Wonder Woman ’77 Special
Year: 2015
Publisher: DC Comics
Release date: 7/5/15 (AU), 6/5/15 (US) |
| Pic from Comic Book Resources |
With Wonder Woman’s cinematic debut coming next year in Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice,
there’s been a bit of renewed interest in the character. Last year she got her
own digital series with the fun-but-mixed quality Sensation Comics, in addition to her regular monthly title and Superman/Wonder Woman. I can only assume
that some of these are selling reasonably well, as DC went on to announce that she
would be getting another digital series with Wonder Woman ’77, based on the 1970s Lynda Carter TV series.
I haven’t watched all of the old TV show, but I’ve seen
probably a season or so. It was great fun – full of action and campy without
being too silly. It was a balance many have attempted but few have gotten
right. So I was pretty excited to finally get the chance to read it! The first
chapter (as DC likes to call its digital-only issues) was released back in
January, but it never became available on Comixology or DC’s digital stores in
Australia. I was fortunate enough to meet Nicola Scott on Free Comic Book Day
this year and she was shocked to find out that this was the case. I’m not sure
why it’s not being sold digitally; my guess it’s to do with the rights to the
TV show being tied up in some kind of funny arrangement under Australian
copyright law, but that’s just speculation.
 |
| Pic from DCComics.com |
Anyway, this release compiles all six chapters thus far
released into a nice format – it’s got the feel of a regular comic, but is a
little thicker, and with a perfect-bound spine rather than a stapled one. Were
this a higher-profile title, it probably would have had a “proper” trade
paperback release, but I’m pretty happy to take what I can get. There are two
covers available – one by Australia’s own Nicola Scott and the other by Phil
Jimenez. I prefer the Nicola Scott one, but they’re both pretty good.
The first story arc (Chapters 1-3) is the better of the two
– it embraces the 1970s aesthetic pretty well and goes for broke with most of
the action taking place in a disco. The second one (Chapters 4-6) is fun too,
but mostly for the little cameos and in-jokes it throws in there rather than
the story itself. Those unfamiliar with Wonder Woman’s wider mythos will likely
be a little baffled – a couple of references get pretty obscure.
However, chapter 4 does take the cake for best art of the
run. I think it’s a bit of a shame that Jason Badower didn’t draw ALL of the
chapters. The other artists (Drew Johnson, Matt Haley and Richard Oritz) are good too, but they tend to
alternate between drawing good likenesses of Lynda Carter and slipping into
just “plain” Wonder Woman.
Though you can certainly criticise this book on the basis of
plot, I think the pacing is good and it is an awful lot of fun. It’s not quite
the glorious return I’d hoped for, but hopefully this will sell well enough for
DC to commission more chapters and things will pick up over time. My main
problem with the book is actually that a lot of the colouring looks too modern.
Printing technology now is light years ahead of where it was in the 1970s,
which is a good thing for the most part, but for such an intentionally retro
project I think it would have been good to go all-out and style the whole thing
to look like a 1970s comic. Hire Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez to do the artwork and
then colour it with that “dotted” look. That’s the Wonder Woman ’77 book I’d really like to see!
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