Wonder Woman

Wonder Woman
Real Name	Diana Prince (Civilian Name), Princess Diana of Themyscira (birth name)
First Appearance	All Star Comics #8 (December, 1941)
Creator	William Moulton Marston
Team Affliations	Justice League of America, Justice Society of America, Female Furies (while brainwashed)
Aliases	None
Base of Operations	Washington, D.C.
Powers	Godlike Super strength, speed, agility, reflexes, stamina, and endurance, Flight (since Silver Age), Healing Factor
Skills And Abilities	Excellent hand-to-hand combatant, skilled in most weapons, excellent war strategist and mediator
Tools and Weapons	Golden Lasso (can force others to tell the truth), Silver Bracelets (can deflect any projectile), a magic sword, a tiara which can be weaponized

Wonder Woman is a superheroine in the DC Universe and arguably the most famous superheroine in the world. 

Origin

The daughter of the Queen of the Amazons on an island paradise that no man has visited. She was born in 3,000 B.C. Diana is spurred to travel to the outside world by the appearance of a male visitor. She decides to bring the wise teachings of her people to the world and fight injustice as Wonder Woman.

Biography

Golden Age (Earth 1)

Diana was created by her mother Hippolyta out of clay and was granted life by the Greek pantheon. This made Diana unique as she was the only Amazon without a biological father. Diana was once a member of the Amazon tribe living on Paradise Island, an isolated community where the women were trained as warriors and no man had set foot on the island. One day, a pilot named Steve Trevor crash landed on the island where Diana and other Amazons tended to his wounds. Diana fell in love with him when she helped him heal and decided she wanted to follow him into Man's World (in other words, the world outside of Paradise Island).

Legacy of the Character

Golden Age

Wonder Woman’s first appearance was in All Star Comics #8. She was made quite popular due to the fact that All Star Comics was a bestseller and her next appearance was in Sensation Comics #1 and later took her place in her own comic series. Though she was not the first female comic character, she took her place beside Black Widow (nothing to do with Marvel), Invisible Scarlet O'Neil and Nelvana of the Northern Lights. Marston wrote her as the perfect woman, as she had bullet proof bracelets, the Lasso of Truth and had the knowledge of Amazonian ways of fighting. She was strong - both physically and mentally, intelligent and beautiful yet also depicted as having a graceful, soft side. Her powers were taken from traits of Amazon goddesses which would become apart of her origin story soon. Her magic golden lasso was forged from Antiope’s and Hippolyta’s Golden Girdles of Gaea by Hephaestus. This lasso was unbreakable and anyone who was wrapped around in it was forced to obey the lasso holder, who usually asked her captive to tell the truth.

Steve Trevor was also a character in her origin story, where she crash landed onto Paradise Island, and he was healed by the Purple Ray and fell in love with him. Aphrodite then declared it was time for the Amazon’s to travel to Man’s World to fight the Nazis and a tournament was held to see who would fulfill the place. Her mother, Hippolyta forbade Diana to compete, but they were all required to wear masks and Diana entered. Diana was the victor and after revealing her true identity, her mother allowed her to travel to Man’s World and became Wonder Woman. Diana went to Man’s World along with Steve and became Lt. Diana Prince and stayed close with Trevor so she could heal him. He then became Wonder Woman’s well known partner and partner in crime-fighting. Diana overhears Steve’s intelligence and by that, she is always close with him, ready to heal. Eventually, she is to work with Steve as an assistant in the War Department. Steve is also suspects that Wonder Woman and Diana Prince is the same person because he usually sees her using her tiara or lasso.

Etta Candy, another character who was introduced was used in many of the main storylines and affirmed her place in the Wonder Woman universe. Etta Candy was the leader of a sorority called the Holiday Girls. The reason why Etta stood out was that she had a distinctive figure and had a famous line in which she would yell “Woo-woo."

Between 1942 and 1947, images of tied up women began to populate the covers of Sensation Comics and Wonder Woman. An example, is in Wonder Woman #3, where Wonder Woman ties up women and dresses them up as deer and chases them through the forest. She then ties them up once again and places them on a platter. The subtext has been noted, and it has been debated whether it was a release for Marston’s sexual fantasies, or an outlet for readers of the comics, who were teenagers developing their sexuality. Marston had worked as a prison psychologist and bondage and submission were two themes of his comics and they were intertwined with theories of the rehabilitation of criminals. Wonder Woman of course, being a superhero wanted to change the ways of the criminals. Even a rehabilitation centre was built on a small island near Paradise Island. A concept of Marston was the “loving submission” where kindness would allow people to surrender. Parodies have been written with this concept, as male criminals may give up only to spend time with her.

