Would Wonder Woman be better served by a new and completely fictional pantheon?

[Pinsir]

Simone, Rucka and the one where they gave her pants so the most recent ones and those comic books weren't a feast for the eyes, they looked like they were from previous decades. The classic look was demodé and the new outfit with pants was really tacky but at least they had the discernment to scrap it. Kvetch all you want about Azzarello's run but Wonder Woman, her supporting cast and the mise-en-scene were all breathtakingly beautiful, everything looked like there was some thought put into it which made New Wonder Woman vastly more appealing than her old, old-fashioned counterpart

Wonder Woman has a history of terrible art, though most of vol 3 WW does have good art.

[Agent Z]

Simone, Rucka and the one where they gave her pants so the most recent ones and those comic books weren't a feast for the eyes, they looked like they were from previous decades. The classic look was demodé and the new outfit with pants was really tacky but at least they had the discernment to scrap it. Kvetch all you want about Azzarello's run but Wonder Woman, her supporting cast and the mise-en-scene were all breathtakingly beautiful, everything looked like there was some thought put into it which made New Wonder Woman vastly more appealing than her old, old-fashioned counterpart

So how did you find the stories regardless of the artwork?

[Dr. Poison]

Simone, Rucka and the one where they gave her pants so the most recent ones and those comic books weren't a feast for the eyes, they looked like they were from previous decades. The classic look was demodé and the new outfit with pants was really tacky but at least they had the discernment to scrap it. Kvetch all you want about Azzarello's run but Wonder Woman, her supporting cast and the mise-en-scene were all breathtakingly beautiful, everything looked like there was some thought put into it which made New Wonder Woman vastly more appealing than her old, old-fashioned counterpart

I beg to differ with your final sentence. Most of the designs for the New 52 Olympians were clearly borrowed from some real life person(i.e. War/Azzarello, Milan/Wesley Willis) or just downright ridiculous looking such as Hermes having chicken feet, Strife looking like a goth skank, Poseidon looking like a Disney character, and the First Born looking like a mash-up of Vandal Savage and Doomsday. I'll admit I did like Hera(when she was wearing actual clothes), Apollo, Athena, and Sirraca but that's about it. The rest were mediocre to terrible. Plus the art was very inconsistent throughout the run even when one artist did an entire issue. There were characters with missing facial features and a noticeable lack of detailed backgrounds.

[numberthirty]

Plus the art was very inconsistent throughout the run even when one artist did an entire issue. There were characters with missing facial features and a noticeable lack of detailed backgrounds.

I thought you dropped Wonder Woman a few issues in?

[Dr. Poison]

I thought you dropped Wonder Woman a few issues in?

I read/bought issues 1 thru 5, 14, 36, and the Secret Origins tale plus all of the previews posted online for each issue and just from that alone, I noticed the flaws that I mentioned.

[Darius]

Meanwhile, back on topic

I have no idea why people care so much about public domain characters. It's not like DC has ever really done more than use the general construct of the Greco-Roman pantheons. Perhaps they went overboard with the Azzarellomrun, but it was still compelling enough to draw in readers. You can change all the names you want so you have copyrights and such, but no one is going to be fooled by such a thin attempt at changing it up. Plus the public domain gods are relatable to most readers.

[Dr. Poison]

Meanwhile, back on topic

I have no idea why people care so much about public domain characters. It's not like DC has ever really done more than use the general construct of the Greco-Roman pantheons. Perhaps they went overboard with the Azzarellomrun, but it was still compelling enough to draw in readers. You can change all the names you want so you have copyrights and such, but no one is going to be fooled by such a thin attempt at changing it up. Plus the public domain gods are relatable to most readers.

Well, I read DC Comics to read about original DC created characters. There are plenty of other options for being entertained by these public domain characters including the original Greek myths form which they came from. I don't mind if they appear occasionally in Wonder Woman but 3 years was way too much. Even more than 3 issues per year would be too much for me if the gods were more than supporting characters in a story. It just comes across as cheap and the easy way out for DC to fill pages by using these characters. I would much rather their creators spend their time and effort on developing DC's own characters.

I don't see the need to create a new pantheon at this point either. I say have the Wonder Woman writers focus on developing Steve Trevor, Etta Candy, Donna Troy(in a positive light), Sirraca, and Hessia.

[My Two Cents]

All comics have there flaws.
I just learned to ignore them which has helped me to be able to purchase and read Wonder Woman (and many other characters) each month for
over forty years.

