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Showcase Presents: Wonder Woman #2
Showcase Presents: Wonder Woman, Vol. 2
Collecting WONDER WOMAN #118-137, in which Wonder Woman and Wonder Girl face the Human Iceberg, the Island Eater, the Robotic Wonder Woman and more!
528 pages, Paperback
First published November 11, 2008
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About the author
Robert Kanigher
584 books8 followersSee also as Bob Kanigher
One of the most prolific writers in comics, particularly in the Silver Age. He took over scripting duties on Wonder Woman after William Moulton Marston's death, and handled the character's transition from the Golden to the Silver Age. He also created Barry Allen, the second Flash, for editor Julius Schwartz's superhero revival of 1956, as well as writing and editing DC's pioneering war titles.
His creations include Sgt. Rock, the Unknown Soldier, Barry Allen, Ragman, the Losers, Black Canary, the Metal Men, Poison Ivy, Enemy Ace, the Suicide Squad, and Rex the Wonder Dog.
One of the most prolific writers in comics, particularly in the Silver Age. He took over scripting duties on Wonder Woman after William Moulton Marston's death, and handled the character's transition from the Golden to the Silver Age. He also created Barry Allen, the second Flash, for editor Julius Schwartz's superhero revival of 1956, as well as writing and editing DC's pioneering war titles.
His creations include Sgt. Rock, the Unknown Soldier, Barry Allen, Ragman, the Losers, Black Canary, the Metal Men, Poison Ivy, Enemy Ace, the Suicide Squad, and Rex the Wonder Dog.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
May 30, 2022
2.5 Stars
Things took a turn for the silly in this volume. Ross Andru's art is still top notch, but the stories weren't as strong as volume 1. For one thing we got as much of Wonder Girl and...sighs..."Wonder Tot" as we did of Wonder Woman. Wonder Girl I can understand, as many readers were probably younger and could relate to the younger character better. But I doubt there were many four year olds reading the book, so Wonder Tot I could do without. Add in the fact that most of the Wonder Tot stories were "imaginary" and it seems even more pointless. Sale must have been decent, though, so readers at the time must have liked Wonder Tot a lot better than I did. It was also a little odd how they kept looking into the future and the past to check in on Wonder Tot, Wonder Girl, and Wonder Woman. Seems like that took a little excitement out of the Tot and Girl stories, since she obviously made it to be Wonder Woman, right? I'm overthinking this.
Many Wonder Woman stories could have been termed "Lois Lane's Revenge", as male readers were finally subjected to a comic where the male lead spent almost the entire series being rescued by a female, pretty much the reverse of most comics of the time. And also, don't ever get into a plane with Steve Trevor because odds are it's going to crash. I realize he was a test pilot, but with his record he should have been grounded long ago. And let's not get into Merboy, who had to be rescued almost as much as Trevor, if not more.
Speaking of Merboy, one of the main themes of this volume was Wonder Woman having to choose between Steve Trevor and Merman (Merboy as an adult) as her suitor. So either a guy who's half fish and lives in the water, or a human who lives on land. I never quite understood how there was competition there, since I couldn't see Wonder Woman living underwater.
Anyway, even though I'm nitpicking a bit here, for the most part this is still a fun read.
Things took a turn for the silly in this volume. Ross Andru's art is still top notch, but the stories weren't as strong as volume 1. For one thing we got as much of Wonder Girl and...sighs..."Wonder Tot" as we did of Wonder Woman. Wonder Girl I can understand, as many readers were probably younger and could relate to the younger character better. But I doubt there were many four year olds reading the book, so Wonder Tot I could do without. Add in the fact that most of the Wonder Tot stories were "imaginary" and it seems even more pointless. Sale must have been decent, though, so readers at the time must have liked Wonder Tot a lot better than I did. It was also a little odd how they kept looking into the future and the past to check in on Wonder Tot, Wonder Girl, and Wonder Woman. Seems like that took a little excitement out of the Tot and Girl stories, since she obviously made it to be Wonder Woman, right? I'm overthinking this.
