Though Wonder Woman has been published since 1941, her Rogues Gallery isn't as robust as her male counterparts'. Is her #2 archenemy enough to match or surpass the stakes of the first film? Not quite. Wonder Woman 1984 does not have the same impact or gravity as the original. On the upside, the villains are more complex and memorable and director Patty Jenkins’ take on the 80s does offer some nice material to chew on.
In 1984, Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) befriends Barbara Ann Minerva (Kristen Wiig) while studying the “Dreamstone” - an ancient artifact that supposedly grants wishes. After it brings Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) back to life and fulfills Barbara's deepest desires, the stone is taken by businessman Maxwell “Max Lord” Lorenzano (Pedro Pascal).
The first movie was about Diana learning of mankind's potential for both good and evil. This time, the themes are desires, loss, and acceptance. Diana is still heartbroken over Steve Trevor. You don’t blame her; Pine and Gadot were so good together you crave to see them as a couple again. Barbara idolizes Diana and wants the same kind of beauty and strength she has. After seeing her get harassed and then attacked by a drunkard while walking home, you understand her envy. There's even a message there about the fact that once her transformation begins she's still taken advantage of by a rich man and that both she and Diana are constantly receiving unwanted advances by would-be suitors. It isn't the focus of the film but does circle back to the idea of "be careful what you wish for".
If there's one characteristic that defined the '80s, it's greed and indulgence. Lord's desires are like all of humanity's at the time; understandable at first but ultimately, unsustainable. His quest for more - more oil, more power, more resources, more respect - risks a global conflict. The "wishes with a toll" thing has been done before but it's given some new tricks in this story. I particularly like the way Max Lord finds ways to circumvent the "one wish per person" rule.
A few aspects of this sequel make it a lesser film than its predecessor. Last time, we had a coming-of-age story. Now, Diana’s world-savvy. Steve is the one catching up to her - a nice reversal - but the plot has her powers diminished. Our heroine isn't the same powerhouse we saw traverse No Man's Land. Combined with the 151-minute running time and this Wonder Woman lacks a bit of punch.
Having just rewatched Wonder Woman, I was hoping this sequel would deliver the same level of emotion. Unfortunately, it doesn't. Though this makes it a slight disappointment, the conclusion is more emotional and truer, the romance between Diana and Steve is just as good as before, and the villains are better fleshed out (an upside of that length). If you want to see more of the character, you'll be glad to see Wonder Woman 1984. When you do, stay tuned for an extra scene mid-way through the credits. (December 27, 2020)
Wonder Woman 1984 Review: How Does Gal Gadot and Patty Jenkins’ Sequel Stack Up?
There’s a saying that you don’t know what you have until it’s gone, a saying that could also best represent 2020, a year in which so much has been taken away from moviegoers… like getting to see movies in theaters, for instance. While you might not necessarily miss everything that’s been taken away this year, maybe the decrease in the surplus of superhero movies has given new and indie filmmakers a chance to be discovered by avid movie fans.
After two weaker comic book offerings this year in Bloodshot and The New Mutants, we’re finally getting a sequel to Patty Jenkins’ 2017 movie Wonder Woman, but if nothing else, Wonder Woman 1984 makes one realize that the lack of innovation when it comes to the “superhero genre” is not something we’re going to see very soon.
As you might guess from the title, it’s 1984 and Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) has a job at the Smithsonian Museum in D.C. as an expert on antiquities. Her new klutzy co-worker Dr. Barbara Minerva (Kristen Wigg) has just started and is immediately jealous of Diana’s beauty, her intelligence plus all the attention she gets from the men around her. One such man is oil magnate Maxwell Lord (Pedro Pascal), who is looking to invest in the Smithsonian. He’s particularly interested in an item that Minerva is studying that turns out to grant those who hold it a single wish. What could possibly go wrong?
I enjoyed Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman just fine, although I never really bothered to see it a second time, which would have been the case if I truly loved the movie rather than just liked it. Working from a script co-written with former DC head honcho Geoff Johns and David Callaham (writer of the 2014 Godzilla), Jenkins faces obstacles faced by every sequel when you’re working against having to raise the stakes from an original movie without losing everything that made the first movie so loved and special.
