Wonder Woman #34 is where the swords start swinging. It’s Wonder Woman vs the Matriarch for the fate of the world…and it’s pretty much over after a few pages. That sounds like a complaint, and I think it probably is, but frankly you see so much cool stuff in this issue it’s hard to be too upset about it. The ending… oh man, people are going to be mad about that ending. I won’t be spoiling it in this review but I assume the Reddit threads have already moved to DEFCON 2.
The Wonder War is finally here, and we’re getting two stories with two artists to tell it. Flashback scenes happen throughout the book to explain how the Matriarch came into possession of a Green Lantern ring and it’s pretty brutal. She killed John Stewart and through sheer force of will commandeered (kidnapped?) his ring and bent it towards her own twisted goals. Eventually, the Guardians of Oa come to reclaim the ring and they’re taken care of in sadistic fashion.
DC
The rest of the comic focuses on the battle between Wonder Woman and Matriarch. They trade massive blows with each other as they fight for what’s essentially the title of power for the Earth, with most of the other heroes done away with.
Narrating this epic slugfest is the three fates who have one incredibly interesting page where they argue about what a myth really is. The three fates appear as women in different stages of life and thus have three different interpretations, but the entire time, Wonder Woman fits into every single description they share. It’s a really nice moment that highlights just how big of a character Diana is in a world (formerly) with characters like Batman, Superman and everyone else.
While this issue does a lot of showing, the narration by the Three Fates does make it feel like it’s already happened and like the story is being told. I understand that’s the nature of the characters but it was occasionally jarring to see immediate action but discussed like it was ancient history.
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Bruno Redondo joins regular artist Daniel Sampere to help with the aforementioned flashback sequences involving the Matriarch and the Lantern ring. While only contributing five pages that take place in the past, even his incredible pencil work felt a little out of place with the rest of the story. He’s an incredible artist but just slightly more cartoonish in tone compared to Sampere. It’s not bad, but it is noticeable.
It made me wonder at times if this story would still feel as epic if it Sampere weren’t steering the ship on art duties. The weight of his pencil work, his facial expressions in particular, really adds a lot of pain and pomp to the proceedings. There’s one punch that Wonder Woman throws at the Matriarch that is maybe the most effectively drawn punch I can remember seeing in a book. I grabbed my own jaw to make sure it was still in place after seeing it.
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The ending is going to rub people the wrong way, but I’m not writing a review about how other people felt about it, I’m writing one about how I felt about it and I found it to be moving but a little underwhelming. That said, on the final page there’s a “To be continued” graphic, so I have to assume this story still has some meat on the bones and I’ll get a more satisfying explanation. I didn’t get it here, but I’m absolutely intrigued enough to already be counting the days down to the net issue.
Wonder Woman #34 sees what’s presumably the final battle of the Wonder War, and it’s a doozy. It’s beautifully brought to life by two artists whose styles clash a little bit when put together but there isn’t a single page that isn’t fun to look at. Tom King poses interesting questions but ultimately sets up a confusing ending that intrigues me as much as it frustrates me. There’s more Wonder Woman and Wonder War to come, but this issue in a vacuum ends in an underwhelming fashion.
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