Despite the embarrassing cinema outings for female superheaters such as Catwoman, Elektra and Aeon Flux, hope springs eternal that someone someday will make a movie about a heroic female that isn’t utterly cringeworthy. Of course, TV is a lot more heroic woman friendly
, so it’s there that we find Wonder Woman — whose movie version stalled long ago — currently trying to find a home.The story goes like this: David E. Kelly, the famed TV producer behind such shows as Boston Legal and the “groundbreaking female dramedy” Ally McBeal, was tasked by the WB to develop a Wonder Woman pilot. He wrote that pilot. It was passed around all the networks and no one picked it up. Sad face. But then, SURPRISE, NBC decided they would put it on this fall! Happy face!
Rebooting Wonder Woman is a task that has vexed many a man and woman in the comics, let alone the TV. The Lynda Carter original was 70s campy, a take that no one would take seriously any more. No, you need to have some kind of faith and belief in the background and motivation of your hero for audiences to do the same.
Kelly’s pilot script is now making the rounds in Hollywood — it’s apparently very easy to come by, so if anyone wants to send it our way, we won’t object — but from all reports it is…sort of like Ally McBeal with bracelets
:Pages 8-14: The first of many lengthy heart-to-hearts between Diana and her press secretary, Myndi [sic], that’s meant to play as though the two are long-lost sisters who gab about boys in between high-powered meetings. Here, there’s the additional opportunity for gratuitous skin, as Diana takes a long, hot shower before she opens up about long-lost love Steve Trevor, now a lawyer in the Justice Department. (Wait, really?) Despite the alleged feminist undertones, Kelley uses the scene as an opportunity to dissect Diana’s love life and engage in some stereotypical banter about much-needed makeovers (alter ego Diana Prince is rather mousy because she has brown eyes, apparently, and doesn’t style her hair well) and Myndi asks her how the women of Themyscira have babies. No surprise that war hero Steve Trevor has been redesigned as a lawyer here. You didn’t really think Kelley would do a show without a single member of the legal profession in the mix, did you?
The rest of this report is equally dire with ice cream sleepovers, Wonder Woman’s three identities, Beyoncé songs, and Diana swooning for Steve Trevor like a lovesick teen.
If you want a more comic-book knowledgable review, Sue from Dc Women Kicking Ass also had a peek
and was unimpressed:If this were a show about a generic female crime fighter, it wouldn’t be bad. But it’s not. It’s about Wonder Woman and what Kelley has done, despite the character’s love of flying, is to bring her down to earth and not in a good way. He underplays her origin, reduces her scope and waters down her motivation. Wonder Woman is a bigger than life character who should inspire awe. And there are moments where he writes her that way but for the most
15 Comments on What’s up with…the ladies in comics movies, last added: 2/6/2011Display Comments Add a Comment
If Baccarin is the front runner, my money is on a Maria Hill role. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Hill
“and Diana swooning for Steve Trevor like a lovesick teen.”
Yeah, that loud eyerolling over WW swooning for Steve Trevor is totally justified. I remember how outraged I was when Reeve swooned over Kidder. I was SO rolling my eyes with indignation. And turning the world backwards for her? Such a male stereotype. Instead, Clark should have been going out with his three pals, hitting all the nightclubs and downing manhattans.
“what Kelley has done, despite the character’s love of flying, is to bring her down to earth and not in a good way.”
We really should keep it more like the comic. Show her birth, you know..her mom making her out of clay? Lets have her share an apartment with a bunch of talking gorillas. She goes to work in her skin tight white body suit and cool sunglasses and her boss has a metal hand. We could cap every episode with Etta Candy putting Diana over her knee, spanking her with a hairbrush (as Diana shrugs and winks). All in good fun of course. All this when she isn’t fighting sea monsters for the UN. NBC would be fools not to greenlight that!
Comixace That’s a lot of spunky brunettes for the SLJ sidekick role. I’m guessing Maria Hill (Avengers/Iron Man).
@John
As someone who has seen and loved Superman and Superman II and read the Kelley script,I feel completely confident in saying you don’t know what you’re talking about.
And your stringing together various moments through 60 years of comics to try and degrade Wonder Woman is a game that can be equally played with Batman and Superman. So really, what’s your point?
The point about Superman/Lois, WW/Trevor is an obvious one…hypocrisy. And really, really laughable hypocrisy at that.
