Um,

To whom do the New 52 Anazons owe patronage? Whom do they worship? Which gods rescued them from servitude and granted them immortality? The new 52 Amazons, especially Diana, seem to have no loyalty or allegiance to any one or group of gods as benefactor(s) to their survival. Diana actually seems to have very little respect or reverence for the gods even before she learned of her parentage.

WW has been so busy with her magic swords and Amazon anger that she hardly ever shows honor and praise to any particular god she has ever worshipped- so how are the Amazons immortal and in whom does Diana believe?

How has Hippolyta made it this far through centuries alive?

Great Hera! Jumping Jupiter!

It's true that Wonder Woman seemed to be indifferent to the idols of the Amazons, than lost respect (e.g. see New 52 Wonder Woman issue 2) for them, but the rest of the Amazons and Hippolyta had great respect for all of the Olympians; seems that Hera was up there; however, the New 52 Amazons should have the same patron Olympian as the post-crisis Amazons, as the New 52 was not a COIE type event. Azzarello just went into a more logical and in depth detail examination of the Amazon culture than any other post-crisis Wonder Woman writer.

@dshipp17:i decided to play your game,hulk can't bust a planet is an anomaly,hyperion can't bust a universe,it only happended once,it's an anomaly,apokalypse can't bust a planet it hasn't happended enough amount of times,it's an anomaly,usually he gets defeated by mid powerhouses,galactus can't bust planets,it has happended just a few times through the years,it's an anomaly.

@gokuwarrior: umm? wrong thread

@darknightspideyfanboy:yes.

I don't think any of these questions have been answered yet. Took Azz two years to finish his damn baby protecting arc and even that is technically over yet. I'm not holding my breath.

Till he jumps into those back stories I'm just going to assume it's the same......which it probably isn't.

@dshipp17 and @pokeysteve:

Untrue. Perhaps you have not read or read up on Amazons in the DCU. They have been portrayed as continuing their isolationist society almost indefinitely and evolving into a known nation with a U N voice in the world. These were both logical outcomes explored well.

The current writer has not addressed to whom the Amazons have the deepest allegiance for their survival and immortality. Traditionally, this would count Athena and Aphrodite high on that list. The Amazons did not just wake up immortal. These particular gods usually speak up for the Amazons, especially Athena who has not been depicted at all. And WW has not mentioned or honored these missing benefactors at all.

Although wishful thinking, the baby story has not ended. This WW has to constantly babysit to keep the baby safe. In fact, recently a guy just had to rescue the baby after Diana lost it. Baby story is not over until baby is safe and not in need of WW constant on hands vigil. That has not happened.

When have they given us back story on the Amazons in the New 52 outside of getting rid of their men which Hephaestus takes in?

@pokeysteve:

That is part of the question I am posing.

My reference you quote was to pre-new 52 when audience didn't have to guess, assume or personally make up backstory to make a story work or claim it didn't matter cause "good stories" don't have to make sense.

Part of the lazy writing from new 52 is for readers to assume as much as they need from pre-new 52 to make the stories work. Good writing means the writer gives the reader enough backstory to go with the character they are presenting.

In all her dealings with gods in the solo WW title, most of the relationships are antagonistic and there seems to be no reverence or warm ties to any one or specific gods. The Amazons are not born immortal; they get immortality from the specific gods they worship. Those same gods defend them from other gods occasionally. Who and where are those gods in this WW series? And why does Diana not reference or call on them? Ever?

I think I gotcha now. They already showed Hera, Hermes, Artemis and I think Demeter. Athena, Aphrodite, and Hestia haven't been mentioned yet.

I think her lack of mentioning them comes from her not being immortal and her being the offspring of Zeus. Diana was never immortal having been created waaaaaay after the others. Hera wouldn't hate the Amazons (besides Hippolyta) because they didn't.......have relations with Zeus.

I've noticed Wonder Woman doesn't have or hasn't displayed many of her pre 52 powers. Her abilities from Athena and Artemis and Athena most notably. Her strength from Demeter could now be just from Zeus and she didn't display flight or speed until Hermes gave her them in the middle of that arc.

They have briefly showed Aphrodite (she's always naked and most of her is off-panel, but she's been there a few times), and she always seemed pretty indifferent to Wonder Woman and the Amazons. It also seemed like Hera was angry with all of the Amazons - we don't see what happens to them, but the implication is that Hera is responsible for their disappearance. Maybe she simply decided to withhold their immortality and they vanished as a result? Or by not showing us what happened, Azzarello left himself free to bring them back later (as I'm sure will happen to Hippolyta at some point - she's not dead, just turned to stone).

