By: DC Comics Publisher: DC Comics Average Rating: Binding: Hardcover Label: DC Comics Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 240 Publication Date: May 04, 1998 Release Date: May 04, 1998
Product Description: The earliest adventures of the most enduring heroine of all time are featured in this hardcover collection, from her beginnings as an Amazon Princess to her 1940s career battling the power of the Nazis. These celebrated, quirky stories made an indelible impression on all those who grew up with them.
The Original Golden Age Wonder Woman Created by Dr. William Moulton Marsdon "Wonder Woman" was created by Dr. William Moulton Marsdon, Psychologist, from the Harvard School of Psychology. He got involved with DC Comics after he had written a newspaper article about how comic books can be psychologically detrimental to a child. When publisher Max Charles Gaines (M.C. Games) of All American Comics (then a subsidiary of it's parent company, DC Comics) read this article, H contacted Dr. Marsdon. Gaines offered Dr. Marsdon a job to look over the comic books they were producing and getting ready to publish and give them any advise he could of how they could improve on it so that it would not be looked at as being detrimental to the Psychological development of a child.
One day M.C. Gaines asked Dr. Marsdon if he would like to try his hand at creating a comic book character and writing the stories. Dr. Marsdon decided to do so, and so he created "Wonder Woman."
Dr. Marsdon was also currently still writing newspaper articles for a newspaper column he had, so he decided to use a pen name instead of using his real name, Charles Moulton. "Charles" was taken from the middle name of M.C. Gaines and "Moulton" was Dr. marsdon's middle name.
Wonder Woman first appeared in the pages of "All Star Comics' that featured the superhero team "The Justice Society of America." containing characters appearing in their own series in comic book titles that All American Comics published. Wonder Woman was introduced as a new member who was the secretary of the group.
This was an introduction to the new Wonder Woman series that was to come out in "Sensation Comics #1." A short time later, Wonder Woman was given her own title comic book. As "Action Comics" was to Superman and "Detective Comics" was to Batman, "Sensation Comics" was to Wonder Woman. However, "Sensation Comics" did not survie into the 1950's. Wonder Woman only continued to appear in her own title comic book.
Dr. Marsdon was an advocate for the rights of women, and with more women entering the work force during the war at the time (World War II). With the men at war, their was need for people to take over the jobs in factories to produce war time weapons and products. The Government put out a call encouraging women to join the work force symbolized by "Rosie the Riveter." I guess that you can say that Dr. Marsdon took the concept of Rosie the Riveter" one step further in creating "Wonder Woman," comic books first super-heroin.
The idea also was to create a female superhero for girls to read. However, it turned out that most of the fans of Wonder Woman were not only boys, but also the G.I.'s who also read comics.
Wonder Woman became "All American Comics" most popular character.
In the original "Wonder Woman" stories, Princess Diana arrives in America to return Steve Trevor a U. S. Military officer whose plane went down in a battle. The wounded parachuted down to an uncharted island which turned out to be Paradise Island the home of the Amazons known from Greek mythology. Princess Diana, the daughter of Hypolite, the Queen of the Amazons from Greek mythology. A contest is held to choose an ambassador to return the American to the U.S. in "Man's World," which against her mother's wishes, Princess Diana joins and wins to don the colors of the nation's flag that she is to go to. Princess Diana is given an invisible plane for her means of transportation.
In the U.S., Wonder Woman brings Steve Trevor to a military hospital. There she meet a nurse who is a doppelganger for her named Diana Prince. Diana Prince wants to meet her fiancé who is a soldier stationed overseas to get married, but she does not have enough money for an airplane trip. Wonder Woman strikes a deal with Diana Prince, for the use of her identity and ID and credentials, she will fly Diana Prince to meet her boyfriend overseas in her invisible plane. In the guise of Diana Prince, she soon becomes Yoman Diana Prince, secretary and assistant to Steve Trevor in which she has to help out of a lot of scrapes in her guise as Wonder Woman.
As I said, these stories take place in World War II, and theses volumes of "Wonder Woman Archives" are also great time capsules reflecting the times the stories were written in.
After World War II, the superhero genre lost it's popularity and soon the superheroes began to disappear from the comic books on the newsstands. "Wonder Woman" went on to become one of the only three comic book superheroes to survive these times, the other two were "Superman" and "Batman," all three published by DC Comics. (After the untimely death of Publisher M.C. Gaines, DC Comics decided to merge its subsidiary, All American Comics, which Gaines ran, making it one entity.
More About Dr. William Moulton Marsdon:
Dr. William Moulton Marsdon was married and also had a mistress in which the three of them all lived together with the children Dr. Marsdon had with them.
It is said that Wonder Woman tends to have a resemblance to Dr. Marsdon's mistress.
Dr. Marsdon also did studies on Sadomasochism saying that the dark haired woman is usually the one to show more dominant tendencies as opposed to a blonde haired woman who tend to mostly lean towards being more on the submissive side.
It is interesting that later in the 1950's, Dr. Fredrick Wertham, a proponent against comic books because of the psychological detrimental effects he believed they had on children, wrote in his book "Seduction of the Innocent" that Wonder Woman could foster sadomasochistic tendencies.
Dr. Marsdon, along with his son, went on to create the polygraph (the lie detector). People say that this is ironic because one of the properties of Wonder Woman's magic lasso is that when someone is bound by the lasso, they are compelled to tell the truth.
Dr. Marsdon would continue to write the stories for "Wonder Woman" until his death to cancer in the 1960's. Publisher M.C. Gaines had given over "Wonder Woman" to editor Robert Canniger to take over. M.C. Gaines was supposed to have helped Canniger with "Wonder Woman," but he met with an unfortunate boating accident while away on the weekend. Robert Canniger was now lost and totally had no idea as to what to do with the character and the series.
