Donna Troy Appreciation 2023

[wonder39]

Maybe more than George but I'm not giving Marv a pass. After all he did write Donna's very first origin in the first volume of Teen Titans. He then also wrote her first retcon in the pages of New Teen Titans and then her next one in New Titans. I'd argue that if Marv had just given her a simple, solid origin to begin with it wouldn't have left the character open to so many retcons in the first place. He might not be responsible for the first mistake in identity that created her in the first place but he's the main guy that made her history complicated and messy. I love Marv's work but I don't understand why he did this with Donna's origin and retcons.

The Who is Donna Troy isn't a retcon, it's an expansion of the bare bones story they gave her in TT.

Crisis screwed her origin up... Moreso the PTB at DC did that. Rumor is that George wanted the start of his reboot of WW to be a sort of Year One, and then the rest of the run being "now". And that would have allowed him to work in the WG stuff. But DC likes the idea of Diana arriving later in the age of heroes (after Kal and Bruce, etc) so that screwed everything up, and needed to be addressed by Marv and George with the Who is Wonder Girl? Retcon ( the first retcon)

That all would have been fine. They could have even tweaked things once they returned Diana's debut to earlier, melding the Amazons and Titans of Myth parts of her history.

But then she died and came back and was retconned by Byrne, by Infinite.Crisis, by the 52, etc etc etc. Changes to fix changes to fix mistakes from.changes.

None of that other stuff was her or Marv's fault, but of screwy editors not respecting what came before and wanting to put their stamp on it.

[Garrac]

For any fan of Donna: World's Finest 2 has retconned Donna's origin to be her first one, now she's an adopted amazon for good. That is actually great news for the future, I hope?

[Factor]

For any fan of Donna: World's Finest 2 has retconned Donna's origin to be her first one, now she's an adopted amazon for good. That is actually great news for the future, I hope?

I’m so happy about this. I really hope they coordinated with Orlando so that he’ll also use this origin in her upcoming Tales of the Titans issue.

[M@Bowers2014]

The Who is Donna Troy isn't a retcon, it's an expansion of the bare bones story they gave her in TT.

Crisis screwed her origin up... Moreso the PTB at DC did that. Rumor is that George wanted the start of his reboot of WW to be a sort of Year One, and then the rest of the run being "now". And that would have allowed him to work in the WG stuff. But DC likes the idea of Diana arriving later in the age of heroes (after Kal and Bruce, etc) so that screwed everything up, and needed to be addressed by Marv and George with the Who is Wonder Girl? Retcon ( the first retcon)

That all would have been fine. They could have even tweaked things once they returned Diana's debut to earlier, melding the Amazons and Titans of Myth parts of her history.

But then she died and came back and was retconned by Byrne, by Infinite.Crisis, by the 52, etc etc etc. Changes to fix changes to fix mistakes from.changes.

None of that other stuff was her or Marv's fault, but of screwy editors not respecting what came before and wanting to put their stamp on it.

You're right Who is Donna Troy was more of an expansion of her origin. Also it was editors that made it necessary for a retcon of her origin because of what was happening in Wonder Woman. I guess I'm just saying at that point Marv could've gone with something less convoluted. And if he had maybe it would've stuck. Of I did forget to mention in my original post that the person who did the most damage to Donna is John Byrne. Now at the point that he got a hold of her she had gone from being Wonder Girl to Troia to a Darkstar to a Goddess. So maybe he thought he was justified in trying to tie it all together. He only made things worse. She's been similar to Hawkman/Hawkwoman ever since in that someone's always trying to "fix" them often with confusing results. I'm glad to see they are finally going back to Donna's roots concerning her origins. Hopefully it will stick.

[Digifiend]

The Who is Donna Troy isn't a retcon, it's an expansion of the bare bones story they gave her in TT.

Crisis screwed her origin up... Moreso the PTB at DC did that. Rumor is that George wanted the start of his reboot of WW to be a sort of Year One, and then the rest of the run being "now". And that would have allowed him to work in the WG stuff. But DC likes the idea of Diana arriving later in the age of heroes (after Kal and Bruce, etc) so that screwed everything up, and needed to be addressed by Marv and George with the Who is Wonder Girl? Retcon ( the first retcon)

That all would have been fine. They could have even tweaked things once they returned Diana's debut to earlier, melding the Amazons and Titans of Myth parts of her history.

But then she died and came back and was retconned by Byrne, by Infinite.Crisis, by the 52, etc etc etc. Changes to fix changes to fix mistakes from.changes.

None of that other stuff was her or Marv's fault, but of screwy editors not respecting what came before and wanting to put their stamp on it.

Yeah, the whole origin mess was caused by Diana being rebooted, which meant Donna now predated Diana. Donna being Wonder Girl at all no longer made sense at that point (she'd sound like a junior Wonder Woman when she was actually the senior one), hence her codename change to Troia that came with her new origin. They should never have rebooted WW without also rebooting Titans. It should've been both or neither. Whoever edited Perez's WW run is the one to blame.

[Factor]

Yeah, the whole origin mess was caused by Diana being rebooted, which meant Donna now predated Diana. Donna being Wonder Girl at all no longer made sense at that point (she'd sound like a junior Wonder Woman when she was actually the senior one), hence her codename change to Troia that came with her new origin. They should never have rebooted WW without also rebooting Titans. It should've been both or neither. Whoever edited Perez's WW run is the one to blame.

The biggest problem was not the reboot itself, but the insistence on it taking place in the present. Had Perez’s first arc happened in the past, most of the continuity problems it caused would have been avoided. Including Diana no longer being a JL founder.

