Wonder Woman (Earth-Two)

Wonder Woman
The Earth-Two Wonder Woman in Infinite Crisis #5. Art by Phil Jimenez.
Publication information
Publisher	DC Comics
First appearance	Historical: All Star Comics # 8 (December 1941)
Created by	William Moulton Marston Elizabeth Holloway Marston
In-story information
Alter ego	Diana Prince Trevor
Species	Amazon
Team affiliations	Justice Society of America All-Star Squadron
Notable aliases	Princess Diana
Abilities	Superhuman speed, strength, agility and accuracy, Ability to glide on wind currents

Wonder Woman of Earth-Two is a fictional DC Comics superheroine retconned from original stories created by Wonder Woman writer/creator William Moulton Marston and his wife Elizabeth Holloway Marston. This "version" of Wonder Woman is attributed to have first appeared in All Star Comics #8 (Dec. 1941). This was after DC Comics established a multiverse within their published stories to explain how heroes could have been active before and during the World War II era and still retain their youth and subsequent origins in the 1960s.

The Earth-Two Wonder Woman is first featured as a specific separate character from the then mainstream Wonder Woman (referred to as the "Earth-One Wonder Woman") in the second Jay Garrick and Barry Allen team-up.^[1] Technically the Earth-Two Wonder Woman had appeared several months earlier cameoed in a single comic book panel.^[2]

Like most of the elder Earth-Two incarnations of the DC characters, this version of Wonder Woman was semi-retired from costumed exploits by the time she reappears in later stories indicating her age. She was shown to be aging with gray hair and wrinkles when she is featured in later Justice League stories.^[3]

She continued to appear in many later Earth-Two specific features including the multi-generational "Infinity, Inc." series, where her daughter Fury is featured.

She and her version of Earth were eliminated in a company wide storyline titled Crisis on Infinite Earths. After this series ended she ascended to her world's Mount Olympus with her husband General Steve Trevor and attained godhood. Although Diana Trevor was eliminated from history due to the storyline's outcome, her daughter was not. Fury, or Lyta Trevor, was later explained to be the child of the New Earth history World War II Fury—Helena Kosmatos.

The Earth-Two Diana Trevor reappeared in mainstream DC Earth during a later storyline titled Infinite Crisis,^[4] but only as a ghost apparition. She later faded from existence after speaking to her newest counterpart Wonder Woman.

At a still later period another storyline was created titled 52. In the aftermath of this storyline an alternate reboot version of the Pre-Crisis Earth-Two characters are reintroduced. These characters are separate from their Pre-Crisis Earth-Two versions though bear some resemblances to the Pre Crisis Earth-Two version. The Post-Crisis Earth-2 Wonder Woman is mentioned by her daughter Fury though does not appear except for a reference picture taken before the death of Bruce Wayne and disappearance of their Superman.^[5] The Post-Crisis Earth-2 Wonder Woman is formally retired from her Earth's Justice Society team and is suggested to be the current Queen of the Amazons, which never happened to the Earth-Two Diana Trevor before she ascended to Mount Olympus to become a goddess with her husband.

Fictional character biography

Princess Diana of Paradise Island — the Wonder Woman of Earth-Two—served as a member of the All-Star Squadron and soon after became secretary (later full-fledged member) of the Justice Society of America. As Diana Prince, she worked in the U.S. War Department as an assistant to intelligence officer Steve Trevor. Decades later, she and Trevor were married and had a daughter named Lyta (also known as Fury). Although Diana was retconned out of existence by the events of Crisis on Infinite Earths and All-Star Squadron #60, she was later restored into present continuity.^[4]

Early history

Diana, Princess of the Amazons of Earth-Two was born on the mystical Paradise Island several hundred years before^{[citation needed]} she became known to the outside as Wonder Woman. Isolated from the cruelty and corruption of men and their ways, the Amazons lived in peace and advancement openly working with and obeying the will of the Olympian gods. Longing for a child of her own, Hippolyta the Queen of the Amazons, begged for the gods to grant her request and turn her perfect clay statue into a real girl. Sympathetic to Hippolyta's request, the gods relented and animated the statue with true life and the girl immediately leaped off the pedestal and into her mother's arms. She named it after Diana, goddess of the Moon, who became her godmother.

Pleased with the child, Hippolyta began to raise her daughter as an Amazon with all the station and privilege of her mother's royalty. Diana would age slowly and stop aging altogether upon reaching her adulthood as with all of the Amazons. Diana would continue to excel surpassing most of her Amazon sisters in her skills and intelligence, she could run faster than a deer at the age of five, and uproot a tree easily at the age of three.

Diana would continue to perform as a contented Amazon until the fated day when Captain Steve Trevor crash landed on Paradise Island. Never having seen a true man before Diana was immediately attracted to the handsome man despite his extensive injuries. Violating the Island rules about taking in outsiders, Diana took the unconscious Trevor back to the Amazons in an attempt to save his life. Pleading with her mother to save the man, Hippolyte relented and used the life healing Purple Ray on Trevor saving his life by bringing him back from death.

