In a late breaking, surprise move, NBC television has given the greenlight to David E. Kelley’s Wonder Woman series. Earlier in the year, NBC had shown interest, but with certain execs leaving, no one would commit to the project. Now with Bob Greenblatt in place, WBTV has been given the go ahead to take the shelved project and get it into production.
The project is described as a reinvention of the iconic D.C. comic in which Wonder Woman — aka Diana Prince — is a vigilante crime fighter in L.A. but also a successful corporate executive and a modern woman trying to balance all of the elements of her extraordinary life.
Well… I guess it could be worse… couldn’t it?
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LOL well this is gonna be a joke and a WW movie will never see the light of day.
Again, how difficult is it to just follow the comic to some degree? JMS just recently rebooted the series to certain extent. They could have used that as a base. But no, let’s make up something dumb.
how difficult is it to just follow the comic to some degree? JMS just recently rebooted the series to certain extent.
These two statements pretty much answer the question. They can’t follow the comic because the comic is rebooted every 3 to 6 years or so…
Okay, fine. The comic is rebooted more times than the X-men face death. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t some consistencies from reboot to reboot. (Amazon. Themescerya. Greek Gods.) But this looks like they took the idea from the worst run of Wonder Woman where she didn’t have any powers and was simply a kung-fu chick. There couldn’t just have picked ideas from TV shows at least?
“Well… I guess it could be worse… couldn’t it?” Really? ‘Cuz after reading that reinvention description I can’t see how.
They made her a freaking “modern woman”, what I loved most about Gail Simone’s Wonder Woman was how alien she was to the modern world, she has always been portraited that way even in the cartoons!
The saddest thing is that describes Batman not Wonder Woman, I’m seriously starting to hate The Dark Knight’s success, now every hero has to be Batman…
this is older than Nolan, you have Tim Burton to blame for this…
this is older than Nolan, you have Tim Burton to blame for this…
Burton, hell. We have FRANK MILLER to blame for this…
Frank Miller, hell. We have Bob Kane to blame for, wait, what were we talking about again?
> “a vigilante crime fighter in L.A. but also a successful corporate executive and a modern woman trying to balance all of the elements of her extraordinary life.”
Really? That sounds like enough material for three shows….
I hope she has to take care of a baby too.
can it be an imaginary dancing baby?
and special guest-starring a potty-mouthed Betty White!
Why do TV execs over think comic properties? This isn’t hard. And we’ve already stated it. Just go from the source material. But since it’s NBC it will probably be a freak of the week, and they’ll hint at people with powers but never actually show them using them.
I hope the show goes well, but I know its going to bomb.
Wonder Woman in name only. What was wrong with the story how it was?
Too expensive. The ‘trying to balance all of the elements of her extraordinary life’ is just cheap filler for half the show.
Because it would require audiences to have imaginations and not be spoon-fed some variation of something they’ve already seen with a new package. That’s why we keep getting things like new “V” & “No Ordinary Family” and now we’re getting WWINO – networks like the audience to be as stupid & unimaginative as humanly possible.
No, it couldn’t much worse than this. This is an asinine idea but then I’m not surprised that something this stupid could come from David E. Kelley. He’s a hack of the first order.
TV executive decisions are the main reason I Don’t have Cable or Satellite. The Networks have been pulling this crap since before the original Star Trek.
So the only way to get a Wonder Woman tv show through is to make it…not Wonder Woman?
Lovely. Maybe next we can get a Black Panther tv show where he’s a jive-talking, street wise, ex-con.
An ASIAN jive-talking, street wise ex-con if TV execs meddling keeps steady.
Am I completely lame, then, for liking David E. Kelley and wanting to see this show?
No… You’re being open-minded.
This being the internet, we forget what it looks like because everything must be either “Epic Fail!” or “Meh.” There is no success.
Actually, I prefer “Feh” over “Meh”.
I don’t think it will do well because it’s like every other “vigilante” TV show that’s been pitched…not just ’cause this is the “internet”. Trust me, the old comic book fan “newsletters” and whatnot from years before the first two PC’s started chatting with each other would have been just as harsh and critical.