Many Wonder Woman stories could have been termed "Lois Lane's Revenge", as male readers were finally subjected to a comic where the male lead spent almost the entire series being rescued by a female, pretty much the reverse of most comics of the time. And also, don't ever get into a plane with Steve Trevor because odds are it's going to crash. I realize he was a test pilot, but with his record he should have been grounded long ago. And let's not get into Merboy, who had to be rescued almost as much as Trevor, if not more.
Speaking of Merboy, one of the main themes of this volume was Wonder Woman having to choose between Steve Trevor and Merman (Merboy as an adult) as her suitor. So either a guy who's half fish and lives in the water, or a human who lives on land. I never quite understood how there was competition there, since I couldn't see Wonder Woman living underwater.
Anyway, even though I'm nitpicking a bit here, for the most part this is still a fun read.
May 31, 2020
Having read the first Showcase already and being a HUGE fan of the Golden Age WW, this is more or less what I expected: a continuation of Marston's WW with changes to accomodate the CAC restrictions (No more lesbian Amazons, no BDSM innuendos etc.) but with the same character as a protagonist. And as same I mean the EXACT SAME character, with the same core values and attributes (THE VENTRILOQUE TALK ROCKS!) and absolutely zero pretense to bog the Wonder Woman mythos in actual mythology, like some 80's penciler hamfistedly turned writer did. Love the fact that Hyppolita takes a bit more the stage than she did in the 40's as well as the gorgeous drawings by Ross Andru, hands down the best WW artist after her unbeatable creator H.G.Peter. Three and an half star, with the latter due to Kanigher pushing some Superman-alike connections that are not needed in the case of DC's amazon princess.
Highly recommended to fans of the 70's TV show with Lynda Carter, that took quite some inspirations from this run and not only from the Golden Age one.
Highly recommended to fans of the 70's TV show with Lynda Carter, that took quite some inspirations from this run and not only from the Golden Age one.
February 21, 2021
The formula must have worked at the time, otherwise Wonder Woman wouldn't have bridged the gap between the Golden and Silver ages but by the early sixties it was wearing thin. There's only so many times Bob Kanigher could rehash Lois Lane storylines and the eternal triangle with Steve Trevor and Merman got wearisome very quickly. (Steve Trevor crashes planes so often he should have been under investigation either as a saboteur or a user of recreational drugs.) Let's draw a veil over Wonder Tot.
The Andru/Esposito artwork is, as always, wonderful.
The Andru/Esposito artwork is, as always, wonderful.
March 22, 2023
The Best Book of the Series.
September 23, 2015
Ross Andru's art is terrific, while Robert Kanigher's elaborate tales of Wonder-action are decidedly so-so.
"Wonder Woman #118" features the ongoing "who would Wonder Woman marry between us even though she's not really going to marry anyone" feud between Steve Trevor and the Merman she's known her whole life, that feud gets so heavy that they get their romantic tea leaves from how she reacts when they almost die.
The idea isn't inherently bad, but Kanigher sort of beating around the bush for 25 pages, with on the nose dialogue and and on the nose thought bubbles about "is she really into me?".
It seems like these mens don't even care to ask Wonder Woman how she feels, and this kind of emotional distance summarizes not just Kanigher on "WW" comics, but basically DC until the mid-70s. Ugh.
"Wonder Woman #130" is much better paced, although it's almost kind of sad that it accomplishes this just by splitting up one issue into two stories instead of one.
Wonder Tot, Wonder Woman at baby age is kind of a mixed bag. It's supposedly funnier, because she approaches decisions with impish rashness or with "dumb baby logic" (kind of like a caveman exactly for some reason).
It's a little more interesting in this issue, because her Genie sidekick creates both actual team dynamics and a basic antagonism of "don't do that!". But also, it's kind of unfortunate that both characters lack any real depth aside from vaguely doing the thing they were supposed to do, to get the object, etc.
