SithVamp Reviews: Wonder Woman (2009)

Welcome back to Girl Power Month on SithVamp Reviews! Well, Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice will be out in theaters next year, and in that movie we’ll see the Amazon Princess herself: Wonder Woman for the first time in a live-action movie, and in 2017, she’ll get a movie of her own. But before we see how Gal Gadot portrays the Amazon Princess, I’d like to take a look at the first movie about Diana. An animated movie, with the title same as the Superheroine’s name: Wonder Woman.

Wonder Woman came out in 2009. The movie opens with the Amazons, led by Queen Hyppolita, fighting an army of demons, led by Ares, the God of War (voiced by Alfred Molina). It’s a long and violent battle between the two armies and many Amazons get killed. Among the Amazons there are Artemis (voiced by Rosario Dawson, and no, this Artemis is not Young Justice Artemis), Alexa (Who's more of a bookworm than a warrior, and is voiced by Tara Strong) and Persephone. Persephone gets badly wounded by one of the Demons.

Hyppolita runs to fight Ares, who lectures her that she’s just an Amazon, whereas he’s the God of War. Hyppolita then jumps on a Pegasus to kill Ares’ son, Thrax. Hyppolita beheads Thrax then proceeds to kill Ares too, but Zeus interferes, telling Hyppolita she has no right to kill Ares, because he’s Zeus’ son. Then Hera shows up too, telling Hyppolita to spare Ares’ life and keep him as a prisoner. Hera gives Ares gauntlets that block his powers and these gauntlets can only be removed by a god.

Hera sends Hyppolita and the Amazons to the island of Themyscira, which is isolated from the rest of the World, so no one would ever find the Amazons. Here, Hyppolita stands on the beach, takes some clay and models a figure of a baby out of it. This clay baby turns into a real baby, and this is the birth of Hyppolita’s daughter: Diana, aka Wonder Woman.

Years later, Diana (now voiced by Keri Russell) grows up to be a really good Amazon warrior: we see her training with Artemis and she beats her. Then Hyppolita shows up and Diana asks her why do the Amazons keep training if they won’t go into battle. Hyppolita replies that the Amazons must stay vigilant. Then Alexa suggests the Amazons should reconnect with the rest of the World and Diana agrees, but Hyppolita takes Diana aside. Hyppolita shows Diana the prison where Ares is held prisoner (where we also see Persephone on guard duty), and Hyppolita tells Diana that Ares is the reason why she and the Amazons can’t reconnect with the rest of the World: they think all men are just like Ares: vile, untrustworthy and evil.

We then see three fighter jets, and one of the jets is piloted by Steve Trevor, voiced by Nathan Fillion. The jets soon start a dogfight with some enemy jets. Meanwhile Hyppolita is looking through a window that was forged by Hephaestus to keep Themyscira hidden from the Outside World. And because Hyppolita touched the mirror, Steve noticed Themyscira for a brief moment and he wonders where the island came from. Steve’s fellow pilots get killed in the dogfight and his jet is also hit by an enemy jet.

Steve’s jet crash-lands into Themyscira and he’s soon captured by the Amazons, Diana to be exact, whom Steve falls in love with from the moment he sees her. The Amazons take Steve to Hyppolita and when they interrogate him, he tells the Amazons the truth, because Hyppolita puts the Lasso of Truth on him.

Hyppolita announces a contest and whoever wins this contest gets to go to the mainland and take Steve back. This contest is long, but in the end it is won by Diana who hides her identity until the end of the contest. Surprisingly, Hyppolita is not angry at Diana and she gives her the outfit, which would later become Diana’s trademark outfit as Wonder Woman.

In the prison, Alexa checks on Persephone and Ares, but she finds out that Persephone is secretly working for Ares! Persephone kills Alexa so she won’t be able to alert Hyppolita, and then Persephone and Ares escape. The first thing Ares wants to do is get his power-blocking gauntlets removed. Hyppolita, Artemis and the others soon find out about this, so Hyppolita gives Diana a second assignment: she must find Ares and Persephone and stop them.

