Written by: Grant Morrison
Art by: Yanick Paquette
Publisher: DC Comics
It’s been three years since DC announced Wonder Woman: Earth One. In that time, I’ve built the book up in my head to the point where I wasn’t sure I would be able to fully enjoy it when it finally did come out. I know that I’m not alone in this–plenty of people in the community have been looking forward to this book. And why not? It’s written by Grant Morrison, backed up with fantastic art by Yanick Paquette. It’s an excellent creative team, and each of them excels in their given areas.
As it turns out, there was really no reason to be worried about over-hyping the book. Wonder Woman: Earth One is not only the best of the Earth One line (and by a wide margin, I might add), but also easily joins the pantheon of best Wonder Woman stories. It may very well be one of my favorite Grant Morrison works, and I say that as someone who has enjoyed pretty much everything he writes.
For those worried about the book being super heady and conceptual, as Morrison’s work tends to be, you can rest assured. While the book is definitely quite strong thematically and grapples with a lot of issues on a conceptual level, he definitely tones it down a bit here. This isn’t Final Crisis or Multiversity levels of his off the wall, meta method of telling a story. In fact, I would liken this more to his run on Batman, in the sense that it’s very character driven (while retaining Morrison’s love for world building and exploring complex themes) and focuses on exploring new ground with existing characters.
Morrison isn’t for a second interested in retreading old ground. Sure, if you know what the influences are, you’ll be able to spot them fairly easily. But while he definitely wraps in elements of existing Wonder Woman material, he makes the lore and mythology surrounding the character his own. It’s a fairly unique take on the character–not one we’ve never seen before, but definitely on that we haven’t seen in a long time, and one that most comic book readers have probably never been exposed to.
Stemming from this particular interpretation of the character are the themes that I’ve referenced. For the sake of not spoiling too much of the book, I won’t get too deep into them. However, they serve as the source of most of Diana’s character development as she interacts with man’s world for the first time. There are quite a few great character moments interspersed throughout the book, mostly for Diana, but also for the supporting cast.
At this point, I’m five paragraphs in and have only briefly made reference to Paquette’s artwork. If you’ve ever read anything he’s been on art duty for, you know what to expect: sheer excellence. The book has a very strong visual direction, one that differs from DC’s house style enough to make it feel distinct. Paquette leverages it to help tell the story. For instance, there are subtle differences in the way he draws Themyscria and man’s world.
One of my favorite elements of the art is the paneling. Every single page has a unique flow to it, because structurally they’re all very different. Even the way the panels are separated changes from page to page. It’s a fascinating way to present the story, and makes the book feel even more unique. Furthermore, it makes a lot of sense considering how the story is structured. Everything just fits together so well and makes the book a super cohesive experience.
All that being said, Wonder Woman: Earth One isn’t without faults. It definitely feels very much like the first part of a story that we may or may not see the continuation of, considering how long it took for this to come out. As such, there are threads that are left hanging. The book definitely has a lot of set up, and most of it pays off, but I didn’t feel that everything was paid off in a satisfactory manner. Of course, this isn’t necessarily a self contained story, so it’s difficult to actually hold that against the book.
That being said, there are real flaws with the book, the most glaring of which is that it concludes rather rapidly. It’s almost as if there were another ten or twenty pages that were heavily condensed. The conclusion itself is mostly satisfying, it’s just that it happens super quickly. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that it’s out of nowhere, but it definitely feels like there should have been a little bit more to it than there actually is.
Also, a lot of the supporting characters kind of get the shaft here. Diana is the only character with an actual arc; the rest are foils to her story. Of course, this is a graphic novel about her, so in a sense, that is to be expected. However, I would have loved to have spent some more time with the other Amazons, and even characters in man’s world. Again, it feels like there were parts of this book left on the cutting room floor, so to speak.
That being said, I did find myself really loving what Morrison and Paquette are doing here. It’s a book I’m sure I’ll be coming back to a couple of times, since one time through definitely wasn’t enough to quite grasp everything going on. It definitely feels like there should be more, and if we get another volume, I think this one will retrospectively become a lot better. Even if we don’t, I think this stands pretty well on its own as a different interpretation of Wonder Woman’s character.
