Obligatory disclaimer: I still am not dead. To elaborate further: the ‘WW84’ film is good.
Let us start from the beginning: what is this film about? It
is about the further adventures of the titular heroine, this time – in the middle
1980s. So far so good, though did Ms. Patty Jenkins had to tack on the Donald
as well?.. however, we digress.
Let us try again. The main difference between this year’s
film and the 2017’s one is that the first WW movie was a part of the ‘greater
DCEU’, let us call it that, it tied on directly into the effects of the JL movie,
and on the flip side it was strongly reminiscent of Marvel’s first ‘Captain
America’ film, though with a less pulp fiction film. I don’t know as to who
thought that pulp fiction Nazis on screen was a good idea; they and their
association with Hydra backfired on MCU in a big, unpredictable way, but that
isn’t the point right now – the point is in that WW84, there are no WWI or WWII
associations, there are some signs of an escalating, cough, Cold War, but none
of the main characters of this film are associated too deeply with that RL
aspect. Now what?
First, a shout-out to Pedro Pascal for his depiction of
Maxwell Lord; the man has nothing in common with ‘the Mandalorian’, even though
one and the same person is playing them both. Pedro Pasqual is clearly a man of
many skills, whereas Ming-Na Wen, who has also reappeared in ‘the Mandalorian’
S2 finale as Boba Fett’s new sidekick, is more of a hot sauce – as the ad says,
Grandma Disney puts Wen into everything. MCU? – AoS; Disney? – ‘Mulan-2020’ (and ‘Mulan-1990s, cough); SW – now ‘the
Mandalorian’; yet so far Wen either plays a tough, powerful woman warrior, or
she is just a cameo, a spectre of her normally powerful image.
…Yet even such a spectre is more powerful than Chloe Bennett
is; the younger woman seems to be a one-hit wonder, now that AoS’ and its’
Quake are gone, and Quake/Daisy Johnson herself seems to be largely not in demand by Disney/Marvel now that
AoS is finished; but how did Chloe wax poetic after the series’ finale!.. Where
were we?
…Well, the Whedon family heavily invested & involved
with AoS, and had published their own article once AoS was finished, but
nothing was mentioned of the Mr. Whedon-father, who is under a MeToo cloud
currently – and now Ms. Gadot, aka Diana Prince of the latest WW-movies,
mentions Mr. Whedon-father in a less than flattering light. Fair enough and –
girl power! Go, Diana! Go, Wonder Woman! Or not.
Oh no, the girl power in Diana is there, and if you need a sexist
pig to base your villain upon, then the RL Donald is your man. The trick here
is how Ms. Jenkins had handled her Maxwell Lord; ‘her’, because there are at
least two other versions of Maxwell Lord who were played by RL actors rather
than being cartoon animations, and one of them appeared back in ‘Supergirl-2015’
– a rather different person from the Maxwell Lord of WW84, so why hadn’t Ms. Jenkins
used this actor?
Because she needed a Donald look-a-like, with one major
twist – her Maxwell Lord actually redeemed himself at the end, because of his
son, but regardless. In RL, of course, Barron Trump was off the metaphorical
menu, though this was probably due to the actions of Melania, who was usually ‘ignored’
by the anti-Trump media because of reasons, but nevertheless, this version of
Maxwell Lord proved to be a different version from the Donald, making their
resemblance to each other imperfect, and Lord’s misogyny, (relatively speaking,
but still) – ditto.
…And on the other hand we have the Cheetah, who was not
redeemed, however likable she used to be in most of the movie. If Maxwell was a
misogynist of WW84, then Dr. Minerva/Cheetah was an equally toxic TERF, (not
unlike J.K. Rowling in real life), a stereotype that is much less popular in
the mainstream culture, political and otherwise, than someone as the Donald is.
By depicting the Cheetah this way, may be one of the reasons as to why WW84
reviews were mixed, as some of the reviewers do not like this portrayal of
hers, and the others – of the Donald… I mean, Maxwell Lord. Fair enough.
