Wonder Woman. #755 // Review
In the long-term, truth is complicated to maintain. Given a long enough timeline, it’s almost impossible. Diana becomes further acquainted with harsh realities in Wonder Woman #755. Writer Steve Orlando continues to wrap-up his work on the series with an issue drawn by Jesus Merino with inks by Vicente Cifuentes. The overall theme of truth makes for an impressive centerpiece to this latest chapter in Wonder Woman’s sage. Still, the deeper intricacies of the theme are lost in a clash of aggression between heroine and apparent villain. Thematic matters aside, the issue’s central conflict makes for a satisfying adventure.
Wonder Woman is addressing a group of elementary school kids about the history of the Amazons. She’s unflinchingly honest about the past with them. Her colleague with the Boston PD is in the middle of suggesting that this might not be a good idea. As Wonder Woman is whisked away to Norway courtesy of long-time ally/present enemy Paula Von Gunther, now calling herself Warmaster. Paula has a bone to pick with her former friend about her Valkyrie ancestry and a long-standing vendetta that erupts into violence. Before it is over, Wonder Woman is faced with a tough choice.
Orlando deserves credit for even addressing the strangely mercurial nature of historical truth in a DC multiverse that reaches back the better part of a century. (In a different life on a different Earth when the character was first introduced, Von Gunther was Wonder Woman’s first arch-villain.) The surface conflicts involved in ancient vendettas and difficult choices obscure what could have been a far more in-depth and further richly sophisticated look at the mutation of information over time. There are ways to explore this in complexity without compromising the central pulse of the action in an issue like this, but they are lost in the rhythm of Orlando’s script.
Merino and Cifuentes strike a nice balance between the physical and emotional ends of the story. The artists etch a heavy impact on much of the physical action between Paula and Diana. The fight between the two is framed in close-ups that often rob the action of its big, sweeping power even as the percussion of the aggression is hammered home. The close-quartered framing DOES allow the drama between Paula and Diana to come quite vividly to the page. There’s a compellingly emotional embrace between hero and villain as the issue draws to a close.
This issue launches the opening chapter of the “Four Horsewomen” story that will likely end Orlando’s present run on the series. The long-running conflict between Wonder Woman and Paula Von Gunther is visited once more. All of the major elements of a powerful superhuman drama are clearly rendered, but the greater complexities of the themes explored are narrowly missed. Judging from this issue, Orlando has some serious work to do if the title is going to smoothly transition to new writer Mariko Tamaki with issue #759.
