Wonder Woman #772 Review

 

Don't Lose Your Pantheon

Writer: Jordie Bellaire, Becky Cloonan, Michael Conrad

Artist: Paulina Ganucheau, Travis Moore

Cover Price: $4.99

Release Date: May 11, 2021

While I am still intrigued with Diana saving Asgard while remembering who she is, I need Cloonan and Conrad to pick up the pace a bit here.  The wow factor of it all is wearing off, and I need to see that we are setting up something meaningful and not just biding time until Diana can get back to being Wonder Woman.  Does that happen this month?  Well, not exactly...

I will start by saying that this book looks gorgeous!  Travis Moore has been killing it on this series, and this issue is no different.  The story has been going downhill, though, and this one was a bit of a slog to get through.

We open with Diana grabbing the Valkyrie key inside of the Snake, Nidhogg.  It's a bit moment that doesn't feel big at all.  How can we spend this amount of time getting the key to have it feel like an afterthought now?  Not only was it too easy to get, but there was no sense of danger after Nidhogg figured out they fooled him.

After Siegfried shows up again to warn Diana about the Valkyries, we catch up with Odin and Thor. Unfortunately, there isn't much to see here until Odin gets squashed and Diana jumps back into battle.  We finally get to see who has been talking to Diana from beyond this whole time, and really, the popped collar of his silhouette gave it away from the start.

Again, though, the most significant moment in the book so far just gets pushed aside before we learn much, and now we have Diana fighting her evil self in the woods.  The pacing is way off in this issue, and I am not sure why, but something felt off.

The evil Diana just kept going on and on about how Diana loves Asgard and loves the killing, but when Wonder Woman kicked the Dr. Psycho out of him, I was ready to call it a day.  Maybe I should have since what was left was Ratatosk talking about Olympus and getting lost and Odin showing back up as the ferryman who will take Diana to the Valkyries.  Oh yea, he also repeats the warning Siegfried keeps giving.

I'll repeat that I loved the art in this issue, but little else.  The storytelling was scattered, and Cloonan and Conrad didn't give the big moments any time to breathe.  I was very excited for this new status quo for Wonder Woman, but it's starting to feel like placeholder filler.  That can easily change with one good issue, but I don't know if we'll get that right now.

Bits and Pieces:

While I was excited for Wonder Woman's new direction after the first issue, I am already looking for the exit after this one.  While the issue looked great, the pacing was way off, and I was bored by the end.  I hope Cloonan and Conrad can get back to the magic of their first issue because I am losing faith in this story. 

6.0/10