CBI Archive
Comic Book Questions Answered
Tuesday, June 12th, 2007 at 12:10 PM EST
Updated: Tuesday, June 12th, 2007 at 4:08 AM EST
Here’s a new schtick. If you have a nagging comic book question that you’d like to know the answer (or at least AN answer) to, just ask me, and I’ll see if I can’t answer it (and if I can’t, then hopefully I can find an expert on the subject who CAN). Sounds cool, right? Remember my e-mail contact info here. Here’s the first one, courtesy of my pal, Hisham Zubi.
Enjoy!
Hisham asks:
Was the Silver Age Wonder Woman active in World War II?This is based on two observations:
1) The original Cheetah, Priscilla Rich, died at an advanced age and was replaced by her niece before everything was rebooted by Crisis. Was there a big age disparity between Wonder Woman and her former foe or was she older than she appeared?
2) Originally, Donna Troy was found as a baby by Wonder Woman and brought to Paradise Island to be raised by the Amazons. This suggests that Wonder Woman had been active for at least a couple of decades at the time of the Teen Titan adventures.
To answer Hisham, I figured I’d need a Wonder Woman expert, and who better to go to than Carol A. Strickland, Wonder Woman history buff extraordinaire!!
Here is Carol’s reply:
1. Usually, any female character who was replaced with a younger relative must have been entirely too old (ie, over 30) for the writers to wrap their heads around. However, I know that she retired of her own volition, but she was having medical problems that made her an invalid (she died the same issue we found this out). These problems may or may not have had to do with age (I would have to look it up, but I’d bet it was glossed over). While she looked old in this story, it could have been a result of her disease.
As to whether she was older than WW, that’s difficult to say. We don’t know how old the SA/BA WW was. She could have been a thousand years old or in her fifties. Add to that the concept of comics time being different from real time, and take a few aspirin.
2. Absolutely, this origin had Wondie being Wondie in public longer than Superman or Batman had been in their adult careers. Many fans seemed to have a problem with this for some reason. Many fans didn’t. It doesn’t bother me a bit. In fact, I liked it very much as it gave Wondie an edge (and I was hoping it would lead to a “Superboy meets WW” story).
The first Teen Titans story, where Donna first appeared in the mainstream DCU, was published in 1964. If Donna was 15 then, that means that SA/BA Wonder Woman could have started her career latest in, oh, 1950 or 1951, which means she would have skipped WWII, leaving that to her Earth-2 counterpart. Of course that starting date would move with her through time as comics were published. After all, Donna was only 20-ish in 1984, which would have WW starting her career at latest point circa 1965-66.
Hope this adds fuel to the conversation.
That it did, Carol!
So, any more Wonder Woman experts out there who would like to shed some light on Hisham’s question?
Thanks to Hisham for the question and Carol for her help. And feel free to send in any more questions you have wanted an answer to!
15 Comments
Jeff Moreci
June 12, 2007 at 1:43 pm
What happened to the thought balloon? Is it just me or are they extinct in new comics?
Brian Cronin
June 12, 2007 at 1:49 pm
Bendis just brought them back in the pages of Mighty Avengers, Jeff!
Another question answered already!
Ken Raining
June 12, 2007 at 1:55 pm
Yeah, but Mark Waid did as well in Brave & the Bold (and much more skillfully, if you ask me).
Flush it all away
June 12, 2007 at 4:47 pm
Great idea for a series! Looking forward to reading it.
Greg Geren
June 12, 2007 at 5:37 pm
From my reading, it seems that Robert Kanigher (Writer/Editor of WONDER WOMAN for much of the 50s and 60s) would have said that his Wonder Woman in the 60s was the same character as the one in the 40s, as he was never big on the multiple Earths idea. I don’t have anything to back that up, it’s just my impression.
Matt Vergin
June 12, 2007 at 5:55 pm
What was the original story for The Twelve storyline in the X-Men comics?
John Trumbull
June 12, 2007 at 8:23 pm
I first read Donna Troy’s origin 20+ years ago, in the classic “Who Is Donna Troy?” issue of The New Teen Titans, and I swear that this is the FIRST time I even realized the time discrepancy inherent in Wonder Woman finding Donna Troy as a baby. As a timeliner, I’m rather ashamed.
My question: Will comics ever acheive massive mainstream popularity again? Or will we stay in the weird place we are now, where millions of people see comic book movies but only a few thousand read comic books?
Omar Karindu
June 13, 2007 at 9:37 am
What was the deal with Roy Thomas’s subplot in All-Star Squadron and Infinity, Inc. retconning the Vigilante’s enemy the Dummy into (apparently) an actual, magically animated wooden dummy? Has Thomas ever said where he was going with this, and has anyone since ever followed up on it?
Tomer
June 13, 2007 at 9:50 am
Brian, sent you a question in the mail. Hope you can find an answer, because it’s a hard one.
Tomer.
Mullon
June 13, 2007 at 11:28 am
I still want to know how Wonder Woman could be a vegetarian and still get part of her powers from Artemis without pissing her off.
But I assume hat is the result of a writing decision and couldn’t be properly answered.
DanCJ
June 14, 2007 at 4:45 am
Whatever happened to Glynn Dillon?
Cei-U!
June 14, 2007 at 11:30 am
According to the first Silver Age version of Wonder Woman’s origin, in WW #105 (April 1959), Diana is hundreds of years old but didn’t come to America until after World War II. This story, however, also claims that she is literally Hippolyta’s daughter, not a clay statue come to life, so take it with a grain of salt. The truth is that the series was so internally contradictory between Marston’s death in the late ’40s and Mike Sekowsky’s overhaul in the late ’60s that it is virtually impossible to come up with a definitive bio or timeline.
Enda80
June 15, 2007 at 4:31 am
When the Earth-1 Angle Man accidentally teleported to Earth-2 in the 1940’s, he was surprised to see a Wonder Woman active then. This seems to indicate that the Earth-1 Wonder Woman did not come to Man’s World till after WW2.
Janet
June 19, 2007 at 9:31 am
My sister-in-law has a bunch of old DC comics called the Question? She would like to know how she can find out how much they are worth. I know the one is a 1989 issue
Rebis
June 19, 2007 at 3:32 pm
Tell your sister to put ‘em on ebay. Soon. Because DC is going to start collecting the Question in graphic-novel format, which lots of folks find easier to manage than the individual issues. Tell her to start out with a conservative asking price, and the market will soon show her how much people are willing to spend on her issues. (It will matter if she has a consecutive run, if they’re in good condition, etc.)