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beccatoriaThis is some long, hopefully not entirely incoherent meta about Wonder Woman and feminism and how I fell head over heels in love with her.
I want to talk a bit about Wonder Woman. I have a confession to make. A lot of why I used to like her was...out of a sense of duty. I wanted to like her. I like the notion of her being one third of the DCU Trinity, I like the fact she's Superman's equal, I like that she is frequently in positions of political and diplomatic power. Despite disliking the fact that DC can't seem to make her as popular as Superman or Batman (for reasons that are directly relevant to the rest of the this post), I like that they at least keep trying.
But honestly, she also made me uncomfortable. There's a perception of aggressive second wave feminism about her, and combined with her costume, I don't know, it's easy to reach to cartoonish and embarrassing images of, bluntly, the way second wave feminism is often neutered. By mischaracterisation as two-dimensional man-hating woman from a bunch of irrational women, good thing this one's cute (and wearing next to nothing) and not one of those ugly lesbians! You know, Taming of the Shrew bullshit.
And I admit, there has always been a part of me that wanted to, I don't know, run up to her and yell, "Don't you understand?! You're making it easy for the misogynists to laugh at us! Please tone it down!" Which is, of course, spectacularly depressing. But, I gotta be honest, part of me felt like that. About the character, and about people who saw her like that, and about the times she was written like that - by people who didn't get it, who thought having her insult guys who pluckily refused to stop hitting on her was the way to go. (I'm looking at you, Wonder Woman Animated Movie of 2009, even though most of you was fun enough).
So like, basically, I wanted to like her but wasn't sure what to do with her. I kind of wished she had softer edges because I wanted her to stop being so aggressively associated with "man-hating", because at times I thought she ended up representing parodies of feminist concerns (due to poor writing) and at times I thought she was too brave in announcing them and might get further with a softly, softly approach - which yes is a horrible attitude born out of exhaustion and I ain't proud of it. Anyway, that's how I felt.
Then I read some fucking Wonder Woman.
Or, more correctly, I read some really, really good Wonder Woman.
I read the runs by Greg Rucka and by Gail Simone. (I also read the 14 issues between the two runs, which I had vastly more mixed feelings about).
Is Wonder Woman a feminist? Well sure. She's also a pacifist, a diplomat, a warrior, willing to kill when neither Batman nor Superman are and for (for my money) better ethically justified reasons, a vegetarian, a humanitarian, an ally against racism and homophobia, an anti-imperialist, a princess, a demi-goddess and a daughter.
That's slightly facetious in that anyone from an exclusively female society who were shut off from the world on a magical island by Greek Goddesses as, basically, recompense for having been fucked over by blokes, is never going to be void of gender politics. But...neither should she be.
Feminism is among the issues raised by implication in Rucka and Simone's work. But Wonder Woman's mission, to act as ambassador for her people in Man's World, so...inelegantly named, perhaps, so easy to hamfistedly write as an angry woman raging against men with her invulnerable skin and her most iconic weapon, a tool that forces out hidden desires and then judges you for them - that's never written as a feminist crusade.
It's a humanist crusade. A pacifist crusade.
Wonder Woman's feminism works best through her existence as someone who does not consider her own equality anything other than self-evident. It's in the reactions, both fictional and realworld that the truth of it comes out.
Rucka and Simone's runs are different in quite a few ways - Rucka focuses more on the political and perceptual because throughout his run, Diana is an actual figure of political importance and an Ambassador to the UN. Simone's is more personal; this is Diana after Rucka slowly took everything from her (spectacularly, I might add). It's a Diana who has been through more, but interestingly, in some ways, I feel a Diana who seems younger, with the return of her mother to the tale - she becomes once again the collective daughter, rather than leader, of her people. In any event, if Rucka gives us Diana as a world leader, Simone gives us Diana as a guerilla hero (with gorilla best friends!) rebuilding her life and reputation. But both women are recognisably the same person.
They are both shockingly well-adjusted, profoundly caring, deeply competent, fiercely loyal, utterly unmovable in the face of the Gods when she does not agree with them, and willing to live with the consequences of every one of her actions.
