Tim Hanley > Quotes

“Even bullying was important to Wonder Woman, and in Sensation Comics #23 she stopped a gang who were picking on a young boy, showed the head bully the error of his ways and learned about his home situation, spoke to his father about his abusive tendencies, and then helped the father get a job in a wartime factory. She always took the time to get to the root of the problem.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Active or ambitious women were not only rare but often evil. Wonder Woman flipped this paradigm by embodying the strength, assertiveness, and independence usually associated with bad girls and villains in a positive heroic light. The Golden Age Wonder Woman was a blatant rejection of the good girl/bad girl binary and even offered a critique of the good girl role.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Lois Lane is to women in journalism as Superman is to superheroes.”
― Tim Hanley, Investigating Lois Lane: The Turbulent History of the Daily Planet's Ace Reporter

“Catwoman had transgressed the patriarchal social order, and because of it had to be a crook, but Wonder Woman was establishing a new matriarchal social order and she was its heroic model.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“These damsel in distress roles were very common in the 1940s. Superman had Lois Lane, Batman had Julie Madison, Captain Marvel had Beautia Sivana, the Flash had Joan Williams, and the Spirit had Ellen Dolan. These women weren’t particularly well-rounded characters. Instead, they were defined only through their male love interests, existing solely to be rescued,”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“herself changes too. In current DC Comics continuity, Catwoman is a wealthy socialite named Selina Kyle, rather ambiguous in her aims. Sometimes she works with criminals and breaks the law and other times she allies with Batman or the Justice League and enforces it. Her domain is Gotham City’s East End, and she protects its residents through whatever means she sees fit.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“She was a superpowered Rosie the Riveter, constantly encouraging women to join the auxiliary forces or get a wartime job. But while Superman and Batman sat out the war, Wonder Woman fought on every possible front.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Sally the Sleuth” was a new twist on the usual format, and not just because it was a comic strip. From pulp novels to film noir, detective stories were hugely popular in the 1930s, and the women who appeared in them tended to fall into two categories.
Some were assistants to the detective or, very rarely, detectives themselves, innocent women who needed men’s help to get the job done. Others were femme fatales, women on the side of evil who relied on their feminine wiles to steer good men wrong. With Sally, Barreaux combined both roles into a female detective who was willing to use her sexuality to nab crooks.”
― Tim Hanley, Sally the Sleuth

“During the Golden Age, Wonder Woman was a part of the Justice Society of America but was relegated to the role of the team’s secretary. In the Justice League, Wonder Woman was a full-fledged member. For”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“I’m for equal wages, too! But I’m not a joiner. I wouldn’t fit with your group. In most cases, I don’t even like women.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Wonder Woman’s war adventures were extensive. She shut down Japanese bases all over the world, from Mexico to South America to China. She, by herself, seized a German U-boat, overturned a Japanese dreadnought, and captured an entire fleet of Nazi battleships. The Nazis attempted to infiltrate America several times and were stopped by Wonder Woman at every turn. Whether it was a plot to poison the water supply or disrupt American industry, or a Nazi spy impersonating an American general to find out their military plans, Wonder Woman thwarted every Axis foe.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Wonder Woman completely eschewed a damsel in distress role by instead being a superhero of unparalleled skill, and the inversion of the typical gender roles didn’t stop there. Like her superhero peers, Wonder Woman had her own damsel in distress, a fawning love interest who always got captured and had to be rescued. “Her” name was Steve Trevor.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“He said that “boys, young and old, satisfy their wish thoughts by reading comics. If they go crazy over Wonder Woman, it means they’re longing for a beautiful, exciting girl who’s stronger than they are.” Wonder Woman tapped into “the subconscious,”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Several other female heroes predated Wonder Woman, including Timely Comics’ Black Widow, Quality Comics’ Phantom Lady and Miss America, and the comic strip heroine Miss Fury.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“William Moulton Marston wrote that “not even girls want to be girls so long as our feminine archetype lacks force, strength, power.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“For Marston, it wasn’t enough to just have a female superhero. The prescribed gender roles had to be subverted even further, so he made Wonder Woman demonstrably more capable and comprehensive a superhero than her male peers.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Before Wonder Woman, Marston was best known for helping to invent the lie detector test, or polygraph, which was based on his research in systolic blood pressure.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Once World War II began, he argued that women’s participation in the war effort would give them even more strength and speed up this coming matriarchy. Wonder Woman comics were his way to prepare young readers for this inevitable revolution.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Employment was always Wonder Woman’s first suggestion to help women gain independence.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“There’s always another life just around the corner, with heroes to outwit and treasures to steal.”
― Tim Hanley, The Many Lives of Catwoman: The Felonious History of a Feline Fatale

“It can’t just be a coincidence that the first generation of girls raised on empowering female characters like Wonder Woman and Rosie the Riveter became the generation of the women’s liberation movement.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Wonder Woman has lacked the publication, television, and film presence of her fellow superheroes.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Golden Age Wonder Woman would certainly have a thing or two to say to Bella Swan about that vampire fellow and her complete and total inability to do anything for herself.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Wonder Woman is inarguably the most famous female superhero in the history of comic books, but she wasn’t the first. Comic book historian Trina Robbins found that the earliest costumed heroine was the Woman in Red, a policewoman named Peggy Allen who wore a red robe and mask to fight crime.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“the cannibal clam should have eaten other clams, but in actuality it seemed to only like to eat humans. This doesn’t make it a cannibal but instead an anthropophagus.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Without Sally the Sleuth, there would be no Superman.
In fact, without the pulp heroine with a penchant for solving crimes in a state of undress, there would be no Batman either. Or Wonder Woman. Or even the Avengers.
This statement reeks of hyperbole, clearly. From her black and white pulp origins in 1934 to her full colour comic books outings in the 1950s, Sally spent the bulk of her time fighting off goons and cracking cases in a series of adventures that were an odd mix of heroism and hedonism. She’s a fascinating figure in the history of comic books in her own right, but an unusual and little known one, especially in comparison to globally beloved superhero icons. Nonetheless, not only does the superhero industry owe its existence to Sally the Sleuth, it owes it twice over.”
― Tim Hanley, Sally the Sleuth

“However, the man was entirely inept. No matter the mission, he’d end up ambushed or captured and Wonder Woman would have to save him. When Steve was taken by Nazi gangsters, Wonder Woman raided their boat and knocked out the Nazis with a large anchor, rescuing the bound and helpless Steve.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Wonder Woman, on the other hand, was rooted in a feminist utopian vision.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“When DC Comics decided to assemble its best superheroes into the Justice League of America in 1960, Wonder Woman was the only female member. During”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine

“Wonder Woman, on the other hand, was rooted in a feminist utopian vision. Her mission was not to resolve tragic personal issues but to help facilitate a coming matriarchy.”
― Tim Hanley, Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine