Wonder Woman #9 Review and *SPOILERS*

Themyscira or Bust

Written By: Greg Rucka
Art By: Liam Sharp, Laura Martin, Jodi Wynne
Cover Price: $2.99
Release Date: October 26, 2016

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

Wonder Woman has just been killing it between her "Lies" story and her "Year One" and I guess by Wonder Woman I actually mean Greg Rucka, who's been writing these epic tales.  While I've always liked the character of Wonder Woman, I can't say that I've ever been interested in her the way I am now that Rebirth has come around and made things interesting again.  Alright, that's enough gushing, in the previous issue of "The Lies", we saw our hero defeat Urzkartaga and with his defeat the curse on Barbara Ann Minerva was lifted, releasing her from her Cheetah persona.  Now that Barbara Minerva is back and not all about consuming human flesh, it's time to see if we can get our hero back to her home and find out what's been actually going on with her memories being false.  Let's jump into this issue and check it out.

Explain It!:

Our issue begins with getting Barbara Ann Minerva a little less naked than when we last saw her and that means a trip to the........... mall?  Do people still go to the mall?  I don't know, but what I do know is that Wonder Woman's presence there is causing a scene and everyone's turned out to see the Amazon like the Pope was in town or something.  It's great though because Wonder Woman goes out to greet the people who have come to sneak a peek, while Etta and Barbara head out the back of the store and it's all to show how great of a character Wonder Woman is because she's willing to let these people come up to her simply because she knows how much it means to them.  

After the meet and greet at the mall, we then get into some mystery territory where we find out that the orb that seemed to be controlling Sasha Bordeaux in a previous issue is actually the property of Empire Enterprises run by the Wonder Woman villain, Veronica Cale, who seems to have a whole bunch of shit setup in order to do something probably nefarious with our hero, which includes getting her hands on Urzkartaga, who's little more than a potted plant now.  So yeah, some of the mystery is revealed, but it only leads to more questions.  While Veronica is in her company plotting, Wonder Woman is reconnecting with Steve Trevor and I'm happy as hell that we got this part in the book because it discusses the elephant in the room, Wonder Woman's relationship with Superman and while we don't really go into detail about it or what his death really means to Wonder Woman, it seems that she's about ready to move on........ or back because she still has feelings for Steve....... and you know that boy never stopped carrying a torch for her.  

In the end, after searching with satellites, Barbara Minerva believes that she can get Diana back to Themyscira and I'm guessing that it's all about getting Diana back to the island that Barbara found in the "Year One" interlude that we had in the previous issue.  It seems Barbara believes that since Wonder Woman still has all her powers, she should be able to get to Themyscira because it's all about her using her power to breach between worlds like she's done every time she's gone home, but now that it's on the fritz, Barbara sends her to a place where the barrier between worlds is apparently thin and when Steve and her get there, it seems that she's found her way home........... Only, this doesn't seem like the Themyscira we've seen in the "Year One" story at all........ or even the one we knew in the New 52 because for one, her mother's alive and for another, Paradise Island seems kind of worse for wear and her mother's now rocking blonde hair instead of the the brunette she's had in this series. 

That's it for this issue of Wonder Woman and while this was a slower issue, what with Barbara getting new clothes and Diana greeting her adoring public, I have to say that I loved everything we got because we moved the story along with the reveal of Veronica Cale and even got a great moment between Diana and Steve that felt right even though we still have Superman's death lingering in everyone's mind.  Now the big kicker to the story that I'm the most interested in is the ending, where Diana seems to have finally gotten home, but it doesn't look like the one we've seen throughout this series and this is interesting as hell because I've been on the edge of my seat throughout this run to find out what the "Lies" actually are.  As always, the art in this book is some of the best that DC Comics has to offer and I look forward to it every month and it never disappoints.  This is just a great series and this issue keeps up that consistency.

Bits and Pieces:

The mysteries are just thrown at us in this issue of Wonder Woman and man do they get me interested as hell to see what Greg Rucka has up his sleeve for our Amazon Princess.  The art and the story in this book are fantastic and this issue is just full of heart that reminds me why everyone should be reading Wonder Woman.

9/10