Posts Tagged ‘ Wonder Woman ’

He may have enormous willpower, a square jaw, and the ability to bed two of the DCU’s most independent women at the same time – but, boy, is Hal Jordan a douche. You need proof? Alright – the top 10 reasons that Hal is a douche.

1. He fakes injury to get attention from a pretty woman – that he’s supposed to love.

2. He chops the hands off friends when they won’t give him what he wants (sure, sure, yellow fear monster, blah, blah – no, he’s just a douche).

3. He doesn’t like women – even Zatanna – fighting for him, but he’s more than willing to hide behind her while he gets his ring to work. Wait a minute. Power rings can be fiddled with? What, do they have a dial or something?

4. Rather than ask somebody, Hal would rather violate someone’s mind…to find out where to get a stamp. Or he could just head to a post office.

5. Sinestro hates Hal for a reason. Because he’s a douche.

6. Late to the party, Wonder Woman? Then cut the cake. Because that’s woman’s work, and I’m hungry dammit. I don’t care if you’re Wonder Woman – WOMAN’S. WORK.

7. Protect the Guardians of the Universe? No way! Hal doesn’t just hide behind them, he uses them as a shield. No wonder they hate him.

8. Hal has no respect for other people’s property. The douche.

9. Hal steals his (not actually) dead colleague’s girl – and he starts to move in pretty damn quick. “I know Guy Gardner’s only been dead for a few hours, but of course I’ll hold you, pretty broken-English gyspsy lady”…

…because she makes him feel good. Just like Guy did. I mean, okay, so this scene is a few weeks later, but still – what a douchebag. This is why Guy Gardner hates Hal – and who can blame him?

10. Sometimes, you don’t need to explain why Hal’s a douche. He does it for you.

And a special bonus reason that Hal’s a douche: because even when he knows he should pity his old lover, Carol Ferris, he doesn’t. He handles her ‘the old fashioned way’.

Hal Jordan: douche.

(Front page header image by Jim Oakley)

(When I was looking for images for this post, I came across a similar tumblr post from a couple of weeks ago and used most of the images from there; credit where credit’s due!)

Everyone else posted it yesterday, so why not?

The image below was released by Toon Tumblers to promote their SDCC exclusive, and appears to feature the newly rebooted Justice League membership in it’s entirety.

For those keeping a checklist, in addition to the big seven of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern, Aquaman and MartiaCyborg, it looks like Deadman, Atom, Element Woman (a new Flashpoint character who looks a lot like Metamorpho, so I assume she found the Orb of Ra before Rex Mason), Green Arrow, Hawkman, Mera, and, er…Power Girl?

Well, no, that’s not Power Girl. And according to Geoff Johns, she isn’t blonde – her hair is definitely light though, so maybe…white?

Zealot would certainly make sense – the Wildstorm characters are integrating fully with the DCU, and Lee has an affinity with her since he created her originally. So yes, let’s say Zealot until we hear further.

It’s a largely traditional line-up with a few curve balls thrown in – and all those curves belong to women.

Wait that came out wrong.

Anyway, there you are – and I have to say, now that I’ve got a good look at the full segmented redesigns of Superman, Green Lantern, Batman and Flash costumes, man they look dumb.

Gene Colan has passed away, aged 84.

Obviously, I didn’t know the man personally but he was one hell of a comic artist – and his covers especially could be incredibly dynamic.

Thoughts with his family and friends.

Here’s a gallery of 50 of Colan covers that I’m a fan of (although I didn’t include any of his Western stuff here)

On Fringe

In spite of my worries, the Fringe finale actually kind of rocked.

That said, I’m still a little confused with Peter never having existed. Why did Walter cross worlds and start the whole mess if not to save him? How did Olivia end up getting Walter out of the mental institution to help her way back when? Did Fauxlivia still have a baby? Who was it’s father? If Peter didn’t exist, how could the machine be turned on in the first place? And exactly who are the WatchersObservers that they apparently exist outside of regular time?

And, wait, if Walter created the machine in the future and sent it back into the past, why did he create it in the first place? How did it end up with parts in both worlds? And if he only created it so he could send it back so it could be used in a different manner than it was used the first time, didn’t he just create a massive paradox?

Oh, and good on Seth Gabel for getting promoted to series regular next year. No return for Kirk Acevedo to the regular cast, though – mainly because of the hat.

I’m not saying that the show’s perfect, and it has more dangling plotlines than Claremont’s X-Men, but still – pretty good.

On Smallville

Ten years? Damn.

I haven’t watched a full season of Smallville as it airs since…what, season four? Whichever one Jensen Ackles was crap in. I do, however, have a bunch of seasons on DVD that I’m very slowly watching (veeeery slowly), and I tried to watch this season but somehow dropped away. It’s an enjoyable show a lot of the time, but it’s not always – or even often – a very good show.

In any case, I’ll watch the finale tonight. And I’ll probably enjoy it.

Ten years. Wow.

(Oh, and if you haven’t been keeping up with Chris Sims’ and David Uzumeri’s Smallville Recaps over at Comics Alliance, you really should go and read them. It’s more fun than watching the show half the time.)

On Human Target

Damnation.

While not surprised at the cancellation of Human Target, I am saddened. The show was one of the few that I made a point of watching every week, and the chemistry between the three leads – Mark Valley, Chi McBride and Jackie Earl Haley – was great fun to watch. The addition of two female cast members – Indira Varma and Janet Montgomery – felt forced in the second season, I actually grew to like them both more than I thought I would (especially Montgomery’s Ames, who sparked off Haley’s Guerrero).

Ah well. If there’s any justice in the world, Valley will get another good action show, because that guy is good.

On Wonder Woman

Well, bugger.

I know a lot (a lot) of people derided the costume, but I wasn’t one of them. Well, I don’t think I was. It’s been a while.

Anyway, while I don’t think David E Kelley is anyone’s idea of a good showrunner for a superhero show, I was looking forward to Adrienne Palicki as Diana. Hopefully the pilot will get leakedreleased at some point so we can all see what might have been.

And laughed at the costume.

On Flashpoint

And finally, on a comic that actually came out this week that I actually read – not bad, although for a story that’s now 20% completed (not counting spin-offs, obviously) it certainly felt like 15% set-up and 85% exposition. I’m not sure anything actually happened in the issue.

Even so, I think I liked it more than when it was called House of M.

This…I would have heard about this if it was real, right?

Right?

Via

EW has the first photo of Adrianne Palicki in costume as Wonder Woman from the new pilot.
(Now clickable in hires thanks to Bleeding Cool)

Now, I like Palicki, and I think she has the acting chops to pull this off – but I’m not too sold on the costume here. Maybe it’s one of those things where I have to see it in motion.

If you add a leather jacket it looks kind of familiar (well, with some extra pants detail)…

…and possibly just in time to be out of sync with the comics again.

That said, it could have been a lot worse…

Edit: Actually, you know, this costume is really growing on me.

I may not be particularly partial to what I hear about David E Kelley’s Wonder Woman pilot – but as far as I’m concerned he nailed the casting – the usually blond Supernatural and Friday Night Lights alum Adrienne Palicki has been cast as Diana, Princess of Themyscria.

For those not in the know, check out the first two seasons of Friday Night Lights.

I’m pretty sure Palicki was mentioned in the casting of the mooted-then-abandoned JLA movie back in 2007 – and although at the time I would rather have seen her as Supergirl (in fact, she was the first Supergirl in an episode of Smallville back in season three, and also the female villain in the Aquaman pilot), I approved of the idea.

Damn – I just got interested in the Wonder Woman show.

I’m not really into these sites, but Beyondtherack.com – one of those private sale sites – has got some superhero themed merchandise on there at the moment. For example, there’s a bunch of superhero cufflinks (all DC) and – in the case of Wonder Woman, some cuffs – which are all less than $10:

The site also has a bunch of pendants (I think that means necklaces), terry cuffs (for those aerobics sessions?), belts, bracelets and rings, too. While I’m not one for most of those things, I confess that I am tempted by this Flash ring just because…

You need to create an account to see the merch, but that just means dropping your email in – click on over here.

DC have been teasing the upcoming Flash-centric event all day, and it appears to be based around the Reverse Flash changing some key moments in DC’s history so things don’t happen the way that they did.

But that might not be all bad…

Wonder Woman has a new outfit and a new direction to coincide with her 600th issue and JMS taking over as writer –

On the whole, the outfit isn’t too bad, I suppose. I’m not entirely sure why Diana has Witchblade-style gloves, but I’ve seen worse. JMS story on the other hand…well, its just smacks of yet another example of him not playing well with other kids’ toys.

Somehow, though, seeing a more ‘street’ Wonder Woman doesn’t feel quite as shocking as it might.

Probably because we’ve seen something similar – if a lot more EXTREME 90s! before:

Granted, the new design has given Diana shorts and covered her chest a bit more, not to mention kept the WW motif (which the one on the right above couldn’t because Diana was no longer Wonder Woman at that point, Artemis was) but it still feels similar to me.

That is to say, temporary and designed to raise eyebrows and possibly a bit of press.

Wonder Woman is crying out for one of Alan Kistler’s excellent Agent of S.T.Y.L.E. columns isn’t she?

No, Superman doesn’t have a subconscious ‘thing’ for Wonder Woman (or her identical younger twin sister) at all, does he?

Via

Google‘s front page is graced by Jim Lee’s artwork today – which means that it will be the most seen art of his career (well, probably).

And it’s DC-centric.

I bet Marvel’s kicking themselves.

(Click pic to embiggen)

You know there was all that kerfuffle over Beyonce as Wonder Woman the other week?

Well, it suddenly occurred to me who I would like to see as the Amazonian princess:

Rosario Dawson

Beautiful, tough when she needs to be, can act, has geek cred, looks good in a bustier-type thingy.

What more do you need?

Rumor has it that Beyonce is interested in Wonder Woman:

But Wonder Woman?

There’s a role that’ll make people take notice.

Via here and here.

I wish that Wonder Woman movie Joss Whedon had been developing had come to pass, especially after seeing that poster above (it even makes me think Jennifer Connolly may not be a horrible choice). Who knows, maybe it will now that the WB seem to want to build towards a Justice League movie.