In a way similar to Fringe where the writers - at least at points - write Olivia as an overworked cop, basically with a lot of the bloke traits and behaviours and storylines, except she happens to be a woman, but without deliberately drawing attention to this decision either, both Rucka and Simone write Diana as herself. As a superhero. As a leader. The references to gender politics are present, because it would be disingenuous to ignore them. Despite my first paragraphs; despite the fact I once wanted that - I wanted Wonder Woman to maintain the fiction that we are in a gender neutral world, and to stop embarrassing us all by making Comic Book Readers admit otherwise, because they'd just start laughing, fuck that, it's not right.
But the references to gender politics are not the story. It's not the tale of how Wonder Woman has to overcome everyone's prejudice because she's a woman, or how she has to find true love with a man, or how she inspires housewives, because she couldn't possibly inspire businessmen.
There's always going to be the fact that her Rogue's Gallery skews heavily female, the way Batman or Superman's skews male, except suddenly it's obvious because women are the exception. There'll always be the fact that Circe has an at-times explicitly gender-political agenda. Or that Simone's creation in Alkyone is a giant, epic clusterfuck of gender issues that I'll get to in a minute.
And sometimes this works well and sometimes it's an unfortunate link to past eras, and really who cares, because alongside all this, Diana is the ambassador to the UN or teaming up with Beowolf. She's defying the gods to save her mother, or she's acting as Athena's champion and destroying the Medousa to save millions of people from getting turned to stone.
She's just this giant fucking hero, except she makes it a point to pass the Bechdel test six times before breakfast, and that's her unapologetic act of aggressive feminism.
The reason Wonder Woman is amazing, is the same reason she doesn't sell as well as Batman or Superman, and why, while she sells better due to her legacy and yes, due to DC actively attempting to maintain her status as one of the DC Trinity (for which I thank them, even as I know that their constant interference in trying to make her more popular is probably not always helpful or about making her into the kind of character written by Simone or Rucka), despite that, she's probably less universally loved or liked than characters like Batgirl or Supergirl.
She's amazing (and fails to sell) because she makes everyone uncomfortable by existing without apology.
Everyone. On all sides.
And I do mean that in terms of, "she makes guys nervous because she's unattainable, she makes misogynists nervous because she's a strong woman, she makes girls nervous because they don't want her to be a laughing stock, she makes feminists nervous because she runs around in a swim suit..."
But I also mean that in terms of her stories. That the breadth and style of topics that are covered at least results in the potential to make the readership themselves uncomfortable. And again, I include myself, and again, let's talk specifics.
Gail Simone's opening story - "The Circle" - retells Wonder Woman's origin in flashback as we see where she is now. And it's a great book. And no lie, bits of it made me hella uncomfortable. I mean, if I wanted to tear it down, the whittle-baby thing is pretty creepy; it's basically a tale of women going babycrazy in all kinds of different ways, even if the fairly awesome idea of Diana as everyone's daughter is worth more mileage. No matter the narrative logic of any childless culture eventually yearning for a legacy, it's uncomfortable. And then there's the weird plot with the Sons of Aries. And then there's the fact that, not just in Simone's run, but generally, the Amazons are kind of manhaters, and for all the narrative reasons behind that, is it a supergreat idea to tell tales about an isolationist colony of extremist rape victims who trained themselves to be fighting machines? Is there a way any possible direction away from that starting point won't make someone go, "wait, ick"?
But equally, let me take my snark-hat off, and say, Gail Simone's story was some well-written stuff. And if we step back and don't ignore narrative logic for a second, Diana's story is steeped in Greek myth, which is internecine, bloody, disturbing, incestuous stuff.
But perhaps most importantly, what this is really doing, is getting wrapped up in later waves of feminism. Women have babies. It's a thing they sometimes do. It's actually a kind of important thing they sometimes do, individually and societally. And we absolutely suck at telling good stories about that in our media.
And women also get raped and abused disproportionately. And we absolutely suck at telling good stories about that in our media.
Maybe a Rucka/Simone parallel is in order. Rucka largely avoids these issues and instead insists on simply telling us the tale of the Athena's Champion. Simone confronts them more directly; never in terms of direct commentary (as I said, I think for both writers Wonder Woman's feminism becomes an aspect of her existence, of the nature of her story, rather than preaching from a speech bubble), but she throws all this stuff, all this uncomfortable, awkward stuff right there onto the page.
