Absolute Wonder Woman #1

Ever wondered what it would be like to see Wonder Woman without the sisterhood, without her God given mission for endless peace? Well you are in luck, Absolute Wonder Woman #1 offers exactly that and much more – I mean in this universe she is literally raised in Hell(?) by Circe – a truly incredible unique story set in this brilliant new universe. But does this comic hold up to the Absolute name?

With such a strong start to the Absolute series with Absolute Batman #1, it is hard to keep up the momentum but DC are really trying with this one. There is a lot to talk about here so let’s dive into the Absolute Wonder Woman #1 review.

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The Review

Image by DC Comics

After Amazonians failed Zeus, Diana was sent to hell where she would remain in the care of Circe. Though the gods cared not what happened to Diana, Circe came to love her as she mothered her and watched her grow into one of earth’s biggest defenders, Wonder Woman. Isn’t that just a great premise for a story?

As someone who has never read a Wonder Woman comic, I have a fairly unbiased opinion. Sure, I know a bit about her, her backstory and main villains, but I am by no means a super fan – this helped make this an even more enjoyable experience. Absolute Wonder Woman #1 is fantastical, visually stunning and at times even made me laugh out loud – in the first few pages Diana ‘yeets’ a snake winning the love of her surrogate mother.

Though this first issue was spectacular, I couldn’t help but notice the story length. While the first issue of a comic often acts like a prologue and origin story to our main character whilst still bringing forward a gripping story arc, which often leaves fans needing more, Absolute Wonder Woman #1 did not exactly do that. Though I will undoubtedly read and review the next instalment, I have absolutely no idea what will happen next as the main story arc is still a little unclear – it really is just an origin story with a bit of action. 

Image by DC Comics

Do not have me mistaken, I did not hate this comic, if anything I actually really enjoyed it! It just felt like Issue 0 rather than Issue 1 – you could quite easily skip this comic and get what is happening in future issues with no questions asked.

The art in this comic is fantastic, it reminded me of one of my other favourite series Hell to Pay, but there were a lot of panels taken up by this absolutely beautiful artwork rather than impactful story progression. We of course do see the story advance in these panels, but a bit more dialogue would not have gone amiss.

I would love to know how someone raised in Hell became such a good person, and who trained her to fight. We do see Diana and Circe practising magic together, but nothing close to the Amazonian trials usually depicted in her backstory. She is still an Amazonian, so of course would have inherited their god-like strength and agility, but let’s not leave it all up to assumptions please DC – if it’s an origin story you wish to tell, give us the whole damned thing!

Image by DC Comics

As I said in the introduction, it would be a hard challenge for anything to keep up with the strong start to the Absolute series that Absolute Batman #1 brought, but Absolute Wonder Woman #1 did try and mostly succeed. While serving as a much needed origin story for this Universe’s Wonder Woman, this comic offered such a unique twist to yet another beloved character.

Though the next issue could essentially be a completely unrelated story and still make sense, the groundwork has been put in place for a very strong series, one of which I am already invested in and have pre-ordered the next issue of! Hopefully we see more ugly creatures from Hell too.

Let us know your thoughts on the Absolute series so far in the comment section! Who would you like to see added to the line up? Is there anything you would’ve liked to see done differently? Whatever your thoughts, I would love to know.

See also: Must Read Batman Comics

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