Red or Blue, Wonder Woman’s Boots Were Made For Walking17

by Bob Suicide

It’s official: NBC told Wonder Woman to grab her redesigned hooker boots and take the walk of shame off their network. But what does that mean for comic-based television programming as a whole, as well as the more niche super heroine-led titles?

The realistic answer: not much.

With the level of backlash this show has received at every turn, from both die-hard fans as well as general network audiences, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the Wonder Woman re-boot didn’t last long. The real surprise is how many people don’t seem to remember how poorly the original show did. It was only on for three seasons, and the first performed so badly that they had to completely re-vamp the entire premise, moving it from the ’40s to the ’70s. So from the outset, a big-budget reboot of a mediocre show from the ’70s didn’t seem like the best idea. And yet, everyone seemed to take the news that Wonder Woman was cut before she even had a chance to take flight with great confusion: “Woaaaa? Where are we to find our strong female heroine now?” they bemoaned.

As a true, man-shirking Amazonian, Wonder Woman was created as a symbol of female empowerment (despite her skimpy outfit and some serious bondage imagery) in the ’40s. However, after the death of her creator (Dr. William Moulton Marston, a psychologist who helped invent the modern polygraph test), she reverted to the archetype of women of the period, obsessing over marriage and dealing with copycats who were “biting her style.” After several re-inventions, she’s had her powers, friends, home, and even her origin stripped to the point where it was questionable whether she was even a remotely positive feminist example for women. And yet, for some reason, the sacking of Wonder Woman has many questioning the viability of leading heroines in any television show. There’s a startling amount of people asking, “If she can’t make it, who can?” I could make some comment about sexism, decrying the numerous male superhero shows that made it to broadcast vs. the cancellation of a heroine’s show before it even aired, but the best I could come up with is: If they aired the BS that was The Cape, they should have given the go-go booted, bouncing-titted fail of a show equal airtime. But, somehow, even that argument rings hollow.

Specifically, speaking as a die-hard fan, I would hope that people would not equate the nixing of something SO far from the original source material (meaning the comic – not the original TV series) as an indictment of the genre as a whole. However, some media outlets appear to be spinning this as a turn of events that, by superhero association, also puts the upcoming Hulk reboot in jeopardy. If the Hulk remake does poorly, it will not be because audiences don’t like comic-based television shows, and it won’t imply that the genre as a whole is declining, like many assert, or for that matter, that male-led TV show are no longer viable.

The sad fact is some things don’t transfer to other mediums well, both Wonder Woman and Hulk being good examples.

In traditional Wonder Woman storylines, Diana talked her enemies out of their life of crime rather than clobbering them with her heightened heroic powers. Translating that low-energy, moral discourse to a television show would be like giving Monica from Touched By An Angel a golden whip and some hot pants: awkward, confusing and boring. And, with several failed movies at the box office, the reluctant beast that is the Hulk doesn’t ever seem to translate into a leading movie man despite his larger than life movie screen size. No one wants to watch a geeky scientist, who gets angry and turns a particularly unattractive shade of green, run and whine for two hours.

While some have said the Wonder Woman pilot wasn’t that bad, some reasonable amount of fail must be inferred based on its poor performance in screen tests, and the raucous backlash that each spoiler produced. The lack of a TV series with a female superhero as the title role doesn’t mean we should settle for a insultingly vapid husk of a show that resembles Wonder Woman in name only. Especially when the premise of the show appears to be that this “Wonder Woman” is a billionaire (her career went from lawyer to CEO between the two scripts and the pilot) whose hobbies apparently include reenacting the street-walking scenes from Pretty Woman in her spare time.

The revival of Wonder Woman was the first thing the new NBC CEO requested and it had his full backing; it’s therefore even more of a big deal that he declined to pick up the pilot. You know it had to be bad when he decided to scrap his first major act as a network head, an action which in the backstabbing world of entertainment will no doubt leave him open to political attacks from rivals inside and outside his company.

Some have asserted that this might be the best thing to happen to Wonder Woman, and are crossing their fingers in the hopes that she might find a home on cable. (Although this is highly unlikely since media reports seem to indicate the general industry opinion is: ‘If NBC doesn’t want it, who would?’) Fans see cable like the lush hills of Themyscira, offering the show more freedom to let Diana’s invisible plane fly.

But, if this show isn’t dead – and I’m predicting right now that it is – someone needs to ground that plane. When it comes to comic adaptations that make us fans look bad, Wonder Woman is major a no fly zone!