Do I think that she wrote without flaws on these topics? No. I'm genuinely uncertain and undecided what I think of a lot of it. But my reaction isn't revulsion, it's a burning desire to read about a billion academic papers by people smarter than me on what she might be doing, on what it says, on how it works, or doesn't.
In that, does it play back to the start of Rucka's run, when Diana releases a book of answers that she only ever intended to start debate?
Whether or not Simone did it well, the point I feel it's important to make, is that there are tropes about women that are awful primarily because they've been co-opted, and maybe losing them from a toolbox isn't the answer.
Is it reclaimation? Is it stereotype? I don't know. It makes me uncomfortable. But my considered opinion is that it was gutsy of Simone to try.
Oppression is a scar on all of us. We don't think clearly around it. Any of us. Any time a whisper of it is in the air. Even with the best and kindest intentions. Even when we know we have to have these conversations and fight for them to take place, even when we are firm in our beliefs that we are on the right side of the issue, they're not comfortable.
And that's why Wonder Woman is fucking amazing and yes, a feminist icon.
She makes me uncomfortable. I love her.
Like I said, the character doesn't come out and start punching a supervillain named Misogynist Man. She doesn't spout feminist theory. She just exists in this nexus of gender politics both textual and metatextual and is at complete ease with herself, even when we're not, even when we wonder if she should be.
And that's why she'll never sell as many comics as Superman, Batman, or even Green Lantern. And I don't see how it can change. I don't think you can write her ironically. I don't think it works. She has the problem Superman does - which is why Batman is currently more popular - he's a sincere guy, a Big, Blue Boy Scout in an age of cynicism. Wonder Woman has that problem backwards, and in high heels.
Somewhere in here there's a metaphor about truth versus perception that's worthy of the wonderful work Rucka did with those concepts across his run, but I can't find it.
Somewhere in here I should have mentioned how much I love Gail Simone for, when faced with a situation where a Superman villain would kidnap Lois Lane, specifically not having her villain kidnap Wonder Woman's love interest, but rather kidnapping her tough-as-nails, slightly-overweight, slightly-older, best friend in the world, Etta Candy, because Etta is far more important to Diana.
Somewhere in here, I should mention how much I enjoy both authors' portrayal of Diana as incredibly free with her affection and expressive of her love and appreciation for friends and family.
Somewhere in here should be a closing paragraph. ;)
I want to talk a bit about Wonder Woman. I have a confession to make. A lot of why I used to like her was...out of a sense of duty. I wanted to like her. I like the notion of her being one third of the DCU Trinity, I like the fact she's Superman's equal, I like that she is frequently in positions of political and diplomatic power. Despite disliking the fact that DC can't seem to make her as popular as Superman or Batman (for reasons that are directly relevant to the rest of the this post), I like that they at least keep trying.
But honestly, she also made me uncomfortable. There's a perception of aggressive second wave feminism about her, and combined with her costume, I don't know, it's easy to reach to cartoonish and embarrassing images of, bluntly, the way second wave feminism is often neutered. By mischaracterisation as two-dimensional man-hating woman from a bunch of irrational women, good thing this one's cute (and wearing next to nothing) and not one of those ugly lesbians! You know, Taming of the Shrew bullshit.
And I admit, there has always been a part of me that wanted to, I don't know, run up to her and yell, "Don't you understand?! You're making it easy for the misogynists to laugh at us! Please tone it down!" Which is, of course, spectacularly depressing. But, I gotta be honest, part of me felt like that. About the character, and about people who saw her like that, and about the times she was written like that - by people who didn't get it, who thought having her insult guys who pluckily refused to stop hitting on her was the way to go. (I'm looking at you, Wonder Woman Animated Movie of 2009, even though most of you was fun enough).
So like, basically, I wanted to like her but wasn't sure what to do with her. I kind of wished she had softer edges because I wanted her to stop being so aggressively associated with "man-hating", because at times I thought she ended up representing parodies of feminist concerns (due to poor writing) and at times I thought she was too brave in announcing them and might get further with a softly, softly approach - which yes is a horrible attitude born out of exhaustion and I ain't proud of it. Anyway, that's how I felt.
