WW84 Delivers…A Sigh…
2020 is coming to a close, and finally, FINALLY, we had a blockbuster movie to look forward to! So…In case you’re living under a rock, WW84 could be seen at the theater, or on HBOMax. I opted to watch the movie on HBOMax, purely beacuse my local theater went out of business. It’s not because I was scared of COVID, or trying to avoid a super-spreader event. Watching a movie at the theater is equivalent to dining at a restaurant for two hours during this 2020 pandemic. Like a restaurant, you’ll need to social distance, wear a mask – until seated, and well, that’s it – you’re safe. As of today, there hasn’t been a single case of COVID-19 that has been traced back to a movie theater.
By the way, if you’re wondering how Wonder Woman ended on HBOMax, well, it’s because HBO is owned by Warner Brothers. The WB also owns the DC Universe. And AT&T owns Warner Bros – so in other words, it’s a big corporate mess and I wouldn’t want to be their accountant. I’m just wondering how Wonder Woman ended up on HBO and not on DCUniverse.com.
Anyway!
I definitely recommend watching this movie if you haven’t already because it’s the ONLY 2020 BLOCKBUSTER MOVIE OUT THERE, not because it’s good. It’s not worth getting HBOMax, though. If you have trouble streaming this movie, make sure to clear your cache before streaming. Also, I’m finding that it streams best on an updated version of Google Chrome.
The movie is safe for kids to watch, with no nudity or sexual comments. There’s not even that much violence. But, the movie is a bit long and only somewhat entertaining, so I’m not sure if it’s something your kids would enjoy.
Are you ready for the only blockbuster movie review of 2020? Well, here goes. From here on out, there will be some spoilers. So if you haven’t watched the movie, don’t read any further!
LET’S TALK STORY – THE SCRIPT
WW84 was a barely average movie, it certainly wasn’t a bad movie, but it wasn’t as great as the first. And if anyone thought this was downright horrible, I wouldn’t be surprised. There is a distinct difference between WW2017 and WW84. And it’s a GIGANTIC difference. WW2017 was MUCH BETTER than WW84, and I ultimately point the finger at the writing team, specifically Patty Jenkins for almost every failure of WW84.
Take a look at the assembled writing teams for each movie.
WONDER WOMAN 2017
Credited Screenwriters:
- Allan Heinberg – very experienced drama TV writer
Story by:
- Zack Snyder – Heading up the DC Franchise
- Allan Heinberg – very experienced drama TV writer
- Jason Fuchs – co-writer of Ice Age: Continental Drift
WW84
Credited Screenwriters:
- Patty Jenkins – Director of Wonder Woman franchise
- Geoff Johns – very experienced writer of the DC universe
- Dave Callaham – very experienced writer for action movies
Story by:
- Patty Jenkins – Director of Wonder Woman franchise
- Geoff Johns – very experienced writer of the DC universe
If it ain’t broke, don’t try to fix it – don’t even try to overthink it. But hey, what can I say. This is Hollywood. And this is Hollywood living in a social justice era.
In WW2017, Patty Jenkins, who was not a feature film director, was allowed to direct even though she didn’t have any experience directing a big-budget film. She was a television director, and that was it. Well, let’s give her props where it is deserved, because WW2017 was a hit, probably the best out of all the DC films out there. But for some reason, she wasn’t given any more big-budget movie opportunities until WW84. Strangely, after directing WW2017, she directed a video short, and 2 television episodes of a short-run TV show called I am the Night.
Was it sexism, nepotism, the reason why she didn’t work after WW84? Because those things definitely do exist in Hollywood. Or was she just not any good? That’s an honest question, not sexist. Maybe she just didn’t want to work. Hollywood can suck the life out of you.
I can tell from WW2017, that they surrounded her with A+ screenwriting talent, and they pounded out an excellent script for her to direct.
Now, fast-forward to WW84. Patty Jenkins is not only given the opportunity to direct again, but now, she will help create the story and write the screenplay.
