The numbers are in: DC’s Wonder Woman is critical darling and box office monster, sitting at a genre-best 94% on Rotten Tomatoes and a massive $233 million global opening weekend. While a sequel has not been officially green lit, director Patty Jenkins is planning on it and is contracted for another film.
Given those numbers, it’s hard to imagine that Gal Gadot and Jenkins wouldn’t get another shot to dazzle us on the big screen. However, it does leave a big question: what would the sequel cover? Luckily there are some fairly big clues from the DCEU and comics as to what a sequel, whenever it does arrive, would likely be about. Here are 5 things to expect the next time we see Diana grace the screen.
*The following contains significant spoilers for BvS, Wonder Woman, and a bunch of comics. You’ve been warned.*
Diana settling back into being Wonder Woman
Batman v. Superman made it clear that Diana was reluctant to return as Wonder Woman. The horrors of WWI and the realization that Ares did not in fact cause mankind to be awful to each other caused her to turn away. As she is reminded several times throughout her film, mankind did not deserve Wonder Woman.
The arrival of Superman, Zod, and Doomsday forced Diana to come back into the spotlight. By the end, it isn’t clear if she will help Bruce Wayne find the “others” to help fight in Superman’s absence (though the Justice League trailers make the answer pretty clear). But the end of her solo film does confirm that Wonder Woman is back. Diana has chosen, perhaps due to being reminded of her first adventure in the mortal world, to return to mankind.
But this doesn’t mean that Diana’s transition back will be smooth, and that seems like a good bet for a personal conflict in Justice League or her sequel. As far as we know she’s been on her own, or at the very least not in combat with a team, for quite some time. Now she’ll have to contend with greenhorns like Flash and Cyborg, who won’t have her experience or control; overly dominant veterans like Batman, who will assume the leadership role despite her experience, and wildcards like Aquaman, who may not be reliable. Count on seeing Diana learning to deal with these new team dynamics, among other conflicts, in Justice League.
What do you think will happen with Diana in Justice League and the (probable) Wonder Woman sequel? Let us know on Twitter and Facebook, and in the comments below!
Expanding abilities, and being put to the test
Throughout just the several days during which most of Wonder Woman‘s plot takes place, Diana’s powers develop and grow considerably. In her final bout against Ares, Diana is able to channel the lightning her foe has summoned and unleash it, eliminating him. We also see her struggle with those expanding powers, momentarily taken in a rage that is directed toward an unfortunate unit of German soldiers.
In BvS, Diana’s powers seemed to have expanded, or at least come under more of her control. A hundred years of practice will do that. It stands to reason then that we will see just how far those powers have come in Justice League, especially since she is the veteran of the team. Jenkins has also hinted as much, so it will be exciting to see what the extent of her demigod abilities are.
No matter how Diana’s abilities play out, she is going to need to be at her best against the villains of Justice League. Confirmed for the film is Steppenwolf, general of the war-bent alien planet Apokolips. From the trailer, it seems that in his wake will be legions of Parademons, mindless alien war machines. Together they will constitute the greatest threat Diana has ever faced, and it’s going to put her abilities to the test.
What do you think will happen with Diana in Justice League and the (probable) Wonder Woman sequel? Let us know on Twitter and Facebook, and in the comments below!
A threatened Themyscira, and some tragedy
Justice League‘s basic plot line has been seen many times within the pages of DC Comics. Darkseid, the tyrannical leader of Apokolips, sends his armies to Earth to destroy it because he’s the big bad and that’s what they do. The armies of Earth are largely powerless to stop them. Atlantis and Themyscira are petitioned by Arthur Curry (Aquaman) and Diana to help, but they say no because isolationism narratives are easy to play with. Then they get hammered, hard.
Given that the rest of the DCEU spins out of November’s Justice League, it, or more likely the Wonder Woman sequel, will deal with this same plot device. Despite it’s magical camouflage, Themyscira will not be able to hide from the invading armies of Apokolips. Given their continued isolation from the outside world, the question will be “can they survive?”
