WW '08 - The Gail Simone Era General Discussion

[HestiasHearth]

Thank you! One thing that has happened a LOT, and I want to be clear that I don't blame them at all, but I find that guy writers seem to worry a LOT about making
Diana anything but a perfect flawless character. A few make her the opposite, sort of a terrible person inside and out, which is another problem entirely. But most seem
to worry about feedback if they show Diana as more human, more flawed.

Even some of the best writers seem to make her an ice queen, because making her make mistakes and have less-than-noble emotions at times is going to get some
pushback from some fans.

I have found, to some degree, that female writers seem to inherently embrace her being more human and more flawed. I think we feel we have more license to do that
than guy writers. I'm not saying it's fair, but it does seem to be the pattern. There are exceptions in both directions. Sometimes you can see that a writer, whatever their
gender, just plain doesn't like Diana and it shows.

For me, I love her, but I never wanted her to be cold. As I said often, Amazon blood runs hot. I like a Wonder Woman who is compassionate always, but is perfectly capable
of surrendering to fury if necessary.

Oh Goddess, if DC ever decided to bring back Queen Clea into the Wonder Woman book in a major way, I wish with all my heart that they offered you the chance to write that story (and again, that Amanda Conner would draw it). It would be the dream!!!!!

[ComixGail]

Hey Gail, cool of you to show up here. Hope the X-Fans don’t drive you off and that you’re having fun doing whatever it is you’re doing for Marvel which definitely isn’t X-Men lol.

1. How heavy was the editorial interference of the era? You don’t have to name names (although I suspect everyone you worked under at DC is gone thanks to the recent Bloodbath), but was WW a book that came with a ton of editorial demands, or was it one of those books where nobody in power cared, so they just went “we gotta put a book out, give it to Simone she can do whatever.”?
2. Any Wondy villains you wanted to get to but weren’t able to?
3. This is more of a general Wondy question but how old do you think Diana is? Is she 1000s of years old, or did Hippolyta have her around the same time Clark and Bruce were born? Do you prefer her debuting in the modern day or showing up in WW1/2 and disappearing again before resuming heroics in the modern age?
4. You made your feelings regarding Diana’s attitude to lethal force clear with that great Amazon quote about “don’t raise a hand before you’ve extended it”, but does *your* Diana have a hard rule against killing or is it more “only as a last resort”?
5. Who’s Diana’s archnemesis in your opinion? Who is her greatest villain, the one you see standing above the rest like Lex and Joker? It’s traditionally been Cheetah but Circe is my personal fave for that role.

1) They mostly trusted me, but WW is a trinity book that had a movie in development. I got away with a LOT. There were a few notes that kept coming back--they wanted more guys in the book, which is pretty common for WW, and they wanted more stories on the island. Not bad, really.
2) Not really, but I wanted to use Rucka's gods and was not allowed to for reasons I don't know.
3) I think making WW 100s of years old is a terrible idea. It takes away so much of her sense of wonder and discovery. I always think she is the age she looks, late twenties.
4) Last last last resort. Wonder Woman could and would kill if there was zero possibility of another solution.
5) It's probably Circe but I do like the adjustments Rucka made to Cheetah.

[ComixGail]

A) The character creation set-up on CoH was insanely great.
B) Now that you've said it, I can totally see it.

My heart broke when they shut down that game! I know it's coming back, in a way, but I really loved it.

[ComixGail]

I haven’t read the full run cover to cover but I like the team-ups with Powergirl and Black Canary. They were fun. I feel like Wonder Woman almost never get to team up with non-Wonder Girl superheroes (and even then that has been few and far between until as of late). And the Justice League feels like it doesn’t count because it’s just her half the time and the other half it’s her and one other woman sooo.

Also the artwork was always top notch.

We lucked out on artists, BIG TIME. And agreed, it's fun to see Diana with other DC women!

[ComixGail]

Hey Gail!

Before you were taken off the book, did you have any ideas for other old villains to be brought in? I thought I remember reading somewhere that you had plans for Dr. Cyber and Dr. Poison, but I may have imagined it.

No, that is correct, but the only one we really had a plan for was Dr. Poison (don't ask what the plans were, I have forgotten!).

[ComixGail]

That's really cool, I think Aaron Lopresti is a really underrated WW artist.

I agree. And he KILLED on Wonder Woman vs. Conan. But I know he's having big success with his independent stuff.

[ComixGail]

I was not a huge fan of Genocide at first, but I have grown to love what she brings to the table. I also love that she is an unstoppable tornado of destruction that can go mano a mano with Diana, and I would love to see her return.

She has shown up a couple times, but I love your description of her, and Diana taking the Lasso back is one of my favorite moments in the entire run.

[Skytten]

I loved the moment with Diana giving up the lasso for Donna. It was so sweet and with how little we see them interact (overall, not in this run) that was great. I loved how much you used Donna.

[ComixGail]

I haven’t read the run since the original publication. A lot of it has faded into the mists. LOL That’s not a reflection of the work, but I find now that I’m…of a certain age I don’t remember the specifics of comic runs like I used to.

I will say with my chest, though, that The Circle was a terrific opening arc.

ETA: Oh, and Ms. Simone, aren’t you the one responsible for WW getting her own forum on this site?

