Should the comic book origin of the JSA be revised to include Wonder Woman?

[married guy]

I had no issue with Hippolyta being the Wonder Woman in the JSA.
Then Diana as a founding member of the League.
As much as I love the JLA: Year One, the retcon of Dinah as a founder never hit the mark. (Although Waid sure made a good fist of it!)

[Stanlos]

I enjoyed that series and the upgrade to Dinah's profile.

[astro@work]

With Wonder Woman (Diana) being at the 1939 World's Fair in New York City, I always assumed that was setting up the new "Golden Age" timeline that would have been in DC's 5G revision ("Generation One: Age of Mysteries") that had the plug pulled.

So now I have no idea what DC is doing with it.

Exactly. The ship has already sailed on whether or not Diana existed in the Golden Age. It was established in Wonder Woman's own book, #750. It was then confirmed again in The Golden Age #1.
Whether or not she was there has already been made clear. She was, until there is another continuity reboot. In the meantime I like holding the JSA golden age history and Wonder Woman's history as close to what was published as is reasonable. (But for heaven's sake DC, flesh it out a bit more, since Steve Trevor was part of the golden age origin story...explanations are needed!)

[MajorHoy]

. . . Exactly. The ship has already sailed on whether or not Diana existed in the Golden Age. It was established in Wonder Woman's own book, #750. It was then confirmed again in The Golden Age #1.

Are you talking about Geoff Johns' The New Golden Age #1 one-shot?
If so, I don't trust that to establish anything definite yet until the Per Degaton messes are resolved (since if the JSA defeats him that may undo changes he caused to the timeline).

Whether or not she was there has already been made clear. She was, until there is another continuity reboot. In the meantime I like holding the JSA golden age history and Wonder Woman's history as close to what was published as is reasonable. (But for heaven's sake DC, flesh it out a bit more, since Steve Trevor was part of the golden age origin story...explanations are needed!)

Johns is too busy adding in his new pet characters to the past timeline to bother clarifying what's already been any more.

[Lightning Rider]

Why can't Diana be a JSA member, then head back to Themyscira (maybe because of HUAC), then reemerge to be a founding member of the league decades later?

[MajorHoy]

Why can't Diana be a JSA member, then head back to Themyscira (maybe because of HUAC), then reemerge to be a founding member of the league decades later?

That's up to DC to decide (if they ever bother with that).

Personally, I like a "Wonder Woman" as a JSA member back in the 1940s, but I prefer Diana to be more of a contemporary to Clark and Bruce. So I'd prefer Diana's first superteam experience to be the founding of the Justice League.

[Guy_McNichts]

Why can't Diana be a JSA member, then head back to Themyscira (maybe because of HUAC), then reemerge to be a founding member of the league decades later?

So she's a quitter. A quitter and a loser who took her ball and went home because being a hero was too hard for her.
The mighty Wonder Woman, immortal warrior with god-like power who faces down the worst evils of the world, completely caved because Joe McCarthy yelled at her. Truly the embodiment of female empowerment.

And that's not even figuring the headache-inducing questions about how Steve Trevor and Etta Candy, among others, are still alive and young.

Wonder Woman's origin is simple, direct, and powerful. Isolated island of Amazons until by chance or fate Steve crashes onto it. His coming heralds the Amazons sending their Champion who will change the world.

I do not understand the insistence on diluting that with convoluted lore nonsense about how she left and went back, or she wasn't the first Amazon to leave and no on cared, or Steve crashing on Themyscira wasn't that big a deal after all...or just outright sabotaging Diana's integrity as a character...all so she can exist on the Justice Society AND be a founding member of the Justice League. She gains nothing from being a part of the team or fighting in World War II.

Leave it so some alternate Earth if it must be done and let the main Diana first appear in modern day like everyone else.

[krazijoe]

No, just no...There is NO good reason to.

[Gaius]

I loathe these attempts at regressing Wonder Woman and completely upending her entire status quo and supporting cast just to shoehorn her back onto a team that hasn't been important to her longer than most fans have been alive. The only worse retcons in Wonder Woman history are Daddy Zeus and her deadbeat brother, a fitting collection of creatively bankrupt ideas.

Let's just get through all the arguments:

1. WW2 and the JSA are just not important enough facets of her character history to where they can't be easily replaced as has been shown in multiple stories like G&Ms, Year One, or even the first movie.

2 I've never heard a convincing argument for why she's more "tied" to WW2 than either Superman or Batman are to WW2 or the 30s who do not have to deal with this nonsense.

3 Pretty much all attempts I've seen to try and have it where she debuted in WW2, quit like a coward, came back in modern times so Supes can still be #1, and somehow Steve and Etta are still young (or their coincidentally identical descendants) are the kind of stuff that get superhero comics rightfully mocked and laughed at.

