Contains Wonder Woman Vol. 2 #25-35 (December 1988 – October 1989)
Written by George Pérez
Assistance From Keith Giffen (#25-26), JM DeMatteis (#25), Cary Bates (#26)
Pencilled by Chris Marrinan (#25-31, 33-35), Tom Grummett (#32)
Inked by Will Blyberg (#25-31, 33-34), Steve Montano (#32, 35)
Coloured by Petra Scotese (#25), Carl Gafford (#26-35)
Spoilers from thirty-two to thirty-three years ago
My reading of these trades has not gone as well as I’d hoped. I was frequently bored and/or overwhelmed by the wordiness of Volume 2, and found my attention drifting a lot. But, I bought Volume 3, and through lockdowns and store shutdowns, and my reluctance to go shopping much, it is now the only unread trade paperback left in my home, so we’re doing this.
I’m reluctant to start on it because Pérez didn’t draw these issues (or not many of them), and his art has been the main reason why I wanted to write these columns. On the up side, it starts with the Invasion tie-in issues, and one thing I’ve been wanting to see is Diana interacting more with the other parts of the DC Universe.
I don’t see myself picking up any more trades in this run, but let’s see if this one will make me want to change my mind…
This book features the following characters:
Villains:
- Thanagarians (#25)
- Khunds (#25, 27)
- Durlans (#26)
- Chuma (Barbara Minerva’s servant; #27-31)
- Cheetah (Barbara Minerva; #27-31, 33-35)
- Anahid (Queen of Bana-Mighdall; #30-31)
- Nehebka (Bana-Mighdall; #30)
- Kadesha Banu (Priestess of Bana-Mighdall; #30)
- Assyra (Bana-Mighdall; #30)
- Gisa (Bana-Mighdall; #31)
- Faruka (Bana-Mighdall; #32-35)
- Shim’Tar (Bana-Mighdall; #34-35)
Guest Stars
- Black Canary (Dinah Lance, JLI; #25)
- Hawkwoman (#25)
- Hawkman (#25)
- Blue Beetle (Ted Kord, JLI; #25)
- Rocket Red (Dmitri Pushkin, JLI; #25-26)
- Martian Manhunter (J’onn J’onzz, JLI; #25-26)
- Ice (Tora Olafsdotter, JLI; #25-26)
- Fire (Beatriz DaCosta, JLI; #25-26)
- Mister Miracle (Scott Free, JLI; #25)
- Green Lantern (Guy Gardner, JLI; #25-26)
- Captain Atom (Cameron Scott, JLI; #26)
- General Wade Eiling (Project Atom; #26)
- Amanda Waller (Task Force X; #26)
- The Creeper (Jack Ryder; #26)
Supporting Characters:
- Lt. Etta Candy (USAF; #25-28, 32, 35)
- Euboea (Themyscira; #25)
- Pythia (Themyscira; #25)
- Menalippe (Themyscira; #25, 32, 35)
- Hippolyte (Themyscira; #25, 27, 32, 35)
- Hygeia (Themyscira; #25)
- Professor Julia Kapatelis (#25-28, 32-35)
- Vanessa Kapatelis (#25-28, 32-33, 35)
- General (Colonel?) Hillary (USAF; #25-26, 32)
- Steve Trevor (#25-28, 32, 34-35)
- Hermes (Olympus; #26-28, 32-35)
- Harmonia (Areopagus; #26)
- Hellene (Themyscira; #27)
- Iphthime (Themyscira; #27)
- Phillipus (Themyscira; #27)
- Oenone (Themyscira; #27)
- Barry Locatelli (#27)
- Lucy (#27)
- Christine “Chrissie” Fenton (Myndi’s assistant; #28)
- Inspector Ed Indelicato (Boston PD; #28, 31-32, 35)
- Lt. Michael Shands (Boston PD; #28, 31-32, 35)
- Captain Ablamsky (Boston PD: #28)
- June Shands (#31)
- Nehebka (Bana-Mighdall; #31, 33-34)
- Penelope (Themyscira; #32)
- Halliwell Vicks (Harvard; #32)
- General George Yedziniak (USAF; #32)
- Carya (Themyscira; #32)
- Dr. Osman Suakin (#33-35)
- Horace Westlake (Vanessa’s teacher; #35)
Let’s see what happened in the comics, with some commentary as I go:
- The remote base in the South Pacific where Lt. Etta Candy cracked the code of alien races invading Earth has come under fire, but Etta has escaped with a case full of documents. On Themyscira, Menalippe is in distress. The Amazons summoned Diana back home, and on the way she noticed that the mystic storm that surrounds Paradise Island is raging more than normal. She realizes that the portal she flies through is under bombardment from the “patriarch’s world” side. When she returns, she finds Thanagarian warships trying to get through the portal. One ship makes it through, and Diana tries to stop the other two, which end up colliding. She flies into the portal to get the other Thanagarians, but when she tries to tow their floundering ship through the maelstrom, they attack her. Their ship is hit by lightning and is destroyed. Diana figures she needs to return to the world to see what’s going on. Etta