First, thank you, The Circle is probably my favorite superhero story I have ever written. I feel it's unlike any other WW story. It's also a story that weirdly, I get asked to talk about at colleges to this day.

And I am indeed the one who asked for a Wonder Woman forum. The DC COMICS general forum was fine, but I was getting guests and interviews and art previews and such, and with the volume of threads
there, sometimes a really cool thing would be down the page before people even got to see it. Jonah was not convinced it would have enough traffic but for a long time, it was REALLY busy, and I am thrilled
to see it's still busy!

[ComixGail]

It is oh so sad her run was riddled with the DiDidiocy's BS. That Amazons Attack and Granny effin Goodness defeats Olympus shite is unforgivable. I guess she gets kudos for trying to take the high road and acknowledge that giant poo poo platter, but it definitely hampered the run a bit.

My favorite element of her run was the 5 Questions With series of interviews with vatious creators on WW

That was a blast!

And I always say comics at the big two is a bunch of kids sitting at a round table, with a pile of crayons in the middle. Sometimes, you want purple, but some other kid grabbed it, and sometimes, you're left with colors you don't want at all. It's really part of your job to make the best of the crayons you get, and sometimes, you have to throw a fit to get Forest Green, you know?

But I have never complained about it, really. It's a joy and a thrill to get to write these characters. Only a handful do in any given year. I don't care for it when writers just ignore everything that went before. I'd rather work with it and try to make it as cool as I can.

[ComixGail]

I enjoyed that 5 Questions series as well. Especially the ones with Dan Mishkin and Martin Pasko because Bronze Age WW doesn't get talked about much. DC acknowledges the Golden Age, the mod Diana Prince era and then skips straight to Perez.

Have you all seen the announcement for the new reprint line - DC Finest - that's supposed to launch in November? Apparently, it's supposed to be DC's version of Marvel's Epic series. The first WW volume is supposed to the Gail's run.

It does seem to be mostly my run. The recent Omnibus editions have done extremely well, so it's nice to see this stuff back in print!

[Vordan]

Congrats on being part of Uncanny X-Men 700 by the way. If you don’t mind this shifting towards a more general questions for you with regards to Wonder Woman, I had two more questions:

1. Should Themyscaria be a place Diana can go to and fro after leaving, or do you think it has to be a place that’s extremely difficult/nigh on impossible for her to return to once she leaves? The problem writers keep seeming to have with it when it’s easy to reach is that either you play it straight and it’s utopia, which begs the question of why they’re not doing more to help the world, or the Amazons get turned into red shirts and slaughtered. Themyscaria being walled off does address those issues - it doesn’t help because it can’t and writers can’t use the Amazons as fodder - but we do lose out on a unique/cool setting. What’s your take?

2. Do you have any feelings regarding Wonder Woman being a legacy mantle that Diana inherits from Hippolyta, or do you think she should be the first Wonder Woman?

Apologies if I’ve strayed too far from the thread’s purpose but we rarely get the chance to ask a WW writer their feelings on the franchise so I thought I’d take a chance. Glad to hear your stories are selling, God knows we need more omnibuses from DC that aren’t Batman.

[Gaius]

I agree. And he KILLED on Wonder Woman vs. Conan. But I know he's having big success with his independent stuff.

Yeah, I was really happy to see him on the Conan crossover when I picked that.

I enjoyed your BC and Powergirl crossovers you did with WW, are there any other DC heroines you'd have wanted to pair WW off with? Big Barda's an obvious one but I've always thought Zatanna works great for teaming up with Diana if DC wanted to copy the "World's Finest" gimmick for WW.

[I'm a Fish]

1) They mostly trusted me, but WW is a trinity book that had a movie in development. I got away with a LOT. There were a few notes that kept coming back--they wanted more guys in the book, which is pretty common for WW, and they wanted more stories on the island. Not bad, really.

Did you get notes like that for Birds of Prey?

[Stanlos]

That was a blast!

And I always say comics at the big two is a bunch of kids sitting at a round table, with a pile of crayons in the middle. Sometimes, you want purple, but some other kid grabbed it, and sometimes, you're left with colors you don't want at all. It's really part of your job to make the best of the crayons you get, and sometimes, you have to throw a fit to get Forest Green, you know?

But I have never complained about it, really. It's a joy and a thrill to get to write these characters. Only a handful do in any given year. I don't care for it when writers just ignore everything that went before. I'd rather work with it and try to make it as cool as I can.

Wow, Gail! You truly are a WW in your own right to have remained focused and undeterred no matter what was thrown your way!

The crayon metaphor triggers a question in my head about the Genocide arc. There is a moment when the League shows up to engage the creature before Diana gets there. Was that Team's composition the Leaguers you had in mind initially? If not, what characters were off limits?

One of my absolute favorite stories you have ever written that isn't Sensei & Student was the Infinite Crisis Villains United special with the prison break where the book closes with the most epic mic drop I have ever read. At the time, I thought that dealing with that was going to be Diana's responsibility while Bats led the OMAC team and Supes led the Superboy Prime assault. When you were witing were you aware of what would follow? Did you have a 'next chapter' or conclusion in mind at the time of writing in case that task fell to you?

Thanks again for the Awesomeness!!!