That’s a big deal. That’s a lot of control. If you’re the director and writer, that movie is basically yours.
Warner Brothers brings in – once again, a big team of A-list screenwriters, including Geoff Johns, who writes movies, cartoons, comics, and tv shows for DC. But for some reason or another, it seems as though WW84, drastically misses the mark. I can’t speak to when these other writers were brought in, but I don’t think experienced writers would miss the mark this bad, because WW84’s script is horrible. QUITE HORRIBLE. Not Last Jedi Horrible, but up there, or pretty close.
What I find quite amazing is that Zach Snyder, the man who will be directing much of the Justice League Franchise, was not brought in, to make sure this story flowed properly.
The rule of thumb with fictional storytelling, or one of the rules, is that your story is only as good as your bad guy, or your antagonist. In this case, we have Maxwell Lord, who in the movie has turned into a crazy human genie. And if he grants you a wish, he can take what you truly love. That’s really it. That’s not much for a bad guy.
In the canon DC World, Maxwell Lord is a supervillain who has the power of telepathic persuasion. At one point in the comics, Lord controlled Superman, and Wonder Woman ended up snapping his neck to save the red underweared hero. When Wonder Woman killed Maxwell Lord, his death was broadcasted worldwide, and Batman and Superman stopped being friends with Wonder Woman beacuse she killed someone. Geez, are they a bunch of snowflakes.
Which version do you like better? Patty Jenkins version or the canon version of Maxwell Lord?
Jenkin’s version of Maxwell Lord was a wimp. He couldn’t go toe-to-toe with Wonder Woman. We didn’t get any epic fight scenes like in WW2017, when we were treated to an epic fight between the God of War (Ares) and Wonder Woman. This is why Jenkins had to put in Cheetah, so we had somewhat of a fight scene.
The Cheetah character, by the way, was also murdered by Jenkins. In DC canon, Barbara Minerva was a crazy rich heiress who loved archeology. During an expedition, she agreed to become the protector of an African tribe, and did so by ingesting a potion created by a plant god that would mutate her. The potion worked, gave her superhuman strength, agility, and immortality. But because she wasn’t a virgin when she took the potion, she experienced pain and a physical disability when she transformed back to human form. She was also, forever a slave to that plant god.
There are different origin stories of The Cheetah in DC, but all of them are much better than Jenkin’s screen version. I still don’t understand how Barbara turned into an actual Cheetah in the movie. Think she got there through wishes? Really? That’s it?
Surprisingly, there weren’t many plotholes in the script, but there were too many logical loopholes to list. There is a difference. A plothole is a hole in a script that affects the plot; a logical loophole defies commonsense WITHOUT affecting the plot. Both are not very good, so writers need to catch as many of them as possible, before heading into production (but there’s a problem with how scripts are written these days that I’ll get into).
What were the logical loopholes in Wonder Woman? Well, just to name a few:
- How did everyone in the world understand Maxwell Lord’s broadcast when he only spoke in English? Now, something as simple as this could be explained, but there was no explanation.
- Was everyone who made a wish, selfish?
- How did Maxwell Lord hear everyone’s wishes?
- Why was Wonder Woman’s wish granted when she didn’t say it. And why did Steven Trevor return in someone else’s body and not his own?
- Travel time. I’m not talking about time travel; I’m talking about the time it takes to travel. In this movie, people can travel around the globe, without teleporting, in the snap of a finger. And there’s a point where Wonder Woman’s invisible plane manages to fly around the world without gas.
- Where did the hurricane wind in the underground secret control TV room, come from? Wishes?
I can go on and on, but any hole in a story, plothole or logical, is a serious concern that writers, directors, and producers, need to think about – AND PLUG – when creating storylines. If the audience can spot a tear, especially a logical loophole, which in my opinion are worst than plotholes, the entire fictional world can come crashing down.
And that’s the last thing you want as a writer.