When Marston died in 1947 Robert Kanigher took over and Diana became less of a feminist character but during this time, her abilities expanded as she wore earrings that provided her with the air she needed when she was in outer space and she had an invisible plane. Extra additions included a tiara which could slice through pretty much anything and acted as a boomerang and her bracelets now had two way radios.

Silver Age

During 1954, Wonder Woman was considered a lesbian as Dr. Frederic Wertham alleged that there were lesbian subtexts in the comic series (he also said that comics contributed to juvenile delinquency) in his book Seduction of the Innocent where he claims that Wonder Woman had relationships with the Holiday Girls (Etta Candy's sorority club). The Comics Code Authority was then introduced in reaction to Wertham as sense of pre-emptive censorship. Seeing as Marston passed away and the new power of the Code, Wonder Woman lost her grip on being the strong and leading woman and instead starting falling for Steve Trevor and was interested in other comic superheroes such as MerMan and Birdman. Soon after there were major changes to Wonder Woman's origin story and this time, her powers came from certain gods and goddesses as she was "beautiful as Aphrodite, wise as Athena, strong as Hercules and swifter than Mercury." Other changes included changing Hippolyta's hair to blonde, she could glide on air currents and if Man were to ever set foot on Paradise Island, the Amazons would all be doomed.

The introduction of the Multiverse, where different versions live in different realities meant that the Silver Age Wonder Woman was situated on Earth-One and the Golden Age Wonder Woman was situated on Earth-Two.

In the 60s, Robert Kanigher used the same technique as he did with Superman, telling the story of Wonder Girl. Then there was Wonder Tot, the Amazonian Princess as an infant where she would go on adventures with a genie. In the series Impossible Tales, all three different versions of Wonder Woman were put into one story.

Bronze Age

In the 70s, the new comics were influenced by Emma Peel, who was a spy. Wonder Woman became a woman without her super abilities, and became a mod boutique owner (think Italian suits and the Kinks) and was the protege for a man called I Ching where she learned different styles of martial arts and learned how to use a variety of weapons and underwent many missions and new characters were introduced as Wonder Woman's enemies such as Morgana, Doctor Cyber and Catwoman. In this era, she killed Steve Trevor as the editors launched a "new" Wonder Woman. During this time, the writing team changed four times, and the styles changed quite frequently. Because of this, writers who didn't originally write for comics did. During 1973, Wonder Woman's original costume and original powers were restored by Gloria Steinem where she was offended by the fact that most female superheroes were being depowered and made it on a cover of Ms. Magazine. Wonder Woman's ties to Greek mythology show here, as she attempted to join the Justice League of America again after she was depowered and had to undergo twelve labours (based on Hercules' own twelve labours). Steve Trevor was then resurrected and was working alongside Wonder Woman in the UN. Because the Wonder Woman TV series was running during this time and it was set during World War II, the comic ran parallel to it and after some time, the TV series returned to a 70s setting and the comic ran along with that too. The TV series was then written by Jack C. Harris and Steve Trevor was killed off again.

During the 1980s, Steve Trevor was resurrected by Gerry Conway. After Wonder Woman gave up her title, another version of Steve Trevor was the multiverse made it to Earth-One and with Diana's memory erased, Steve Trevor crash landed on Paradise Island. Wonder Woman reclaimed her title again and worked in the military with Steve Trevor and Etta Candy. In 1982, Wonder Woman had a new symbol, the "W" on her costume. This new logo was copyrightable so it was able to sell better in merchandise and other areas of marketing. Dan Mishkin then took over after Roy Thomas and he wrote her as a confident and bold character than ever before, writing exciting and surprising plots. Even so, sales declined and the series ended with issue #329 where Steve had married Wonder Woman. After the Crisis on Infinite Earths in 1986, Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor from Earth-Two were written out of continuity (the pair got married on Mount Olympus). In the end, Anti-Monitor seemed to have killed Wonder Woman, but she really devolved into her clay form in which was how she was created. This had erased all the history of Wonder Woman and this meant that the writers could now write a whole series of Wonder Woman comics.

Post-Crisis

In 1987, Wonder Woman made it to her second volume, and writer Greg Potter and editor Janice Race were hired to discuss ideas and plots. After the second issue, Potter left and artist/writer George Perez was hired. Perez became the main writer and sometimes was helped out by Len Wein and Mindy Newell. Perez and Potter wrote Wonder Woman as a feminist-type character. To further enhance the stories of Wonder Woman, Perez researched Greek mythology which added depth and a refreshing original origin story.

