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The holiday film release season has passed us with only one real blockbuster, which is the return of Wonder Woman, and we likewise have a returning hero: Our college-going young guest from ep. 33 on heroine journeys has now grown into a grad student just studying comics and brings her deep WW knowledge to consider the new film in context with Erica, Mark, and Brian.
Part of this context is the 2017 biopic Professor Marston and the Wonder Women, which reveals the unorthodox views of WW’s creator, and so of course this shows up in how WW judges us: She’s not just a Captain America-style patriot, but a foreigner who in this film compassionately condemns our 80s greed and dishonesty. But do the themes actually make sense? And what’s with having her love interest return from the dead, hijacking another man’s body with no acknowledgment that that’s very skeevy?
Also, how does the depiction of WW’s homeland compare to other feminist utopias like Herland and “Sultana’s Dream”? Does it matter that WW was created by and initially aimed primarily at males? We learn a little about the post-Marston WW (who couldn’t join the Justice League, which was for boys only!) and talk about the ’70s TV show, the outfits, the villains, and WW in love.
Here are a few supplementary articles:
- “The Surprising Origin Story of Wonder Woman” by Jill Lepore
- “Does Wonder Woman 1984 Have a Steve Trevor Problem?” by Sarah El-Mahmoud
- “The Warped Morality of ‘Wonder Woman 1984’” by Dani Di Placido
- “How Wonder Woman 1984 Reboots the DC Hero’s Forgotten Superpower” by Eric Francisco
- “How ‘Wonder Woman 1984’ Villain Maxwell Lord Stays True to the Comics” by Graeme McMillan
- And from our former guest, Noah Berlatsky: “HBO Max’s ‘Wonder Woman 1984’ Stars a Trump-y Villain, Gal Gadot’s Charm and a Garbled Message“
Listen to The Partially Examined Life discussing Herland.
This episode includes bonus discussion you can access by supporting the podcast at patreon.com/prettymuchpop. This podcast is part of the Partially Examined Life podcast network and is curated by openculture.com.
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