At first watch, Wonder Woman 1984 passes as standard, overlong superhero fare. It pilfers liberally from prior superhero films, notably the Thor trilogy and Christopher Reeve-era Superman, with a mythological trickster god driving the action, a megalomaniacal magnate as villain, and loving shots of the protagonist in flight. It also adopts the longstanding but still inexplicable sequel template of cramming in two supervillains.
The more you think about it, though, the stranger this movie becomes. The first scene sets up a challenge for Diana to learn the value of truth, which seems something she would've learned by 1984. This plot point vanishes until nearly the end of the film. In the meantime, Diana does not exactly act heroic. She captures some robbers and smashes their bodies into the top of a police car, demolishing it, rather than simply tying them up somewhere. She constantly puts people in jeopardy, particularly two kids she "rescues" while her powers are waning (an alternate plan might've been to yell, "Hey, kids, get out of the way of these large, loud military vehicles"). And most worrisomely-unless I'm mistaken-she straight-up rapes a guy.
I don't want to skip over this point. Another man's body is inhabited by the soul of Steve Trevor. Diana and Steve question the logistics of how this happened, but have no problem putting this gentleman's body in repeated danger nor using it for sexual gratification. It could be argued that since Steve consents, no rape occurs. But sex is a physical act.
How could none of the creative people involved with this film realize what they were doing? Did no one stop and think of its ramifications? Imagine if the sexes were reversed here. Imagine if this was Captain America and Peggy (easy to do, since the Wonder Woman movies already steal so much from the Captain America franchise). The most inexplicable element here is that we're already dealing with fairy-tale logic. A magic wishing stone turns a woman into a cat at one point. How hard would it have been to simply bring Steve back without having to inherit another man's body?
Aside from this craziness, there's also the movie's lack of narrative coherence, its shifting goalposts on what the Macguffin can do (you'd figure some people's wishes would cancel each other out), its preachiness and hamhanded attempts at relevance, and that final showdown with the Cheetah, which reminded me of The Amazing Spider-Man 2, a movie you never want to be reminded of.
The more you think about it, though, the stranger this movie becomes. The first scene sets up a challenge for Diana to learn the value of truth, which seems something she would've learned by 1984. This plot point vanishes until nearly the end of the film. In the meantime, Diana does not exactly act heroic. She captures some robbers and smashes their bodies into the top of a police car, demolishing it, rather than simply tying them up somewhere. She constantly puts people in jeopardy, particularly two kids she "rescues" while her powers are waning (an alternate plan might've been to yell, "Hey, kids, get out of the way of these large, loud military vehicles"). And most worrisomely-unless I'm mistaken-she straight-up rapes a guy.
I don't want to skip over this point. Another man's body is inhabited by the soul of Steve Trevor. Diana and Steve question the logistics of how this happened, but have no problem putting this gentleman's body in repeated danger nor using it for sexual gratification. It could be argued that since Steve consents, no rape occurs. But sex is a physical act.
How could none of the creative people involved with this film realize what they were doing? Did no one stop and think of its ramifications? Imagine if the sexes were reversed here. Imagine if this was Captain America and Peggy (easy to do, since the Wonder Woman movies already steal so much from the Captain America franchise). The most inexplicable element here is that we're already dealing with fairy-tale logic. A magic wishing stone turns a woman into a cat at one point. How hard would it have been to simply bring Steve back without having to inherit another man's body?
Aside from this craziness, there's also the movie's lack of narrative coherence, its shifting goalposts on what the Macguffin can do (you'd figure some people's wishes would cancel each other out), its preachiness and hamhanded attempts at relevance, and that final showdown with the Cheetah, which reminded me of The Amazing Spider-Man 2, a movie you never want to be reminded of.