So why were there just so many holes here? It could be, that Wonder Woman, like so many other movies in Hollywood, was being written as it was shot. Yes, this happens. It’s not like the old days where scripts were finessed before heading into production. One too many films are written during production, making it impossible for writers to do their job. And if you rewrite one scene during production (for any reason), well, that just affects the continuity of the entire story, and all hell breaks loose.
GRADE: F
DIRECTION
Unfortunately, I don’t think Patty Jenkins will direct another feature film again, or one for a long time. She really dropped the ball on WW84, and the fan backlash is starting to gain momentum. The story choices were just bad, the pacing, the action scenes, and her choice to rewrite fascinating characters; the blame comes down to her. Was it all Patty Jenkin’s fault? Not at all, but she will shoulder the blame.
By the way, didn’t the movie feel like a TV show at one point? Maybe an episode of 90210? Especially when Steve Trevor started trying on clothes?
This is almost as bad as Rian Johnson’s screw up with The Last Jedi.
By, the way, I read some comments on social media on how Diana Prince was “oogled” by men when she walked into a party. They said that men’s responses were not realistic, and Patty Jenkins went a bit over the top with this scene. Well, I have to disagree with them here kindly. Pretty men get “oogled,” hit on, approached, quite often. I’ve seen it happen, and it’s quite hilarious to watch from afar. I’ll forgive Patty Jenkins for that scene. For the rest of the movie, though, I’m not letting her pass.
So just how bad did Jenkins fail with the characters? I’ll get into more of that in the next section.
GRADE: F
CHARACTER BREAKDOWN
It’s going to be really difficult to accurately assign each character a real-life personality type because they were all so poorly written. This is what’s really wrong with the movie. When a writer creates characters that do not have a strong foundation rooted in reality, the whole story struggles to push forward.
MAXWELL LORD: Poorly Written Unhealthy Type Three “Achiever”
By the way, the actor who played Maxwell Lord is Pedro Pascal, the actor who plays the Mandalorian.
Okay, now onto the character breakdown.
There’s a lot of chatter flying through the internet that Maxwell Lord was created to mimic President Donald Trump. The only thing somewhat similar Lord has to Trump is the hairstyle, Lord’s love for gold, and a black helicopter in a commercial that looked like Trump’s. Maybe Jenkins did try to turn Maxwell Lord into Donald Trump, who knows. If she tried, she did a poor job.
So just who was Maxwell Lord in this film?
Plain in simple – a conman. Someone who was obsessed with the image of success, but was not actually successful.
The problem with Maxwell Lord was that his character was not believable. Real conmen are scary because you don’t know they are ripping you off. They are charming, well-spoken, extremely likable, well-measured, and smart. Real cons, such as Elizabeth Holmes, the CEO of Theranos, faked her way to becoming a billionaire, with fake technology. 99% of the people out there bought into her scam, everyone from big investors, to politicians, to Fortune 500 companies.
Maxwell Lord, well, he wasn’t charming at all. He was a bad portrayal of a used con artist, not smart, and not cunning enough. If he was a great con, the audience couldn’t spot him. But in this case, the audience could see he was slimeball a mile away. There was no brilliance behind Maxwell Lord, when true Type Threes are extremely intelligent. In the comics, Lex Luthor and King Pin are brilliant conmen, and portrayed in the movies as such. Maxwell Lord, well, he’s much more of a jester, than anything else.
The closest personality type I can slap onto Maxwell Lord is that of a Type Three “Achiever,” but a true Type Three would be captivating. Most antagonists, are Type Three “Achievers,” and it does trigger me because I’ve seen it repeatedly. The rich, greedy, businessman, who makes everyone think he’s for world peace, when he just wants more…
I’m still asking myself, why did Warner Brothers, who owns DC, let Patty Jenkins rewrite the character of Maxwell Lord into this version? How could this be done with Geoff Johns, a DC comic book writer, in the room?
BARBARA MINERVA: Both a Type Five “Intellect” and a Type Eight “Challenger.