continues to evade bombardment in the Pacific. At Julia’s house, Steve Trevor, General Hillary (who has either been demoted to Colonel or there’s an editing error), another military guy, and Black Canary have gathered to meet with Diana, who is a little late. Once she arrives, they explain that she’s needed to rescue Etta, and is sent to rendez-vous with the Justice League International in the South Pacific, while Steve goes to help Captain Atom with something. Diana takes off. She meets with the League (Hawkwoman, Hawkman, Rocket Red, Martian Manhunter, Blue Beetle, Fire, Ice, Mister Miracle, and GL Guy Gardner), where Rocket Red and Blue Beetle stumble all over themselves to gain her attention or favour. She and J’onn are told that Khunds are taking over the island where Etta is, and they want Diana to go rescue her. She wants to take a couple of Leaguers with her. At first, Guy refuses to go with her because of her pacifism, but Fire and Ice convince him. Dmitri also volunteers. They head out, and soon encounter some Khund warships. Diana takes offense at how quick Guy is to put Khund lives at risk, while Dmitri, still getting used to his Apokoliptian armor, struggles to fight the Khund gently. Etta sees Diana and Guy arguing, and starts yelling her name, giving away her position to the Khunds. A warship starts firing at her, but Guy is able to save her with his ring. Diana flies into the warship, sending it flying into the ocean. Etta worries that Diana killed the Khunds on the ship, but is pleased to see her friend. She worries that the codes she has in her case got wet. Later, Diana reports to the military, and she and J’onn discuss how he holds the same views as her with regards to warfare. Blue Beetle tells them they are all needed elsewhere, and hits on Diana again.
- Diana says goodbye to the League, feeling an affinity with J’onn J’onzz, and having earned the respect of the others. She flies through Boston and surveys the damage from Hermes’s fight with Ixion (last volume). Hermes speaks to Phobos, who was turned into a statue about how he feels about everything that happened. Harmonia, Phobos’s sister, appears and suggests that he apologize to Diana. Diana arrives at Hanscom Air Force Base at the same time as Etta Candy. They go to see General Hillary, who has Captain Atom with him. Atom explains that Steve Trevor has been captured during the mission they went on together. Their only lead has to do with the helicopter pilot who was flying Trevor. Hillary calls General Eiling and Amanda Waller, and gets a lead, but then discovers that the pilot they’re looking for has been dead for days. They figure that he was replaced by a Durlan, and have an idea of where he is flying to now. Hermes shows up in Boston, in the area that was wrecked in his fight, and tries to appeal to the crowd that gathers around him. Julia and Vanessa watch this on TV, and Julia still makes it clear that she doesn’t like Hermes. A shadowy figure also watches. The Durlan pilot flies a plane and checks in with his compatriots, who are holding Trevor prisoner, and are trying to torture him into giving up military secrets. Diana and Atom catch the plane and capture the Durlan. Hermes uses his powers to start rebuilding an office tower that was destroyed. The Creeper comes out of the alley and attacks him. They start to fight, and Julia thinks that’s a good thing. Diana and Atom arrive at the island their Durlan captive told them about. Atom blasts a tree outside of a cave, because he’s been told it’s a Durlan. They enter the Durlan base and split up. Diana realizes that a Durlan is trying to fool her and knocks him out. At the same time, Atom takes out the last Durlan who is trying to impersonate Diana. He comes across Col. Trevor, whom Diana already found. When they leave the cave, Atom flies off. Creeper and Hermes still fight, until Hermes decides he’s had enough and knocks him down. He’s upset that the crowd took Creeper’s side, and just as Creeper gets ready to continue fighting, Diana arrives and restrains him. Hermes explains that he’s returned to make penance, and then the meta-gene bomb goes off (thus ending our connection to the Invasion event).