The general lack of action might not be so obvious right away, because it begins with a pretty pointless sequence on Themyscira with Diana as a young girl taking part in an American Ninja Warrior style obstacle course competition against older Amazons – just to reiterate that her mother Hyppolyta (Connie Nielsen) doesn’t want Diana training to be a warrior. Again. It makes for a semi-redundant opening scene that doesn’t really add much in the way of setting up what happens later in the movie. We then get a scene of Wonder Woman in a DC mall taking on a bunch of burglars using all her powers, basically to remind us that she’s a superhero in “Man’s World” six decades after the events in Wonder Woman.
That’s all the action for almost an hour, because the movie then shirts to introduce the new villain characters, and we spend a good hour seeing how they interact, as well as seeing how their relationships are affected by a historical artifact, essentially a “wishing stone.” I won’t spoil how Chris Pine’s Steve Trevor, who seemed to die in the first movie, is back in the ‘80s to play Diana’s love interest again – I’m sure you can figure that out -- although he does get more into the action this time, rather than just being an Amazonian boy toy. Regardless, the scenes between Pine and Gadot tend to be the best parts of the movie.
I’ve generally been mixed on Wiig as an actor for a long time, and she doesn’t do that much as Minerva that changes my opinion, while Pascal tends to veer into the hammy acting we’ve seen from far too many actors playing DC villains. Sure, there have been exceptions, but Maxwell Lord hasn’t even really been handled very well in the comics other than his early appearance in the DeMatteis-Giffen-Maguire Justice League from from the ‘80s. I’m a little surprised by the attempts to turn him into a major DCU villain ala Superman’s Luthor, but Pascal plays Lord more like a sleazy oil magnate version of Luthor, which is what this version essentially is.
Jenkins tries so hard to instill the movie with a light, care-free tone but the humor feels forced and often feels flat. For instance, there’s only so many times you can make jokes about Trevor being a fish out of water before it gets tired even if it’s meant to be played off of Diana’s own adjustments in the first movie. The action is generally okay, a lot of awkward wirework combined with some of the Zack Snyder style of using time-control to make it seem more exciting. One of the better action setpieces takes place in Egypt that comes across a bit Indiana Jones but generally works better than all the action that comes before or afterwards.
Wonder Woman 1984 has the same general problem as movies like The Dark Knight Rises, Batman Returns, Spider-Man 3 and The Amazing Spider-Man 2 where Jenkins is once again adding too many villains to the mix and making the movie more about interconnecting their origins rather than keeping the spotlight on Diana. Fans of the comics might also be disappointed with how long it takes for Minerva to actually transform into the Cheetah and how little we actually get to see of her in that guise. It just adds to a superhero movie problem that we’ve seen countless times before.
As far as how Wonder Woman herself evolves, we do get to see her flying in the movie – both alone but also with a nod to her famous plane -- although the idea of having her use her lasso to wrangle onto lightning bolts for steering might not have been the most well thought-out idea. And yes, that golden armor with wings, something probably more appropriate for Hawkwoman, does show up and is put to use in one of the fights, but it’s also something that (like a lot in this movie) serves very little purpose.
Despite all the issues, where Wonder Woman 1984 excels is its ending which really pays off in a great way after turning what seemed like a simple premise into a full-on global crisis, and it almost makes you forget some of the sillier bits from earlier.
Wonder Woman 1984 is neither a terrible superhero movie nor necessarily a bad sequel – it’s not as bad as Suicide Squad or Justice League, for example. Saying that, Wonder Woman was the very first full Wonder Woman movie, so you can understand why expectations for a sequel might be high. Unfortunately, while good, this sequel might not live up to many of those expectations, although like everything else these days, mileage may vary.
Rating: 7/10
Note: There is a mid-credits sequence you might want to stick around for, though it feels like more pointless fan service than anything needed to enhance the movie or even set anything up for future films.
2020 certainly threw most everyone for a loop, but for a handful of pre-scheduled blockbuster releases, the whole landscape was thrown into disarray, and the outlook was uncertain in regards to what the future held. Wonder Woman 1984 found itself in the unique position of not only being delayed to an unknown date, but maintaining a high profile due to a healthy number of adjacent promotional campaigns. As the year wrapped, however, Warner Brothers Studios made the shocking announcement that all 2021 films would be released on HBOMax concurrently with their theatrical releases for a period of 30 days, and the first up to bat was Wonder Woman 1984 on Christmas Day.