Intellects are your nerdy personalities who have trouble relating to the real world. They have more fun interacting with books than people. While they are intelligent, they tend to over throttle their brains, red-lining it, and going permanently crazy.
Most notable real-world Intellects was Alan Turning, the genius who broke Germany’s Enigma Code, or Josh Nash, both geniuses who unfortunately got lost in their own mind.
Barbara Minvera starts in WW84 as a Type Five Intellect, then becomes a Type Eight “Challenger” after getting her wish granted. Now, that really isn’t the normal progression for a triggered, or an unhealthy, Type Five. But after getting her wish granted, who she was before, vanishes, and she does become Wonder Woman, who is a Type Eight “Challenger.”
Type Fives are honestly, enjoyable villains. They are geniuses who don’t necessarily realize they are on the wrong path. It would have been much more enjoyable to watch a Barbara Minerva slowly deteriorate in her pursuit of knowledge, instead of her wishing to become Diana Prince.
WONDER WOMAN: Type Eight “Challenger” with a Nine Wing
Challengers are your natural-born leaders in life. They are of the Type-A personalities, the ones who defy the rules, push the boundaries, and the law, to satisfy their own wants and needs. In WW2017, Diana Prince was not loyal to the Amazonians’ creed, and she defied their rules, the advice of her own mother, to hunt and kill Ares. She then leads soldiers into war, defying even the advice of Steve Trevor, the man she loves. In WW84, the audience is treated to a Wonder Woman who is much less violent, operates as a superhero in the shadows, and longs for Steve Trevor. But in the end, she realizes that she has to let her personal wants go, to gain be the superhero she needs to be.
Wonder Woman, I’m happy to report, is written accurately.
But here’s the kicker. If you’re going to have a Type Eight “Challenger” as your heroine, you better have one helluva villain. In this case, we got a wimpy Maxwell Lord. I’m sorry, that doesn’t cut it.
Gal Gadot, by the way, is gorgeous…
STEVE TREVOR: A Poorly Written Type Eight “Challenger”
From WW2017, Steve Trevor was a well-written Type Eight “Challenger.” Like Wonder Woman, he disobeyed orders from the top, to get the job done. In real life, when you get two Type Eights in a room together, there’s conflict, bickering, arguing, even if they both are on the same page. And we were treated to some of that during WW2017.
But in WW84, Steve Trevor returned from the dead, emasculated.
He was a sidekick of Wonder Woman, no longer a man on his own mission. There was no fire under his belly. This Steve Trevor just wanted to be a tourist for about half of the movie, and a blind loyalist to Diana Prince, in the other half. It would have been nice to have seen him play hero on his own, just as he did in the WW2017.
ACTING PERFORMANCE
Everyone here did a great job. I can’t complain, at all, about any of the actors. They did the best they could with a poor script and a poor director.
GRADE: A
OVERALL IMPRESSION
Maybe it’s the pandemic speaking, and maybe it’s because I was so hungry to see a blockbuster movie, but I couldn’t give Wonder Woman a failing grade. I couldn’t give it an F. I couldn’t give it a D, even though the script and directing were horrible.
I think I may have COVID of the brain.
Let’s get one thing straight. I don’t agree with these professional critics who loved the movie. This was not a good movie.
The movie was okay to watch. Not good, not great, but just okay. It just coasted along, from scene to scene, even though at times I didn’t understand where in the world we were going. I was just along for the ride, admiring the beauty that Gal Gadot was (and is), having a laugh watching Chris Pine try on fanny packs, purposely making an effort to enjoy this movie, rather than to criticize it. I just wanted to check out of my rewriting brain, and to take off that hat.
If you hate it, I can’t disagree with you. I can’t argue with your stance, as you are probably right. And if you want to give it an F, I can’t debate why it should deserve a higher grade.
But as of now, and maybe it’s the 2020 pandemic that’s clouding my judgment, I can’t fail this movie.
FINAL GRADE: C
Steve Young