- Diana has taken Steve and Etta to Themyscira, where they are welcomed warmly and very impressed by everything. Some Amazons think it’s ironic that the first man to walk the island is the same one who almost destroyed it, but Phillipus is happy to meet the son of the woman who saved her life. When she takes him to see his mother’s statue, Diana talks with some of the more skeptical women. Lucy (the new girl at Vanessa’s school) meets with Barry Locatelli, who insists that he never dated Vanessa. He wants to make out with Lucy (claiming she “owes” him), but she gets him to go into the boy’s locker room, where a bucket of blue paint falls on him. Vanessa and Lucy worked together to set him up. A military convoy is attacked by guys in yellow jumpsuits with gas guns. They steal two coffin-like containers. On Paradise Island, Steve is touched to look at the statue of his mother. Leaving the temple, he gives the traditional Amazon salute and thanks Hippolyte for her hospitality in her own language. Hippolyte thanks him in English and they embrace. Julia is concerned with Vanessa’s enjoyment in embarrassing Barry. They arrive at their rebuilt original home (remember, they have three on a single university professor’s salary), and are surprised to find their movers just sitting around. They learn that Hermes has restored their home for them, putting everything back the way it was. The yellow suit guys take their stolen goods to a plane and receive their payment from Chuma, who we recognize as Barbara Minerva’s servant. Minerva is there too, and as their plane takes off, she opens the cases to reveal that she now has the two Khund warriors Diana captured before. Vanessa learns that Hermes upgraded her bedroom, giving her a state of the art entertainment unit. Julia seems to be warming up to Hermes a little. Later, the two Khunds stand around, waiting for Diana to come through the portal from Paradise Island (which, I will never understand why, is off Martha’s Vineyard). As Diana emerges, carrying Steve and Etta, the Khunds shoot at her. It takes her a while to fight these two aliens, but eventually, she ties one up with her lariat, but then has to move quickly when the other throws Steve and Etta off a cliff. Diana rescues them, but the Khunds are gone. They’re on a helicopter with Chuma, who doesn’t want to help untie the one. The lariat makes that Khund admit that he’s going to kill Chuma, and then they are both surprised when they hear a growling coming from the back. Diana chases the helicopter, reaching it just as the Khunds are thrown out. She’s a bit stunned, so it takes her a few minutes to realize that the helicopter has taken off with her lasso.
- At Dr. Minerva’s estate, Chuma prepares his herbs. The two leaders of the group of men that acquired the Khunds last issue are on the estate grounds, suspecting that Minerva is upset with them for not following orders exactly. She appears as the Cheetah and kills them. Diana and Hermes are in the chaos realm outside of our reality, trying to contact Hestia to let her know about the lasso she forged, but since the gods have left, Diana realizes it is her duty to retrieve it on her own. She turns down Hermes’s offer of help. Steve, Julia, Etta, and Chrissie Fenton (Diana’s former publicist’s secretary) go to Boston PD to speak to Inspector Indelicato and Lt. Shands, who they met before. They think that Minerva is behind the missing lasso, but the cops don’t really see it as their problem. This is echoed by their Captain, Ablamsky, who yells at the cops. Hermes and Diana arrive, and Diana decides to handle things on her own. She plans a trip to England, which includes a side trip to meet with Justice League Europe in Paris (a meeting we don’t get to see). All of this is covered in the newspapers, and Chuma suspects why she’s really there. The Kapatelises, Steve, and Hermes discuss Diana’s trip back in Boston, and the concept of the “modern woman.” Diana takes a cab close to Minerva’s estate, but walks the last few kilometres, not knowing that Chuma has already seen her. He welcomes her to the castle and provides her with tea that he suspiciously keeps promoting, until she finally drinks it and immediately collapses as the herbs in it paralyze her. Chuma starts to narrate the story of Dr. Minerva, which owes a lot to Indiana Jones, I think. She was part of an expedition to Africa, looking for a lost temple Urzkartaga. There was a “pygmy voodoo doctor” who worked as their guide (this is obviously Chuma, and as racist as the weird dialogue he uses to tell this story). The group was attacked, Minerva and some white guy escaped, and later, Minerva made him continue. They found the temple, where the natives that attacked them started sacrificing the other members of their party as part of the ritual we saw in the first volume. Just as Chuma was going to restore the Cheetah-ness of the previous Cheetah, an older woman, some gunmen that were attached to the archeological expedition attacked, killing the woman. Minerva and Chuma ended up in a blocked off part of the temple together.
