SMAX... that blue guy in TOP 10, right?

[Sigma]

And there's some of the crap I hated most.

It's all a matter of opinion.

In a more perfect world we would have gotten Alexander Jodorovsky's Dune, which would have made Lynch's version look like Robert Rodriguez's Sin City in comparison.

[Buster's Uncle]

I've heard good things about Jodorovsky's plans, though what I've seen didn't impress much.  (Salvador Dali as Shaddam?  Really?)

If I could travel timelines, I'd definitely score all the videotapes I could.  I'd like to see that, Star Trek starring Jeffrey Hunter, and a million things of the sort.  I'm even curious about Star Trek: Voyager with Anne Boleyn (name that reference ).

[Buster's Uncle]

...Mylochka just made me sit outside for a half hour and keep her company while she washed the dogs.

We think we figured out how to fix Wonder Woman...

[Doc Nebula]

Sometimes I don't understand anything you say.

[Buster's Uncle]

You know, one of the most iconic comics characters of all time, of whom innerwebs nerdz are always talking about DC not knowing what to do with her?  You must have heard of Wonder Woman; she looks like former Miss World USA Lynda Carter, who was a big TV star in the late 70's.

I think the first line of my imaginary pitch would be: "Key to fixing Wonder Woman is understanding that she doesn't need fixing."

[Doc Nebula]

Wonder Woman needs a CONCEPT.  That's the key to, for example, doing a successful WW movie adaptation.  WW as she exists is a collection of weird S&M fetishes in a red white and blue costume.  She needs some essential, underlying theme, beyond "power and beauty in subservience to any man who gets a lasso around her". 

[Buster's Uncle]

Concept?  She's the strongest woman in the world.  She has superhero adventures. 

Historically, her book hasn't been very good.  What wasn't a bit inept, mostly in the old days, has been overthought, because she is Iconic, and her stories need to be Important.  THAT'S the real heart of the 'problem'.

As to a few important details:

1) Steve Trevor is pretty much it for supporting cast who's taken root.  Precious few have heard of Eta Candy, and who remembers the various nonentities everyone since George Perez has invented?  Writing 101, and Stan Lee's big contribution to cape comics: if all else fails, you can write soap opera.  Well, she needs a viable supporting cast.  Perez did the equivalent of rebooting Superman with Louis Lane turned into an old lady, and that's a mistake in the long run.  Nothing wrong with the iconic Steve Trevor that writing him well won't fix.  We want to bring back Eta, too, and in her original form as a fat comedy relief sidekick - as a challenge to do something interesting with.  -And, this is pretty crucial, she has a sister who's also a super adventurer.  We gotta get at least limited use of Donna.

And that's a good start for a viable supporting cast.  Research into those nonentities I mentioned is also called for, as you never know what you'll think of.

2) WW's rogues galley sucks hard.  Most of them are salvageable, I think, but they've never been used all that well, and she certainly has no Lex Luthor, no Joker.  We talked about doing stuff with various reflections and antitheses of Wonder Woman, so Dr. Psycho's part just got a lot bigger.  Probably bring back Artemis as a sort of anti-Wondy.  I believe Circe has traditionally been the closest there is to an arch, and she may get fired from the gig.  Cheeta, I got no ideas for yet - again, more research is called for.


...My mommy is calling, so more later.  -Okay, my internet was saying no, so I'm only posting now - but still, more later.

[Buster's Uncle]

So, that's only the beginnings of that part of a pitch, with a lot of research left to do, and much detail in need of development.  If we could get that limited use of whatever they're calling Donna Troy these days (which doesn't really matter, because it's Dianna's SISTER we want to use, not so much ex-Wondergirl/Troia/Darkstar/Troia/fill-in Wondy/whoever), we could add value to the character for wherever they're already using her -I assume they gots to still have a Titans book.  Look, the real Wonder Girl always had this thing going for her that I'm not aware of anyone exploiting in her favor; she's the sister of the THIRD MOST ICONIC SUPERHERO OF ALL TIME.  A version of her was played by a hot young Debra Winger on a hit TV show.  Only Robin should have had more iconic status in the New Teen Titans, but outside a couple of spotlight issues, she was rather marginalized in the Wolfman/Perez run.