New 52

In the beginning the writers changed the character's clothes to be a Greco-Roman armor that only has some colors of the American banderia, instead of putting it wearing the American flag without any explanation, and the character was kept as having powers that are present , but now she is an aging demigod.

Powers

Wonder Woman's powers are drawn from certain traits of Greek goddesses, who created her. Her physical feats are impressive, with her strength, flight, stamina, speed and endurance allow her to easily overpower Kryptonians with nothing but her godlike strength. She is also invulnerable, but her weaknesses are projectiles. Examples of this are projectiles which can harm her are arrows and bullets. However, because she has speed and reflexes that are honed to perfection, she can deflect these with her bracelets. Given divine powers by the goddesses, she is also resistant to magic attacks and is effective against her foes which use magic as their main power. Diana's healing capabilities allow her to constantly renew herself, allowing her to last longer than an average human. She also has the ability to have a special connection with animals, able to tame them or feel empathetic towards them, a trait taken from the goddess Artemis. Before the Infinite Crisis, Wonder Woman was blinded, but her sight was restored by Athena and by this, this gave her a boost in her sight and with this super sight, she was able to "see" the feelings of people around her. Along with this, she had gained an immunity to Dr. Psycho's illusions. Also due to Athena's traits, she has great wisdom in which she can learn languages much faster than any other average human being (Wonder Woman vol. 2 #3). The languages in which can speak are her native language (Themyscirian), English, ancient and modern Greek, French, Russian, Hindi, Spanish, Mandarin, and Portuguese.

Being an Amazon warrior, she is a finest warrior to be born so far. She is excellent in unarmed combat. She also has learnt exotic forms of combat, including the Amazons' way of combat. This gives her an advantage in all fights, as her style of fighting is not practiced outside of Themyscira unless she is fighting someone who has the equivalent strength and durability, or someone who is stronger. She is proficient in weapons, including the javelin and the bow.

Woman Wonder also knows how to act rationally, diplomatically and is an accomplished strategist and tactician and is a born leader. For a short time, with the writers George Pérez and William Messner-Loebs, she could project herself astrally, in order to gain advice from mystical creatures. She is also able to hypnotize anybody with her lasso, but this is perhaps a default power in all Amazons as Hippolyta had used it on Diana before during War of the Worlds.

Weapons and Equipments

• Lasso of Truth: The Lasso of Truth, explained by its name, forces people to tell the truth (perhaps influenced by her creator, who created the polygraph), by the Fires of Hestia and forged by Hephaestus from the Golden Girdle of Gaea that Antiope once wore. It is able to restore people's lost memories, get rid of illusions, heal the holder's body (in this case, Wonder Woman), cure insanity and people who are in its circumference will be protected from magical attacks. It is unbreakable, being able to hold anybody, even someone with the physical strength equivalent to Superman. This lasso however should not be confused with Cassie Sandsmark's lasso. Her lasso was given to her by Ares and should any of her enemies get caught in it, they would be given a shock.
• Bracelets of Victory: These are a pair of steel cuffs which are indestructable because they were used from the remains of the Aegis shield and were modeled after the cuffs which they were once enslaved in. They are even able to deflect Darkseid's energy attacks. Wonder Woman can use her super reflexes to deflect projectiles, punches, blades, or any sort of flying offensive object. She can also use them to deflect the object back into her enemies (much like Jedis with their lightsabers).
• Boomerang Tiara: Wonder Woman can also use this as an offensive weapon, throwing it, hurting her enemy and effectively return straight into her hands. It is also actually razor sharp and can cut through most things. She also wears this as the red star represents freedom and patriotism.
• Sandals of Hermes: Given to Diana by Hermes, this allows her to travel between Themyscira and Man's World. These sandals have also been given to Artemis and Wonder Girl.
• Gauntlet of Atlas: Taken from the Greek mythology, Atlas was a Titan who was to hold the world up by his hands. These gauntlets allow the strength of the anybody who uses it to be multiplied by ten. She has used these to kill the White Magician in his demon form and Doomsday but because of the suddeness of this profound strength, Diana found it difficult to control her strength when she used them as she already had enough in her.
• Lansinar disc: This disc was a piece of alien technology which allowed her to become an invisible version of whatever object or vehicle she needed to be, all by visualising how she wanted to look. The most frequently used object is the Invisible Plane which she uses to travel places in fast time. It's hardly used during the Post-Crisis time.... <3 love her she is cute