Wonder Woman (TV Pilot Fail)

Will Wonder Woman return to the TV?

Hello fellow readers, today we enter the world of one of the greatest female characters comic books have ever created: Wonder Woman. The interest for having WW in a TV show with real actors is nothing new. In fact, back in the 70's when they wanted to release the very first movie based on this great character they did release a pilot movie before building the TV show. The TV pilot had a very different WW that had nothing to do with the comic book character. She was blonde and had a suit specially designed for the TV movie, and it didn't quite look like the WW suit we all like. After lots of talks they released the pilot in 1974 as a TV movie and that was it, at least for blonde star Cathy Lee Crosby and her early attempt. A few years later in 1977 Lynda Carter would become the WW we all love and worship.  The 70's TV show had it all, Lynda Carter was the go to character to impersonate Wonder Woman. She was convining as Diana Prince and astonishing as the strong but feminine character of the amazon wonder.  That granted Carter and the Warner Bros. executives a succesful story of several seasons with lots of action & adventures. And yes, that's the Wonder Woman we all remember, a bit campy but entertaining. So what's the deal on bringing her back to life in a 21st century TV show? I don't know, I'm just a regular guy who likes movies and stuff, so fuck me if I play the critic connoisseur.

Wonder Woman has been a thorn in DC's back for years. They have looked forward to reactivate the character only to find little success with the  Justice League cartoon where WW has  a leading role and some sort of affair with Batman.  David E. Kelley wrote a tempting script to bring her back to life in bone and flesh form. His script had the go and they instantly moved to produced the very first Wonder Woman meets the 21st century TV pilot. End of story. No TV show, no big screen movie, no nothing. What happened? fans are still here, we're still here! Didn't they like Adrianne Palicki's impersonation? didn't they have fun with Kelley's script? did they puke at Jeffrey Reiner's direction? Honestly, I can't answer those questions, but I can tell you about the pilot and its hits and misses.

Updated suit.

She does look amazonian.

Behind the scenes.

First of all, let's remember this was a Pilot episode of a show that never made it. And obviously you could be easily complaining about the unfinished/unpolished special effects, but that just makes no sense, since it wasn't even a finished pilot. The real reasons why this show was cancelled are here:

First of all the setting. In this reality of Wonder Woman, we have no back story beyond the fact that Wonder Woman is a CEO of a major corporation and uses her likeness to fund her crime fighting efforts. Wonder Woman a CEO? seriously does that really add an interesting bold feature to the character? She also doesn't just have a double identity...but a triple identity, yes a triple identity just in case. She's known as Diana Thermyscira, Wonder Woman...and she has a separate Diana Prince identity where she stays at a lonely apartment playing with her pussy (cat) Probably the writer didn't have enough time to explain this fact. I suppose she is currently Diana Thermyscira and that in the past she used to be Diana Prince, the lonely assistant of Steve Trevor, but I'm just guessing as we have no deeper info from the pilot.

The focus of the pilot is that a pharmaceutical company headed by some gal named Veronica Cale (Elizabeth Hurley) is doing some research and experimenting on young athletes, one of which named Willis is a friend of hers. The subjects are either turned into supermen, or die through the genetic incompatibilities of the drugs...

Ready for action.

Gals can be tough.

The original suit!

Any doubts she can be a Wonder Woman?

Wonder Boobs.

Now on to the Wonder Woman character... She seems a little short, certainly not the characterization played by Lynda Carter all those years ago. This version is very jump the gun. I would say if you put Jack Bauer but in a Wonder Woman costume, that would be a fair assessment. She's blunt, and a little abrasive.

Additionally there's a B-plot involving Steve Trevor, who she left to start her crime fighting activities. At the end of the episode, it turns out he's the representative from the Justice Department who's sorta been charged with keeping an eye on her. It's also revealed he's married since she left him, which leaves for a awkward situation since they still have feelings for each other. 

Overall, this show had some major flaws. A lot of throwaway characters. But the action sequences are well shot and interesting, despite the obvious flaws of the unfinished visual effects. I'm glad this wasn't finally on TV, the feeling you're left with after watching this pilot is that the guys involved had no clue about the comic book character. It felt as a pilot that wanted to feature every cliché that's made some other TV show so important these days, like dork science and dark humour a la C.S.I. and urban elements a la Smallville.

 To finish today's entry I give you this fanmade opening sequence which features the original 70's catchy WW theme song: