Introduction
Wonder Woman, a character in DC Comics is an original creation that art audiences first experienced her in 1941. Since that time, the role has embedded herself in our general consciousness as a women’s rights activist and a peace-loving hero with superpowers. She has also become synonymous with being a dominant female figure who binds men with her magic lasso to get the truth. Like most other big-name comic book characters, she has crossed all forms of media, from early radio shows, Saturday morning cartoon character, subject of magazine articles, a figurehead for the women’s rights movement in the U.S. (being the subject of the first cover story for Ms. magazine), a spokesperson for the U.N., live action television series and feature films.
In the 1950’s, there were only three superheroes that enjoyed the space of their very own superhero comic books, these are, Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman. Many scholars and historians agree that, though the character has been through many transformations over the 70 and more years of her existence, the cultural impact of the cast has impacted and influenced the societal understanding of the capabilities of women. She has a reputation as an outstanding symbol of what is now commonly referred to as a symbol of female empowerment. It is worthwhile noting that her image is used to endorse war bonds, action figures, comic books, lunch boxes, girl’s costumes, magazine covers, as well as U.S. stamps and cultural magazines. The character also has become the “world ambassador” for the U.N. Apparently, the role of Wonder Woman has a worldwide reach that is second to none for the feminism empowerment movement (Zoe, 2017 p. 1). Having earned her place as a cultural icon courtesy of the many direct and indirect referencing from animation, film and TV programming, the character has also morphed into a subject of several homages and parodies in various forms of media.
The focus of the paper will be a critical evaluation of the character Wonder Woman, the creator William Moulton Marston, his wife and their lover Olive Byrne, who developed the first female superhero in the early 1940s (Ross, Kanigher, and Marston, 2009 p. 1). The body of the paper will be a critical evaluation of the Feminist impact that the fictional character, herein identified as Wonder Woman has had on culture and other aspects discussed and touched on briefly. Additionally, the body of the paper will delve into some of the themes and look at the various ideas that have been explored to make the Wonder Woman franchise a remarkable success story over a span of decades. Such is relative to the central theme that is the Feminism movement (Zoe, 2017 p. 1). Given that the character is a woman, the critical analysis cannot, therefore, shy away from making inferences and conclusions on the inspiration behind the character’s physical appearance, personality and background. Such were all influenced by real-life women, one being the wife of the characters creator, Moulton and Olive Byrne, who formed an unusual polyamorous relationship for the time. The paper, however, argues that Wonder Woman embodied the female virtues of compassion and understanding, truth and justice over violence and war. Her most significant "foe" has been the war God, Ares.
Cultural Impact of Wonder Woman
Exploration of the cultural impacts that the character has had on feminism would involve looking at the history of this role. It is after comparing with what was and what is currently is that we can make an analogy and come up with an impeachable assessment of the cultural deviations, if any, that the character instilled in society. Primarily, we look into the star-spangled hot pants woman who claims to be the warrior of peace within the purviews of the “secret history” of Lepore. With the work of Lepore as a guide, we must first set a base for the comparison, for the purpose of this section on the impact on culture. The assessment looks at how women used to dress amongst a host of other cultural aspects relative to the female gender. With quite some remarkable ease, Lepore has managed to do a reconstruction of the social mood before the birth of our comic hero, Wonder Woman. The analysis in this section has carefully evaded and delineated what has become the conceptual debt that this character had accumulated vis-a-vis the 20th-century feminism and the birth control movement in particular. In an examination conducted on much of what was left of Marston’s tax records and many more documents found in his dingy, dimly lit work place, the readers can now be taken through the development of the character of Wonder Woman. Lepore writes that, the woman that inspired the character was fierce and very picky. More often than not, she was fearless and came off as someone who was very tight lipped. In summation, Lepore quips that, “she was bold; she was unflinching and played field hockey.” It is in Lepore’s work that we are treated to pit stops in attempts to try examining some of the culturally reverberating developments in Wonder Woman’s history. For a brief period in the 1960’s, DC Comics decided to reinvent the character and make her more independent from the other superheroes of the day. They “dared” to have a story line where Wonder Woman “lost” her powers and that her protectors, the Greek Pantheon of Gods, were fading from existence from a lack of being worshipped by humans. To compensate for this lack to super-powers, her “alter-ego” Diana Prince decide to learn the arts of Judo and Kung Fu, and took on a spiritual master, the I-Ching to help her combat evil. Her look was revamped, and resembled closely Emma Peel from the Avengers, with mod stylings, and hip high boots. Many fans were quick to react negatively.