Wonder Woman #774 // Review
Olympus is burning. The gods are dead. Diana has arrived there with a squirrel from Asgard; a Roman god is dying in a temple. He’s got a lot of explaining to do in Wonder Woman 774. Writers Michael W. Conrad and Becky Cloonan bring Diana to the graveyard of the gods in a story rendered for the page by Andy MacDonald. Meanwhile, writer Jordie Bellaire continues an emotionally engaging story of teenaged Wonder Woman in a story once again brought brightly to the page with the art of Paulina Ganucheau. The main feature feels like a solid echo of what has been put to page and panel before, while Bellaire’s story has a brisk freshness about it that would be perfectly at home in its own monthly title.
The squirrel messenger of the tree of life has joined Diana in her journey to Olympus. It’s in ruins. A quick investigation finds half of Janus lying in a pool of his own blood. The only weapon that could cleave them in half is capable of killing even a god. To set things right, Diana contacts an old friend who takes her and the squirrel to the graveyard of the gods. In the second feature of the issue, Young Diana has discovered the story of a selfless male warrior who dies in pursuit of compassion. Why would this story have been torn from history by Themysciran scholars?
Conrad and Cloonan respectably capture Diana’s wit and wisdom in a story that feels suitably epic, populated as it is by characters from the margins of the panel. Diana and Ratatosk the squirrel meet-up with Deadman thanks to knowledge gleaned from half of Janus in a story featuring some very sharp and brisk dialogue. In the second feature, Bellaire does a brilliant job of bringing a teen Diana to the page with very sharply crafted dialogue and internal monologue. Bellaire’s pacing captures the mood, motion, and emotion of teenaged intellectual life that is so rarely explored on the comics page.
MacDonald has a very vivid grasp of perspective. The artist frames the fall of Olympus with an overpowering sense of proportion. Diana is presented from some very dramatic angles. The actual action that MacDonald is bringing to the page feels a bit stiff, but the artist’s sense of drama is impressive. In the second feature of the issue, Ganucheau’s anime-inspired art gives a soft, curious appeal to Bellaire’s story. Diana’s emotions are crushingly rendered without being unpleasantly exaggerated. A few moments on the beach allow Ganucheau an opportunity to add a bit to the emotional atmosphere as Diana takes her pet kangaroo Jumpa out for a walk.
Conrad and Cloonan are doing an excellent job with the rhythm of a story that has taken Diana from one pantheon to the other in an enjoyably powerful serial of heroic adventure. Bellaire’s issue-ending feature has more of an original feel that explores the fascinating, under-explored teenaged phase of a character of great power coming-of-age in a lost world inhabited exclusively by adults. The dramatic potential of that end of Wonder Woman’s life is finally given some time on the page thanks to Bellaire’s clever storytelling.
