Azzarello - The Final Judgement.

[Hawk80]

I could go into details, but let's just say this: it was a 3 years long offensive act of incompetence.

[Vanguard-01]

I'll give it a C. When it first started, I'd probably do a B, but as the series went on, I'd give it a D, so I'm compromising.

Pros:

• Diana is really well-written, with the exception of a few questionable actions (testicle-grabbing comes to mind). She is compassionate, she is strong (for the most part), but still with a bit of Marston bite to her.
• The art was beyond amazing. I love the cartoon-ish style, and Wonder Woman looked formidable rather than waifish, which sometimes can be the case. Many of the Gods had great designs that made them stand out much more than in previous runs where they used togas.
• Hera was by far the stand-out character of the run. It was very entertaining watching her descent into humanity.

Cons:

• Too many characters, not enough Diana. It felt more like an ensemble book, which wouldn't be so bad if I didn't detest many of the supporting characters. And because Diana's depiction was on the pro, I would've liked to see much, much more of her.
• The First Born is one of the most uninspiring villains Diana has ever faced. Like I said before, he seems like what a 12 year old boy thinks is a cool villain. There's little to no depth with the character, and he isn't a villain you "love to hate." Apollo was much greater as a villain, or Cassandra, and I wish they were the big bads rather than a hulking lump of veins.
• Little to no references to past runs. Steve Trevor only appeared in the Origins issue, and Azzarello got rid of Artemis and Phillipus in favor of his own creations Aleka and Dessa, which is a big slap in the face to longtime readers who had invested many years into the characters, as well as the creators who worked on them. Also, his complete unwillingness to use any of her classic rogues puts a sour taste in my mouth.
• Many of the plot elements introduced throughout the run were never resolved, which is unfortunate. They could've easily ditched many of the later story elements in order to wrap up earlier ones (really, we needed Poseidon vying for the throne in the last issue instead of resolution with Hippolyta? Or all the emphasis of the Minotaur being the one she faced before which we all knew instead of wrapping things up with Hera and the others?). It felt like an unsatisfying way to end 3 years of commitment, especially since I never considered the friendship between Diana and Zola (who was awful) to be the main plot point of the series.
• The New Gods. Seriously, what was Azzarello doing with them? I feel like he wanted to write a New Gods book but used Wonder Woman to do so. I'm a fan of the New Gods, and Orion, but I wasn't happy with Orion's portrayal for the most part.
• The change in origin isn't my cup of tea. Instead of the whimsical born-from-clay origin, she's now basically She-Hercules. I don't HATE the origin change, but it definitely is an unremarkable one. I do hate the Amazons-rape-raids, though.

Wow.

This is almost exactly what I was going to say.

The only points where you and I disagree is on the art. I personally found Chiang's art a little boring to look at. I like lots of detail in my artwork. I can spend several minutes poring over a page of Ivan Reis's work, checking out all the details. Chiang? One glance and I've seen everything worth seeing.

[chlj1]

E
There is no question Azz. run was awful!! The changes that were made didn't need to be done!! It was plain to see the changes were made to appeal to a male fan base, fan that had little to no respect for WW or women in general. Azz. did everything he could to put distance between WW and her feminist root. From WW birth, no longer a gift from the gods, now a product of an affair with a married god! Her once proud people that were a positive light for women are now killers and slave trader. Even Azz. choice for her love interest is a guy that has no respect for her and women. In the past any man that would be her love interest would have to respect her both as person and as woman. WW wouldn't accept a guy that has no respect for women, that treat her like a sex object, that has sexually harassed her, that brow beat her. But in Azz. reboot she does! It's clear he wanted the once proud symbol of strong women to submit to a guy that would belittle her, degrade her and would show WW little no respect and have her accept that. Some may try and push it under the rug or made excuses! It's very clear what Azz. was doing. It clear he wanted to push WW and women back into the stone age, not standing by men as their equal, but standing behind men as their submitted partner. I hope the new team can repair the damage!

[SteveGus]

One of the vilest acts in the history of illustrated fiction, deliberately degrading the character and her world. Thanks to Brian Azzarello, I am no longer reading DC universe comics, and consider myself a recovering DC and Wonder Woman fan. It will live in infamy as a textbook example of how not to treat a classic character.

[Gaelforce]

I'd say C-

Pros:

- His actual characterization of Diana as a caring, compassionate person who brought would-be villains to her side.
- The new depictions of the gods (tho' I still prefer Rucka's)
- The overall story arc was interesting, if not a bit lacking in Diana for the first half.
- Chiang's art worked well with Azzarello's storytelling style, which I liked, btw.
- Diana becoming a god, giving her a unique position in the DCU.