[numberthirty]

Well, I read DC Comics to read about original DC created characters. There are plenty of other options for being entertained by these public domain characters including the original Greek myths form which they came from. I don't mind if they appear occasionally in Wonder Woman but 3 years was way too much. Even more than 3 issues per year would be too much for me if the gods were more than supporting characters in a story. It just comes across as cheap and the easy way out for DC to fill pages by using these characters. I would much rather their creators spend their time and effort on developing DC's own characters.

I don't see the need to create a new pantheon at this point either. I say have the Wonder Woman writers focus on developing Steve Trevor, Etta Candy, Donna Troy(in a positive light), Sirraca, and Hessia.

At the same time, DC produces plenty of titles where Hippolyta(and the Greek mythology that comes along with her) does not play any role in them.

I just can't understand readers being upset by the presence of Greek mythology in a title where the main character's mother is a character from Greek myth and the title character is part of a mythological Greek society.

[Dr. Poison]

At the same time, DC produces plenty of titles where Hippolyta(and the Greek mythology that comes along with her) does not play any role in them.

I just can't understand readers being upset by the presence of Greek mythology in a title where the main character's mother is a character from Greek myth and the title character is part of a mythological Greek society.

Well, if Wonder Woman had more than one in-continuity book, I would agree with you because one book could focus on her mythological ties and the other could focus on her DC-exclusive characters but unfortunately, we don't have that luxury at the moment so I don't care for the fact that with the exception of Donna Troy, the last 3+ years of Wonder Woman have featured mostly public domain characters. Even JMS/Hester's run featured the Morrigan as the main antagonist so I've had more than my fill of these types of characters in the book.

[numberthirty]

I mean just steer clear of the title completely.

Things that you clearly don't like are a part of the title at it's core. It's like saying you want a Green Lantern title without the "cosmic" aspect.

[Silvanus]

It just comes across as cheap and the easy way out for DC to fill pages by using these characters.

What makes it "cheap[er] and eas[ier]" to use, let's say, Strife instead of Cheetah? It's not like using Cheetah in the New 52 meant creating a new character; she'd already been created 70 years before. Johns and Lee (or whoever was doing the art by then) had to put work into revamping her; but Azz and Chiang had to put work into reimagining Strife, too. The New 52 Strife's design, in fact, seems more like a new version, "from scratch"; we'd have recognized the New 52 Cheetah as Cheetah at first glance, but I don't think we would have visually recognized Strife. A complete redesign might be more work, I would have thought. I understand that you may not like this version of Strife; but was it really "cheaper and easier" to use her to "fill pages" than it was to use Cheetah?

There are plenty of other options for being entertained by these public domain characters including the original Greek myths form which they came from.

Perhaps, but there's nowhere else where we can see them interact with Wonder Woman; and for some of us, seeing Wonder Woman interact with supporting characters derived from Greek mythology has always been one of the pleasures of her book.

[numberthirty]

Azz and Chiang had to put work into reimagining Strife, too. The New 52 Strife's design, in fact, seems more like a new version, "from scratch"; we'd have recognized the New 52 Cheetah as Cheetah at first glance, but I don't think we would have visually recognized Strife. A complete redesign might be more work, I would have thought. I understand that you may not like this version of Strife; but [why] do you think it was "easier" to use her to "fill pages" than it was to use Cheetah?

It's not just that. An Ares who has grown tired of being the god of war is clearly a more drastic retooling of that character than anything I've seen of Cheetah in the "New52" era.

[Silvanus]

It's not just that. An Ares who has grown tired of being the god of war is clearly a more drastic retooling of that character than anything I've seen of Cheetah in the "New52" era.

Yeah--and I think that if we had a new pantheon with someone named Phil, for example, as god of war, it would feel less strikingly original that Phil was sick of war, because there'd be no previous bloodthirsty and rampaging Phil to contrast him to.

(Though actually, Phil from Duck Dynasty looks a little like Ares.

phil.jpg

Maybe the Olympian Pantheon should be replaced with Duck Dynasty. )

[Dr. Poison]

I mean just steer clear of the title completely.

Things that you clearly don't like are a part of the title at it's core. It's like saying you want a Green Lantern title without the "cosmic" aspect.

Well, I enjoy Wonder Woman herself quite a bit along with the supporting characters of hers that I mentioned earlier. I also happen to like many of her rogues as well. I don't even mind the characters like Sirraca who are based on Greek myth but not directly from it.