Then I read some fucking Wonder Woman.
Or, more correctly, I read some really, really good Wonder Woman.
I read the runs by Greg Rucka and by Gail Simone. (I also read the 14 issues between the two runs, which I had vastly more mixed feelings about).
Is Wonder Woman a feminist? Well sure. She's also a pacifist, a diplomat, a warrior, willing to kill when neither Batman nor Superman are and for (for my money) better ethically justified reasons, a vegetarian, a humanitarian, an ally against racism and homophobia, an anti-imperialist, a princess, a demi-goddess and a daughter.
That's slightly facetious in that anyone from an exclusively female society who were shut off from the world on a magical island by Greek Goddesses as, basically, recompense for having been fucked over by blokes, is never going to be void of gender politics. But...neither should she be.
Feminism is among the issues raised by implication in Rucka and Simone's work. But Wonder Woman's mission, to act as ambassador for her people in Man's World, so...inelegantly named, perhaps, so easy to hamfistedly write as an angry woman raging against men with her invulnerable skin and her most iconic weapon, a tool that forces out hidden desires and then judges you for them - that's never written as a feminist crusade.
It's a humanist crusade. A pacifist crusade.
Wonder Woman's feminism works best through her existence as someone who does not consider her own equality anything other than self-evident. It's in the reactions, both fictional and realworld that the truth of it comes out.
Rucka and Simone's runs are different in quite a few ways - Rucka focuses more on the political and perceptual because throughout his run, Diana is an actual figure of political importance and an Ambassador to the UN. Simone's is more personal; this is Diana after Rucka slowly took everything from her (spectacularly, I might add). It's a Diana who has been through more, but interestingly, in some ways, I feel a Diana who seems younger, with the return of her mother to the tale - she becomes once again the collective daughter, rather than leader, of her people. In any event, if Rucka gives us Diana as a world leader, Simone gives us Diana as a guerilla hero (with gorilla best friends!) rebuilding her life and reputation. But both women are recognisably the same person.
They are both shockingly well-adjusted, profoundly caring, deeply competent, fiercely loyal, utterly unmovable in the face of the Gods when she does not agree with them, and willing to live with the consequences of every one of her actions.
In a way similar to Fringe where the writers - at least at points - write Olivia as an overworked cop, basically with a lot of the bloke traits and behaviours and storylines, except she happens to be a woman, but without deliberately drawing attention to this decision either, both Rucka and Simone write Diana as herself. As a superhero. As a leader. The references to gender politics are present, because it would be disingenuous to ignore them. Despite my first paragraphs; despite the fact I once wanted that - I wanted Wonder Woman to maintain the fiction that we are in a gender neutral world, and to stop embarrassing us all by making Comic Book Readers admit otherwise, because they'd just start laughing, fuck that, it's not right.
But the references to gender politics are not the story. It's not the tale of how Wonder Woman has to overcome everyone's prejudice because she's a woman, or how she has to find true love with a man, or how she inspires housewives, because she couldn't possibly inspire businessmen.
There's always going to be the fact that her Rogue's Gallery skews heavily female, the way Batman or Superman's skews male, except suddenly it's obvious because women are the exception. There'll always be the fact that Circe has an at-times explicitly gender-political agenda. Or that Simone's creation in Alkyone is a giant, epic clusterfuck of gender issues that I'll get to in a minute.
And sometimes this works well and sometimes it's an unfortunate link to past eras, and really who cares, because alongside all this, Diana is the ambassador to the UN or teaming up with Beowolf. She's defying the gods to save her mother, or she's acting as Athena's champion and destroying the Medousa to save millions of people from getting turned to stone.
She's just this giant fucking hero, except she makes it a point to pass the Bechdel test six times before breakfast, and that's her unapologetic act of aggressive feminism.
The reason Wonder Woman is amazing, is the same reason she doesn't sell as well as Batman or Superman, and why, while she sells better due to her legacy and yes, due to DC actively attempting to maintain her status as one of the DC Trinity (for which I thank them, even as I know that their constant interference in trying to make her more popular is probably not always helpful or about making her into the kind of character written by Simone or Rucka), despite that, she's probably less universally loved or liked than characters like Batgirl or Supergirl.