It is significant that we got this idea from our mother, who remembered Drusilla Prince on the TV show.  She's got some (old and distorted, but still) real recognition factor of her own among the mundane public - this, and the sister thing, which we'd totally use, gives her powerful potential as a new mainstay of Wondy's supporting cast.

Next: dealing with the sexuality issue, and, Wonder Woman's core personality and nature.

[JarlWolf]

I am quite frankly not too familiar with Wonder Woman myself, but I remember she had a sort of Amazonian theme going didn't she? Maybe expand upon that or re-invent it. The newer Batman movies, while keeping to the story fairly well also HEAVILY modified some of the backstory and the overall interpretation of Batman. And the result wasn't too bad for it. (Though there is some issues, won't bother going into them because it's off topic to this.)

[Doc Nebula]

Okay.

Well, here's what I mean by a theme or an essence -- something that drives her central plotlines and core stories.  Something more than 'the strongest woman in the world!', because, frankly, that doesn't drive much. 

The X-Men are 'mutants -- hated and feared by the world they are sworn to protect!'  that's it, in a nutshell, and no angsty adolescent who has ever felt like the rest of the world doesn't like or appreciate or understand them -- in other words, every adolescent since the beginning of time -- can fail to relate to that.

Spider-man's essence is, essentially, that as long as he's Spider-man, he can never be truly happy -- but he can never give up being Spider-man, because He Failed Uncle Ben. 

The Avengers essence is Big Time Heroes Handling The Problems Normal People Never Could.  It's a simple essence but it works so well that as long as Joss Whedon managed to include it in his Big Time Avengers Movie, even he couldn't [fuddle-duddle] the team up  Although he tried.  (It should work well; Lee and Kirby lifted it directly from the JLA... which is ironic, because the superhero team they actually created as a direct response to the JLA was the Fantastic Four, which was nothing like the JLA.)

The Fantastic Four is a super powered family having crazy adventures. 

The essence is that thing that, when you forget about it, the book stops working.  Oh, it may not stop working COMMERCIALLY... Claremont largely abandoned the X-Men's essential theme for years and X-MEN became and remained a huge top seller spawning many franchise books and rip offs... but that was because Claremont stumbled onto a vital truth... everyone wants to read a romance comic, but nobody wants to BUY a romance comic.   Also, male adolescents love a big hit o' lesbian vibe. 

But most of what Claremont did on X-MEN had nothing to do with X-MEN and, well, the stories sucked.  Of course, even when Claremont would sporadically remember X-MEN's theme and do mutant stories about the X-Men protecting a world that hated them from evil mutants, it still sucked, but that's Claremont.

Wonder Woman has no such essential theme.  As a character, she's a complete mess. 

Aside from lacking any kind of essential theme, she's also crippled by... yes... Steve Trevor.  Why?  Because, emotionally, fanboys are disturbed on a level beyond their ability to articulate by a woman who is more powerful than her male companion, and who constantly rescues him.  Superman carrying Lois Lane in his arms like a child is fine; Wonder Woman carrying Steve Trevor similarly is deeply offputting. 

Especially since Steve Trevor is a veritable Race Bannon of a man; he should have his own pulp series... but he keeps getting involved in [poop] that's supposedly way over his head and Wonder Woman has to zip in for the save.  Yet this is very difficult for us to accept, because pulp heroes like Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers and Indiana Jones fight similar menaces all the time and THEY don't have a girlfriend with Kryptonian level powers to rescue them, either. 

Yet you cannot simply give Steve super powers because then the book will be about him. 