- The Egyptian Coast Guard or Navy board a vessel on the Mediterranean where the Libyan smugglers they’ve been tracking have been mauled to death by an animal. Chuma continues to talk with Diana lying paralyzed on the floor. He continues to tell the story of how Minerva became the Cheetah. When he and Minerva were trapped in the temple, he explained how the previous Cheetah was having trouble finding enough sacrifices to keep going, until some local tribes captured one of the Urzkartagan priests, who told the truth about the Cheetah. He led men there, but was killed. Later, the people in the village learned that Cheetah killed one of her followers, and began to use other villagers for the monthly sacrifices. This weakened and aged the woman who became Cheetah. Chuma was upset that she was dead, but Minerva saw the chance to gain the Cheetah’s powers. The problem was, she had no one to sacrifice, until she heard her colleague outside the temple. He found the explosives Chuma took from the rest of the expedition, and blew the temple open, which alerted the gunmen who were stealing from the village. Minerva learned she had to be the one to kill her colleague, so she did, and then she drank some of his blood. Chuma completed the ritual just as the gunmen returned, so as the new Cheetah, Minerva killed them all. After that, they dug up the plant (Chuma’s god) that is used in the rituals, and brought it to the UK. The problem is that Minerva was not a virgin when she became Cheetah, so between rituals, her body became weaker. Chuma explains that Minerva became obsessed with obtaining sacrificial victims, until she decided she wanted Diana’s lariat. Chuma tells Diana he’s going to leave her on the floor because he needs to do some stuff. Diana asks him a question, and he realizes that she’s been faking being paralyzed. She explains, as she grabs him, that it’s part of Themysciran culture to be able to identify all poisons (including ones that don’t grow on Paradise Island? Because how?), so she knew he was drugging her. By going through Chuma’s bag, she figures out that Minerva is in Egypt, and flies there. She gets caught in a sandstorm that comes out of nowhere, and figures that her lasso is in the middle of it. The sandstorm dumps her out in a mosque. Walking around it, she finds two women who were probably killed by Cheetah. She notices the symbol of Pthia on one woman’s armband. Diana is surrounded by a half dozen women dressed kind of like Amazons, holding spears and guns, and speaking a language that sounds like a mix of Themysciran and Arabic.