4 No interest in Hippolyta on the JSA either. Yeah, Diana ain't a Legacy character to a title that only exists because of her. You don't do that with Superman or Batman, you don't get do it with Wonder Woman. Hippolyta being an epic hero from the ancient past like seen in Perez's run or Historia is far more impactful for that character and Diana than having her run around failing to stop Hitler.

[caj]

I had no issue with Hippolyta being the Wonder Woman in the JSA.
Then Diana as a founding member of the League.
As much as I love the JLA: Year One, the retcon of Dinah as a founder never hit the mark. (Although Waid sure made a good fist of it!)

I agree with all of this.

[astro@work]

Are you talking about Geoff Johns' The New Golden Age #1 one-shot?
If so, I don't trust that to establish anything definite yet until the Per Degaton messes are resolved (since if the JSA defeats him that may undo changes he caused to the timeline).

Johns is too busy adding in his new pet characters to the past timeline to bother clarifying what's already been any more.

All true, but Diana's own book was the one that established her presence during World War II (issue #750), prior to any Golden Age #1 shenanigans.
Unless the resolution to the first JSA arc undoes that story point from WW issue #750 as well (I mean, it could?) then she is there whether she is a JSA member or not.

I also would disagree with those who are asserting that if Diana went back to Themiscyra after WWII, then came back, it was "as a coward". Why is that assumed? I call bulldookey.
Maybe she went back because her mission was finished (War in man's world). Maybe there were more urgent needs with the Amazons. There are a million story options as to why she might have gone back other than "as a coward". That's silly.
But I do agree that if DC is going to stick with this newly re-inserted part of her history it needs to be fleshed out (especially modern vs GA Steve & Etta, why she returned to the Amazons, and why she came back again).

[SiegePerilous02]

Superman debuting as the first superhero in 1938 is a bigger deal both in universe and out than Wonder Woman's ties to WWII or the JSA (and is more important than the JSA themselves). He also has been depicted as either ageless or aging extremely slowly in some depictions, meaning he could be both in the past and modern day. Yet DC is always less eager to put him back in the Golden Age. Probably because they know he's evolved past his WWII era ties and it will cause havoc to his supporting cast, abd he would never quit just because McCarthy bitched him out.

Yet Wonder Woman has to deal with all of that just to give the JSA a boost with her presence? Nah.

[Sacred Knight]

I'd vote no. First off, it's a mess for her lore. Where does her supporting cast go? WWII or modern day? And what fills in the other time period? It's just a mess. Also if you're not going to have Superman and Batman as part of the original group, Wonder Woman shouldn't be either. She's far more tied to that representative group of heroes, regardless of where the lore wants to place them at any given time. But just as I didn't like it Post-Crisis when she was way too new and green compared to the others, I don't much fancy the idea of her being eight decades more experienced in the superhero realm either.

Hippolyta I don't view as acceptable either as no one should be Wonder Woman before Diana. I consider the whole thing just trying to craft a solution for a problem that doesn't need to exist. If you're determined to have the JSA in the same world as the JLA, then you need to make that team sink or swim on their own.

[CaptCleghorn]

All true, but Diana's own book was the one that established her presence during World War II (issue #750), prior to any Golden Age #1 shenanigans.
Unless the resolution to the first JSA arc undoes that story point from WW issue #750 as well (I mean, it could?) then she is there whether she is a JSA member or not.

I also would disagree with those who are asserting that if Diana went back to Themiscyra after WWII, then came back, it was "as a coward". Why is that assumed? I call bulldookey.
Maybe she went back because her mission was finished (War in man's world). Maybe there were more urgent needs with the Amazons. There are a million story options as to why she might have gone back other than "as a coward". That's silly.
But I do agree that if DC is going to stick with this newly re-inserted part of her history it needs to be fleshed out (especially modern vs GA Steve & Etta, why she returned to the Amazons, and why she came back again).

Diana's activities after the HUAC hearings are certainly rife with possibilities. Based on her being pointed out specifically as someone who had been cleared, I can see her feeling even more betrayed by the current political climate and give an Amazonian F.U. to the superhero life.

And I don't like the Hippolyta solution either. No one should be Wonder Woman before Diana of Themyscira. There just needed be any Wonder character in the JSA. Again, unless you really wanna be clue to the classic roots and install all the originals. Beyond that, it's not necessary.

I agree with you on Hippolyta. A big part of Diana's status is her first travel to "Man's World".

[MajorHoy]

I always wonder what it might have been like if instead of using Miss America or Hippolyta as Diana's replacement in the WWII-era JSA they went with a different Quality Comics character . . .



from Feature Comics #42 (March 1941).