The solution is simple, and very fitting to WW's Amazon background... give her a girlfriend.  Then, not only does nobody care that she constantly rescues her love interest, but more guys buy it because, you know, girls kissing each other. 

She also needs a better origin.  Or, a writer who will actually do something with the concept that she's a homunculi... a clay statue animated by magic/divine power.  That's the sort of thing that should cause some deep, introspective thoughts on the nature of humanity... yet it never has.  WW has always known that she's a homunculus, and has never cared.  This is strange.

WW could easily be a comic about a superhuman being of inhuman origin striving to define her own identity.  In fact, that's what it SHOULD be about... identity.  Because no matter how Diana tries to define herself, there are question marks there.  Is she human?  A goddess?  A superheroine?  And while she's trying to sort all this out, she also has to deal with her native culture and her adopted culture, both of which insist on primarily identifying her by her gender... but maybe she herself doesn't find her gender to be her most important or defining characteristic.  Maybe she wants people to stop seeing her as a 'wonder' or as a 'woman' and just see her as a person.  And isn't that what we all want?

There are a ton of fascinating stupidities implicit in the way WW has been handled.  Why are all the Amazons apparently boy crazy?   I get that she was created in the early 40s when non heterosexuality could not be acknowledged in any way, but still, this is an interesting question.  Why do the other Amazons simply accept Diana as not only a person, but the daughter of, and presumptive heir to, their Queen? 

Do Amazons, perhaps, reproduce their numbers by magically animating clay statues of women?  Is this why, to them, Diana is no big deal... because all the Amazon elders create 'daughters' this way?

If Wonder Woman is about a search for identity, about defining what it means to be human, about having equal social  status regardless of gender or weird mystical origin... then this will drive all her stories.  She will be all about helping others find equality and establishing their own identities.  She will be vehemently opposed to all things that dehumanize us... authoritarian forces in all incarnations, from profit driven corporations to tyrannical government entities. 

This Wonder Woman should not rescue a female orphan from a burning orphanage.  She should find her young ward working in a  third world sweatshop and break her out... freeing everyone enslaved there, but taking a special shine to this one courageous young girl who could so easily be an Amazon. 

If she needs a Steve Trevor, he should be a guy with a life and career of his own, and he shouldn't need constant rescuing.  The two of them should work together.  They should be equals, if not in terms of sheer raw power, then emotionally and psychologically. 

And Wonder Woman absolutely has a Lex Luthor -- Dr. Psycho.  And the Cheetah has been very well developed lately, too. 

[Buster's Uncle]

[ninja'd.  I'll get you next, Doc.]

The Amazon thing?  I think 20 years of inept trying too hard have overemphasized that part.  Going back to George Perez' reboot, every new creative team has seemed to want to work with what makes Wonder Woman unique, and you know what?  Hippolyta and Paradise Island and all that are fine, but I wouldn't want to live there. 

How about this?  What makes her special is that she's Wonder Woman.  Strongest woman in the world (also fastest, if Jesse Quick never got her speed powers back).  I see WW as one of those characters, who, like Superman and Captain America, stands out for her pure goodness.  That's not the most intriguing character hook in the cosmos, but it worked for those guys, and is a good traditional fit for her.  You make it work by bouncing her off the bad guys and flawed friends.

You made me skip ahead to the 'Wonder Woman's core personality and nature' stuff, BTW.

None of this "Amazon Warrior' crap, and no killing bad guys.  She's strong and she's good.  Write good straightforward superhero adventures for her, just like you would for Supes and Cap, done with better cast and better villains, write her like a real woman, but not make everything about her Woman and Important.  She's a superhero - you don't have to put WOMAN in all caps on every page; write stories about a superhero who is a woman.  There's a difference.  They've been overthinking it for 25 years.

More soon.

[Buster's Uncle]

Okay, not to be dismissive, Doc, but I haven't finished my pitch yet - you won't agree with all my ideas, (that I came up with on the fly in conversation this afternoon after a lifetime of not following Wonder Woman except during the Perez run,) but there's little you raise that hasn't been taken into account on some level.

