"The name's Wonder Woman and I'm making it my business!"
Wonder Woman
Wonder Woman is a comic book series published by DC Comics as part of the DC Infinite Frontier initiative, retaining its legacy numbering that began with #750 of the previous run (hence the name of this page), with this run proper beginning at issue #770. It is initially written by Becky Cloonan and Michael W. Conrad (DC Future State: Immortal Wonder Woman) with by Travis Moore (Nightwing) and others.
Following the end of Dark Nights: Death Metal, Wonder Woman has awoken to find herself in the middle of a battle with rampaging hordes of mythological beasts bearing down on her! Not even the Princess of the Amazons can survive such an assault, but that’s okay—it’s just another day in Valhalla! It’s up to Diana to find out why things are going wrong in the Sphere of the Gods—and whether it has anything to do with what landed her in the Norse afterlife.
Starting with Issue #770, a backup feature was added to the comic focusing on the adventures of the other areas and characters of Wonder Woman's mythos.
In March 2023, DC revealed
Cloonan and Conrad's run will be ending with the landmark Wonder Woman #800. It was relauched in September by Tom King and Daniel Sampere.
Storylines that are part of this run:
Tropes:
Becky Cloonan and Michael Conrad's run
- Issues #770 - 800, Wonder Woman 80th Anniversary 100-Page Super Spectacular #1, Wonder Woman 2021 Annual #1
- Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder: Following their breakup and Diana's disappearance at the end of Death Metal, Steve has gotten into a relationship with another woman.
- Adaptational Backstory Change: Duke of Deception is changed here to be a version of Dolos, a spirit of deception and lies from Greek Mythology.
- Alternate Universe: Diana's search for Janus across the multiverse has her end up in Earth-11 in one issue, DC's gender-swapped universe.
- Amnesiac Hero: The opening arc of "Afterworlds" sees Diana arrive in Valhalla only knowing her name and that she used to be some sort of warrior. When Ratatoskr tells her they need Wonder Woman, Diana's only response is wondering who that is.
- Arc Villain:
- Janus, or its female half, is this for the "Afterworlds" arc.
- Image Maker for the "Through A Glass Darkly" arc.
- Dr. Psycho for "The Villainy of Our Fears" arc.
- Beautiful Slave Girl: Psycho has as part of his version of Villainy Inc a mirror clone of Diana (in a frilly maid version of her WW outfit) as his slave, whom he frequently berates.
- Being God Is Hard: The reasoning behind the Valkyries stopping their duties of resurrecting those who die during the battles in Valhalla. They've simply grown exhausted with the burden of having to bring back souls everyday who die in the daily battle that happens in Valhalla.
- Brought Down to Badass: In Valhalla, Diana doesn't have her super strength, flight, invulnerability, and seemingly any other power besides her ability to talk to animals (though Ratatoskr might just be a Talking Animal who everyone understands, given they're sometimes depicted as in other depictions of mythology). She is still a badass with years of experience in combat, and is the mightiest of the Amazon warriors. Deconstructed though as despite her skill, the fact she's lost her powers throws off her instincts, so she's not blocking or dodging like she should because she still expects attacks to bounce off of her.
- The Bus Came Back: This run's been very big on reviving dead or forgotten parts of Wonder Woman's lore (in particular villains).
- Issue #778 features the very first appearance of Aethyr in modern comics.
- Issue #780 sees the first modern appearance of The Holiday Girls.
- Issue #782 reintroduces to modern comics the Image-Maker, who hadn't appeared since 1962.
- Issue #787 introduces Professor Calculus, who's only appearance was in 1948.
- Issue #787 also sees the return of Villainy Inc. One of superhero comics' first villain supergroups that had been last seen in Phil Jimenez's run on Wonder Woman in the early-2000s.
- Issue #788 continues the trend by bringing back the Duke of Deception, who had been absent since Flashpoint.
- Issue #778 features the very first appearance of Aethyr
- The Cameo: Issue #780 sees a montage of reactions from Wonder Woman-related characters discovering Diana's returned to Earth; Donna and Cassie in Gateway City, Artemis with the Bana-Midghall Tribe in Qurac, Nubia informing the Amazons on Themyscira, Steve Trevor and Etta Candy in Washington D.C., and Dr. Psycho at an undisclosed location.