- Surrounded by these women, Diana tries speaking to their leader in Egyptian (by which I assume she means Ancient Egyptian). The queen, Anahid, can understand her but thinks she’s lying and has her Amazons attack her. While the fight happens, Anahid and her advisor Nehebka, watch as she avoids hurting anyone badly, and wonder if perhaps it’s true that she didn’t kill the two guards. Anahid orders the fight finished, and approaches Diana as a friend, but then blows venom into her face. Diana collapses. Not too far away, Chuma is driven to the place where Minerva is staying. He comes across a British man who was out drinking with Minerva, but then wasn’t able to spend the night with her. Chuma tosses him out and heads to Minerva’s room, where he finds her in bed in rough shape. Diana comes to in a prison filled with men chained to the walls. She’s joined by an old woman named Kadesha Banu, the high priestess of Bana-Mighdall. She’s been sent to study Diana, which she starts by tossing a rock against her head. Elsewhere in Bana-Mighdall, the hidden city of Mid-Eastern Amazons, the women build rifles for someone named Colonel Hadal. Anahid assumes that Diana did come to their city with someone else, who killed the guards. She prepares to make her delivery to Hadal. Chuma talks to Minerva, who is upset with him, thinking that he didn’t make her potion properly, which is why she’s in so much pain. She mentions that this has been more of a problem since she stole the lasso. She tells him about how the lasso pulled her through a sandstorm and into the mystical city of the Amazons, where she killed two guards. She opened up a vault in a tabernacle that the guards were guarding, but what she found there caused her to vomit blood. She stole something called a pyx and ran. Chuma goes to check on the plant he worships, and finds it wilting. He looks at what’s left of the potion he made, and finds that it’s turned into powder. Colonel Hadal and his men wait near the edge of the sandstorm for Anahid. When she comes, she asks about Barbara Minerva, and he provides an address since he knows where she is. Anahid tells him that she’s sending fifty of her warriors to join the Colonel in a week, but he’d expected to get one hundred right then. Anahid threatens him, and one of his men calls her some names. She fights this man, chopping off his arm, and when he still won’t apologize, killing him. She lets the Colonel know that now she’s going to take half of his men back to her city for breeding purposes, and the Colonel has no choice but to agree. The priestess goes to see Diana, with the goal of vivisecting her. Diana prays to Gaea for strength, and then, restored, breaks down the door to her dungeon. Kadesha Banu runs from her, but Diana grabs her and tosses her down the hall. The old woman is dead, having swallowed her venom by error. Diana heads to the town’s temple, where she finds Nehebka dictating something to a scribe. She knocks them out and reads the document, which she can decipher. She recognizes Minerva’s name, and sees the full moon.
- Inspector Indelicato goes to Lt. Shands’s house, where we learn that June Shands doesn’t much like him. He has information he wants Shands to see about Barbara Minerva, and they realize that Wonder Woman is probably in trouble. Queen Anahid leads her Amazons into the town of Syene Kesh, where they are looking for Minerva, but intend to kill everyone they find. They start slaughtering the people. Two women rush into the room where they know Minerva is staying, but are shot by Chuma with a double crossbow. He next throws a gas bomb at the women in the hallway, and retreats to Minerva, who is suffering badly. Chuma tells her to complete the ritual using the two women he just shot. Anahid learns what’s happened, and leads a group to go get her. She’s stopped by Diana, who starts throwing spears at her chariot, and fires arrows at the women, trying to get them to stop their rampage. The women start shooting at her, so she fights them close up, not noticing that Anahid has slipped away. The first Amazon to enter Minerva’s room through the window is tossed back out, and Diana hears her scream. As she rushes to get to that part of the battle, she is attacked by more Amazons. Anahid ends up fighting the restored Cheetah, who is physically stronger than her. Her venomous spit trick does nothing, and Cheetah is about to kill the Queen when Diana enters and hits her. Diana pleads with her to stop the madness, but they start to fight, quite viciously. Anahid stops her warriors from shooting at the two women, realizing that Diana saved her. Diana and Cheetah fight some more, and Chuma fires a poisoned dart into Diana from the window. The Amazons shoot him, and he falls. Diana feels the effect of the poison and falters, and the other women take that chance to shoot at Minerva. This gives Diana time to suck the poison out of her leg, and rejoin her fight with Cheetah. Their fighting levels a building, and when Cheetah tries to strangle Diana with her tail, she rips it off her, and then starts beating her mercilessly. Diana stops herself from killing Minerva, and that is when Nehebka comes with more Amazons. Nehebka learns that her queen is dead (it’s weird that we don’t actually see her die), and that Anahid’s last order was to spare Diana. The women start to gather their dead before soldiers come. Diana goes to Chuma, who is dying, and he begs for Minerva’s life. Diana asks him where her lasso is, and the artifact Minerva stole from the others, and he says he threw them in a garbage pile, since they weakened his sacred plant. Diana digs through the trash and finds her lasso, which Nehebka thinks is a silly thing to search for. The lasso sends light into the garbage pile, revealing the location of the Pyx, which turns out to be the other girdle of Gaea (which would not be a silly thing to search for).
