Review - Wonder Girl #1 by J.T. Krul (writer), Adriana Melo (penciller), and Mariah Benes (inker)

Thought I'd post a quick review of Wonder Girl #1 to keep things moving along. Why Wonder Girl?  First off the series of DC Covers with white backgrounds were intriguing me and it's a first issue so it's easy to get in on the ground floor story-wise. And, y'know, every now and again it's worth dipping into mainstream superhero titles just to see what's happening.

So the first thing that struck me was the, obviously, the cover and how well proportioned Wonder Girl looked. This can only be attributed Australian artist Nicola Scott. In case you're not sure what I'm getting at: she's a woman so she knows how women are put together, i.e.: they're not drawn like men with boobs stuck on. Likewise Adriana Melo's artwork throughout is suitably comic but knows how to draw a female's proportions. In fact she  needs to because there's no men in the comic! Unlike the way some female comic characters are drawn, those in Wonder Girl #1 have waists, hips, and thighs in the right positions and proportions. And staying on this theme, Melo's artwork is noticeably devoid of gratuitous pseudo-porn poses and panel-busting boob shots that normally populate the pages of superhero titles. This in itself is excellent work and shows how a male artist's gaze and interpretation of character is so blatantly different to a woman's.

So, that brings us to the story and... hmmm...

Cassie (aka Wonder Girl) is having a break from the Titans and goes to visit her mother in London who works in a museum. There's an archeological conference happening so there's lots of people around. We can tell that Cassie's mother is cold-hearted because she wears glasses. Okay, okay, Cassie also tells us that her mother doesn't care for her being a Titan, and a derogatory comment from her about Cassie being too muscular reinforces that. So it's all really clear that Cassie's mother - who Zeus (Cassie's father) must have seen something in  -  is disapproving. But I mean really, what did she expect if she gonna do the wild thing with a god? You'd have to think you might get some sort of superpowered offspring - and you know the pill isn't going to keep you safe from pregnancy. Zeus is a god. Okay, so maybe Zeus didn't fully explain this at the time, I hear he's a bit like that. It looks to me that Cassie's bearing the brunt of a little misdirected mother anger.

Pretty soon Cassie is befriended by an Indian girl, Kiran, and before you know it there's an attack on the museum by some stone men who come up through the floor. Looks like some obligatory punching has to be done. But guess what? Kiran is a super person too! She goes by the name Solstice and has some kind of heat/light controlling ability. Well, how about that? She does some punching on the stone men too. Then Cassie recognises Land Zand, 'the psychotic ruler of Zandia' who is in control of the stone men. Seems she's stealing back an artifact that was stolen from Zandia 'by a greedy thief'. Those greedy thieves! They're the worst kind! I much prefer those self-restrained thieves that only take what they really need.

Anyway not sure why Lady Zand is stealing back the artifact herself as you'd think she might be better served back at home ruling Zandia and not acting like a criminal. She is psychotic, I guess, and if a job needs doing, you may as well do it yourself. Then there's a bit more punching on with Lady Zand, but she gets away. Cassie then thinks that her and Kiran should head off and 'stay below radar', y'know, because nobody has noticed the stone men... and the two of them punching on with them... in the middle of the British Museum.... Too late! Cassie's mother has witnessed the whole thing. Cassie offers to get changed out of her fighting gear/costume because she knows her mother doesn't like the attention it draws. No. Because punching on with stone men in the British Museum doesn't draw any attention now, does it? However the whole episode has changed Cassie's mother's mind about Cassie. Big hug. The End.

Yep.

Because this is a self-contained story I'm assuming (unless there's a huge fan reaction for an ongoing series) that this is a one-off. Thank goodness. Sorry to be harsh, but this type of by-the-numbers story was a reason I stopped reading a lot of superhero comics. This shows just how good writers like Morrison, Ellis, and Bendis really are. I'm not familiar with Krul's work and this may be an anomaly because of any number of factors.

At the moment DC are 'Drawing a line at $2.99'. Going by Wonder Girl #1 I think they should be focusing on drawing the line somewhere else, like right through a bad script. It's disappointing because the superhero landscape can always do with more female titles.

This: Ho-hum. What does internal logic mean again?
Forthcoming: Doesn't look like it and I will shield my eyes if there is.