The back up story is a little more interesting in outline than execution, but basically Wonder Woman gives Steve Trevor some comeuppance for being so vain about how pretty Wonder Woman is. Some different bodied Wonder Woman artwork designs for Ross Andru to try, and ACTUAL POSITIVE GENDER MESSAGING, wow.
"Wonder Woman #137" features Wonder Woman trapped in a duel that "she seemingly cannot win" against the Robo-Wonder Woman from the Robo-Amazon Robo-Tribe.
Definitely a good idea for any superhero to fight robo-selves, but the problem about old-timey comic writers building new worlds like Robo-Amazon is that you have to get so many convoluted explanations about the robots and where they came from and what their goals are (something about men setting foot on the robo-land, but they're robo-men?)
And then it gets more convoluted, because inevitable robo-skill gives an edge in the duel in a complicated way that doesn't make sense and uses pseudo-science (oh, she used phosphorescent dots on the ground...of course!). And then Wonder Woman pulls shit out of her hat that isn't really physically possible, and along the way Steve Trevor is doing something weird that is explained away in a cop out way.
So to summarize all of this, Ross Andru is arguably the greatest comic book artist of superhero stuffs, Wonder Woman is great iconography, but execution is minimal, often too long and convoluted.
3/5 (mostly because it's not an unlikable read, i think)
"Wonder Woman #118" features the ongoing "who would Wonder Woman marry between us even though she's not really going to marry anyone" feud between Steve Trevor and the Merman she's known her whole life, that feud gets so heavy that they get their romantic tea leaves from how she reacts when they almost die.
The idea isn't inherently bad, but Kanigher sort of beating around the bush for 25 pages, with on the nose dialogue and and on the nose thought bubbles about "is she really into me?".
It seems like these mens don't even care to ask Wonder Woman how she feels, and this kind of emotional distance summarizes not just Kanigher on "WW" comics, but basically DC until the mid-70s. Ugh.
"Wonder Woman #130" is much better paced, although it's almost kind of sad that it accomplishes this just by splitting up one issue into two stories instead of one.
Wonder Tot, Wonder Woman at baby age is kind of a mixed bag. It's supposedly funnier, because she approaches decisions with impish rashness or with "dumb baby logic" (kind of like a caveman exactly for some reason).
It's a little more interesting in this issue, because her Genie sidekick creates both actual team dynamics and a basic antagonism of "don't do that!". But also, it's kind of unfortunate that both characters lack any real depth aside from vaguely doing the thing they were supposed to do, to get the object, etc.
The back up story is a little more interesting in outline than execution, but basically Wonder Woman gives Steve Trevor some comeuppance for being so vain about how pretty Wonder Woman is. Some different bodied Wonder Woman artwork designs for Ross Andru to try, and ACTUAL POSITIVE GENDER MESSAGING, wow.
"Wonder Woman #137" features Wonder Woman trapped in a duel that "she seemingly cannot win" against the Robo-Wonder Woman from the Robo-Amazon Robo-Tribe.
Definitely a good idea for any superhero to fight robo-selves, but the problem about old-timey comic writers building new worlds like Robo-Amazon is that you have to get so many convoluted explanations about the robots and where they came from and what their goals are (something about men setting foot on the robo-land, but they're robo-men?)
And then it gets more convoluted, because inevitable robo-skill gives an edge in the duel in a complicated way that doesn't make sense and uses pseudo-science (oh, she used phosphorescent dots on the ground...of course!). And then Wonder Woman pulls shit out of her hat that isn't really physically possible, and along the way Steve Trevor is doing something weird that is explained away in a cop out way.
So to summarize all of this, Ross Andru is arguably the greatest comic book artist of superhero stuffs, Wonder Woman is great iconography, but execution is minimal, often too long and convoluted.
3/5 (mostly because it's not an unlikable read, i think)
June 29, 2016
This book collects Wonder Woman Issues 118-137, covering 2 1/2 years of comics from November 1960-April 1963.