- Canon Immigrant: A group of soldiers from The Imperium from the pilot movie of the DCAU Justice League show pop up as the villains in issue #793.
- Changing Clothes Is a Free Action: Diana's outfit changes for every new dimension or universe she ends up in in the "Afterworlds" arc.
- Continuity Nod:
- While traveling through Tartarus, Diana briefly passes by the Titan, Cronos, of which she makes a reference to her being the reason he's there. A call back to Eric Luke's run on Wonder Woman where Cronos showed up as an enemy of Diana for a storyline.
- Donna and Cassie are at foot court in Gateway City when they learn of Diana's return to Earth. Gateway City being one of Diana's old stomping grounds in John Byrne's 90s Wonder Woman run.
- Crossover Cosmology:
- The opening arc finds Diana in the Norse Warrior Heaven of Valhalla.
- Janus, a Roman God/Goddess, is revealed as the overarching enemy of the "Afterworlds" arc. Notable in that Janus is a native Roman deity with no Greek counterpart.
- Documentary Episode: Cloonan and Conrad's story in the 80th Anniversary one shot has Steve Trevor showing Etta Candy a documentary he's made dedicated to Diana, since she's been believed dead since Death Metal.
- Evil Me Scares Me: Diana confronts an evil version of herself called the Queen of Asgard. However, it is quickly revealed to be an illusion created by Dr. Psycho. That then later turns out to be foreshadowing of the arc villain Janus.
- The Fair Folk: Diana's pursuit of the female half of Janus takes her to Elfhame, the land of the fairies, whose queen has been killed by Janus. As she is wearing Diana's visage, the fairies mistake Diana for her.
- Fisher Kingdom: As noted below, Diana's costume changes to match whatever realm she's in.
- Foreshadowing: Dr. Psyscho's projections of the evil "Queen Diana" turns out to be setup for Janus as it is in her appearance. Given Janus states in a later issue she manipulated Pyscho in projecting himself into Asgard, she probably put the idea in his head.
- Glass Cannon: The duplicate clone of Diana attacks Steve Trevor at his apartment and is strong enough to toss him around but shatters into pieces like glass when he fires a few bullets at it.
- Gods Need Prayer Badly: While exploring the Graveyard of the Gods, Boston explains that numerous gods residing there died after their followers lost faith in them.
- Guardian Angel: Deadman is the mysterious figure Diana talks to in between her Resurrection/Death Loop scenes. He's been assigned to help guide her to her appropriate afterlife but he's not sure how she ended up in Valhalla and admits her heroism in trying to save it has been something of a headache for him as she keeps getting herself killed.
- Healing Shiv: This is how the Rod of Asklepios heals. The snake decoration comes to life and bites the victim. Janus seems to find the process as unpleasant as his injuries.
- Homage:
- The cover of issue #771◊ is a homage to Wonder Woman (Vol 1.) #233◊ from the Bronze Age.
- The cover of #790 is homage to Wonder Woman: The Hiketeia, with Dr. Psycho in the place of Batman.
- The cover of issue #771
- Humans Are Ugly: In Issue #776, Ratatoskr eats an enchanted tart which transforms him into a human boy but still retaining his horn. Ratatoskr is distressed by this to the point of tears, viewing his new look as "hideous".
- I Have Many Names: While fighting Eros in issue #765, Yara jokes about the Lasso of Truth's many different titles.
- Kill the Gods: The entire Olympian pantheon is slaughtered by the female Janus. Diana has to venture into the Graveyard of the Gods and defeat the Keeper of the Grounds in a game of wits to resurrect them.
- The Man Behind the Man: Hera is Psycho's secret benefactor during The Villainy of Our Fears.
- Mr. Fanservice: Siegfried, or "Siggy" as Diana calls him. Especially when drawn by Travis Moore.
- The Multiverse: The "Afterworlds" arc has Diana traversing the much of the multiverse after the Roman Goddess, Janus. Stops including; Valhalla, Olympus, the gender-swapped world of Earth-11, the Fifth Dimension, and Gem World
- Mythology Gag:
- Issue #773: Wonder Woman wields Thor's hammer on the cover and interior art, as she did with Marvel's Mjolnir in Marvel Versus DC. Here, however, the hammer is a creation of Doctor Psycho to manipulate Thor's negative emotions against the Valkyries. The same goes with the other weapons of the Norse pantheon.