Diana and Steve go back to the Mainland with an invisible jet Hyppolita gave them. They arrive in New York City and they land in Central Park. The first thing Diana sees here is some kids playing and then she notices a little girl crying. Diana asks the little girl what’s wrong and she tells her that the boys won’t let her play pirates with them, because she’s a girl and she doesn’t know how to swordfight. Diana comforts the little girl and shows her some sword fighting moves with a stick. The little girl then runs with the stick to play with the boys. This was actually a pretty touching scene.

Then, after he gets her some casual clothes so she can blend in with other people, Steve and Diana go to Air Force headquarters, where they meet another woman: Etta Candy. When Etta asks Steve to move her table for her, Diana is surprised, because on Themyscira, the Amazons do everything themselves. Later Diana tells Steve that she’s outraged that in this society, women have to be inferior to men, but Steve says they should focus on finding Ares.

Steve asks Diana about what is it that Ares wants, to which Diana replies: Ares wants to put the world in chaos, spread misery, destruction and hate, and wants every human to kill each other in war. Steve searches on his computer and finds that the number of violent incidents has increased and Diana knows that Ares has something to do with this.

Steve thinks that he and Diana still have time to find Ares, so he decides to relax a bit. He takes Diana on a date to a bar and they talk, while having drinks. While they talk, we find out that Amazons cannot get drunk easily: Steve is the only one who gets drunk, while Diana stays sober no matter how much she drinks. But when the drunk Steve leans closer to her, Diana is outraged, so she walks out of the bar and Steve goes after her.

Diana is outraged of Steve’s behavior, but then they’re attacked by a gang of muggers. Steve wants to give the muggers his wallet, but Diana tells him not to. Then a mugger pulls out a gun, but the bullets bounce off Diana’s bulletproof gauntlets. Diana then fights off the muggers, who run off. But danger isn’t over yet, because now Diana and Steve are approached by one of Ares’ monster minions: Deimos, who says he’s come for Diana.

Diana tears off her casual clothes, revealing her Superheroine outfit and starts fighting Deimos. It’s a long and violent fight between the Amazon and the Monster, but in the end, Diana defeats Deimos, puts the Lasso of Truth on him and asks him where Ares is, but the Monster kills himself so he won’t betray his master. But Steve finds a medal with the symbol of Tartarus, so Diana finds out that is where Ares is.

Diana and Steve fly the Invisible Jet to the island, where Tartarus is located. They find a base of a group of soldiers, whom Diana refers to as the Cult of Ares. Diana and Steve break in the camp and fight off the soldiers. Then we cut to a cave, where we see Ares and Persephone. Diana and Steve enter the cave and see what Ares is up to: he wants to make a blood sacrifice to open the Gates of Tartarus. Diana interferes, but Ares summons some Harpies to take care of her. The Harpies show up and one of them grabs Diana. Luckily Diana is saved by Steve, but she loses consciousness, so Steve takes her to a hospital.

Ares makes the blood sacrifice by killing one of his soldiers, then enters Tartarus and meets Hades. Hades knows what Ares wants, so first he is reluctant to remove the gauntlets. But Ares promises Hades that once he unleashes war, chaos and hatred all over the world, he’ll turn the people who die in battle over to Hades to be his slaves. Ares then discovers that Hades made his son, Thrax his slave. Hades removes the power-blocking gauntlets from Ares’ arms, allowing the God of War to have his powers back.

Then we cut to the hospital, where Diana soon wakes up. She tells Steve that he should have saved himself and stopped Ares and she doesn’t need a man to save her. But then Steve flips out, saying that he’s tired of Diana thinking that all men are like Ares or misogynistic jerks; he also says that it was a cowardly act from the Amazons to isolate themselves from the rest of the World. He also tells Diana that he didn’t save her because men are stronger than women, he saved her because he cares about her and he would never abandon a friend in need whether man or woman. This is when Diana is convinced that not all men are evil.