Cons:

- The Amazons being devolved into barbaric sex pirates
- Zeus as Diana's daddy and the re-writing of Diana's origin, especially in light of Azzarello's statement that he was not changing the origin when he began. This kind of set the tone for me for the remainder of the book - I felt I couldn't trust the writer.
- The puns were overused, therefore lessening their impact for me.
- Diana very rarely, if ever, got to stand up and be a solo hero. For a three year run, there are very few standout 'superheroic' moments for her.
- The ending left far too many things unfinished/unanswered. For a 'complete story with a definitive origin', I don't feel I got either.
- Overall, the removal of many of the major feminist elements of her history and story and replacing them with masculine influences.

[Bound4olympus]

I've liked a lot of runs over the years and tolerated some i didnt enjoy so much but with the exception of Gails run this has been the most i've enjoyed reading Wonder Woman since i started reading the book. I loved the redesign of the gods, Dianas new power set, the art, the characters and the expansion of Dianas family. I'm glad Azz left some mystery behind for future writers to expand on and am looking forward to the Finches run to see how they deal with the stories left to tell. I also have gotton a kick out of how much this book has pissed off the Perez fan base. Lol. To me that is an idication that the book is headed in the right direction...the future.

[Agent Z]

I've liked a lot of runs over the years and tolerated some i didnt enjoy so much but with the exception of Gails run this has been the most i've enjoyed reading Wonder Woman since i started reading the book. I loved the redesign of the gods, Dianas new power set, the art, the characters and the expansion of Dianas family. I'm glad Azz left some mystery behind for future writers to expand on and am looking forward to the Finches run to see how they deal with the stories left to tell. I also have gotton a kick out of how much this book has pissed off the Perez fan base. Lol. To me that is an idication that the book is headed in the right direction...the future.

Not trying to pick a fight here, but what exactly do you have against the Perez run? Plus, it's possible they have problems with it other than 'it's not Perez'.

[teardropmina]

Gail's run is my favorite, and I have D-E level issues with Azzs'

[mathew101281]

Interesting in some respects, but ultimately suffers from a lot of the same problems that a lot of the other runs suffer from. The desire to completely remake instead of build on what has come before.

[Ascended]

Gave the run an "A" but B also applies. It wasn't a perfect run and there were some things I didnt care for, but that's to be expected.

I've been reading Wonder Woman for twenty years and this is the best the character has been treated since Rucka, and now that its over I'd argue that this run was better than his in many respects.

Some of the larger scale changes Azzarello made, such as the Zeus-is-her-father thing, the less-than-admirable Amazons and the God of War deal, obviously turned some fans off. Me, I had some issues there too, but ultimately Ive come to the conclusion that these changes were improvements to the mythos. Diana used to be a tool the gods would use, often with little regard for her. Now that shes one of them she's directly involved in their actions and that gives her more autonomy and influence in her own plots. The Amazons have obviously been set-up to take a turn for the better under Diana's leadership, and that can be a strong arc for them that could provide tons and tons of great story potential. Much better, in the end, than the static, unchanging culture they used to be. And the god of War thing....well, I'd have preferred god of Truth, but a god is a god, and seeing Diana wrestle with her new role should be fun. It also may show the other gods, who so often decry that they "cannot be anything other than what they are, and have no choice" the hypocrisy of their statements, as Diana refuses to bend under the same stresses that eventually broke Ares.

These changes may go against old continuity and Diana's original mythos, but they all provide great options for story lines that could last for years. That's an improvement over the old versions that did not lend themselves very well to stories being told in the "now".

[Agent Z]

Gave the run an "A" but B also applies. It wasn't a perfect run and there were some things I didnt care for, but that's to be expected.

I've been reading Wonder Woman for twenty years and this is the best the character has been treated since Rucka, and now that its over I'd argue that this run was better than his in many respects.

Some of the larger scale changes Azzarello made, such as the Zeus-is-her-father thing, the less-than-admirable Amazons and the God of War deal, obviously turned some fans off. Me, I had some issues there too, but ultimately Ive come to the conclusion that these changes were improvements to the mythos. Diana used to be a tool the gods would use, often with little regard for her. Now that shes one of them she's directly involved in their actions and that gives her more autonomy and influence in her own plots. The Amazons have obviously been set-up to take a turn for the better under Diana's leadership, and that can be a strong arc for them that could provide tons and tons of great story potential. Much better, in the end, than the static, unchanging culture they used to be. And the god of War thing....well, I'd have preferred god of Truth, but a god is a god, and seeing Diana wrestle with her new role should be fun. It also may show the other gods, who so often decry that they "cannot be anything other than what they are, and have no choice" the hypocrisy of their statements, as Diana refuses to bend under the same stresses that eventually broke Ares.

These changes may go against old continuity and Diana's original mythos, but they all provide great options for story lines that could last for years. That's an improvement over the old versions that did not lend themselves very well to stories being told in the "now".

As a reader of 20 years, could you elaborate on how you think the Amazons were unchanging. Perez had them forgive Heracles, Jiminez had them adopt outsider technology and science, Gail introduced the Circle and Rucka had them more involved in Earth politics. I'm not trying to pick a fight here, just trying to understand your opinion more.

[SiegePerilous02]

I gave it a "C" overall.