And guess what? I’ve done research for articles on Supes, WW and many other characters, articles that ended up in Amazing Heroes, Comic Book Artist, Comic Book Marketplace and Alter Ego. So saying “I love the movie” and “I’ve read a script” and dangling them as some sort of evidence of your credentials really doesn’t mean much to me. If you want to measure “long boxes” with me, be prepared to bring a long ruler.
As to the script and what I’ve read (yes, it’s on the internet Sue, everyone’s read it, HELLO!), and as to your usual inconsistent and dated, cliché angry feminist preachings on the subject, I’d say your view of the character is about as narrow and limited as Kelleys “currently“ is. But I imagine you’d find something to bitch about even if Gloria Steinem wrote it. However, based on yours and Kelley’s track records and given my druthers, I’ll choose to back Kelley’s horse in this particular race.
In the future, you might want to remember that a females take on a female comic character isn’t necessarily always the right one by virtue of it coming from a female. Especially given that the best runs of WW were written and drawn by men. Oh snap!
I once was told about a female friend of a friend who’s rule for watching movies was:
1) It had to have at least two women in it.
2) They had to talk about something besides men.
Well, yes, Maria Hill–but back in the (old) day, Nick’s constant female companion was Countess Valentina Allegro De Fontaine, who was even in that David Hasselhoff Fury TV thingy. Whichever character it turns out to be, they might also be eventually recruited to be in that NICK FURY movie that Samuel J’s contracted for!
@John, when you use some incredibly misogynistic language how do you expect anyone to take you seriously? It’s quite sad.
@Allen Rubinstein: That two-part criteria is the very same “Bechdel test” mentioned in the article. It was popularized, if not originated, by the cartoonist Alison Bechdel in her strip DYKES TO WATCH OUT FOR.
@Allen Rubinstein and Jack Fear: There’s even a website that tracks if movies pass the Bechdel test or not: http://bechdeltest.com/
As for the article, the first time I saw Morena Baccarin in an ad for “V,” I immediately thought “With that haircut, she looks just like Maria Hill” so yeah, I’d say she’s a great choice. As for the Wonder Woman TV show, I haven’t read the script, but I can imagine a slightly irreverent, “single female superhero, workin’ for her client, wearing sexy miniskirts and bein’ self-reliant” take on WW *could* work. I would certainly give it a shot.
Sadly, this script sounds like it might be from Lame-ville.
“We could cap every episode with Etta Candy putting Diana over her knee, spanking her with a hairbrush (as Diana shrugs and winks). All in good fun of course. All this when she isn’t fighting sea monsters for the UN. NBC would be fools not to greenlight that!”
I wouldn’t mind seeing Wonder Woman fight sea monsters. As for Etta spanking her, I’m sure that’ll surface in one of those comic-porn films eventually.
Hey, there’s always Heroic Trio. That even had Wonder Woman in it.
I have this weird feeling Mila Kunis ends up playing Lois Lane, although I’d love to stare at Rosamund Pike Imax-sized.
I can’t imagine the Avengers not-superhero female part having 10 lines, even if they give her two of Clark Gregg’s.
I don’t understand why a Wonder Woman movie or episodic film-like TV show drawing on at least some traditional elements of the character is so difficult for all of these fine writers to do. Then again, I want Dancing Wonder Tot.
Also, if I were making a DC superhero property into anything, I’d really want GL to do well to avoid the extra scrutiny that will come if it doesn’t.
John, where exactly is the hypocrisy you’re talking about? I don’t see it.
I don’t recall Reeve swooning over Kidder (or, as I bet you meant to say, Superman swooning over Lois, as we’re talking about the characters, not the actors, right?). And it seemed to me he turned back the world as much for himself as for Lois (he didn’t want to live without her). I don’t see how any of that is the same as the stuff that produced the “eye rolling.”
In fact, I don’t think the complaint was so much that those sorts of things were in the script, but that those seemed to be the focus, rather than WW’s superheroic qualities.
(John apparently sees any two people kiss and files it all under “that girly stuff”, regardless of how it’s handled.)
re: Superheroines on TV. The show’s starting to bore me I’m afraid, but “No Ordinary Family” includes a super woman that unfortunately doesn’t seem to get the focus as much as her husband does, but otherwise doesn’t suck.
I think that No Ordinary Family has the same general ratio of Current Story This Week vs. Ongoing Subplot. It just so happens that Dad stars in Current Story This Week and Mom stars in Ongoing Subplot.
That said, I’m sitting here thingking about how interesting it would have been if Mom was the police artist who goes out and fights crime and Dad was the scientist looking for the source of their powers.