This was an odd era for Wonder Woman. In many ways, the writers seemed to be doing much of the same thing that writers of Superman were and interested in similar themes such as featuring adventures of Wonder Woman when she was a girl and introducing a grown up version of the boy who chased her in childhood, Merman and making him a rival to Steve Trevor as a kind of mirror of the whole Lana Lang-Lois Lane rivalry, though I found it a bit tedious.
The big challenge with all of this is that Superman had two comic books, plus one more for Lois Lane, another for Jimmy Olsen, and a feature for Superboy in Adventure Comnics . Wonder Woman had one comic book, so the books became increasingly filled with tales from Wonder Woman's past and romantic fights for her affection by Steve and Merman and less with actual modern day adventures.
Another feature was what was called "Impossible stories," in which Wonder Woman would team up with Wonder Girl and Wonder Tot along with Wonder Woman's mother Queen Hipolyata to fight some evil (usually the Multi-man). Of course, except for Wonder Woman's mother everyone else in the "Wonder Woman family" was really just Wonder Woman at different ages, something that made the book confusing though apparently they kept getting requests to do more of them. It's no wonder that Bob Haney thought Wonder Girl was a separate character when he was writing Teen Titans.
The stories are fun but a bit below what you get in the better comics. My favorite is a tribute to, "The Fifty Foot Woman," and there's also a handy story explaining all the phrases Wonder Woman uses. Handy. Overall, okay, but not all that spectacular.
This was an odd era for Wonder Woman. In many ways, the writers seemed to be doing much of the same thing that writers of Superman were and interested in similar themes such as featuring adventures of Wonder Woman when she was a girl and introducing a grown up version of the boy who chased her in childhood, Merman and making him a rival to Steve Trevor as a kind of mirror of the whole Lana Lang-Lois Lane rivalry, though I found it a bit tedious.
The big challenge with all of this is that Superman had two comic books, plus one more for Lois Lane, another for Jimmy Olsen, and a feature for Superboy in Adventure Comnics . Wonder Woman had one comic book, so the books became increasingly filled with tales from Wonder Woman's past and romantic fights for her affection by Steve and Merman and less with actual modern day adventures.
Another feature was what was called "Impossible stories," in which Wonder Woman would team up with Wonder Girl and Wonder Tot along with Wonder Woman's mother Queen Hipolyata to fight some evil (usually the Multi-man). Of course, except for Wonder Woman's mother everyone else in the "Wonder Woman family" was really just Wonder Woman at different ages, something that made the book confusing though apparently they kept getting requests to do more of them. It's no wonder that Bob Haney thought Wonder Girl was a separate character when he was writing Teen Titans.
The stories are fun but a bit below what you get in the better comics. My favorite is a tribute to, "The Fifty Foot Woman," and there's also a handy story explaining all the phrases Wonder Woman uses. Handy. Overall, okay, but not all that spectacular.
April 9, 2013
YES, I loved this. Snapshot of pop culture from 1960-1963. Lots of robot stuff, "futuristic" technology, lots of UFO stuff, some time travel to fight dinosaurs, all of the villains are very imaginative. Laughed out loud at her interactions with poor, whiny Steve. I totally dig that Wonder Girl is not sexualized whatsoever (ahh, early 1960's...) and Wonder Woman is an effortlessly va-va-voom woman who gets s**t done. This is how it's supposed to be, people.
I only took one star off because this edition doesn't have any color (i.e. all "covers" were black and white too).
I only took one star off because this edition doesn't have any color (i.e. all "covers" were black and white too).
October 7, 2014
A second volume of adventures from the Kanigher/Andru/Esposito era as Wonder Woman battles alien invaders, giant monsters and the occasional super-villain. Kanigher's somewhat oddball style isn't for everyone but I like it. The weirdest feature is the "impossible day" stories in which the Amazon splice together footage of Wonder Woman with her younger selves Wonder Tot (who debuts this volume) and Wonder Girl so they can have imaginary adventures together.
April 25, 2012
Wonder Tot rocks!
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews