My Wife: Understands The Cosplay Impulse

Before I delve in here, I must come clean about a coupla things.

First - I don't really know anything about Wonder Woman except for what I remember of the Linda Carter TV show, and what I remember of that show is that I watched it, and it was a television show.

Second - I don't really know my mythology. My mythology is familial, my mythology is World War 2, it's Russia, it's stereotypes. Greek stuff? I don't know Greek stuff.

Sooooo.....there's a lot in this comic that I didn't totally grab ahold of.

That being said? This was a delightful read! While I didn't get all of the reference, I enjoyed spending time with such a cool story. There was so little dialog and narration here and when there was dialog, it wasn't a literal, redudant explanation of what was on the page--which I feel like happens in comics way too often--but instead, the language and writing expanded it in a way the art couldn't, making it even better. (That first time it happens, when the line "...sun of a king" shows up was particularly awesome. There's no way to draw that the guy is toying with the girls he's about to kill by letting them know he isn't human, and there's no way we would hear the distinction in a movie if an actor said the word "sun" instead of "son"--it's only going to happen here, in text. Knowing where that scene goes at the end, that line gets even cooler.) And the final reveal of where that narration comes from--wow. That was really awesome, and so dark. It wasn't what I expected, and I loved it.

And yet? I have to say that my favorite parts of this comic were the one's without any words. For instance, there's a series of frames where a woman clad in a hooded cape of peacock feathers, uses a scythe to kill a horse. Whoa. The colors of that cape, juxtaposed with the barn and the horse. That blade swinging amongst all the softness and silence, sharply singing its song. The frame where you the horse neighing, yet there's no sound effect written - I loved it all.

Now, how about those two horse-people-mythological-figures bustin' down the door! I stared at that for, like, five minutes. The harnesses, the legs of the horses, the violent charging. There's so much "motion" in one page, it's like--have you ever been around horses? They have the most intense presence, with all that power caught up in their muscles. It's unreal, being close to them, realizing that they've just agreed not to "attack", that domestication is just a promise between us and them, a promise not to run us down. I look at the legs on those centaurs and they've got that kind of power. They're scary.

What about Diana? Wonder Woman herself? I just love all the angles that she's drawn from - her long hair flowing down her back as she looks over her shoulder, opening her serious closet full of serious equipment; the intense look in her eye. I especially love the frame where she's jumping in the air to protect the chick in her underwear, how she blocks and destroys an arrow that was coming straight toward her. YES. See, now I get why you would wanna be Wonder Woman for Halloween. Before, it seemed like a costume. This seems like something more...badass.

The end of this comic, which I alluded to before is depicted in such a cool way that I want to go dig up some mythology books and learn a thing or two. I stared at that last page for what felt like hours. Those girls got burnt to a crisp. I love that the last frame is one of their falling, fiery bones. Just a dark piece of confirmation that yes, those three girls are completely burnt up and dead. Make no mistake, accept no substitute. RIP.

This was a delightful read. I came in not knowing a lot about Wonder Woman or Greek Mythology, and nevertheless, I was able to enjoy this comic. I guess that means that you've got a successful #1 on your hands.

-Nina Stone, 2011