Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons
I have been reading and enjoying Absolute Wonder Woman for some time. In reading about the series, I discovered it was considered a spiritual successor to Wonder Woman Historia, and so I sat down to read it. I am... not sure how to feel about it.
Sing, o muse, and tell me a story of women scorned
Of suffering inflicted by the violence of men
And sing of the seven goddesses, six defenders, one lapsed
Who sought to warriors make, and so brought gifts
And from these were born those women who could act
To protect women in their time of need: the Amazons!
It is not often writers remember that Diana of Themiscyra is a creature of myth and legends. She is not just a superhero, she's an advocate and ambassador from the mundane to the strange. And if she comes from a people of myth and legend, what legends then must they have to tell?
For the good: God, what artwork! Every page drips with character and glorious, glorious detail. The goddesses alone are rendered more abstract than normal, in a way that makes them alien but also understandable; Athena has an invisible body but for a mask of steel for a face, and she's the least freaky thing about the gods.
The story feels mythic as well, as befits the title. I can see where Absolute Wonder Woman set its similarities, for the gods are capricious and vain, and the male gods, especially, represent an order enforced on women to control them. The things they say are deeply uncomfortable and realistic, which is surprising when Zeus looks like a blue thundercloud most of the time. It's a book that sticks to its guns and does its best to make the best version of this story.
And that story is... questionable.
I'm almost certainly not the best resource for what feminism and stories about feminism should and should not be. But one thing I always found inspiring about stories of the Amazons were that they were oppressed people who rose up and attained strength and self-actualization. To have the Amazons, then, be created by the six goddesses as defenders of women, unrelated to the suffering inflicted by men... it leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I had heard the Amazons were a group of women who learned to be strong, but in this story it was actually a bunch of other women warriors who did all the saving? I know that's not the most charitable interpretation, but I can't make this feeling go away, and I still don't like this element of the story. (EDIT: on reading more about the story, they appear to be made from the souls of women slain by violence. While I think this design choice is excellent, the characters created by this process are functionally their own people with no memories of who they were before, so the complaint stands)
Speaking of characters: the framing of the story flattens the characterizations of the gods. I am aware it's framed as a story the Amazons tell themselves, so it's not exactly unbiased. But the problem exists among the female and male gods, and not just the males.
Like, of the six goddesses - Demeter, Athena, Aphrodite, Artemis, Hestia and Hecate - only Athena, Demeter and Artemis get focus and characterization. Hecate is just "the person who says things cryptically" in their group, and Aphrodite is just the hot one (though the art does show she is very hot!). There's a particular breed of girlboss feminism that's on display here, implying the heavens would be better if the women were in charge, when we have seen all six act as badly as Zeus, if not quite so heinous in their actions.
This problem of characterization also exists amongst the Amazons. With the gods, I am at least understanding that the men had their worst traits and the women their best traits emphasized for the story. But the Amazons are almost wholly original characters, and we're introduced to thirty of them right away. I cannot remember one distinct character trait among them beyond the shallow (this one is big and strong so she is boastful, and this one is of Aphrodite's clan so she is curious and catty). They felt like Magni and Modi in God of War (2018), where they are less their own characters than their own, smaller versions of Thor, and so the original thirty Amazons mostly feel like alternate versions of the goddesses that spawned them.
This problem does not exist amongst the purely human Amazons. They are all of them defined by something other than their connection to the goddesses and so are free to form their own path. Hippolyta, in particular, gets a strong, focused lens on her personal journey and growth as an Amazon.
I do not wish to prescribe what stories "should" have been. I want to take the stories at face value and determine where and how they succeed or fail at connecting with me. But the version of this story I wanted is included in miniature with the seventh tribe of Amazons: scared women on the outskirts of society, rising up to defend themselves and liberate others like them. It feels so obvious to have the story just be about them, and their empowerment by the goddesses.
But that was not the story they wanted to tell. The story they told is gruesome and sad, but also frustrating and tiring. For the art alone I would recommend reading the book, and there's a good chance you'll find something worthwhile along the way. Bring it back and share it with me when you get the chance.
