Wonder Woman #766 // Review
Diana has lost her sight. She’s in foreboding darkness brought about by a madman. That madman is not Maxwell Lord. She’s allied herself with him. She needs him to see in a very hostile environment. She had been totally in control of the situation. Now she must trust a man who casually describes himself as being power-mad in Wonder Woman #766. Writer Mariko Tamaki continues the conflict between Max and Diana in the first part of a story brought to the page by artist Steve Pugh with the aid of colorist Romulo Fajardo Jr. Tamaki and company orchestrate some surprisingly thoughtful allegory in a very satisfying issue.
Literally blinded by Count Vertigo’s power, Wonder Woman is lost in darkness somewhere in Batavia. Soldiers of Vertigo are closing in on her. Maxwell Lord guides her along with the Lasso of Hestia. She quickly finds that she has a kind of vision with the aid of the lasso. It’s not perfect, but it doesn’t need to be. Back on Themyscira, she trained blindfolded. Blindfolding herself with the lasso gives her a different manner of vision altogether. Vertigo’s amplified power may prove to be a weapon Wonder Woman can use against him. If she can defeat him, she’s not out of the path of danger as things with Maxwell Lord might just be a bit more complicated than matters with Vertigo.
There are a lot of clever bits woven into the script by Tamaki. Wonder Woman must become blind in order to see what she needs to see. She has to trust someone she shouldn’t trust, but not because he’s trustworthy. There’s some real poetry in Wonder Woman’s narration as well. “All these men and the dark paths they use to infect us all,” she says. “Their demons are the burden we shoulder.” More than just telling a good story, Tamaki has occasion to take a look back at the character’s long history in a sharply reflective moment at the beginning of the issue as well. It’s a deeply engaging script on many levels.
Blindness can be incredibly difficult to bring across. Steve Pugh and Romulo Fajardo Jr. do kind of an impressive job of giving Wonder Woman a specific kind of posture. The one might expect of someone blinded who has also been heavily trained to use all of her senses AND aided by the magic of the lasso. A lot of the success here comes from the widened milky-white eyes. But there’s also a slight crouch in her posture that adds to the characterization. The powerful visual of Wonder Woman wrapping the lasso around her eyes leaves quite an impression that artist and colorist harness to clever effect.
The complexities that Tamaki is working with are fiercely interesting. Seeing Max Lord do what Max Lord does at the end of the issue is a bit of a disappointment in light of this. This is still only the beginning of the end for the story arc, though. There’s a chance that Lord could be engaging in something more interesting than simple villainy. The inner convolutions of Lord’s psyche have an opportunity to present themselves next issue.