Then we see Ares and his Army of Demons and Monsters at the National Mall in Washington DC, and Ares is ready to bring forth his Apocalypse of War, Chaos and Destruction. The Army tries to stop them, but the Monsters seem to be stronger than them. Diana and Steve arrive in the Invisible Jet, and when he sees that Ares’ soldiers cut off the head of the Lincoln monument, Steve says: “Nobody messes with Lincoln!” So he and Diana join the fight. While this fight is going on, we keep cutting to the President’s office, where the President’s face is kept hidden. One of the President’s aides tell him about the attack.

Diana confronts Ares, but Ares’ minions hold Diana down, while Ares tells her what he really wants: his plan is not to conquer man, but to conquer the Gods. Ares is just about to behead Diana, when suddenly Hyppolita and the Amazons show up and join the fight. Ares sends his Army to fight the Amazons. Diana starts fighting Ares. The President finds out about Themyscira and thinks that that is where the attack is coming from, so he orders the destruction of Themyscira: he wants to blow up the island with a missile. Steve sees this missile, so he flies the Invisible Jet to stop it before it reaches Themyscira.

Ares then tells Diana that all this fighting is just making him stronger and he powers up, starts fighting Diana and almost beating the crap out of her, all the while boasting about how great he is. He then pulls a cheat card: he summons the dead Amazons, including Alexa, to fight and kill the living Amazons.

Artemis and the living Amazons fight the dead Amazons. Artemis fights Alexa, but while fighting, Alexa whispers some magic words to Artemis. Artemis repeats these magic words and the dead Amazons stop fighting the living Amazons. Alexa then leads the other dead Amazons against Ares, but the God of War soon vaporizes them… So much for the good zombie army… Anyway, Ares and Diana keep fighting each other and it still seems like Ares is stronger than Diana: he strikes her with lightning bolts. Meanwhile, Steve is still flying the Invisible Jet, trying to stop the rocket heading for Themyscira and he manages to destroy it by the Invisible Jet’s invisible rocket and he saves Themyscira.

Back at the battlefield, Persephone fights off her former sisters, until she is confronted by Hyppolita. The two fight each other and Hyppolita chastises Persephone about how she betrayed the Amazons. Persephone also chastises Hyppolita about how she turned her back on the rest of mankind. Hyppolita kills Persephone, but before she dies, Persephone tells Hyppolita: “We Amazons are warriors… But we are women too…”. Ares summons more lightning bolts and continues to bash Diana more and lectures her that she didn’t learn anything, but Diana responds: “I have learned one thing: it’s not polite to hit a lady”. She then grabs Ares with the Lasso of Truth and pulls him in the water.

Ares gets struck by his own lightning, most likely losing his powers in the process. Diana grabs a sword and then rushes to kill Ares. Ares calls Zeus for help, but this time the Chief God doesn’t show up, so Diana attacks and chops Ares’ head off! When Ares dies, the Amazons cheer and the Monsters just walk off. Steve returns with the Invisible Jet, hugs Diana and kisses her. Ares is sent to Tartarus and Hades makes him his slave too.

Back on Themyscira, Artemis reads Alexa’s books and tells Hyppolita that Diana misses the Mainland (and Steve). Hyppolita then goes to Diana, gives her the Superheroine outfit and tells her that it’s time to open connection between Amazons and mankind once again. Hyppolita makes Diana the Amazons’ ambassador and tells her that she’s free to go to the Mainland, but she has to visit Themyscira often. Then Diana and Hyppolita hug each other.

And the movie ends with Diana going back to the mainland in her hero outfit and stopping a half-woman half-cat villain: Cheetah from robbing a bank, while the little girl whom Diana helped earlier says: “Look, it’s Wonder Woman!”

And that’s Wonder Woman! What do I think of it? It’s pretty good. It’s a nice representation of Wonder Woman, her origin story and her world.

Good things:
- This is the first movie featuring Wonder Woman
- The animation is pretty neat
- I think that the movie has a good message of how men and women should trust each other

Bad things:
- Alexa getting killed

Favorite character:
- Diana/Wonder Woman
- Alexa
- Artemis

Least favorite character:
- Persephone
- Ares

So overall, I think the animated Wonder Woman movie is decent. I’m giving it 8 out of 10. Let’s just hope Gal Gadot will make a good Wonder Woman too… See you next time on Girl Power Month on SithVamp Reviews.