That said, for most of the movie, Barbara-Ann Minerva isn’t
the Cheetah, but more of a dark mirror to Wonder Woman, a selfish version of
Diana rather than an outright evil one. Of course, by wishing for Steve, Diana
herself proved to be selfish…at least by the movie’s standards…or maybe the
crystal’s…since it was created by a ‘god of mischief and lies’…cough. Gee, I
wonder who can that be; you know that Marvel hadn’t created him, but rather taken the actual RL Norse mythology
and adapted it to its’ own purpose…but because their association with Loki is
that tight these days, that DC decided to hide behind anonymity, because of
course that works!..
Back to the Cheetah proper, as it was said before, for most
of the movie, she is not an evil person, more of a selfish one, an anti-Wonder
Woman…sort of. Then she decided to change her wish – just as Diana gave up her
own wish, that of Steve being with her, (and in exchange, she was growing weaker,
more ordinary – the movie could’ve had fun, by having Minerva turn into Wonder
Woman, just as Diana was turning into an ordinary woman, and someone who
resembled the original Minerva, maybe?.. but that would be fetish fuel or
something, so no.
Instead we got Minerva turning from a dark Wonder Woman into
an extra from CATS-2019, (and that was a toxic trash fire even before COVID-19 struck), because,
supposedly, Minerva wanted to be an ‘apex predator’, or an ‘alpha predator’, or
whatever.
…The problem here is that a cheetah is a predator, but is
much closer to the bottom of the metaphorical pyramid; there are videos on YouTube
that show RL cheetahs being chased away from their kills by…flocks of vultures.
We’re talking RL vultures here, professional scavengers, not hunters themselves, not at all – and when professional
scavengers can get the best of you, because you’re tired and exhausted to the
bone, and they aren’t, and there’s many of them, and only one of you – then you
know that you’re neither alpha nor apex anything. In RL, cheetahs are pwned by
practically every other carnivore of the African savannahs where they live, and
they know it. They are speeding specialists and as such, they are really
fragile and physically weak, (though I still would not advise any human to
tangle with them for all sort of reasons), so the Barbara Ann Minerva version
of the Cheetah is more like the Leopard or the Jaguar instead.
…There is also the Priscilla Rich version of the Cheetah;
unlike Barbara-Ann, this one is no metahuman, but more like an evil version of
the Catwoman instead, what with a suit…and a load of cash, ‘cause her family
name is Rich, got it? Still, she has not appeared in DCEU so far, so no more
shall be said about that. Anything else?
Well, Steve-O and his amazing body snatching/look-around
switcheroo story line feels rather influenced by the 90s’ X: WP/H: TLJ TV
series’, cough, ancient Greece, cough. In them, some of the villains –
especially a blonde named Callisto – had escaped from the Underworld on one
point and took over Xena’s body, so Xena had to take over Callisto’s…or something.
In RL, Lucy Lawless, who played Xena, had a broken leg or some similar injury,
so Hudson Leick, (who normally played Calypso) had to step in and take over…so
an elaborate body swap had to be involved, somehow.
…Yes, Lucy Lawless had appeared in MCU’s AoS, but that role –
an S.H.I.E.L.D. agent named Isabelle Heartly – was not one of LL’s best, not
even in the top ten. A chakram-wielding character did reappear in S5 – one that
had been played by Dove Cameron instead – but that character, Ruby Hale, had
been underwhelming as well…but we have talked about this before. What about
WW84 instead?
This movie works. It has its’ flaws, of course, but it
works. It fun and entertaining, and while it tried to be woke, it also tried to
be fair – something that’ll backfire on it; already has begun to, as the
reviews have started to tickle in. Ah well, Gal Gadot is still herself, and
Patty Jenkins will be directing the new SW movie, whatever it will be – but that
is another story.
For now, though, this is it. See you all soon! Happy
upcoming Christmas!
