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JUST IMAGINE STAN LEE WITH JIM LEE CREATING WONDER WOMAN
Neutral (4/10)
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DC Comics
Main story
Writer: Stan Lee
Pencils: Jim Lee
Inks: Scott Williams
Colors: Alex Sinclair
On the Street...
Writers: Michael Uslan & Stan Lee
Pencils: Gene Colan
Inks: Tom Palmer
Colors: Lovern Kindzierski
Letters: Bill Oakley
Editor: Mike Carlin
Price: $5.95 US/$9.95 CAN |
Main story: Remember Tangent Comics, the line DC used to fill a couple of skip weeks back in the late 1990s? That's what this Stan Lee project reminds me of... only with lesser writing. No big surprises here, to be honest. Lee's reinventing of familiar DC names is creative and occasionally cute, but his writing lacks a modern sensibility most readers have come to expect. This book is 30 or 40 years too late in coming.
Maria Mendoza is determined that she and her father -- a judge in a tiny Peruvian town -- will one day escape the tyrannical influence of Guitez, a druglord that reigns supreme over the town. However, Guitez has found a source of great evil and great power that will make him unstoppable, but it seems destiny has selected Maria to oppose him, as Wonder Woman, a heroine with the powers of an Incan sun goddess.
I think what I enjoyed most about this new version of Wonder Woman was how it adds a sadly rare multicultural tone to a world of super-heroes. Though I doubt Stan Lee got all his details right and the fact that all of these Peruvians speak English for some reason is befuddling, I'm pleased that this heroine's roots are in another culture, just as the mainstream continuity Wonder Woman's origins are.
Jim Lee's art is fun and his design for the title character is sharp, but his stuff here is all style and no substance. Maria's cleavage gets so much "screen time," it's almost a character in its own right. Guitez's monstrous form is surprisingly generic.
At its heart, this concept is a good one, even if it does remind me more than a little of Alan Moore's Promethea, both in appearance and concept. Lee's ideas are solid, but his execution is lacking. His dialogue is heavy on exposition and is often unnecessarily long-winded, robbing the characters of credibility. It's hard to believe that anyone would talk that way. The characters are also quite one-dimensional.
On the Street: Of the two stories, this shorter back-up tale is much stronger. We see how the title character affects the lives of ordinary people, and these characters, although seen just briefly, are far more believable. Uslan and Stan Lee also plant the seeds for new interpretations of a couple of other DC icons: Hawkman and Hawkwoman.
Colan's dark, moody art is as strong today as it was decades ago. He had a brief connection with the title character as the regular artist on her title in the 1980s, so it's fitting that he contributes to this project, which is as much a tribute to the creators of yesteryear as it is to DC's most recognizable heroes.
Overall, while I was curious about the Just Imagine Stan Lee project and I'm pleased I got a chance to sample it, so far, it's proven to be a thoroughly miss-able series, and a rather expensive experiment.
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