But maybe it won’t. Maybe the origin of Wonder Woman – of being made from clay on an island full of women who, let’s face it, hate men and are kind of butch, what with the armor, spears and wrestling – doesn’t lend itself to movies too well.

And if that origin was changed, if Diana was a cast out minor Greek deity, or a miracle of science, or some other bastardization, how well would it work?

How well would it work, period?

Diana has a muddy origin, no clear mission (want to bring peace to man’s world? good luck with that!), very few defining storylines or moments, a sparse rogue’s gallery and a constantly-shifting supporting cast. Let’s face it, she might be iconic but she’s hardly marketable.

At least, if I was a movie exec that’s how I’d see it. Maybe I’d wait and see how the upcoming Wonder Woman animated feature turned out before moving ahead with a live action movie to see how well it hung together as a story.

I’m just not sure what the best way to approach the character would be. An almost Gladiator or 300-like approach? A World War II movie? Introduce her into the modern day America?

What do you think?

Warner Bros hit the headlines this week saying that they were essentially rebooting the Superman movies after the disappointment of Superman Returns. Instead, the studio is going to build individual movies towards a Justice League movie.

It occurs to me that I’m only reading Trinity for one character.

As much as I like Busiek, Bagley, Nicieza et al I’m certainly not sticking around for the slow-as-molasses plot, the uninteresting new characters or the navel gazing as the trinity actually start to think of themselves as – Spoiler! – a trinity and wonder what that means.

No, I’m reading for Wonder Woman. I can get a pretty good Batman pretty much anywhere (except for Batman itself where I have no idea what’s going on), and I can get a great Superman right now in Action Comics – Robinson’s run on Superman is too soon to judge.

But Wonder Woman?

She’s pretty much a non-presence in Justice League, and as much as I wanted to see Gail Simone really succeed on the title, Wonder Woman is drowning in a sea of sub-mediocrity. While her run started off strong with ‘The Circle’, it’s pretty much unintelligible right now, with a trip through Hades or somewhere for some reason that doesn’t make sense or matter.

Current arc aside, it’s not Simone’s fault that she’s been stuck with a boring double-life/secret identity schtick for Diana, but it is her fault that she’s yet to do anything interesting with it.

It’s also not her fault that Wonder Woman’s villains are pretty dull. Giganta and Cheetah are just kind of there, and only the overused Dr Psycho is genuinely creepy. She doesn’t really have an archenemy outside of Circe (also overused) and while I like the idea of the upcoming Genocide (a being made of dirt from various sites of atrocities to counter Diana, made of the dirt of Paradise Island) I also kind of liked the idea of Devastation, and where’s she now?

Then there’s the supporting cast. Sarge Steel is, very broadly speaking, J Jonah Jameson with a gun. Nemesis is just kind of dull as love interests go. Etta Candy is virtually a blank slate these days….and while you can’t go wrong with warrior gorillas, I think the rest of the cast needs a revamp or at the very least more development.

And honestly, I wish DC would have the balls to just let Diana be gay – or bisexual at the least. If you can do it with Buffy and not have a huge backlash (apart from me moaning about it) then why not try it with Wonder Woman – except that she’s more iconic and Warner Bros hope that one day they’ll actually manage to make a movie with the character and they worry that having a gay or bisexual Diana might damage its success.

Answered my own question there, didn’t I?

Maybe it’s the central concept of the character – it’s difficult to sum her up in one sentence, unlike most other characters, and when she’s worked best in recent years it’s where she’s had a creator with a strong vision – like George Perez, Phil Jiminez or even John Byrne. Simone, so far, hasn’t demonstrated that she has that vision.

Anyway, back to what I started this little diatribe with: Trinity is the only place where I can currently read a well-written Wonder Woman.

And that’s kinda sad.

DC’s new weekly book Trinity kicked off yesterday, and it was a pretty good read. As promised the main feature was accompanied by a back-up which showed – in this case – the beginnings of an anti-Trinity.

Busiek had said in an interview that the anti-Trinity weren’t going to be the obvious option (ie, Joker, Luthor and Cheetah) so it was interesting to see who made the cut. Busiek seems to have a thing for Morgaine Le Fey in both Marvel and DC, so that wasn’t that big a surprise but the identity of the second part of the group did surprise me…

Let’s see, he’s a dapper dresser with a question-mark shaped rod…

…he poses a lot of questions or, say, riddles…

…even his mask is shaped like a sytlized question mark…

…but he seems to have quite a bit of power…

…and he’s not afraid of bragging about it…

…and, he seems fine with being named by Morgaine.
Well somebody definitely fits the bill…

…except he’s not that powerful, he’s not that scarred and he’s usually more subtle.

And so is Busiek. So I guess this isn’t our Riddler. Instead, I think it’s either an alternate Riddler from one of the other 50+ Earths, or a future version of our Riddler.

Sort of a Riddler 2099, if you like.

Or is it someone else entirely? Someone who suffered a lot of pain at the end of his life and asked the occasional Question? Eh, I’m reaching, I know.

It’s a Riddler.