- Issue #778, a Wonder Woman Imp from the Fifth Dimension shows up just after Diana leaves and offers help to Mr Mxyzptlk and Bat-Mite. The two's reactions are taken straight from Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
Mr Mxyzptlk:"Is she with you?"Bat-Mite: "...I thought she was with you" - Not Staying for Breakfast: Diana attempts this on Siegfried before she departs Valhalla but he manages to catch up for a, presumed, final goodbye before she leaves.
- Ominous Floating Castle: The Valkyrie's fortress is depicted a giant floating jewel.
- Reimagining the Artifact: The Holiday Girls, originally a sorority of young females from Golden Age Wonder Woman comics are reimagined as a biker gang.
- The Reveal: The conclusion of The Villainy of Our Fears reveals Hera was Psycho's secret benefactor.
- Resurrection/Death Loop: Wonder Woman wakes up to find herself in Valhalla. Naturally, this is in play, and the mysterious entity trying to get her to leave acknowledges that it's probably super fun to be able to fight without consequence all day, but she has to figure out why she's in Valhalla.
- Serpent Staff: Diana uses the Rod of Asclepius to heal Janus.
- She's Back: Issue #780 is pretty much one entire issue of this with various Wonder Woman supporting cast and DC characters reacting to the news of Diana returning to the land of the living.
- Shout-Out: Issue #781 ends with one to the famous Twilight Zone episode, "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet'', with Diana gazing out the window on an airplane, during a thunderstorm, seeing an army of duplicates of herself and saying "I think there's something out there".
- Signature Scent: One of the things that begins to remind Diana of her past life on Earth is when battling the Njord, a Norse sea god, is that his smell reminds her of Aquaman.
- Significant Wardrobe Shift: The "Afterworlds" arc has Diana has switched out of her movie-derived Greco-Roman skirted hoplite-appearance every time she enters a new world.
- While in Valhalla, she sports a more Medieval-inspired attire befitting the Norse setting from Issues #770 - 773.
- When arriving in Olympus, Issues #774-775, she wears a Greco-Roman tunic along with sandals and a Hoplite helmet-like headgear.
- In the realm of Elfhame, Issue #776, she finds herself in a flowery dress with red, white, and blue coloring.
- In Issue #777, she ends up in her Golden Age-skirted costume.
- Issue #778 has the record so far with almost four total new costumes for each new dimension/universe Diana ends up visiting in it. One of which includes her iconic Leotard of Power modeled after her DCAU appearance.
- Statuesque Stunner: The three Valkyries, led by Gundra, tower over all the characters in Valhalla (including gods like Thor and Odin).
- Swallowed Whole: Diana hides in the shell of an eagle's egg that Nidhogg, a giant serpent gnawing at Yggdrasil's roots, in order to get the key to the Valkyrie's fortress located in the giant snake's belly.
- Take That!: Bat-Mite's appearance in issue #778 is one towards a lot of modern Batman media.
- Talking Animal: Diana is joined in her adventures in the afterlife with the talking squirrel Ratatoskr of Norse mythology.
- Time Stands Still: Janus' male half can do this. He uses this to talk to Diana after his ruse has been revealed but Diana sucker punches him.
- Truer to the Text: Thor is depicted as a stout, red-headed man with a beard, which is how he was said to look in the original mythology, as opposed to Marvel's take on the character. Mjolnir is also designed to look more like it does in Norse mythology, rather than the block-on-a-stick design Jack Kirby gave it and popularized by the MCU.
- The Underworld: Diana ends up travelling through two. First through the Tartarus section of Hades to get to the Graveyard of the Gods, where the Olympian Gods have gone after Janus killed them.
- Warrior Heaven: The first arc sees Diana finding herself in one of the most famous examples from world mythology, Valhalla.
- We Can Rule Together: In Issue #776, the female half of Janus offers Diana a chance to help her "redefine the future". Diana naturally declines.
- What Did I Do Last Night?: Following her first night at Valhalla, Diana awakes in Siegfried's bed in the nude with a massive headache. Siegfried assures her when she begins to ask that they did not sleep together.
Backup Feature
Jordan Bellaire's Young Diana
- Issues #770 - 779, #785 - , Wonder Woman 80th Anniversary 100-Page Super Spectacular #1.