But "give her a girlfriend"?  Wow.  THAT'S not been said in the halls of DC once a week for decades and shot down every time.  I'm pretending I'm organizing my ideas for a pitch meeting at DC -rather in the same line as the Make It Make Sense game- and I'm gonna go with ideas that might get me a gig, not something everybody ever already thought of and wasn't allowed to do.  She ought to be a lesbian for pretty obvious reasons, and I've got an idea about dealing with that.

As to concept - she has as much as Superman, with Greek mythology stuff instead of Krypton.  As it happens, I really know my classical mythology, but think that horse ought to stop being flogged on account of death.  Krypton is pretty neat, and Amazons and classical mythology are awesome - but Krypton is mostly just origin background for Supes, who was mostly improved by not thinking about the craters of Wegthor and Vathlo Island (though I do miss that stuff) - WW need not have all her adventures center around Hypolitus and Pheadra, or the Magic Lesson Book of Achilles's Tutor.

Concept?  The Avengers need a concept, because my parents never heard of them.  Wonder Woman, everybody knows.  -It's just that nobody writing her has gotten a good handle on what everyone knows since that sick freak Moulton died.

More to come...

[Buster's Uncle]

I'm going to catch up on some avatar business before I get back to this - but I will.

[Sigma]

This is coming from a guy who has read maybe a handful of comics in his life, and most of whose knowledge of the medium comes through nerd osmosis.

I agree with Buster's Uncle that turning Wonder Woman into a lesbian isn't a good choice because it's reinforces the stereotype that women should only be damsels in distress, and the only way for a female hero to escape that role is to basically act the masculine role in the relationship. At best it's a half measure in embracing alternate gender roles, at worst its blatant exploitation.

However Doc Nebula is also right about Steve Trevor's role being generally unpalatable to male readers. As a Doc Savage-esque character he doesn't work because his physical abilities are trumped in every way by Wonder Woman's, so casting him in that role is pointless. So for him to work he needs a different role.

How about this: make him into a politician in Metropolis or wherever WW usually has adventures-- a good one, a JFK type character if JFK were the hero of a comic book. An idealist who genuinely wants to help the poor and cut down the fat cats and Lex Luthors of the world. Maybe he'd like to be president some day? The important thing is that it gives Trevor and WW their own clear domains that they excel in. Trevor understands The System and knows how to enact change from within, but WW knows that the world that they live in is complicated by the existance of super powers. Both of them are equally ignorant of how truly difficult the others' job is-- Steve doesn't see why WW can't just rip to shreds any badguy that opposes her, and WW doesn't understand why Steve doesn't just stage a coup or whatever if he wants to bring about real change. But they have genuine affection for eachother and respect one another's goals, as they ultimately want the same thing.

[Buster's Uncle]

Something like that, yes.  Steve is her Lois Lane - he is Iconic; guys who have read maybe a handful of comics in their lives know of him and have an intelligent opinion.  He has to be there, but all that stuff about him getting rescued and such is definitely a good point.  It would be prudent to keep him out of the adventures, mostly.

He can be useful in other capacities.  I never put this thought into so many words, but the intention was never to try to build him up as a heroic figure in the first place.  I'm sorry to keep going there, but the use of Steve has historically, Not Been Done Well.

He can never be her equal, or even near-peer, so that exacerbates the problems with that approach.

Donna Troy's husband Terry Long was never used like that in Teen Titans, and I never resented him for being utterly mundane.  That made him rather non-threatening, and indeed, there was an element of fan surrogate there that appealed...

Not quite where I'd want to go with Steve, but something better can be done.  We want to sell the book to the usual aging fanboys, but gotta have the relationship stuff for all those girls who always wanted to like WW, but couldn't get into it.  Like Stan Lee's innovation, throw in some soap opera...