5 Thoughts I Had While Watching ‘Wonder Woman 1984’
By: John Devore
Tags: Superheroes, Film, Movies, Streaming, Culture

Photo: Warner Media

5 Thoughts I Had While Watching ‘Wonder Woman 1984’

So, are we watching this Gal Gadot blockbuster every Christmas now?

I guess Wonder Woman 1984 is a Christmas movie now because I watched it on Christmas, as did everyone else I know. It felt like the entire world was watching but I don’t actually know if the entire world was watching the blockbuster superhero sequel starring Gal Gadot as the titular woman of wonder.

The movie was highly-anticipated — the first one was a smash. 2017’s Wonder Woman was a surprisingly moving, action-packed salute to the first lady of superheroes, Princess Diana of Paradise Island. But what made Wonder Woman 1984 so buzzworthy was because the studio that produced it, Warner Media, decided to release it on its new streaming platform HBO Max at the same time as it was being shown on the big screen in empty theaters across the country.

I’m the sort of person who goes to the movies on Christmas Day. I’ve been doing it my whole life. But not this year: there’s a highly-infectious virus on the loose and I didn’t want to catch or spread it. So I stayed home. I’m stayed at home and called my loved ones and tried to hide the heartbreak in my voice.

I also watched Wonder Woman 1984. I saw it’s predecessor in the theater twice. I think it’s the best of the most recent movies based on DC Comic’s characters, the ancient rivals of Marvel.

The first Wonder Woman featured a memorable scene where Wonder Woman calmly walks through no-mans-land, the lifeless bomb crater-decorated distance between trenches in World War I. Princess Diana deflecting machine-gun bullets and leading men into battle is strangely uplifting, a melancholy deus ex machina.

The problem with most superhero movies is they lack iconic emotional moments that stowaway in the brain. I don’t want to bring up old arguments but cape-and-cowl movies really are rollercoasters. They’re giant, creaky amusements designed to thrill and exhaust. I know this and that’s why I buy tickets to ride time and time again.

There are a few memorable scenes in Wonder Woman 1984. In one of them, Diana and Steve Trevor fly in a jet through exploding fireworks. The pair are awestruck by the spectacle. It’s a beautiful and intimate scene, actually. I love how movies can show on the outside what’s happening on the inside and sometimes love does feel like you’re sharing a snug cockpit with your favorite person and the world outside is nothing but colors and endless sky.

And, spoiler alert, the jet is Wonder Woman’s invisible jet, the second most famous superhero vehicle after the Batmobile. For decades, Wonder Woman got from here to there flying through the air in a sitting position. I applaud director Patty Jenkins for reinventing this ridiculous bit of character canon. I didn’t really know that Wonder Woman had the power to make things invisible but why not, right? She has a magical tiara-boomerang and a laser rope-whip, too.

A wee recap: Wonder Woman 1984 takes place 66 years after she loses the love of her life and defeats one of the gods in CGI combat. The immortal Diana works at the Smithsonian in Washington DC and mostly mopes (while looking great.) I think we’re supposed to believe a beautiful superwoman who can crush handguns with her bare hands has been fighting bad guys for six decades in secret. For a movie about the daughter of Zeus, this is extremely hard to swallow.

The movie gets off to a killer start with an opening sequence flashback to young Diana competing in the Amazon Olympics. I think I loved this whole opener because we got a minute or so of Robin Wright, who should also have been brought back for longer.

The internet didn’t seem to like the movie, but I did. I mean, I was also drunk on honey baked ham and I might have dozed off once or twice. It’s a 151-minute movie! There were moments I scratched my head, sure. It didn’t always make sense but the whirl was fun. I suppose since so many of us didn’t travel home for the holidays we poured our energy into arguing about WW84 instead of arguing with angry Uncles about face masks.

There are times when the internet resembles that old-timey carnival game where you shoot a stream of water from a squirt gun at a target and whoever fills a balloon the fastest wins only in this metaphor the water is an opinion. The internet is in a constant, neverending, 24/7 contest to fill the balloon and on Christmas day, the balloon was filled with opinions on Wonder Woman 1984.

Here are five of mine.