Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons and Wonder Woman: Diana's Daughter Announced

[charliehustle415]

Oh God
There's no words for this beauty.

Good lord, my eyes got a workout following Jimenez's art.

Same. This is incredible.

I really cannot believe how beautiful this book is.

It's eye wateringly beautiful.

[Sebastianne]

Interview with Kelly Sue and Phil Jimenez

[K. Jones]

This was a treat.

[Primal Slayer]

Just finished it and


Everything about this book was so epic. Not even words to describe how good it is.

I love what other writers have done with WWs origin, gods, etc...but this is how you build her universe and the Gods. They arent a joke, they feel intimidating, they feel powerful, they live in a majestic place and I dont see them just standing around being killed by anything and anyone every 5 years.

[Gaius]

I really cannot believe how beautiful this book is.

It's eye wateringly beautiful.

I'm looking forward to Ha and Scott, but after this I would not mind waiting another three-to-four years if meant Jimenez doing the art on them.

[Nyssane]

I just read it and... wow. I definitely need time to process and re-read (and re-re-read, etc.) as I was just utterly blown away by this. Once the excitement dies down my feelings might change, but I think this may be the best Wonder Woman project since the original 40's run.

A few random thoughts:
spoilers:

I love how Demeter has a snake motif as snakes often get a bad rap for being "sneaky" or "evil". They're natural creatures and I like that Demeter's symbol is a snake. All the male gods in this are super hot and I love that. I love literally all the gods' designs, but I *really* loved Hecate's horrific visage, Aphrodite's sparkly beauty, and Hera just being Hera. I also really loved how Athena didn't seem to have a physical body, but just rather disconnected pieces of armor. I thought that was a really unique take on the god. The Amazons are such a varied and diverse collective of women. I didn't notice before that they even included a little person as one, and that's fucking fierce. You never see representation for that body type, so I'm thrilled to see it here. The writing is also superb. Very empowering and unapologetically feminist which I live for. My only complaint is that with the physical copy, some of the double-paged spreads didn't work too well. Hera's face is cut off in at least two of the spreads and it annoys me, but that's no fault of the creative team.

end of spoilers

[charliehustle415]

I'm looking forward to Ha and Scott, but after this I would not mind waiting another three-to-four years if meant Jimenez doing the art on them.

if there is any inkling of fill-ins - I riot

I just read it and... wow. I definitely need time to process and re-read (and re-re-read, etc.) as I was just utterly blown away by this. Once the excitement dies down my feelings might change, but I think this may be the best Wonder Woman project since the original 40's run.

A few random thoughts:
spoilers:

I love how Demeter has a snake motif as snakes often get a bad rap for being "sneaky" or "evil". They're natural creatures and I like that Demeter's symbol is a snake. All the male gods in this are super hot and I love that. I love literally all the gods' designs, but I *really* loved Hecate's horrific visage, Aphrodite's sparkly beauty, and Hera just being Hera. I also really loved how Athena didn't seem to have a physical body, but just rather disconnected pieces of armor. I thought that was a really unique take on the god. The Amazons are such a varied and diverse collective of women. I didn't notice before that they even included a little person as one, and that's fucking fierce. You never see representation for that body type, so I'm thrilled to see it here. The writing is also superb. Very empowering and unapologetically feminist which I live for. My only complaint is that with the physical copy, some of the double-paged spreads didn't work too well. Hera's face is cut off in at least two of the spreads and it annoys me, but that's no fault of the creative team.

end of spoilers

blame the Abrahamic faiths for vilifying them and associate them with the devil so people would easily convert.

but the last time I saw spoilers:

Hecate

end of spoilers looking this awesome was when Mignola drew her in Hellboy.

I cannot wait for the next issue however long it may take.

[BrianWilly]

I wrote this review for another forum and my blog and ehh well might as well repost it here

So. Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons #1.

The book is basically so beautiful that it will hurt your mind, which is to be expected, and I'm actually little torn about it in the sense that the sheer undeniable quality on display in this book, and how close this book gets to an utter ideal depiction of the DC Amazons and associated mythology, makes me that much more nitpicky and resistant to the periodic parts of the telling that I'm not quite 100% sold on. It's that old conundrum. The more you love a thing, the more you wanna take it apart. Uh. Maybe. Just me, then?

This story can, will, and should completely redefine the Wonder Woman mythos for years to come...and, as a fan, that frightens me as much as it excites. I want this to be doing exactly what it's doing because I can see what it's doing, but I'm also wary of some things that I see it doing.

This is a story built on rage and sadness and trainloads of strong emotional baggage. The first issue is painted at every turn with emotions so raw they tear at the pages themselves. And so the gods and the Amazons themselves depicted in the story are raw. Sharp. Grim. Implacable. Furious. And they deserve it, and are a perfect response to the sort of world that made them necessary.

I'll cut to the chase and just say that I hope that this book doesn't neglect the part of the DC Universe's Amazons that are about love and compassion and reform as well. I recently talked about how much I appreciated that the DC Amazons always seemed to be intended as an subversion of old messy stereotypes of man-hating feminists. I really hope this aspect of them -- this deliberate send-up to the idea that women who don't want to be literally violated by men must also want to do violence to men in return -- does not get neglected by this series and that these Amazons forge a path towards something new and meaningful as they seemed to have been created to do, instead of just repeating the violence of the past. That's what Wonder Woman is about, after all.

And I think that there may in fact be signs that this might indeed be where the story is heading. Again, I hope that I'm reading these signs right, and also fear that I'm not. I actually ended up liking the more down-to-Earth parts of the book about Hippolyta's origins a bit more than the larger-than-life dioramas of the goddesses' plans in motion. This part felt like a true origin story of a meaningfully powerful character, who will truly shape the course of the Amazons. And I love this Hippolyta -- the quintessential Wonder-Mom -- and am desperate to know exactly how she'll do that.

On a more mythological note with more mythological nitpicks (and these are truly nitpicks, but I'd be remiss not to address them), this issue basically divides the Olympian gods' opinions on women based on their gender; all the goddesses are sympathetic to the plights of women, bar none, and all the male gods to a tee couldn't care less. This had always been a bit of a questionable way to depict the Greek gods, even in Perez's day...a vastly binary and oversimplified rendition of the roles and narratives in a mythology where none of the gods are simply one good thing or one bad thing, where Ares actually punished rapists and Apollo freed slaves while Hera and Athena victim-blamed.

I know, I know; this is a retelling, a reinterpretion, not a 1:1 reiteration of a mythos that already had no real canon anyway, and the whole point of Wonder Woman's mythology since 1942 is that the stories we know are wrong while these are how how they really happened...in these cases. Believe me, I'm not pressed about a Wonder Woman book choosing to interpret gods in different ways. But the thing is that with mythology, the closer that you try to hew to the spirit of the ancient gods and stories -- and this Historia definitely does hew very, very, very closely in a lot of great ways -- the more noticeable your deviations become. It may work for this telling, it may be this way for incredibly valid narrative reasons, but at the end of the day you run the danger of missing as many points about these gods as you'd caught, fucking up as many elements as you'd gotten right, picking and choosing at the mythos as you did. It's that other old conundrum...if your retelling of the myths was bananas right from the outset, well, who cares how off-base it gets? See: Thor, Loki, Marvel. But the more marks you actually hit, the weirder your misses become.

In any case, this is a genre-defining book for all the right reasons and I cannot wait another second before issue two (Spring 2022? Spring 2022?? We'll all be dead by then!) which means every little thing about issue one will probably bug me forever!

[Psy-lock]

On a more mythological note with more mythological nitpicks (and these are truly nitpicks, but I'd be remiss not to address them), this issue basically divides the Olympian gods' opinions on women based on their gender; all the goddesses are sympathetic to the plights of women, bar none, and all the male gods to a tee couldn't care less. This had always been a bit of a questionable way to depict the Greek gods, even in Perez's day...a vastly binary and oversimplified rendition of the roles and narratives in a mythology where none of the gods are simply one good thing or one bad thing, where Ares actually punished rapists and Apollo freed slaves while Hera and Athena victim-blamed.

I know, I know; this is a retelling, a reinterpretion, not a 1:1 reiteration of a mythos that already had no real canon anyway, and the whole point of Wonder Woman's mythology since 1942 is that the stories we know are wrong while these are how how they really happened...in these cases. Believe me, I'm not pressed about a Wonder Woman book choosing to interpret gods in different ways. But the thing is that with mythology, the closer that you try to hew to the spirit of the ancient gods and stories -- and this Historia definitely does hew very, very, very closely in a lot of great ways -- the more noticeable your deviations become. It may work for this telling, it may be this way for incredibly valid narrative reasons, but at the end of the day you run the danger of missing as many points about these gods as you'd caught, fucking up as many elements as you'd gotten right, picking and choosing at the mythos as you did. It's that other old conundrum...if your retelling of the myths was bananas right from the outset, well, who cares how off-base it gets? See: Thor, Loki, Marvel. But the more marks you actually hit, the weirder your misses become.

I had the same thought. The more myth-heavy you get, the less convincing the goddesses become as feminist icons. But then, it's only the first issue. The book might still get more complex with its take on the gods later on.

[Vordan]

Great first issue. Jimenez shows why he’s one of the GOATs and the writing is pulsing with fury and energy. Can’t wait for issue 2!

I had the same thought. The more myth-heavy you get, the less convincing the goddesses become as feminist icons. But then, it's only the first issue. The book might still get more complex with its take on the gods later on.

I don’t really think it will, bar perhaps whatever is going on with Hera. I’m expecting the morality divide to remain as it is, goddesses are good, gods are evil/apathetic. It’s fine for this Elseworld take but I’d prefer more ambiguity in the mainline portrayal of the gods.

[Nyssane]

Great first issue. Jimenez shows why he’s one of the GOATs and the writing is pulsing with fury and energy. Can’t wait for issue 2!

I don’t really think it will, bar perhaps whatever is going on with Hera. I’m expecting the morality divide to remain as it is, goddesses are good, gods are evil/apathetic. It’s fine for this Elseworld take but I’d prefer more ambiguity in the mainline portrayal of the gods.

I did like how Ares seemed to be the least smug over Zeus's comments of all the male gods.

[I'm a Fish]

Story wise, I wanna reserve my judgement until all 3 issues are out.

I really like Hippolyta in this though. I'm wondering, did she actually run for months on end or was that an exaggeration?

[Gaius]

Story wise, I wanna reserve my judgement until all 3 issues are out.

I really like Hippolyta in this though. I'm wondering, did she actually run for months on end or was that an exaggeration?

It does have wondering if it's true if she has any special parentage/heritage.

Loved all the spreads with the Olympus stuff but that one of Hippolyta running was probably my favorite.

[Nyssane]

Story wise, I wanna reserve my judgement until all 3 issues are out.

I really like Hippolyta in this though. I'm wondering, did she actually run for months on end or was that an exaggeration?

I initially took it as an exaggeration, but that is a good question. It felt very much like the scene in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs where Snow White is running through the forest.

[SiegePerilous02]

I did like how Ares seemed to be the least smug over Zeus's comments of all the male gods.

I liked the moment between him and Hera where she mentions the "grieving mothers" thing. it actually comes across as she's more disappointed in him, whereas she clearly has grown to actually hate his father.