Amazon Hot Pants

[kybearfuzz]

Back in the late 1960's/early 1970's, DC Comics made the decision to have Wonder Woman give up her Amazon powers (as the result of the Amazons leaving this dimension for another) to stay in "Man's World." Without her powers, Wonder Woman left the Justice League and opened a mod-fashion boutique. She trained with a mysterious martial artist named I Ching and became an adventurer, fighting street thugs and the occasional spy. Comparisons to Emma Peel of The Avengers TV-show were made. The title of her comic became "Diana Prince: Wonder Woman" and she did not use her Wonder Woman alias.

Recently, I bought three trades of the Wonder Woman series from this era. I was curious, having only read sporadic issues I bought here or there, how the series ran. In my opinion, the writing and artwork for the series was better than it had been, but Diana Prince still lingered in the shadow of the super-powered Wonder Woman and it's hard to say that the latter wasn't missed. According to history, even Gloria Steinem called in to DC to complain about Wonder Woman's power loss.


Between crime-fighting battles, Diana Prince worried about her hot pants orders.

Diana Prince wasn't left out of the DC continuity though. She teamed up with Superman and Batman on occasion in their respective books, still being referred to as Wonder Woman. She also appeared in the Justice League of America comic during one of the summer JLA/JSA crossovers.

The power loss lasted for around 23 issues of her book. Eventually, Diana regained her Amazon powers and rejoined the Justice League as Wonder Woman.

Whether the "Diana Prince" path was a good creative decision for DC has been long-debated. Many considered it a brave choice for the time, bringing in a then-modern and original storyline. Others have stated that the most iconic superheroine in comics had been defanged, pointing out that the writers wouldn't have done this sort of thing to Superman.

In reading it myself, I think the stories were good (okay, minus the hotpants panel above), but I think DC could have very easily created a new heroine to be the mod-super spy. One thing I think the change did do was force the comic to be more modern in its approach, maybe even more gritty, which it sorely needed.

Comments

[changeling72.livejournal.com]

I think it and valid point that DC wouldn't (and didn't) take away one of the guys' powers.

[kybearfuzz.livejournal.com]

I'd love to read the minutes of any creative meeting where this was discussed. I bet it took quite a bit of convincing.

[dendren.livejournal.com]

I agree, the whole thing must have been fascinating. I have this whole part of the series in my collection, I think my Wonder Woman's go back to around issue 140 or so. Reading it in comparison to what had gone on before, definitely a huge step forward in writing and creativity, but still pretty tragic at times too (not just the hot pants panel, but the whole I'm independent so I'm going to open a dress shop and spend pages trying on new clothes). The whole storyline of her trying to regain entrance in to the Justice League after she got her powers back must have been fun at the time but again, another slap in the face for women in retrospect. Followed shortly after by the whole switch over to telling Earth 2 World War II based stories to match the TV show. If you look at the series over the course of the 60s, 70s, 80s it's pretty amazing how many times they soft-rebooted the character or storyline... the new mod Diana Prince - Wonder Woman, the new original Wonder Woman, the Justice League trials, the Earth II stories and then return to Earth I stories, then the whole Amazon mists make her forget everything that happened before and Steve Trevor is alive again and there is a new Cheetah thing. Oh, then the new "W" breastplate. Poor Wondy... they just tried and tried and tried with her LOL

[kybearfuzz.livejournal.com]

I've heard that writing and drawing Wonder Woman was often considered a demotion of sorts prior to the Perez reboot. I'll exclude the Jose Delbo years in the 1970's/early 1980s (pre W-breastplate) in that as he was on the comic for a long while.

I suspect that every time the creative team changed, they were given broad leeway on the character, which probably led to the soft-reboots over and over.

I always loved Wonder Woman in the comics, even during this I Ching period.