Rucka rides again some more.

[colonel_green]

Four scans from Blackest Night: Wonder Woman #2.


So now Diana has herself a black ring, and fights Mera.  Mera gets in a few good hits, but Diana's about to gut her:



Diana flies off and tries to remove the black ring to kill herself, but can't.  Instead, she goes on a rampage around Themyscira, killing Cassie, BL-Donna, and Hippolyta, and then makes out with Batman.  This increasingly odd turn of events is revealed to be:




That double-spread was damn hard to work with, because my scanner's not quite large enough, so I had to figure out how to stitch images together using ArcSoft Photostudio.

Nice scene, and I love seeing Aphrodite's Drew Johnson design again (the 'Diana Prince' thing is still annoying, but I suppose if that's how it's going to happen in the main title continuity should be observed).

 Tags:  char: wonder woman/diana of themyscira, char: mera, creator: greg rucka, creator: nicola scott, event: blackest night

Comments

[philippos42]

Oooh, nice use of a patron goddess to tie into the emotioncolor. So, Di's association with "wuv" "love" is due to Aphrodite being her patron? So Geoff (who's presumably sketched this mess out) is trying to reinstate that Volume 1 idea?

Now I'm wondering if the abuse of Athena in Gail's run was part of an editorially mandated repudiation of the Rucka-after-Pérez run where Athena was Di's major patron, SO THAT DI COULD BE REATTACHED TO APHRODITE!

[kingrockwell]

Sick as the whole thing leaves me, Athena's appearance in the last issue of Wondy leaves me hoping that isn't the case.

[jlbarnett]

shouldn't she be attached to all of them?

I remember some issue of Flash where he runs through a prism and end up being split into different colored Flashes(just for a moment)

I'd almost like to see Diana's patrons get into an arguement and Diana end up being separated into different aspects of herself.

[kingrockwell]

If it were Hermes, Hestia or Artemis (her especially, being she was retconned into oblivion because an amazon by the same name exists), I could agree with you, but given that she's apparently always showing the emotion driven by the only patron she had pre-Crisis, I don't think it's so much the case of her other patrons getting a better showing.

[jlbarnett]

except this is the first time in years it's been pushed to the forefront. I only recently started reading Wonder Woman, but looking at Bluefall's series on her any connection to anyone not named Athena seemed to be lip service.

Except for Hermes who seemed to be a genuine friend.

[kingrockwell]

Hestia and Artemis actually had fairly prominent roles from what I've read of Perez's run (which, sadly, is only the first two trades and WWwA). Hestia even made the lasso! Generally though, Hermes seems to've had the biggest role throughout, and might've continued to do so if he hadn't died.

Aphrodite had a firm presence in Rucka's run, she was the only one other than Ares or Athena who still had any sort of place in modern times, she just didn't share the ambitions of the other two. Though it wouldn't surprise me if we would've seen more of her if ICk hadn't mucked things up.
Not to mention the pre-Crisis years (and years and years) where she was the only patron, which is pretty much the crux of why her role here in a central position she hasn't had since is rubbing people the wrong way. We like Athena, dammit!

Other post-Crisis runs I couldn't speak to so well, not having read them, but other than maybe Jimenez or Luke I don't think many of the other Wondy writers put much emphasis on the patrons at all.

[jlbarnett]

I didn't say they didn't appear or do things. But to me they came off as Athena's assistants rather than anyone Diana has a relationship, or obligation to in their own rights.

[kingrockwell]

In Rucka's run, sure. Athena was the one leading the coup after all, so everyone else was either stepping aside or falling in line behind (Hestia and Artemis' conspicuous absence included, though assuming Demeter was there to replace Artemis, the implication seems to be that the both of them were Athena's daughters), but I'm definitely going to disagree on Perez's. Artemis seemed more prominent than Athena even in those early issues.