This also sets up what will be Diana’s primary conflict going forward: can she return home? After leaving with Steve Trevor, she was told by Hippolyta that she would not be able to return home. This action underscored what she was willing to sacrifice to save mankind. However, with her home island under threat, Diana may not be able to resist returning to help her Amazonian sisters. Adding to this, there is a plot from the current and celebrated run of Wonder Woman comics by Greg Rucka and Liam Sharp in which Diana tries to return to home, but cannot find a vanished Themyscira. Whichever way Jenkins and Co. chooses to go, Diana will have a rough time finding her way home.
Let’s assume the best for a moment, and say that Diana is able to find her way home. Unfortunately, the 2011-2014 comic run by Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang, from which Wonder Woman took a lot of inspiration, presents a bleak future for her. Upon returning home after many separated years, Diana confronts her mother about the lie she told her as a child. Hippolyta told Diana that she born from clay, when in truth she is the daughter of Zeus. When Hera finds this out, she goes to Themyscira and transforms the Amazons into snakes and Hippolyta into clay. It’s unlikely that Hera will show up since according to Wonder Woman the gods are gone, but an unfortunate fate for the Amazons should certainly be anticipated.
What do you think will happen with Diana in Justice League and the (probable) Wonder Woman sequel? Let us know on Twitter and Facebook, and in the comments below!
The gods aren’t done with Diana yet
The Azzarello comics run had something in else in common with Wonder Woman: in both stories, Zeus is assumed dead, and other gods cause trouble in his absence. The difference obviously being that in Wonder Woman, all of the gods are dead. If the comics are any sort of clue, they may not stay that way.
During Azzarello’s run, Diana must protect a toddler named Zeke who is said to be the son of Zeus and therefore her half brother. In actuality the baby is Zeus, hiding himself from the other power hungry gods. Other hidden gods include Athena, disguised as Zeke’s mother, and Eros, who is basically a millennial in Italy.
It’s doubtful that Jenkins will follow this exact storyline in the sequel, but it does provide precedent for supposedly dead gods coming out of the woodworks. Keep an eye out for some Olympian shenanigans in her sequel.
What do you think will happen with Diana in Justice League and the (probable) Wonder Woman sequel? Let us know on Twitter and Facebook, and in the comments below!
Artifacts and Arch-nemeses
Whether the gods do come back or not, you’d be smart to expect one of their most famous storylines in the Wonder Woman sequel: ‘The War of the Gods’ by George Pérez. In it, the gods from multiple pantheons all start a war, and things go pretty poorly for Earth in the process. Diana eventually discovers that it isn’t their fault. And the whole thing starts with some artifacts.
Bookending Wonder Woman are scenes showing Diana in a small lab space in the Louvre, surrounded by artifacts of unknown origin. In BvS, we see her in a museum assessing their Sword of Alexander. It’s pretty clear that whatever Diana has been up to in her hundred year sabbatical, it includes artifacts. When it comes to Wonder Woman lore and artifacts, there are always two immediate villainous connections.
The first is Circe, the sorceress from Homer’s Odyssey, who Diana discovers is responsible for the War of the Gods. Circe begins the whole event by murdering some folks and stealing some artifacts, which sounds right up cinematic Diana’s alley. Circe has been used many times throughout Wonder Woman’s history, and is certainly among the top of her rogues gallery. The cherry on top: Circe was just reintroduced into DC Comics, with a modern origin that might factor well into a big screen adaptation.
The second artifact to Diana to villain connection is one of her best known villains: Barbara Ann Minerva, the Cheetah. While her origin has changed several times over the decades, one thing is consistent: Barbara Ann gets caught up with the ancient god Urzkartaga who gifts/curses her, and she becomes the Cheetah. Much like Circe, Cheetah was recently reintroduced, and Barbara Ann was revealed to be a longtime friend of Diana’s before things went bad.
Obviously nothing is certain, but assuming that the sequel film takes as much from comics as the first film did, looking to one of Wonder Woman’s most famous stories and to her biggest villains is a smart bet.
What do you think will happen with Diana in Justice League and the (probable) Wonder Woman sequel? Let us know on Twitter and Facebook, and in the comments below!
