My favourite depiction of Wonder Woman's birth

[thespis]

From Gail Simone's The Circle:









I just love this scene so much. I've not read a lot of Gail Simone's Wondy - much as I like her as a writer, I just haven't been able to get past the idiocy of the Heinboot - but things like this make me think I should.

I posted these scans on Tumblr the other day and Gail had some really interesting things to say about the way she approached the story:

I think if you look at these pages, it presents the Diana birth myth in a way that is actually about maternity, with all its messy, bloody meaning, despite the fact that Diana didn’t come out of Hippolyta’s birth canal. Being a mom is scary and momentous, and there is danger and joy and risk and terror and pain and a rush of emotion that is almost palpable, no matter how the process goes.

I think the talk of blood, and the pages being colored like this, was a subtle but massive change to the Diana myth, and made it infinitely more maternal and even a little scary. I know some people at DC were disturbed (but supportive).

It’s the one thing I wish they’d kept. The original story is great, but was very clearly (I felt) hampered by what they could get away with, content wise. This made it female and frightening without throwing the actual history in the dustbin.

I look at those pages, Hippolyta in the sand, her blood all over the baby in the red glow of the Hunter’s moon, and I really think that that should be the birth image of Diana forever. It’s moving and a little disconcerting, and a lot less sanitized.

I wish they'd taken more of this approach with the New 52 Wondy. I know The Circle isn't a reboot per se, but one thing it demonstrates really well is that it is possible add new depth and dimensions to Wonder Woman's origins without disregarding the long-established canon.