first super heroes. By that logic, Doll Man would also be one the great super heroes, and that just isn’t true. And I do think that it’s ok to disregard the first decade of a character’s existence when a character has been around for most of a century. You don’t have to, but you can. In fact, you can disregard as much of a character’s existence as you like, because it only takes one great writer to find a way to write a character in a compelling way that excites readers. Animal Man has been around since the 1960s but no one cared about him until Grant Morrison wrote his series in the late 80s.
And anyway, I am not talking about golden age, or even silver age, Wonder Woman here. I am talking about Wonder Woman right now. In current comics. Being awesome.
Why yes, it certainly is more silly than a lot of other supeheroes’ and superheroines’ costumes. Just compare it e.g. to the much more sensible costumes worn in the Golden Age by Miss Fury or these days by the Black Widow, Spider-Woman, Spider-Girl, Catwoman etc.
My argument is that ALL superhero costumes are silly. If you can’t handle Wonder Woman’s, why would you like Superman’s? Or Batman’s? And Wonder Woman’s costume, like all costumes, has changed over the years. Some artists make it look better than others. But I don’t understand thinking “Ugh, I can’t read Wonder Woman, she looks ridiculous! I’m gonna read some Hawkman!”
She shares that category with Black Panther, Namor, Aquaman, and Orion. The common denominator here is that outside comic geekdom these characters are fairly obscure (with the possible exception of Black Panther). And I’ve seen too many Aquaman jokes to consider him “non-lame”.
Sigh. I was really hoping no one was going to go there. I am so tired of “Aquaman is lame” jokes being made by people who have never read an Aquaman comic. It’s just so easy. And that is exactly what is happening with Wonder Woman now. No one who is saying she is lame, least of all Megan Fox, actually reads Wonder Woman comics. Most probably don’t read comics at all.
And who cares if they are obscure characters to non-comic fans? I’m not really addressing non-comic fans here.
I do think Diana’s costume is a huge turn-off to non-comics fans (meaning: potential new fans) and even comics fans who don’t like her.
I still adore the character, though. Hola!
I’ll keep it short and just echo the majority of posts above: excellent post! WW kicks @ss!
Wonder Woman has no pants. I love the character, but this really, really bothers me. You don’t think this is a problem? Just imagine Batman clad in just his tiny, tight - um, briefs? Speedos? Not very commanding, right? (Sexy as hell, though.)
Anyway, excellent post! <3
Plus: A perfect actor for WW: Lauren Graham of the Gilmore Girls fame!
*applauds* Excellently put. She is amazing, and I hate to see her not get her due.
Megan Fox? Play one of the best heroines of all time (and a deep one at that)? I don’t think so. We’re not desperate. I’ve never met her personally, so I can’t speak against her, but she’s not exactly a woman I’d have in mind to play WW. Ever. Under any circumstances. And who is she to insult Wonder f**kin’ Woman?
I do so love it when she’s written well, and as she was meant to be. And I’ll be the first to admit that I have the hugest crush on her.
Thanks you so much for this post, Wonder Woman needs more credit! I’m a huge fan of WW and I’m glad to find someone else who is. Also, I love the picture with her Batman at the end. I love Batman/Wonder Woman so much. I actually like Megan Fox, but I think she should be a supermodel not an actress. She’s very beautiful but she can’t act and says stupid things like this. If she doesn’t want the role then good, don’t take it, but don’t insult a character you clearly know nothing about.
Lol Wonder Woman IS lame. Sorry to “DC fans”, but she dosen’t have pontential. And I hate Megan Fox, but she sure made a point. Give the girl some credit, people. Just because YOU guys think WW is all that, dosen’t mean SHE has too think that.
I’m no fan of Megan Fox but I have to agree with the fact that Wonder Woman is kinda lame. I’ve personally never liked Wonder Woman.. As a woman, I’ve found nothing to connect with her on any level. Something about her seems so anachronistic to me and not in a good way. However, I would love it if someone could depict her in a way that I could come to enjoy her
I’ll agree with almost every point you’ve made here. Wonder Woman is an amazing DCU character, and deserves her post as a part of the DC Trinity. She’s a peacemaker, she’s a fighter, she’s a leader, she’s a hero, plain and simple. Certainly, she’s an icon that both men and women all over the world can look at and say “I want to be more like her,” and I don’t mean for the super powers and good looks.
However, I’d like to point out that she is more than capable of doing all these things on her own, easily earning her right to play in the big leagues through who she is and what she’s done. You don’t need to pump her up by calling Superman “an alien who has super powers by fluke chance” or Batman “a miserable billionaire with too much time on his hands” in comparison. Both of those characters are incredible in their own unique ways too, and they’re just as worthy of this kind of praise as Diana is.