She's amazing (and fails to sell) because she makes everyone uncomfortable by existing without apology.
Everyone. On all sides.
And I do mean that in terms of, "she makes guys nervous because she's unattainable, she makes misogynists nervous because she's a strong woman, she makes girls nervous because they don't want her to be a laughing stock, she makes feminists nervous because she runs around in a swim suit..."
But I also mean that in terms of her stories. That the breadth and style of topics that are covered at least results in the potential to make the readership themselves uncomfortable. And again, I include myself, and again, let's talk specifics.
Gail Simone's opening story - "The Circle" - retells Wonder Woman's origin in flashback as we see where she is now. And it's a great book. And no lie, bits of it made me hella uncomfortable. I mean, if I wanted to tear it down, the whittle-baby thing is pretty creepy; it's basically a tale of women going babycrazy in all kinds of different ways, even if the fairly awesome idea of Diana as everyone's daughter is worth more mileage. No matter the narrative logic of any childless culture eventually yearning for a legacy, it's uncomfortable. And then there's the weird plot with the Sons of Aries. And then there's the fact that, not just in Simone's run, but generally, the Amazons are kind of manhaters, and for all the narrative reasons behind that, is it a supergreat idea to tell tales about an isolationist colony of extremist rape victims who trained themselves to be fighting machines? Is there a way any possible direction away from that starting point won't make someone go, "wait, ick"?
But equally, let me take my snark-hat off, and say, Gail Simone's story was some well-written stuff. And if we step back and don't ignore narrative logic for a second, Diana's story is steeped in Greek myth, which is internecine, bloody, disturbing, incestuous stuff.
But perhaps most importantly, what this is really doing, is getting wrapped up in later waves of feminism. Women have babies. It's a thing they sometimes do. It's actually a kind of important thing they sometimes do, individually and societally. And we absolutely suck at telling good stories about that in our media.
And women also get raped and abused disproportionately. And we absolutely suck at telling good stories about that in our media.
Maybe a Rucka/Simone parallel is in order. Rucka largely avoids these issues and instead insists on simply telling us the tale of the Athena's Champion. Simone confronts them more directly; never in terms of direct commentary (as I said, I think for both writers Wonder Woman's feminism becomes an aspect of her existence, of the nature of her story, rather than preaching from a speech bubble), but she throws all this stuff, all this uncomfortable, awkward stuff right there onto the page.
Do I think that she wrote without flaws on these topics? No. I'm genuinely uncertain and undecided what I think of a lot of it. But my reaction isn't revulsion, it's a burning desire to read about a billion academic papers by people smarter than me on what she might be doing, on what it says, on how it works, or doesn't.
In that, does it play back to the start of Rucka's run, when Diana releases a book of answers that she only ever intended to start debate?
Whether or not Simone did it well, the point I feel it's important to make, is that there are tropes about women that are awful primarily because they've been co-opted, and maybe losing them from a toolbox isn't the answer.
Is it reclaimation? Is it stereotype? I don't know. It makes me uncomfortable. But my considered opinion is that it was gutsy of Simone to try.
Oppression is a scar on all of us. We don't think clearly around it. Any of us. Any time a whisper of it is in the air. Even with the best and kindest intentions. Even when we know we have to have these conversations and fight for them to take place, even when we are firm in our beliefs that we are on the right side of the issue, they're not comfortable.
And that's why Wonder Woman is fucking amazing and yes, a feminist icon.
She makes me uncomfortable. I love her.
Like I said, the character doesn't come out and start punching a supervillain named Misogynist Man. She doesn't spout feminist theory. She just exists in this nexus of gender politics both textual and metatextual and is at complete ease with herself, even when we're not, even when we wonder if she should be.
And that's why she'll never sell as many comics as Superman, Batman, or even Green Lantern. And I don't see how it can change. I don't think you can write her ironically. I don't think it works. She has the problem Superman does - which is why Batman is currently more popular - he's a sincere guy, a Big, Blue Boy Scout in an age of cynicism. Wonder Woman has that problem backwards, and in high heels.
