Wait....Wasn't Amanda Waller always evil? (Spoilers)

[Android 17]

I’m personally not a fan of Gunn’s interpretation of Waller. I mean, you expect me to believe that the diabolically clever and badass Amanda Waller would allow her team to start a mutiny and let one of them knock her ass out with a golf club? And by the end of the movie they’re all still alive, have their jobs and she’s just nursing her wound with an ice pack?

That’s not the Wall I know.

[DrNewGod]

I’m personally not a fan of Gunn’s interpretation of Waller. I mean, you expect me to believe that the diabolically clever and badass Amanda Waller would allow her team to start a mutiny and let one of them knock her ass out with a golf club? And by the end of the movie they’re all still alive, have their jobs and she’s just nursing her wound with an ice pack?

That’s not the Wall I know.

IMO, most of the movie interpretations of a comics character don't count. The directors are basically Alien Face Huggers, implanting their preferred story in a character host (without whose established brand, their story would languish in the egg), allowing their story to burst out of the characters chest amidst an otherwise civil dinner.

There are exceptions, of course, but they are the treasures contrasting with Hollywood's natural narcissistic output.

[Frontier]

We need a live action CC Pounder as Waller.

No argument there .

[Android 17]

IMO, most of the movie interpretations of a comics character don't count. The directors are basically Alien Face Huggers, implanting their preferred story in a character host (without whose established brand, their story would languish in the egg), allowing their story to burst out of the characters chest amidst an otherwise civil dinner.

There are exceptions, of course, but they are the treasures contrasting with Hollywood's natural narcissistic output.

That’s such a creative and accurate analogy. I agree.

[Agent Z]

We need a live action CC Pounder as Waller.

I don't think it matters who is playing her as long as she is written the way she currently is. Pounder voiced Waller in one of the animated movies and the character had similar problems.

It's a weakness that crops up when your shared universe is relatively small, like say the DC movieverse. We're not seeing much of the government agencies in those, so of course they're all amoral murder factories, 'cause that's the preferred shorthand for conflict.

In a broader universe (like the DCU *used* to be), there's room for all kinds of shades of grey, from walking-a-thin-line anti-heroes (Waller) to white hats (Nemesis) to lunatic fringers (the Force of July).

It'll be interesting to see if Waller somehow gets a character reset after this latest round of crossovers. Between conquering Earth-3 and outright putting a bounty on super-heroes, she's in dire need of some Yellow Fear Bug/Evil Speed Force retcons to make her a useful character again.

The comics have been writing Waller this way since the late 2000s, even before the New 52 reboot. The DCAU is an even smaller universe than the movies and had a Waller more in line with her classic self. The size of the universe isn't the issue, the erosion of any moral nuance is.

IMO, most of the movie interpretations of a comics character don't count. The directors are basically Alien Face Huggers, implanting their preferred story in a character host (without whose established brand, their story would languish in the egg), allowing their story to burst out of the characters chest amidst an otherwise civil dinner.

There are exceptions, of course, but they are the treasures contrasting with Hollywood's natural narcissistic output.

The comics' writers have been doing the same thing you're accusing the directors of doing for decades. Hollywood directors aren't any more or less narcissistic than comic book writers.

[Jim Kelly]

IMO, most of the movie interpretations of a comics character don't count. The directors are basically Alien Face Huggers, implanting their preferred story in a character host (without whose established brand, their story would languish in the egg), allowing their story to burst out of the characters chest amidst an otherwise civil dinner.

There are exceptions, of course, but they are the treasures contrasting with Hollywood's natural narcissistic output.

Yeah but, I rarely ever read a new comic book anymore. Most of my comic book reading these days is old old stuff. So whatever new content I see is mostly T.V. shows and movies. Of course, they don't count. But then the idea that anything counts proably never was true and it's certainly been thrown out the window on the train to Philadelphia.

[dswynne]

My opinion is this: one, I liked "Skinny/Hot Amanda Waller"...if we're looking at the character as a flashback, back during her field operative days. Thus, when she became a bureaucrat, and got older, of course she gained weight. Two, I didn't like her original background story when she was first created. It came off as a bit "Aunt Jamima" to me. I prefer the idea that career government specialist broke out of her humble beginnings like any other person, and then rose up the ranks. And, finally, Viola Davis' interpretation of the character is spot on. A perfect medium of gravitas dealing with the absurd. I hope she continues her role in the greater DCU.

[Thor-Ul]

Really Waller has been flanderized to beyond recognition from being a grey character willing to do more htan morally questionable actions, even for a greated good and many times questioning herself such desicions to be a moustache twirling villian/evil bureaucrat. But even surprises me how much access to many elelment she have actually. I just wonder if this even is the same Amanda Waller and not some doppelganger/impostor from another reality or a villian possing as her.

[Agent Z]

My opinion is this: one, I liked "Skinny/Hot Amanda Waller"...if we're looking at the character as a flashback, back during her field operative days. Thus, when she became a bureaucrat, and got older, of course she gained weight. Two, I didn't like her original background story when she was first created. It came off as a bit "Aunt Jamima" to me. I prefer the idea that career government specialist broke out of her humble beginnings like any other person, and then rose up the ranks. And, finally, Viola Davis' interpretation of the character is spot on. A perfect medium of gravitas dealing with the absurd. I hope she continues her role in the greater DCU.

What was "Aunt Jamima" about her original backstory?

[AJpyro]

All that matters is Ostrander Waller.

Viola Davis Waller needs a better script.

[Triniking1234]

They honestly keep writing Amanda Waller like Norman Osborn during his Thunderbolts era. Amanda Waller is against costumed freaks whether they're hero or villain. Having her do crap like kill her own officers or let civilians die for the sake of the mission isn't within Waller's character when written properly.

[Triniking1234]

My opinion is this: one, I liked "Skinny/Hot Amanda Waller"...if we're looking at the character as a flashback, back during her field operative days. Thus, when she became a bureaucrat, and got older, of course she gained weight. Two, I didn't like her original background story when she was first created. It came off as a bit "Aunt Jamima" to me. I prefer the idea that career government specialist broke out of her humble beginnings like any other person, and then rose up the ranks. And, finally, Viola Davis' interpretation of the character is spot on. A perfect medium of gravitas dealing with the absurd. I hope she continues her role in the greater DCU.

I don't know why people complained about her being fit in her field agent days. I didn't know the Americans were sending out 40/50 year old women with mum bods out into the field.

[Agent Z]

I don't know why people complained about her being fit in her field agent days. I didn't know the Americans were sending out 40/50 year old women with mum bods out into the field.

She's not supposed to be a field agent.

[dswynne]

What was "Aunt Jamima" about her original backstory?

Her original background story depicted her as an escapee of the housing projects of Chicago, while being illustrated as an obese, angry, Black woman with a bunch of kids. Sure, she is "self-made" in the end, but that origin story rubbed me the wrong way. I prefer her more recent incarnation, where she doesn't have THAT in her background. She worked her way up in the government ranks as a career bureaucrat. And as much as people disliked her New52 origin, I did like the added bonus that Waller was an ex-field agent for "Team Seven", along with Slade Wilson, Black Canary and a number meta- and non-meta-humans. JMO.

[dswynne]

Why? It makes better sense than her starting out as a welfare recipient from Chicago. Why would someone with background end up in charge of TASK FORCE X?