I do agree that the Wonder Woman “mythos” has been so terribly watered down by reboots, re-writes, retellings, etc. that few younger comic/super-type folks fans really have any concept over what the Amazon Princess’ character really is. Wonder Woman has always been seen as sort of Superman’s female counterpart, when in reality her character was more of a female version of Captain America. She was a greek-myth based female “super-solider” clad in old glory and carrying the American flag (“bondage” flap issues not withstanding). In the 60’s she was damn near the poster girl for the women’s movement and the storylines then reflected that as she continually harped on “Man’s World” (James Brown…).
Diana’s “alter-ego” being a service woman was also a first. Here was a female superhero that was connected to a mythical warrior culture and a contemporary warrior culture…except in the “modern culture” of the 40’s, 50’s. and early 60’s women in the military were limited to either being nurses (which was the most dangerous of all female military jobs during wartime) or true support services. It also gave her a way to get her paramore Steve Trevor out of jams without totally making him look like a dill-weed.
Here’s an area of comics lore that, given the expanded role of women in the US military has not even been touched,why make her a “successful business woman” that’s a “vigilante”? That should have been pitched for a Huntress or Manhunter series (which would probably have not been a bad idea). Princess Diana of the Amazons sitting in an office going over the latest profit margins and then getting all dolled up in her new outfit (I fear the one-piece costume is long gone) and playing “Batwoman” in the alleys of L.A. And why L.A.? What the hell is an Amazon Warrior doing in L.A.? Hundreds of years of cowboy, western and Mexican-American history in that area and you’re bringing in Diana Prince? Folks, I have been (in a professional capacity) into the heart of South-Central and Rampart and if you’re going to have Wonder Woman as a legit hero in L.A. she better be REALLY good with them damn bullet reflecting bracelets because MS-13 gang-bangers in the hood got HEAVY armament.
The core of Superman is that he’s an alien with god-like powers that chooses to be more human than the rest of us. The core of Batman is that he is a human that has been driven to near physical and mental perfection by a complete and total hatred of evil. The core of Wonder Woman USED to be that she was both angel and warrior, trying to bring peace into a “man’s world”. But that mythos and core has been so diluted, changed, distilled and overshadowed by the “bitter female” heroine that she doesn’t even look right as part of the DC “Trinity” any more.
That, and not simply intardnet fanboy angst, is why I add my simple…”Feh!”.
All well-thought out points, Taz, but I’m still leery of using the language of one press release as a condemnation of a show that hasn’t even been made yet. I used to read “Comic Scene” and, in the back, they had a page talking about various comic adaptations and their statuses, and the few that ever did happen weren’t always like the green-light announcements. Remember the announcement of Arnold Schwarzenegger as Sgt. Rock? Or the show where the Flash would team up with Green Arrow’s daughter, Doctor Occult and Blok to fight grim and gritty crime in Keystone City?
I’m not saying that there aren’t issues with this announcement, nor am I saying that it WON’T be a huge success. But I am going to reserve my love and/or giant dismay for a finished product, if only because a show getting greenlighted for production is no guarantee that it’ll be completed, or even AIR.
If they leave the whole “Princess of the Amazon” out of it then yeah, I would agree it’s not Wonder Woman. But other than that? Unless they are working with the U.N., JLA alliance they had or is a member of a police force a la Green Lantern they fall under vigilante. As for the “modern woman” aspect, maybe they don’t want a repeat of all of the Capt. America jokes they used in Ultimates. “Ha ha you don’t know how anything works.” As an ambassador of peace to an island nation people shouldn’t know anything about, she would do her best to fit in. I say at least give it a chance before you bash it. At best it could be the new Smallville or Heroes in it’s first season. At worst…well we lived through Birds of Prey.
To quote Ren and Stimpy … “hmmm. No, Sir. I don’t like it.”
But strangely enough, you know what the deal breaker was for me? Not the modern lifestyle she leads. Not that she seems to be completely integrated into “Man’s World”. Not even that she’s a vigilante. It’s that it’s taking place in L.A.. Why couldn’t you cast her in Washington, DC? What? Couldn’t get the West Wing’s old lot?
This is going to be another Birds of Prey most likely. (Saying that and trying not to sound insulting to a show that I have a secret love for.)
Sounds like the remake of the bionic woman to me, and we all know how that turned out….plus am I the only one to like Birds of Prey?
I did too, but it was mainly because it introduced me to the BoP comic book.