Somewhere in here there's a metaphor about truth versus perception that's worthy of the wonderful work Rucka did with those concepts across his run, but I can't find it.
Somewhere in here I should have mentioned how much I love Gail Simone for, when faced with a situation where a Superman villain would kidnap Lois Lane, specifically not having her villain kidnap Wonder Woman's love interest, but rather kidnapping her tough-as-nails, slightly-overweight, slightly-older, best friend in the world, Etta Candy, because Etta is far more important to Diana.
Somewhere in here, I should mention how much I enjoy both authors' portrayal of Diana as incredibly free with her affection and expressive of her love and appreciation for friends and family.
Somewhere in here should be a closing paragraph. ;)
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no subject
Date: 2011-07-06 07:02 pm (UTC)What a great post and a great passage. :-) A lot of it over my head because I know nothing about comics but when has not knowing a fandom stopped me from commenting in your journal? *g*
I just really liked a lot of what you said and wish I had more context and could be more thinky about it.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-06 07:41 pm (UTC)You might be interested, if you want to read more WW, on George Perez's run, which relaunched her after Crisis in '86. He wrote I think the first 50 issues of vol2 and set up most of the current mythology. Phil Jimenez also did some neat stuff with her, starting with vol2 #164. (If you only read one of his, read #170.)
I'm really interested in looking at the queerness of The Circle - I meta'd a little on that on tumblr here.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-06 08:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-06 08:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-06 09:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 01:33 am (UTC)...am I going to have to read some comics? We will talk more. :D
Though what you have to say is really interesting, even without fully understanding the context. Much like you, yet with perhaps even less context, I've always been a bit uncomfortable with Wonder Woman because all I *really* know is what I see, that she runs around in a swimsuit. And I am all, but is this what our feminist icons should wear? Is this ridiculous? Is this exploitative? Is this objectifying? Or in short, is this really feminist??? Because we have relatively few feminist icons, especially of Wonder Woman's stature, we have this understandable but unfortunate tendency to over-criticize them, to want them to be perfect according to each of our (different) ideas of what that means, to be above criticism or, god forbid, laughter. Yet what you say about being made uncomfortable and oppression and feminism is so applicable to, just, feminism in general. Because when I get right down to the heart of it, I really do think feminism is a deeply held belief that all women should absolutely be free enough to do all manner of things that personally make me uncomfortable and I don't get to judge, to say, that is not what a feminist would do, or that is not what a right-thinking woman would do, if that makes sense.
She just exists in this nexus of gender politics both textual and metatextual and is at complete ease with herself, even when we're not, even when we wonder if she should be.
Or basically, what you said! Anyway, color me intrigued.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 05:27 pm (UTC)At least you know about Olivia now. Imagine Olivia without the childhood abuse and with superpowers granted by Greek Gods instead of Walter! :p
no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 06:08 pm (UTC)I'm really glad you enjoyed reading this and think I give a fair assessment of the issues and the runs. And yes, there's so much pressure on her as soon as she, well, exists, that what really floors me about it in many ways, is how Rucka and Simone manage to write her in...powerful positive contradiction to that. Like, that scene in an early Simone issue where Wonder Woman basically lets someone beat the shit out of her because she knows this guy can't possibly hurt her and just keeps extending her hand. Like when you see a thing that is such a powerful, positive, redemptive contradiction to a messed up thing, to like, a screwed up way of thinking, people react so weirdly, especially if it's personal. Like the gamut from aggression to relief to sorrow to joy. And that's like...I'm babbling now and being hyperbolic and overstating stuff, but that's the kind of effect I think Wonder Woman can have, when she's written right?
I'll keep Perez in mind. At the moment I'm catching up on Supergirl, then my plan is to read a one-shot Wonder Girl book I have, then I want to both read the various core mini series about the various Crises, less because I really care that deeply and more just to get a vague grounding (I'm pretty familiar with Crisis on Infinite Earths cus it's pretty iconic, but much more hazy on Infinite and Final). Then I want to read Batwoman as recced by you given my braincrush on Rucka, and possibly Stephanie Brown's Batgirl run, and possibly Blue Beetle 1 - 25. And THEN I'll be done with my current "to read" list. ;)
Thanks for that link to your meta on tumblr. That really is super interesting and not an angle I'd thought of at all. I did pick up on the queer family around her (well, you can't really miss it) which I think set off a lot of parallels for me, in some ways, with Hera Agathon on BSG, before it got awful, where she was this kind of messianic shared daughter. You know, per
no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 06:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 06:39 pm (UTC)Yeah, they were originally published as single issue comics. Greg Rucka wrote Wonder Woman Vol 2 #195 - 226, and Gail Simone wrote Wonder Woman Vol 3 #14 - 44. #226 is the end of Vol 2, then in between Vol 2 and 3 there's a big DC Event called "Infinite Crisis", which is mostly of interest if you care about the whole universe rather than Wonder Woman specifically. You could read it (and you could read the first 13 issues of Vol 3) but you don't need to. Because of the DC's decision to start after Infinite Crisis a whole "year later" as a stylistic choice, it works sort of interestingly as a build up to a huge event and then the aftermath of a huge event. Sure, you can watch the punch-up if you want, but that's not where the emotion is. And really, that's the best way you can describe Infinite Crisis, "Reality had a bit of a punch-up; some stuff changed". ;)
Which leads neatly to my only real recommendation if you're considering reading them (and I DO think they're great!) which is...don't get paranoid about understanding who every character is or panic if you feel you're missing something. Comics will often do crossover issues with other comics, or reference stuff that happened in other comics to give a sense of a cohesive universe and it can be offputting to completists but you don't really need to know this stuff. And if you do, either someone will explain it to you in-comic, or most graphic novels will include the crossover issue in question.
I actually think you might like to read the Gail Simone run first? I think it's a bit better suited to new comics readers (less crossover issues like I mentioned), and I think it really jumps into getting to know Diana as a character immediately; if I have a criticism of Rucka's run, it's that the first four issues are very slow and a bit distant; initially more about the perception of her than her character (though this changes). I read them that way around anyway (Simone, followed by the earlier stuff by Rucka). You can also get all of Simone's run digitally on comixology.com if you wanted, which might be cheaper than graphic novels.
Again, I'm not sure if you are serious about reading this stuff, and please don't feel you have to be! But if you are curious, Simone's graphic novels, in order, are titled (with "Wonder Woman:" preceding them), The Circle, Ends of the Earth, Rise of the Olympian, Warkiller and Contagion. Greg Rucka's are called, Down to Earth, Bitter Rivals, Eyes of the Gorgon, Land of the Dead, Superman: Sacrifice (the OMAC Project) (Yes, that's a Superman book, but it's a crossover with Wonder Woman and includes #219 of her comic and is SUPER important for the run, like it has a PIVOTAL moment in it) and Mission's End.
/massive intimidating infodump. ;)
no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 06:40 pm (UTC)(I found an icon! But only one that I really loved.)
no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 07:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 07:54 pm (UTC)UM. But I think that like, I should talk with you about where it'd be best for you to start if you wanted to read it, and more about like, whether or not you'll hack the comic-factor when I'm not constrained to OMGS A SINGLE COMMENT.
So in the meantime I will talk to you about the SWIMSUIT!
Because, yes, the swimsuit. And apparently authors have wanted to change it for ages but DC wouldn't sign off on it because of its recognisability, even though it's been changed before (albeit long ago), until very recently (when they gave her pants) right in time to reboot the run (this is right after Gail Simone's run finished) into something weeeeird and sorta sucky. She also has pants in the reboot in September.
BUT! Despite all that, I gotta say, I'm...sort of a convert to the swimsuit. For the sole reason that having gotten used to it, and having seen her team up with Beowolf, I realised I'd stopped thinking of it as a swimsuit and had started thinking of it more in terms of like, she's dressed as a barbarian, or an ancient greek warrior, i.e. in a loincloth with lots of skin on show. She's dressed for wrestling.
That said, that's a way it can work but it's not really the way most people will see it. But I'm not, now, that happy with the addition of pants either, mainly because they are, like, fine and all, but they don't address when I feel to be the primary failure of her costume - it doesn't accurately represent who she is. And not enough people know that to be able to infer it. The red-white-and-blue, it makes one think of Superman, of truth, justice and the American way, when in fact, she's a foreign national attempting to introduce an alien culture. She's freaking Greek more than anything else and she's heavily tied to greek myth, and I honestly think that you learn more about her character by calling her a warrior than a superhero. As such, if I were redesigning her costume to something less (by superheroine standards at least) insane and also more indicative of her character, I would mimic the costume Donna Troy wore during the period when she temporarily assumed the Wonder Woman mantle. (Who Donna Troy is is...stupidly complicated, but she's more-or-less Wonder Woman's younger sister). Anyway, this is her:
http://magyk.feelyx.com/public/DONNA/Donna_Troy_is_Wonder_Woman_by_minarho1.jpg
It's like...so much cooler and clearer who she is in that picture.
Especially since Diana DOES get dressed up in that type of stuff at times anyway. And when she needs to pull out the REALLY big guns she dresses up in a kick ass eagle-inspired set of full plate armor.
OH DIANA. ♥
So yeah, that's where my issue with the pants comes in. I like that it gets away from the swimsuit issue, so on balance it's better than nothing, but I also feel it fails to capitalise on her rich Grecian Warrior thing and that's a real shame.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 07:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 10:37 pm (UTC)Anyway, I come away from this not so much thinking about whether or not I want to read Wonder Woman comics (honestly, I've always been a bit ambivalent about comics as a medium, and I couldn't tell you why), but thinking instead about how women portray themselves and react to one another, about how women create female characters and react to them, about how men create female characters and react to women, both real and fictional. Which are all excellent things to be thinking about!
no subject
Date: 2011-07-07 11:01 pm (UTC)FYI, we have a couple of new statues of WW at our store that are kind of awesome: I just put up pictures of both on our website (see http://www.legendsofsuperheros.com ). The top image on the right is a kick-ass WW in her amazing armor, and if you scroll down eight pictures, you'll see a lovely statue where she's wearing the new and much less bathing-suity costume (as seen in Wonder Woman #600, they didn't wait for the reboot.) My husband says it reminds him of Donna Troy's outfit, but I don't care, I really like her new look (I haven't read the comic, I'll take your word for it that it's not been good.) I just think she looks like a real superhero now. PANTS! YAY! Maybe she'll get a little respect now, and we'll get a movie someday.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 02:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 04:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 05:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:02 pm (UTC)Yeah, I haven't tried to read her original stuff beyond a few random stories I read...I can't even remember when by this point, and I think it was later stuff than that anyway, but it's, um, weird. Mind you, most of comics was weird and racist and sexist and odd back then. And on top of that Wonder Woman was created by a pretty weird bloke. He had some good intentions, but you know, so did Freud.
But yeah, I HIGHLY recommend both the Rucka and Simone runs (in case you didn't already guess that).
And that is a fucking awesome statue.
I don't hate the new #600 costume or anything. Like I think for any other superheroine I'd be really a fan of it, and I'm being a bit more negative than I need to be just because of the bad associations I have with the run? (They rebooted everything for J Michael Straczynski, then he TOOK OFF and quit after like five issues and they hadda get a new writer in to tell the rest of his seven issues based on his plot). But yeah, it's actually a pretty nice design, I just suddenly got high standards and started wanting it to be more appropriate to her background since I think that might help with her image in the public consciousness? Though probably pants are actually a more sensible way to do that than gladiatorial attire, I am forced to admit. ;)
You know who I wish would get a makeover like this though? Black Canary. She's already got the jacket (which looks badass on her), she just needs some pants. Plus when she and Zatanna are in the JLA together, they look like a magic act with only one hat between them. :/
Um, back to Wonder Woman! I really would love to see a movie too, though after the animated one (which really was pretty good in a lot of places, but, kind of cringey in others) and the fiasco of the TV pilot (I've seen it; however bad you think it is, it's woooooorse), I'm also kind of terrified of the prospect...
no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:04 pm (UTC)Let me know what you think though!
This is such a beautiful essay.
Date: 2012-02-09 11:06 pm (UTC)