Discovering the outside world was engaged in full world wide war, Diana wanted to participate and help stop the war. Hippolyta refused stating that she and the others should not get involved in the ways of the outsiders. But when the goddesses Aphrodite and Athena appeared to Hippolyta and declared that it was time for an Amazon to travel to "Man's World" and fight the evil of the Nazis as Ares felt he ruled the world, which was all at war, and Aphrodite wanted to help America win, claiming it was the 'last citadel of democracy' (this is actually inaccurate, as the UK was still free). A tournament was held to determine who would be the Amazon champion. Although forbidden by Hippolyta to participate in the tournament, Princess Diana did so nevertheless, concealing her identity with a mask. Upon winning all the rounds Diana revealed her identity to her heartbroken mother who feared that she would never see her daughter again.

After winning the tournament and revealing her true identity, Queen Hippolyta relented and allowed her daughter to wear the costume of Wonder Woman and travel to the outside world. Diana returned Steve Trevor to the United States and adopted the identity of a Navy nurse named Diana Prince so she could be close to Trevor as he recovered from his injuries. She assisted him against a Japanese agent.^[6]

Now, Princess Diana began to operate as Wonder Woman publicly and as a glasses wearing Diana Prince, forged papers allowed her to become the recently promoted Major Trevor's and Col. Darnell's confidential assistant. Later the real Diana Prince returned and tried to take Diana's role as her inventor husband was having financial trouble selling his new weapon to the army. Wonder Woman saves Diana when she is kidnapped by a Japanese agent who tries to get the weapon, and after her husband's weapon is shown to work Diana Prince starts using her married name, leaving Wonder Woman to remain in her identity.

She would continue in this position fighting crime alongside the Justice Society of America (on Earth-Two) as their first female member though she would be regulated to subservient duties performing as an actual secretary for the Justice Society despite her beyond human strength and abilities, as the JSA had somehow discovered her identity, which Hawkman revealed to her.^[7] She was shown taking dictation and typing the teams minutes as costumed Wonder Woman. Diana would rejoin the team when it reformed as the All-Star Squadron and expanded.^[8]

Diana would continue to perform as an open crime fighter after World War Two and resisted being recalled home to Paradise Island after the war, preferring to give up her immortality than leave her life of independence and personal identity.^[9]

Marriage

During the 1950s, Diana was able to continue operating as a super powered crime fighter as she had admitted to having no secret identity and stated herself to be a legendary Amazon, unlike many of the other masked heroes who were forced to either reveal their secret private identity or stop operating by the Federal government's committee on un-American Activities. This of course was not truly accurate on Diana's part as she continued to use her alias of Diana Prince.^[9]

It was during the 1950s that Diana began to explore fully her romantic interests in her long-time crime fighting partner, Col. Steve Trevor. After a period of courtship, Diana revealed herself as Wonder Woman to Trevor. Initially taken aback by the revelation, Trevor and Diana married. Diana would later retire from active duty of the US Navy and decide to become a housewife where she would raise their daughter, Hippolyta "Lyta" Trevor, named after Diana's mother.^[10]

Later adventures

Diana would continue to remain active as crime fighter, even rejoining the reformed Justice Society of America in the 1960s, as she was one of the JSA members placed in suspended animation by the Immortal JSA villain Vandal Savage, and freed by Barry Allen.^[1] She mostly preferred to spend her time raising her daughter as a stay at home mother. It would be during this time that the Earth-Two Diana met her younger Earth-One counterpart.^[11][12] Later she was called upon by the God Mercury along with other heroes of Earth-2, Earth-1, and Earth-S, as the Beastman King Kull wanted to wipe out humanity on all three Earths after capturing the Elders who empowered the Marvel Family. She helps stop Queen Clea, one of his henchman, from taking over the Earth-Two Atlantis in a story involving the Squadron of Justice. The two Wonder Womans would become good friends occasionally inviting the younger Amazon to Earth-Two to enjoy a home cooked meal that the retired General Trevor would usually cook and the two ladies would trade good humored jokes such as the Earth-One Wonder Woman teasingly commenting that she would take the handsome skilled elder Trevor back to teach her own version how to act, which the elder Wonder Woman would threaten as a cause for a true World War to be fought over, indicating her own decades-long past, as stated over dinner between the Earth-Two and Earth-One Wonder Women.^[10]

Crisis on Infinite Earths

Diana would continue in her role as an elder stateswoman among the superhero community until the "Crisis on Infinite Earths" came to Earth-Two and erased all of its existence from reality. Diana fought well and was protected from erasure at the end of the Crisis by ascending to Mount Olympus along with her husband as both were erased and forgotten by the history of new Primary Earth, other than by their daughter^[13] who was reformatted into the new universe to be the daughter of Helena Kosmatos (Fury of World War II).