- Issue thirty-two, titled “Meanwhile” starts in Themyscira where Hippolyte and some other Amazons head out to carry out a ritual called the “Hunt of Honor”. Hippolyte misses Diana, and reminisces about her first hunt with them. She was supposed to kill a deer that stood in the shadow of Artemis’s statue, but Diana hesitated, not wanting to hurt such a fine beast. Hippolyte forced her to go after it, only to find it had been gored by a wild boar. She grabbed the boar and was going to kill it when Hippolyte stopped her and taught her about following the will of the gods. In the present, they see the same boar in the statue’s shadow. Menalippe lets an arrow fly. Julia is at Harvard, and a colleague, Halliwell Vicks, brings her a letter from a foundation. He also lets her know that the police are in her office. It’s Shands and Indelicato, there to share what they suspect about Barbara Minerva’s connection to the Cheetah. Julia looks at a picture of Minerva and realizes they are one and the same, and then worries about Diana. Etta Candy is late to meet Steve Trevor for lunch. He has something he wants to talk to her about, but when she arrives, she is upset. She tells him that General Hillary has been reassigned, and is being replaced by General George Yedziniak, the man Trevor testified against. It’s clear that Yedziniak carries a grudge, and is looking to take it out on Etta. She cancels their lunch plans, and Steve doesn’t get the chance to tell her what happened to him. Hermes showed up at his home and told him he was going to move in and be his roommate (is this around the time that Perfect Strangers was on the air?). He showed Trevor that he could disguise himself in regular clothes. Hermes heads to the temple he built to himself in New Hampshire, and thinks about Diana. He decides to dismantle the temple and reabsorb it, but that causes him unexpected pain. Hippolyte and the others chat as they return home, when Menalippe suddenly collapses. We see her and Hermes both develop a fever and call out Gaea’s name at the same time. Julia arrives home and Vanessa tells her that Diana is on the phone. Shen she picks it up, she quickly realizes that it’s not Diana she’s talking to, because the woman mispronounces “Gaea”. Somewhere, we see one of the mid-Eastern Amazons hang up the phone. This woman, who wears and eye patch, is with another, standing over a dead body. She rips up a picture of Diana and Julia, and they leave, riding horses into the desert.
- The Middle Eastern Amazons return to Bana-Mighdall through the sandstorm. Diana has ridden with them, and Nehebka asks if she is alright. Diana is very unhappy with the fact that the women killed so many people when going after Cheetah, and doesn’t agree that they should call themselves Amazons. Nehebka clearly doesn’t like Diana and is only tolerating her because it was the queen’s last wish, but also wants to learn from her. Diana wants to call her friends, but Nehebka claims it’s been taken care of, and we see the woman with the patch on her eye from last issue. The story shifts to the place where that woman called Julia. The local police are investigating the murder of the shopkeeper, and his wife recognizes Diana in the photo they find on the floor. The Mid-East Amazons have Cheetah in a straightjacket, in a padded cell, where she yells for Chuma and is clearly in pain. Diana goes to see her, and wrestles with the guilt of having almost killed her. The eye-patch woman, named Faruka, comes to see Diana. She explains that she is the assistant to the priestess Diana killed by accident. Cheetah sees them and becomes more agitated. Faruka wants to kill her, but Diana stops her. Faruka accuses her of sacrilege, but Diana is insistent that she be able to honor her promise to Chuma, and protect Minerva. An Egyptian, Dr. Osman Suakin, goes to see the police in the town near where the massacre took place. He’s a friend of Julia’s, and is there to look at all of the bodies and confirm that Diana is not among them. He calls Julia, who is just about to leave to come to Egypt, to update her on things. He doesn’t think she should come, but Julia is insistent. Diana and Faruka go to speak to Nehebka. Diana sees that the girdle is in a display case, and her lasso reacts to it again, creating a bright light that distracts Diana. Faruka tries to attack, but is sent flying by the light. Nehebka orders the girdle put back in its usual place, and shows Diana how Kadesha Banu has been collecting pictures of her. Nehebka starts to narrate the story of their people, which is pretty convoluted, involving Theseus, an Amazon from Antiope’s tribe, named Phthia, adultery, betrayal, swords, and some backwards dealings. This story both contradicts the one that Circe told Diana before, but also confirms other parts of it. These Amazons lost their immortality, and eventually became a tribe of mercenaries and weaponsmiths. The cobra dart thing is a newer addition to their arsenal. Diana questions their warlike ways, but their conversation is cut short when the ground starts to shake, the girdle starts glowing again (in another room), and the sandstorm appears to attack the city. Hermes, glowing red and appearing furious, comes flying into the city declaring that the women are blasphemers that he is going to kill.