Canniger had decided to try to aim for the girl readers and to work more on romance between Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor. As he also did with the Batman comics he was the assigned editor for, he started introducing science fiction type plots and characters. Science Fiction was popular back then. You can find these stories in the volumes of "Showcase Presents Wonder Woman."
During a part of the 1960's, the Wonder Woman stories had also gone camp like the rest of the DC comic book titles did back then especially after the success of the 1966 Batman TV series with Adam West and Burt Ward.
Although "Wonder Woman" has continued to be published up to today, after the death of Dr. William Moulton Marsdon and M.C. Gaines, Wonder Woman never regained the former height of popularity the character enjoyed in the 1940's. In fact, the series and the character had to go through a number of changes due to a number of times the series experienced sagging sales. In fact, in the late 1960's, writer Denny O'Neil was brought in to revamp "Wonder Woman" due to sagging sales. Wonder Woman gave up her super-powers, costume, and magic lasso and bracelets, and her invidibile plane. She now became Diana Prince "The New Wonder Woman." I guess you can say a take-off on Emma Peal of the 11960's TV series "The Avengers." DC Comics received a letter from feminist activist Gloria Stynum expressing her discontent with this.
You can read the original stories of "Wonder Woman" from the 1940's during the height of the character's popularity in these volumes of "Wonder Woman Archives."
Also, if you like the stories of the original Golden Age Wonder Woman appearing in these volumes of "Wonder Woman Archives" then you might also want to look into the DVD set of the first season of "The New Original Wonder Woman" (Wonder Woman - The Complete First Season). The first season of this series which aired on ABC was based on the original Golden Age Wonder Woman from the 1940's during World War II Wonder Woman - The Complete First Season. In the following two following seasons which aired on CBS, the show is changed with the stories taking place in the present. It was basically an attempt to turn it into CBS's answer to ABC's successfully running series "The Six Million Dollar Man" Wonder Woman - The Complete Second Season and Wonder Woman - The Complete Third Season.
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Great Hera! What A Great Book! Get to see the original origin of the Amazon Princess and the contest. Wondy's pal Mala appears as well as the debut of Doctor Poison. These early stories may seem corny, but they are really charming more than anything.
Fun but juvenile D.C. is doing a great thing releasing their archival editions of their most popular superhero comics. Was very happy to come across these earliest Wonder Woman, and indeed, it was a fun nostalgia trip. My only disappointment was that the stories were even more juvenile than I had expected. Would love to see D.C. skip ahead and do archive editions of the '70s Wonder Woman comics. The art reproduction and recoloring are truly fantastic.
Wonder Woman-The Early Years Wonder Woman Archives vol. 1 is the first instalment of a series of hardcover Wonder Woman collections from DC Comics. The Golden Age stories have their ups and downs. Good Points include respect for females, something most comicbooks of the time didn't have, and great artwork, possibly the best Golden Age art I've ever seen. The Bad Points are racism, mainly twoards Germans and Japanese, although the book has it's share of Blackface. Interesting, culturaly signifigant, and at times entertaining, Wonder Woman Archives vol. 1 is a worthy addtion to any Comicbook fan's library.
Great Hera! What a sentimental time warp! My introduction to Wonder Woman (or I should say, who I "thought" was Wonder Woman) came in the form of the weekly TV show starring Lynda Carter. As a child in the mid 1970s, I was not only bewitched, but suddenly I was hooked on superheroes and don't think I missed a single episode of WW or the many other superheroes who made their prime time debuts in the 1970s and 80s. For this 2nd grader, there was no one who topped the esteem that Wonder Woman held in my favor. But like many things from childhood, Wonder Woman the superhero faded into my conciousness for many a decade...until THIS book!
Presented here are the first Wonder Woman tales and what a treat they are to behold! Not only could Wonder Woman fight the Nazis, stop a blacmarket milk trade, uncover unfair working conditions for shop girls-- she could also kick some serious butt and save her beloved Steve Trevor from all harm(who seemed to ENDLESSLY get himself in to pickles) and by the end of the issue not bat an eyelash! Considering the cultural atmosphere of War-time America, this was quite a feat and what a role model Wonder Woman would served for young children. Yes, Wonder Woman was an early Gloria Steinem with brains, beauty, braun and a kicky pair of boots! Interestingly, the producers of the TV series in the 70s, at least for a little while, remained very faithful to the nature of these first comic books. A smart decision on their part. After reading these marvelous adventures, I decided to check out Wonder Woman of the 21st Century at the local comic shop. I'm sorry wasted my $2. The WW of 2005 is a sorry testament to the original icon presented in the pages of this marvelous CD Archives edition. Gone is a lot of the whinsome yet strong storytelling. Its replaced with a Uber-Wonder Woman whose overly "pumped up" muscles and attitude leave nothing to the imagination and sense of "wonder" the early vision so effortlessly supplied. What we have in the early books is the REAL Wonder Woman...perhaps the one that is best left to the casual reader's memory.
The DC Archive Editions are easily one of the most enjoyable and accessible ways to rediscover the comics (something I hadn't given at thought to since 1983!). Presented in beautiful color, on superior quality papers these volumns are "built to last". They are truly archival in every since of the word. These time capsules will not only become welcome additions to your library, but are destined to become terribly addictive to read. Worth every penny for certain! But first and foremost they serve as a reminder to all grownups of simpler pleasures that could be had for a couple of quarters with some change to spare....once upon a time.
Anything Goes Trivia
Trevor
Megaton Man