- And the Adventure Continues: The Young Diana story in the 80th Anniversary one-shot, set after the events of the main story, has Diana meet Nubia while she's guarding Doom's Doorway in a setup for the Nubia mini-series.
- Ascended Extra: Clio, an obscure Amazon scribe from the George Perez run, gets a spotlight role here as Diana's history tutor and the one who charges her with seeking out the missing scrolls of Themyscira's history.
- Bookworm: Clio is this of the Amazons, stating she prefers the more quite nature of working in Themyscira's library. Diana notes she rarely sees her at any of Themyscira's outdoor activities or contests.
- Big Bad: Circe, or an aspect of her magic is revealed to be the malevolent force hiding in one of the lost Themysciran history texts
- The Bus Came Back: Jumpa, Diana's pet Kanga from the Golden Age and Pre-Crisis continuity, is brought back as her childhood pet/friend.
- Coming of Age Story: The story begins on Diana's 13th birthday and centers around her discovering more of the darker parts of Themyscira's history, beginning to get a more mature view of the world.
- Constantly Curious: As is often with depictions of Diana in her childhood, Diana has a restless curiosity that often causes her to get into trouble with the older Amazons.
- Deal with the Devil: Hellene agreed to let Circe take the history texts rather than have them destroyed like Hippolyta ordered.
- Race Lift:
- Hellene, a minor Amazon from the George Pérez post-Crisis 80s run, is changed from a blonde-haired white Amazon to a black woman.
- Oenoe, another minor Amazon from the aforementioned Perez run, is changed from a red-haired black woman to an Asian woman.
- Royal Brat: Downplayed with Diana. She gets into a lot of trouble that's shown to annoy some of the other Amazons but it's clear she's expected to grow out of it and it stems from being the only child on a secluded island. She's also well-meaning and comes from a place of earnestness and disgust for the Amazons' collective erasure of history, something she wishes to rectify.
- Solitary Sorceress: Magala, one of the few Amazons who actively practices magic, lives by herself in a cavern in a secluded part of the island. She oversees the Well of Souls.
-
Spiritual Successor: To the Wonder Girl backups of the 50s/60s that followed a young Diana on Paradise Island. - Sunken City: Diana is looking for one of the missing Themysciran history texts in a sunken city in the waters around Themyscira.
- Threatening Shark: Played with. Diana shows fear of the Megalodons as they approach her after she falls into the waters around Themyscira but is assured by Oenone that they're not dangerous and are the island's protectors.
Vita Ayala's What Lies Beneath
- Issues #781 - 784
- Athens and Sparta: The initiation ceremony of new Bana Amazons works as a deliberate contrast to how Themyscira gets new Amazons. note Unlike those in Themyscira, new Bana Amazons are not reincarnated but have to actually track down the location of their city somewhere in Africa and then participate in what seems to be a battle to the death.
- Big Damn Heroes: Artemis who, single-handily, takes out the Manticore that's attacking the Bana's city.
- A Day in the Limelight: This backup story spotlights the lesser-known Bana-Mighdall tribe of Amazons.
- Initiation Ceremony: The initiation ceremony of the Bana is shown, involving a prospective member forgoing their Man's World name and taking on a new name of choice.
- Kaiju: A giant-sized Manticore attacks the Bana's city that's taken care of by Artemis. Queen Atalanta discovers, to her shock, that she slew this particular Manticore eons ago. Concluding it must have escaped from the Underworld through Doom's Doorway to track her down.
- Meaningful Name: Part of the initiation process of joining the Bana Amazons includes taking on a new name. The new initiate, Mabel Jefferson, takes on the new name of Yaa Asantewaa.
- Mythology Gag: When Artemis leads the Bana against an attacking Manticore, her battle is "Amazons, Attack!".
- Race Lift: Artemis is colored with a darker, more tan, skin tone than she's been depicted as having since her reintroduction into mainstream DC Continuity since DC Rebirth.
- Secret Test of Character: The Bana initiation ceremony turns out to be this. Women seeking to join them are placed in what appears to a battle to the death, with a variety of guns and melee weapons to aid them. The one who picked the staff, the least lethal of the weapons offered, did so because while she wanted to join the Bana she didn't want to have to kill another woman to do so. This woman is accepted while the two went straight for the guns (which were empty) are not allowed to join the tribe.
