THE GOOD:

- Gal Gadot

- the purity and dedication of the gender role reversals (and everything that goes along with that). this, needless to say, is the most thrilling and important factor here.

- Gal Gadot

- the lasso

- Gal Gadot

- WWI setting, which excuses a lot of the inexplicably appalling special effects, in its own saturday morning serial kinda way

- Gal Gadot

- Lucy Davis

- Gal Gadot

- all the bits in London

- Gal Gadot

- the actors who play the villains

- Gal Gadot

- this bullet-point format that allows me to get this over and done with while re-watching FUNNY PEOPLE for work.

THE BAD:

- the cringe-worthy framing device

-…

96/100

Only love can truly save the world.

Remember when some trickster claiming to be a former worker from Warner Bros. wrote an open letter saying that Wonder Woman was just another mess of a DC movie, et cetera? I remember how Patty Jenkins responded to that. She tweeted: "Just wait and you'll see".

Honestly, I don't know how anyone could even consider that there was the slightest chance of this movie not being good, and I'm gonna tell you why: this is the very first big female-led superhero movie, in which the title character also happens to be the greatest female superhero in history. If you really think that Patty Jenkins, also the first woman to ever direct a…

We oppose imperialism. As the most destructive action in the world, as the source of more war, death, and exploitation than anything this world has known since chattel slavery was born, imperialism is the highest, most vile, most horrifying aspect of capitalism, and we oppose it. We oppose the countries that engage in it. We oppose the armies that effect it. We oppose the racism that enables it. We oppose the economic outlook that devised it. And we oppose the lies that support it.

And we oppose those who spread those lies.

It's hard to watch this movie, as it is hard to watch a film about abuse where the lead actor is a known abuser, as it is hard…

► Gonzo's 2017 Movie Rankings

Is it good?
Mmm... It's a tale of two halves, really. The first half is pretty good (and pretty MCU-ish), but the second half is pretty bad (and—and I know this is gonna sound like I'm a hater—pretty DCEU).

Okay... But is it good?
Promising?... But overall, unfortunately, no. It's almost there. They almost nailed it, but not quite.

But... but everybody who has seen it so far has said it's good?
I could see why people would like it. On the surface, it's mostly diverting and generally badass. I mean, how cool is it to finally see Wonder Woman star in her very own film? It's really cool (there's no denying that), and Wonder…

Anyone who knows me even a little bit knows that I love Wonder Woman. She has always been an icon to me. It was actually the animated Justice League cartoon and Susan Eisenberg (who voiced her in the show) that got me to love her. The way she cares so much for humanity and sees that there is good despite the bad, it was so valuable to me as a little girl.

So, I never understood, as a child, why she never had her own film. I saw little boys pretending to be Batman, Superman, and Spider-Man and they all had movies they could watch over and over and over again. It was kind of frustrating because Diana is just…

Movies are alchemy. I’ve said this before, and I’m sure I’ll say it many more times before I’m gone, but it’s the truth of the cinema: a magical, hard to harness process can turn a strip of film into something far more precious and meaningful.

Watch WONDER WOMAN with distant, unengaged eyes and you might see the seams, the places where reshoots came in or where the story is papered over in order to keep moving along to the next scene, where actors are standing in front of green screen or their faces have been plastered on a stunt double. But that’s the lead, and in the hands of Patty Jenkins it’s all turned into gold. What’s her secret? I…

44

The unneeded lowdown from a straight-white-guy: (I, obviously, am not an expert. Only commenting on what I see and grouping ideas together after the conversations I have post-showing. If you feel I'm off-base, under-educated, ignorant, or misunderstanding certain concepts. Shoot me a message.)

As a DCEU installment, Wonder Woman is admirably solid, not rising to the loopy, confounding poetics of Batman v Superman nor falling to the grim, un-textured depths of Man of Steel or that abomination of a supposed 'David Ayer' movie, Suicide Squad. Patty Jenkins knows not only how to shoot action, but how to capture a specific, female-driven energy within the set-pieces. The now famous 'no man's land' sequence primarily soars via Jenkins' understanding of Gadot's…

Still think that the final act of this film definitely doesn't feel as refined as the two acts before it, but Wonder Woman as a whole is a mostly solid & relatively delightful effort from DC for the most part.

Gal Gadot is notably ideal for the titular character's origin story here as she reprises her key role from Batman v Superman, and she does indeed give out quite a captivating performance throughout as she leads the film rather well & truly does capture the Wonder Woman look right.

The supporting cast in this also are generally top-notch as well, as Chris Pine's character & his companions here make for some amusing interactions/chemistry with Gadot's Diana Prince.

Their memorable scenes together, some neat…