Infinite Crisis

When the new or "Post-Crisis" Wonder Woman is breaking up a riot in Boston, she is interrupted by a woman she initially believes is her mother Queen Hippolyta. This is because Hippolyta had become the Golden Age Wonder Woman via time travel in her continuity. However, the intruder identifies herself as the Earth-Two Wonder Woman, Diana Prince, who has voluntarily left Mount Olympus in order to provide Diana with vital information and guidance. She advises her Post-Crisis counterpart to be "the one thing you haven't been for a very long time... human."^[4] She also strongly urges Diana to intervene in a fight taking place at that moment between the Modern Age Superman and his counterpart, Kal-L. Having left Mount Olympus, and with her gods' blessings gone, Diana Prince then fades away.

Powers and abilities

The Earth-Two Wonder Woman had superhuman speed, strength, agility and accuracy. Her superhuman speed and agility were as fast as the god Mercury but usually less than the pre-Crisis Earth-Two Flash (Jay Garrick) as shown during her battle with Garrick when she was possessed by the Stream of Ruthlessness.^[14] She was able to leap 40 ft, a record for the Amazons.^[6]

Originally she was immortal. But in order to remain in "man's world" after her mission was deemed over by her mother, she had to give up her immortality to remain in her chosen area and began to age as a normal human.^[4][10][15]

She also had the ability to glide on the wind currents. She needed air currents in order to do this feat and had to be at a much higher locale than that of the locale she wished to travel to by such gliding. She could NOT jump up into the open air high enough to launch herself in this gliding ability, unlike Kal-L who could attain flight from a standing position^{[citation needed]}. She rarely used this gliding ability, preferring to mostly depend on her advanced invisible plane to travel long distances at extensive speeds.

Attributed to be imbued with the strength of Hercules, the Earth-Two Wonder Woman had superhuman strength levels where she was seen ripping locked steel doors off their bolts and lifting elephants off the ground with ease^{[volume & issue needed]}. While she was extensively strong, she was routinely shown to be far less than that of the pre-Crisis Earth-Two Superman Kal-L^{[citation needed]} unlike the current primary Wonder Woman incarnation who seems to be more of a match to the current primary Superman who is easily multi-megaton level. She was more resistant then a human, an electric charge that could have killed a normal human only knocked her out.^[16] Diana frequently demonstrated knowledge of every terrestrial language, as well as advanced scientific knowledge. She was once shown hypnotizing Etta Candy's brother, Mint, although her Magic Lasso (unlike the Modern version) allowed her complete mind control over others, once she evn hypnotized someone into taking another identity. Her Amazon training gave her extensive hand-to-hand combat skills, particularly when it came to wrestling and binding opponents. She was also able to telepathically communicate with the Holiday Girls using a mental radio, which could also be used by Etta Candy, and had knowledge of psychology that could heal minds. She also had magnetic hearing due to her earrings, which were given to her by the Venusian fairy Queen Desira for stopping the Metor Men attacking her planet, and allow her to contact her.

In other media

TV series

Main article: Wonder Woman (TV series)

In 1976, an hour-long Wonder Woman television series premiered on ABC (following the success of its 1975 pilot movie, The New Original Wonder Woman). Lynda Carter was cast in the title role, with Lyle Waggoner as Steve Trevor. Using the World War II era as its setting during Season 1, the series featured major elements from the mythos of Golden Age/Earth-Two version of Wonder Woman, including: Trevor's plane crash on Paradise Island, Princess Diana's tournament victory and departure for Man's World (via the invisible plane), and the Amazon's secret identity within the War Department as Diana Prince. Most of the villains depicted were Nazis and Nazi sympathizers.

Despite strong ratings, ABC stalled on commissioning a second season, causing the show's frustrated production company (Warner Bros.) to offer Wonder Woman to CBS. While ABC dithered, CBS agreed to pick up the series — on the condition that the setting be updated to the present (the 1970s). The title was changed to The New Adventures of Wonder Woman, and the series continued until it was cancelled in 1979.

References

1. ^ ^{a b} Flash (vol. 1) #137 (1963)
2. ^ Flash (vol. 1) #129 (1962)
3. ^ Justice League (vol. 1) #195
4. ^ ^{a b c d} Infinite Crisis #5 (April 2006)
5. ^ Justice Society (vol. 3) Annual #1
6. ^ ^{a b} Wonder Woman (vol. 1) #1
7. ^ All Star Comics #12 (1942)
8. ^ All-Star Squadron (vol. 1) #1
9. ^ ^{a b} America vs. The Justice Society #1-4
10. ^ ^{a b c} Wonder Woman (vol. 1) #300
11. ^ Justice League (vol. 1) #100-101
12. ^ Wonder Woman (vol. 1) #228
13. ^ Infinity, Inc. #27
14. ^ Infinity, Inc. #5
15. ^ Infinity, Inc. series
16. ^ Sensation Comics #80 (August 1948)

External links

• JSA Fact File: Wonder Woman
• Earth-2 Wonder Woman Index
• Amazon Archives
• Earth-Two Wonder Woman Biography & Chronology