Pros
- Diana herself, especially compared to her appearances in other books.
- The new versions of the Gods. Strife and Hera are my favorite characters in the run.
- Chiang's artwork, especially the covers. Though like Vanguard, I generally prefer someone more detailed like Perez or Jimenez

Cons
- The Amazons are terrible. There is not one interesting character among them, and so many sexist tropes that the Perez run subverted are played pathetically straight here. Any nuance we could have gotten in interactions between them and their sons is glossed over, so we didn't even get any payoff. Azz said he wanted to make them less perfect, but A: they were never perfect before, and B: there is a difference between being flawed and murdering defenseless men and babies. That just makes you a monster. DC would never allow Jonathan Kent or Thomas Wayne to turn a blind eye to murder the way they have Hippolyta.
- Diana gets all her powers from male gods: Her innate power is from Zeus, her flight is from Hermes, her weapons are from Hephaestus and Ares trains her. Women can only be empowered by men I guess.
- Azzarello's original characters like Zola, the First Born and Lennox are dull as dirt. Myndi Mayer was more developed than all of them combined.
- The story is spread way too thin. It could probably have been told in 2 years instead of 3.
- Orion is completely pointless. One of the worst things you can do to a story is shoehorning in a love interest that doesn't contribute much.
- Too many unresolved plot points. I like ambiguity, but God, even the End of Evangelion provided more clues to tie up loose ends and brought more character arcs to a satisfying close than this thing did.

Overall: I liked Diana just fine before this reboot, and I don't see many improvements to her world or her supporting cast to make this whole exercise worth it. It doesn't explore many things Perez and Rucka didn't already do, and did in much better andf less cliched ways.

[Outside_85]

Gave it an A, because thats where I think it belongs; amongst the best runs WW has ever had.

Pro's:
-Solid character work, just about everyone with a face and a name had personality and motivation that pushed them forwards. People hated Hera in the beginning, now they cheer for her. People didn't really like Lennox when he showed up, but that was turned around when he went out with a football song.
-Solid creative team, one of the last teams to remain virtually unchanged for 37 issues (though I thought it traded up when they lost Akins)
-Solid story, because it really was a single story with a fleshed out beginning, middle and end that hung together.
-No filler issues. Stuff like #0 and Villains month were in nearly every other instance a one-shot not tied into anything relevant, in Azzarello's case, he used both to add to his own story so much that they became a part of it.
-Great redesigns of most of the gods
-No massive editorial interference. I have to give props to Matt Idelson for letting the creative team do their thing their way rather than succumbing to the temptation so many other editors fall for by demanding the presence of elements that have no reason to be there, like the appearance of Superman or Batman.
-Changes that made sense and actually matters to the story, we didn't leave the story and the characters in the same manner we started off with.
-Never once did I feel the book turn silly in any way simply to accomodate something from ages past.

Cons:
-Some redesigns, I think, didn't go far enough... looking at Dionysus who should have had the craziest shape of all the Olympians.
-Bit too simplified when it came to the gods and their area's
-For all his bluster... the First Born isn't exaclty what I would call a shining star of a villain. He's far better than Genocide and Doomsday simply because he has a brain and is able to speak, but normally I don't care that much for villains who just want to kill everything, the Thanos sort. So I have to hope he stays gone, because a return would just make him less.
-Akins... great designs, but nowhere near Chiang's level, which made his work a rather jarring experience.
-However great I think Chiang's works is to look at, and I do mean that because I want his stuff as posters to put on my wall, even I have to admit I did wish the fights had a little more 'oomph' to them than they often did.

[Step]

C sums up exactly how I'm feeling, he characterized Diana very well, the art was amazing and I love the Gods' designs, but what he did to the rest of the Amazon's was horrible, I don't feel like Diana got a lot of time to shine on her own, she always needed someone's help or it focused more on someone else and I don't like how all the women in Wonder Woman's life were toxic or useless until the last couple of issues except Siracca, who...doesn't really show up much or do too much of note, and I just don't like how many of Wonder Woman's female influences and feminine themes were replaced by men, that was perhaps my biggest drawback.

What made Diana stand out from the crowd to me wasn't that she was an awesome superheroine, it's that she was an awesome suerpheroine who was influenced by other awesome women, because even the most feminist superheros I can think of were still ultimately trained by men, taught all their philosophies by men, had their biggest influences be men, whereas Wonder Woman became what she was because of other women, so it was really disheartening seeing that go =/

Also, while I love the Gods' design and certainly appreciate them going for more than just ~men and women in togas~ some were a bit of dud, Hermes especially and Dionysus looks like a Naruto villain, but still, I love that they went for it!

[Javier Velasco]

I'd say those people shouldn't be giving their opinion on the run, if they didn't read it.

Ah but in a poll, there is usually a space for "No opinion"

In polling, lack of interest is often as strong a factor as positive or negative opinions.
As in "What did you think of Prince on last night's episode of SNL?" Loved him. Hated him. Couldn't care less.