[marhawkman]

Yeah, the whole origin mess was caused by Diana being rebooted, which meant Donna now predated Diana. Donna being Wonder Girl at all no longer made sense at that point (she'd sound like a junior Wonder Woman when she was actually the senior one), hence her codename change to Troia that came with her new origin. They should never have rebooted WW without also rebooting Titans. It should've been both or neither. Whoever edited Perez's WW run is the one to blame.

You could conceivably have WW(Hippolyta) do the rescuing of Donna....

[donnafan]

You could conceivably have WW(Hippolyta) do the rescuing of Donna....

I thought about that too. I feel like this was a missed opportunity from John Byrne who brought Donna back into the main WW book and added the confusing mirror image origin reboot. At that time it was established that Hippolyta had been time traveling into the past, joined the JSA and pre-dated Diana as Wonder Woman. Donna could've been rescued by Hippolyta instead of Diana. Confusing origin resolved.

Speaking of Donna and Hippolyta - I'm still waiting for Donna to call her "mother." In World's Finest: Teen Titans #2, Hippolyta and the Amazons make an appearance; however, Donna calls her "Queen." I've yet to see Donna refer to Hippolyta as mother even though it appears Donna's original origin is intact.

[marhawkman]

I thought about that too. I feel like this was a missed opportunity from John Byrne who brought Donna back into the main WW book and added the confusing mirror image origin reboot. At that time it was established that Hippolyta had been time traveling into the past, joined the JSA and pre-dated Diana as Wonder Woman. Donna could've been rescued by Hippolyta instead of Diana. Confusing origin resolved.

Speaking of Donna and Hippolyta - I'm still waiting for Donna to call her "mother." In World's Finest: Teen Titans #2, Hippolyta and the Amazons make an appearance; however, Donna calls her "Queen." I've yet to see Donna refer to Hippolyta as mother even though it appears Donna's original origin is intact.

The single biggest hint at Donna's current origin, IMO, is that she not only remembers New Cronus, but subconsciously used it as her mindscape.

[Frontier]

For any fan of Donna: World's Finest 2 has retconned Donna's origin to be her first one, now she's an adopted amazon for good. That is actually great news for the future, I hope?

Glad to hear it .

[wonder39]

You could conceivably have WW(Hippolyta) do the rescuing of Donna....

Yet the very idea of Hippolyta WW was so problematic from the start. ( Not her being WW in place of Diana, who had ascended, but Hippolyta going back into the past ( side note: I don't understand the constant need of the PTB to tie her to WWII. That was Earth 2s Diana. None of the others had that albatross around her neck)

Making Diana a legacy character retroactively just to " fix" Donna isn't a good investment, especially when just making Diana's debut happen earlier, like Kal and Clark, fixes all of that.

So all we have needed, for years, was for Diana to have made her debut with Supes and Bats. Then ease everything with Donna back to a simplified melding of Diana rescue with Titans of Myth ( say, Rhea, sensing the infant Donna's destiny, blessed ger with her powers. Knowing Diana is about to rescue the infant from the fire and take her to be raised by Hippolyta . There she is loved and trained in her powers. Becomes WG, etc. Then learns of her Titans of Myth heritage in a variation of the Who is Wonder Girl? Arc)

Hopefully we have some semblance of that now.

[Thirteen]

Major revelation in the World's Finest: Teen Titans #2 preview!!!!

https://aiptcomics.com/2023/08/04/dc...teen-titans-2/

Nice to see Donna's love of photography on display.

Was there a time jump between issues? Donna seems more physically mature (not just makeup) in issue 2 than when we saw her living with Diana in the first issue...

#2

vs. #1

The single biggest hint at Donna's current origin, IMO, is that she not only remembers New Cronus, but subconsciously used it as her mindscape.

Has that been touch upon since Orlando's run in 2020? Who knows where New Chronus (or anything) stands in continuity now.

Most recent use of the Lasso's Persuasion that I recall was from WONDER WOMAN #756 by Steve Orlando and Jesus Merino where she takes a couple baddies "within" the Lasso of Persuasion to have a battle of wills.

[Frontier]

Nice to see Donna's love of photography on display.

Was there a time jump between issues? Donna seems more physically mature (not just makeup) in issue 2 than when we saw her living with Diana in the first issue...

#2

vs. #1

It might just be the outfit. It doesn't look like she's wearing a bra in issue #2.

[kcekada]

So if it wasn't George's idea to reboot WW in then current time instead of setting her first year in the past, then I'm sorry for blaming him. He and Marv probably did dream up that new origin together. At the time, I guess they felt it made sense for her Donna to not have a strong connection to Diana, but I think that was a mistake. And everything that has occurred since has just layered on to that mistake. Jettisoning all of that would be for the best!

[Mel Dyer]

slight flaw in your argument... "slight"..... you're actually talking about 3 different characters who were at some point "Wonder Girl".

Wonder Woman TV series Wonder Girl was an Amazon named Drusilla.

The simple origin you talk about for the original Wonder Girl in the comics.... wasn't really Donna Troy.

It was kind of a workable origin story... kind of... The Titan of Myth one was a lot better IMO.No one except me. Too many characters in DC use the name Artemis.

I understand all of that, Marh. Perfectly.

I was comparing an unnecessarily complicated, perpetually revised, tacked-on-to-death origin for Wonder Girl in comics ..to the brilliantly simple one on Lynda's show. For my money, every superhero should have an origin that wraps in SIX panels or less. Six panels...and I have yet to find ONE origin tale longer than six or so panels, in all of comics, that was as entertaining and impactful than the Golden Age and Silver Age Flashes'.

I just tweeted something about that, the other day. Dru just pulls this 'Trevor's niece' thing out of nothing, just like she'd do it in a real-life, high-pressure situation, ..and it's so much better than what Donna and we, her fans, are presently saddled with.

Cross-Gen being the most trying example of bad, over-thought comic book origins.