- Hermes is in a rage and is attacking the Amazons of Bana-Mighdell, who also have massive technological cannon things. Diana, seeing what’s going on, flies into the chaos to protect Hermes. Seeing her in danger, Nehebka orders the Amazons stop firing. Hermes calms down, and tells Diana that he’s there because he knows that Gaea’s girdle is there. Faruka grabs the girdle from its altar and carries it through the town, while thinking about how it’s time for the Tournament of the Crown. She goes to two women, and asks that they take her to “her”. Julia arrives in Egypt with Steve Trevor, and is met by her friend Osman and General Masat. Steve has a miniature version of Hermes’s caduceus, which is going to help lead him to Diana. Diana argues with Nehebka about Hermes and whether or not they should give him their most holy relic. Trevor is in a helicopter with Masat, flying over the desert when they spot the mystical sandstorm. The general spots some bodies, so they land. Julia is listening over a radio, and comments to Osman that she doesn’t speak “Egyptian”, which seems to be the type of mistake an editor should have caught and fixed. The bodies belong to the men who tried to hire the Amazons a few issues back. The general wants to bomb the Amazons. Diana shows Cheetah to Hermes. She’s in very bad shape by now, and unconscious; Diana wants Hermes to heal her. Faruka leads a discussion among the women, wanting them to turn from Nehebka, who enters the room, saying she’ll accept Faruka’s challenge. Faruka explains that she is not the one to fight; Nehebka is surprised to see the actual contender to be queen. Hermes is not able to help Cheetah, and believes it’s because of the city they are in. He wants to grab the girdle and leave, so he flies off to grab it. He gets thrown out of the room he flew into. Diana is taunted by Faruka, so she flies into the same room, where she finds the heads of the Amazons’ previous leaders arranged on spikes, including Anahid’s. She is surprised when Nehebka’s head is thrown at her. Faruka introduces her to the new queen, Shim’tar, who looks like an Elseworlds version of Diana, had she been put on the Female Furies by Jack Kirby. This woman attacks Diana, and their fight is pretty brutal. Shim’tar tosses Diana around the city, trashing it as they go. Some Egyptian jets fly towards the sandstorm. Diana keeps fighting Shim’tar. Hermes has one of the Amazons take him to the girdle, but it’s missing. As the city continues to suffer from the fight, the sandstorm starts to clear, and the jets are visible above it. General Masat gives the order to blow the city to bits.