In the year 1984, 66 years removed from her World War I adventures, Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) spends her days working for the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C. as a renowned anthropologist (while continuing to fight crime as Wonder Woman in secrecy). A chance encounter with new Smithsonian employee Barbara Minerva (Kristen Wiig), who is studying the recovered artifacts from a burglary that Wonder Woman stopped, leads to both women encountering a strange stone (later identified as the Monkey’s Paw) that, unbeknownst to them, grants them both a wish. Meanwhile, celebrity and failing philanthropist Maxwell Lord (Pedro Pascal), who is fully aware of the stone’s powers, steals the Monkey’s Paw and makes the wish to transfer its powers to himself, turning him into a living wish stone in hopes of leveraging power from others to boost his profile. Like any situation of exchange, however, bad outcomes stem from the wishes, leading Wonder Woman towards an inevitable showdown with Maxwell Lord in hopes of restoring balance.
Wonder Woman 1984 isn’t going to save the DCEU, but it does take all of the best elements from its predecessor while making some tonal and pacing adjustments congruent to the new era the film is placed in. With no need to build the backstory or the love story, Wonder Woman 1984 is allowed to introduce its key elements swiftly and put them into motion in ways that gives the first act a deceptively strong showing. Once Maxwell Lord really sets the narrative into action, Diana’s dilemma kicks into gear with similar pace, mirroring our main protagonist and antagonist journeys while leaving room in the middle for Cheetah to emerge as a threat. The overall shrinking of Diana’s world mixed with this volatile and multilayered character development is a benefit to Wonder Woman 1984, as it gives it a unique feel from Wonder Woman’s other appearances in the DCEU. The only real misstep is the shoehorning in of the Steve Trevor romance… while very important in Diana’s development of her character and understanding of the people she protects, it would have been nice to introduce a newer, more organic romantic element, or possibly none at all.
The film is also very aware of what it is, setting aside the loftier view of the world presented in the latest Superman and Batman films and presenting a much more direct view on the capitalist and materialist practices of the 1980s. Maxwell Lord and his gifted power fly in the face of the truth, character and honesty that has built and shaped Diana, and despite a minimal use of Themyscira in Wonder Woman 1984, the parable presented runs strong enough to drive the arc to a well-earned landing spot. By the time the film does dwell a little bit on the preachy side (while pulling the double duty of framing the antagonist’s past), the viewer has either completely bought in or checked out, depending on how analytical they chose to be for their viewing. It seems as if the Wonder Woman franchise is doing an extraordinary amount of the heavy lifting for the DCEU, which can put the films under a bit of a harsher microscope than they likely deserve, but Patty Jenkins is doing a fantastic job making films that hold up under the scrutiny of those looking to pick films apart.
For as dark and gritty as the previous Wonder Woman movie was, this one is popping with the life and optimism that the 1980s and its promise for the future held, utilizing bright primary colors, plenty of gold tones lots of visually stunning architecture. The cinematography and choreography mixture really brings Gal Gadot’s action scenes to life, and the special effects used on the lasso really pop on this outing. Thankfully, the film did not lean on a corny stream of 1980’s pop hits, opting instead for a Hans Zimmer score that stands up the character of the film’s titular character. A few old school practical effects were even used to great impact, key among them being the slight breeze that accompanied wishes granted by the Monkey’s Paw. While Diana’s ability to fly did come from out of left field, the flying effects were some of my favorite seen on screen since Chronicle.
Gal Gadot feels a bit more comfortable in the Diana skin, using a calm and collected assured nature rather than a headstrong drive towards a need for proof. Kristen Wiig is delightful as always, bringing a grounded sense of comedy to her initially awkward performance before embracing the remaining two stages of her character evolution with great aplomb. Pedro Pascal puts aside cool and overbearing pride to portray a bubbling maniacal sense of someone struck blind by the madness of power. Chris Pine did not necessarily break any new ground, which was not really any fault of his own, seeing as his character did feel a bit forced into the narrative for a bit of fan service. Robin Wright and Connie Nielsen return for brief appearances to reprise their roles, while supporting appearances by Doutzen Kroes, Amr Waked, Kristoffer Polaha, Natasha Rothwell, Gabriella Wilde, Lucian Perez, Stuart Milligan and one special but familiar cameo, round out the affair.
I’m not going to dogpile on Wonder Woman 1984 like the masses are, as my specific issues with the film are minimal, albeit it impactful. If you’re expecting Wonder Woman 1984 to right the DCEU ship, then you are setting yourself up for disappointment... if you’re just looking to eat some popcorn for a couple of hours and watch Gal Gadot play a character that she excels at in a world that doesn’t quite meet her high bars, then you’re in luck. Either way, you’re not likely to get more out of this film than what you bring to the table.
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