Comic Info
Comic Name: Wonder Woman: Rebirth/Wonder Woman (Volume 5)
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Greg Rucka
Artist: Liam Sharp
# of Issues: 7
Release Date: 2017
Wonder Woman (5) #1
Reprints Wonder Woman: Rebirth and Wonder Woman (5) #1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11 (August 2016-January 2017). Wonder Woman senses something is not right about Themyscira and everything she thought was true. The key to unlocking the secrets of her past could be her former friend turned mortal enemy Dr. Barbara Ann Minerva, and unfortunately for Diana, she must first save Minerva from the curse of the Cheetah if she even hopes to find out the truth of her own life.
Written by Greg Rucka, Wonder Woman Volume 1: The Lies is part of DC Comics’ Rebirth line following the New 52 and Convergence. Following Wonder Woman Volume 9: Resurrection, the series features art by Liam Sharp and the storyline alternated in the individual issues with the “Year One” storyline. The issues were also included in Wonder Woman: Rebirth Deluxe Edition Book 1.
I was surprisingly impressed with Azzarello’s Wonder Woman for the New 52, but it also felt really independent of the DCU…which was part of the reason of the whole New 52 with streamlined concepts. Greg Rucka returns to Wonder Woman and tries to rectify the two stories into a more cohesive title…but he also stumbles.
Reading Wonder Woman 1: The Lies isn’t that bad. You have a solid Wonder Woman story with one of Wonder Woman’s primary villains…but this isn’t how it played out if you read the individual issues. This is a case where DC (or whoever made the decision) to publish in an alternating title really screwed up the series. For some reason, the creators decided they didn’t think an origin issue for six issues would hold a reader or that this collection was solid enough to run straight through. It killed the series for me as a purchaser of the individual comics.
Wonder Woman (5) #11
It also seems like a little questionable to once again dive into Wonder Woman’s origin which has been messed with so many times over the years. She has changed more than other characters and the second half of this collection in particular starts to go into familiar territory in the changing past of DC’s primary heroine.
I do worry about Rucka’s return to espionage and making Wonder Woman as more of a soldier. Greg Rucka really damaged Wonder Woman in a time when DC and comics were struggling with the balance between realism and darkness. Wonder Woman broke the neck of Maxwell Lord under Rucka’s watch and it just led to a really bad path that continued for years. I hope that he doesn’t make a similar mistake.
DC halfway righted the wrongs of Wonder Woman’s publishing by collecting “The Lies” storyline as one collection, but it also makes me not as interested in reading Wonder Woman’s follow-up origin collection. I look forward to see what Rucka does with the mess of Wonder Woman’s tangled origin, but I also worry what might come out. Wonder Woman 1: The Lies was followed by Wonder Woman 2: Year One.
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