After the critical and box office failures of Catwoman and Elektra a decade ago, Hollywood seemingly became convinced that female-led superhero movies couldn't work. And ever since then, nobody seems to have made any serious attempt to try again. Yeah, we've had Mystique, Storm, and Jean Grey in the X-Men movies, but they've spent nearly two decades stuck in the shadow of Xavier, Magneto, and Wolverine. The closest any major studio has gotten to giving a female character a role with any real, significant, meaningful substance to it in all that time has been Scarlett Johansson having a major supporting role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
But then along came Wonder Woman to shake everything up.
Created in 1941 by William Moulton Marston and an uncredited H.G. Peter, Wonder Woman brought a big dose of girl power to the male-dominated superhero genre. She wasn't some damsel in distress that needed a hero to rescue her; she was the damsel that saved herself. And through all the ups and downs the comic book industry has gone through, and through numerous retools and reimaginings, Wonder Woman has persisted, staying in print on a regular basis since her debut and becoming just as important to DC Comics as Superman and Batman.
But unlike her caped colleagues, Wonder Woman hasn't seen a whole lot of success beyond the printed page. With the notable exception of the classic 1970s TV show starring Lynda Carter, she hadn't really appeared anywhere beyond the various cartoons based on the Justice League. However, when Warner Bros. decided to follow in Marvel's footsteps and create their own cinematic universe starring the heroes and villains of DC Comics, Wonder Woman finally got her big break as a movie star. Her appearance in Batman v Superman was one of the few genuine highlights of that dreadful movie, and with the release of her own theatrical solo adventure, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited to see it. And after the string of misfires the DC Extended Universe has had lately, the Wonder Woman movie is exactly the shot in the arm it needs.
Welcome to Themyscira, a beautiful, secluded island in the Mediterranean Sea that is called home by a proud race of warrior women known as the Amazons. Created by the gods of Mount Olympus to protect humanity, the Amazons relentlessly train as soldiers in preparation for the prophesied return of Ares, the villainous god of war who slayed his fellow gods before being defeated by a mortally-wounded Zeus.
Unique among the Amazons is Diana (Gal Gadot), daughter of Queen Hyppolyta (Connie Nielsen). Despite being imbued with all of the same physical gifts as the rest of her people and trained ten times harder than anyone else, Hyppolyta still attempts to shelter her daughter from combat and discourage her from being like the other Amazons.
That all changes when Diana rescues Air Force captain Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) from drowning after his plane is shot down just off the island's coast. He reveals under interrogation that, unbeknownst to the Amazons, World War 1 has been raging for four years and that he is an Allied spy. In Steve's possession is a notebook he'd managed to steal from Dr. Isabel Maru (Elena Anaya), a chemist working under the command of General Erich Ludendorff (Danny Huston) of the German army. In this notebook is evidence that Maru has not only developed an advanced, even deadlier version of mustard gas, but that Ludendorff plans to use it in an attack on London.
Diana believes the war to be the handiwork of Ares and agrees to accompany Steve back to England so he can deliver Dr. Maru's notes to his superiors. But when Diana and Steve are stonewalled by the Allied forces' top brass as an armistice is close to being signed, they're forced to the front lines to stop Ludendorff and Maru from releasing their gas and changing the tide of the war.
The fourth time's the charm, it seems. I say that because after three movies that struggled to achieve even mediocrity, the DC Extended Universe finally has a winner. Wonder Woman is, no pun intended, wonderful. The movie is a 141-minute adventure that is exciting, compelling, at times awe-inspiring. It's not a flawless movie, but it is a strong effort that I absolutely loved.
At the helm is Patty Jenkins, who has spent the better part of the last decade working in television. Wonder Woman is only her second feature-length directorial effort, following the Aileen Wuoronos biopic Monster in 2003. And while Monster and Wonder Woman are on completely different ends of the specturm in terms of both the size of their productions and the personalities of their main characters, Jenkins proves herself more than capable of playing with the boys in their summer blockbuster territory.
Jenkins does not approach the movie with the overbearing gloom and senseless destruction we saw in Man of Steel and Batman v Superman, nor does she turn the movie into a ridiculous mess like what Suicide Squad turned out to be. She instead seems to draw inspiration from Captain America: The First Avenger. Both movies feel rather close in style, especially considering that both movies are period pieces that see superheroes sent to a war in Europe. But that's not to say that Jenkins merely copied that movie wholesale. That doesn't strike me as being the case at all. She does more to capture the horrors of war here than Joe Johnston did in The First Avenger, and to be honest, as much as I love Cap's first adventure as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there are parts of Wonder Woman that blow it out of the water.
Take, for example, the scene where Diana leaps out of the trenches and marches into "No Man's Land" so she can liberate a German-occupied village, brushing off bullets and mortar shells with her shield and wrist bracers. It's an utterly amazing, breathtaking scene that how much of a warrior and how much of a hero Diana is. Jenkins puts the scene together masterfully, a perfect blend of cinematography, music, stunts, special effects, and actors perfectly encapsulating their assigned roles. Just thinking about that scene gives me goosebumps. And the moment shortly thereafter, when Diana leaps into a second story window and takes out a group of German soldiers set to the strains of her leitmotif from Batman v Superman, is one hell of an adrenaline rush.
She also has an amazing cast to work with as well. Everyone contributes a fine performance, but I'd be lying if I said anyone other than Gal Gadot and Chris Pine were the standouts. Pine is charming and charismatic, and he and Gadot have a palpable chemistry together. And I'll confess that it's kinda neat seeing a movie where a man is the female hero's token love interest instead of the other way around.
But honestly, nobody is seeing the movie for Chris Pine. Everybody is seeing it for Gal Gadot, and those that are will not be disappointed because Gadot is tremendous here. She captures everything Wonder Woman is and should be. Gadot makes her more than just a warrior; she's graceful, hopeful, idealistic, an agent of peace and compassion that has no qualms about standing up for what she believes in. For the last forty years, Lynda Carter alone has been associated with the role, but Gadot makes it her own with her fantastic performance. In short, Gal Gadot puts the "wonder" in "Wonder Woman."
When I said earlier that the movie has flaws, I wasn't lying. The plot is nothing exceptional and Diana's climactic confrontation with Ares is practically interchangeable with the final battle from pretty much any other random superhero movie from the last fifteen years. But if those are the only negative things I can think to say about Wonder Woman, then the movie is doing pretty damn good for itself. I honestly cannot say enough positive things about the movie; it's everything I'd hoped it could've been. And between you and me, I have yet to figure out why it took so long for Wonder Woman to get her own starring role in a movie? Superman and Batman can get fourteen movies between them 1978 and now, but Wonder Woman just now gets one? Here's hoping she gets a few more to make up for lost time.
Final Rating: ****