- The Egyptian jets fly over the city and start bombing it, and the Amazons start firing back with their anti-aircraft cannons (which any city that has been mystically hidden for centuries would of course have). Faruka calls for Shim’tar to help, but she’s too busy with her ongoing fight with Diana. Finally, Diana notices the jets, which report to General Masat that they’ve confirmed that she’s there. Diana argues with Shim’tar to stop fighting, but Faruka rallies the others to keep going. Hermes throws up a shield around the city, so the jets call off their attack. Faruka shoots at Hermes, Diana kicks Shim’tar’s gun out of her hand, and an Amazon named Batiri shoots at Faruka. Her sisters join in, killing her, which enrages Shim’tar. Hermes tells Diana to wrap Shim’tar in her lasso, which stops her. Diana is flooded with the power Shim’tar sends down the lasso, so to help her, Hermes reaches out with his caduceus. This creates some kind of energy feedback. Batiri rushes over with Barbara Minerva, who is unconscious, and then things get weirder. The sandstorm crackles with energy, and then appears to explode. Afterwards, a helicopter flies over, and finds Diana, Hermes, and Minerva lying in the sand. It seems that Bana-Mighdall is buried, and when Diana pulls up the rest of the lasso, she finds the girdle of Gaea tied to it. Julia and Steve arrive. A few days later, Vanessa is at the airport, waiting for them all to arrive, but is stuck in the large crowd. Inspector Indelicato and Lt. Shand call her over to them, and abuse their police powers to get to the arrivals gate. Vanessa hugs her mother, while Diana kisses both cops on the mouth to thank them for trying to help (which, like, they didn’t do). Later, Etta comes home to find Steve there. He tells her that Hermes, who is still hurt, is living with him now, and Etta feels a little crowded, and tells Steve she needs some time. The British ambassador negotiates with the Egyptians over what’s to be done with Barbara Minerva. Later, Osman calls Julia to tell her that the Brits are taking Minerva. She thanks him for his friendship, and then sees Diana off as she prepares to return the girdle to Paradise Island. Vanessa is bored at school, and distracted, but is happy when Diana knocks on her classroom window to wave goodbye. Hippolyte questions Menalippe’s vision that Diana is coming home, but then Diana shows up and gives her mother the girdle, which causes great joy.
So I suspect that I was just as, if not more, bored with this volume. The change in art really hurt my enjoyment level as I read this, and I often waited a few days between issues, because there was very little in this book that I cared about. I think that Barbara Minerva is the most interesting thing to happen here, and that I’d have preferred to keep reading about her.
With the comics collected in this volume, Pérez moved away from his attempts to weave Greek mythology into the series, and finally had Diana interact with the DC Universe on a grander scale, but it stayed underwhelming. When Diana worked with the Justice League during the invasion, she was shown as being either a sex object, or was derided for her devotion to pacifism, which, frankly, wasn’t all that on display in the issues leading up to these. The Invasion issues felt tonally different from the rest of Pérez’s run to that point. After that, the book really stayed focused on Cheetah, and then Bana-Mighdall.
I appreciated gaining a deeper understanding of Cheetah’s origin, and the role that Chuma played in it all, but even those issues were a little dull.
I found the Amazons of the Middle-East to be odd creations. I figured we would eventually get to the other Amazon tribe that split off from Hippolyte millennia before, but wasn’t sure when. It’s curious that these women wouldn’t retain their immortality, and would become warrior mercenaries. It’s also interesting that they would end up in Egypt (which is more African than Middle-Eastern, but this is from people who thought that Egyptian was a modern language, so I guess we shouldn’t expect much), and be both technologically advanced and mystical. I’m not sure how their ideology could have shifted to the point that they became the types of women who would slaughter an entire village in order to kill one person.
Anyway, I found the internecine squabbles of these women to be a little boring, if I’m being honest. My biggest gripe was that it was never explained who Shim’tar was – it’s like this (significantly lighter skinned) warrior was just hiding out behind a mask, until it was time for her to become queen? And why did she look so much like Diana (again, she wore a mask, so maybe she didn’t really look like her, but…)? She got written out at the end, unless these are questions that are answered later in the run.
There was really no growth or development for Diana in this book. She had some adventures, but we weren’t seeing the striving to fit in or to honour her culture that filled the first two volumes, and I think this part of Pérez’s run really suffered for it. When he was drawing the book, the strength of his art papered over story or character development flaws, but now, the gaps in his writing were clear to see.
That’s not to say that Chris Marrinan wasn’t a good artist, or wasn’t good for this book. His stuff looks pretty nice; the problem is that his more house style approach made the book less dynamic and polished, and he wasn’t up to the dense panel numbers that Pérez can, on his own, make more effective.
I don’t, at present, have any more trades in this series to read, and I think I’m going to leave it there. I’ve always wondered about this run (and have thought about finally reading the Messner-Loebs/Moder run where Diana worked in a taco joint), but at this stage, I have no real interest in where Diana went next. This is a classic run, but not all classics are created equally.
This also marks the point where my shelf of trades I haven’t read yet is officially empty, maybe for the first time in fifteen years. That’s that pandemic lifestyle for you. It’s likely to stay that way until shows come back and I feel safe going to them.
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