Anyway, by making her the offspring of Zeus they can now explain away any power she has as being a product of her lineage, so the gods don't matter quite so much.

It's like they've built in layer upon layer of cop-outs on top of the company wide cop-out that is "New 52."

@dmessmer: i thought the amazons were turn into snakes?

@darknightspideyfanboy: I wasn't completely sure, but you might be right. Hippolyta turning to stone suggests that Medusa might have been involved, in which case the snakes might be a kind of residue of her presence. Ambiguity seems to be the name of the game these days. Sigh.

Seriously. She was so unique before and now she just another demi. No creativity there. It's like they went through the Justice League characters-

Superman? He's good. We'll just update his costume and take away Lois.

Flash? Let's bring Barry back.

Aquaman? Johns has an idea how to make him relevant. We'll give him a shot.

Lantern? We'll make him Hal again and bring back Sinestro as a GL.

Martian Manhunter? Let's put him on another team.

Batman? We'll condense his history.

Wonder Woman? ........uhhhhh.............let's make her Zues' kid thus destroying 22+years of character and supporting character development that's been done. Oo oo and we can put Cyborb in the Martian's place on the League.

I think WW needs another solo title. I like the current Wonder Woman title while acknowledging that it's kind of isolated. They left a lot of things behind to keep the story going on a strange direction. Therefore another title of wonder woman showing her engagement in some 'secular' affairs can fill up the gaps and, hopefully, make up whatever damage Johns has been done on her image in JL where she's waaaaay too cranky... Give her a good writer who knows and appreciates her history.

I will buy it if they sell it.

Wonder Woman's sudden discovery of her parentage does not negate her previous lifetime lessons and worship of the gods.

Ambiguity is the rule of the day. It is supposed to give the writers freedom to write the best stories. Seems this fallacy further proves that the problem with DC is not the characters, but the writers and lack of structure from editors.

@dmessmer: medusa? really i thought it was obvious that Hera turn the amazon to snake and Hippolyta into stone

@darknightspideyfanboy: Well, once again we run into the whole problem of ambiguity. I don't know, given the story's roots in Greek mythology, the fact that one character was turned to stone and the place was littered with snakes, it's hard not to think of Medusa (though I assume, if it was Medusa, she was acting on Hera's bidding). But again, I'm not sure.

@sinisteri: I was thinking about this myself the other day. It's not like she's one of the Percy Jackson demigods who grew up in modern society. She grew up in a culture that centers around the Ancient Greek gods and I haven't once seen her pray, sacrifice to, or swear by any god. It was a bit disconcerting to see her beating up these beings that she was previously supposed to have worshiped.

@akindoodle:

Yep, a serious disconnect with a key dynamic of the character. There is almost no reverence from Diana to her gods even before the heritage revelation. Even if WW is not immortal, she exists from the gods blessing her people with immortality and the safety which produced her.

Then again, if Poseidon appeared to anyone looking like a kindergarten kid's drawing, it would be hard to respect him or his street level thug or vagabond depicted kin.

This is a sad missing element of WW which is fundamental to her character and one of the most charming elements that speak to her true background and character.

@sinisteri: Funny thing is, in this day and age, religion usually isn't central to a plot or character. Wonder Woman and her title is one of the exceptions and whether you consider it mythology or not, Hellenism is a religion and it's her religion, at least to my understanding. The opposing argument is maybe she's like a lot of us who are simply Christian, Muslim or Jew by birth and not actually practicing.

It was especially disconcerting to me when she was fighting her namesake: Artemis (Diana in Roman mythology). I don't mind if she does battle with some of the gods - Greek mythology is full of instances where the gods squabbled and humans had to take sides (the Trojan War, for instance). And she has worked with some of the gods in a positive way - Hephaestus, Ares, and Eros, for instance.

But you're absolutely right that there is no sense of worship or even basic deference to the gods at all, which is odd. Maybe if Azzarello would incorporate Aphrodite and Athena into the story it might work a bit better, but overall he seems to be getting away from the roots of the character. I wish DC would just give him the New Gods solo title that he obviously wants to write (and would write well) and give Wonder Woman to someone who is invested in the character a bit more.

As much as I love Azzarello's run, that bothered me so much. I was wondering why it's never been brought up that they are namesakes in some weird, regional and time displaced sense or why, in fact, her name is "Diana". That's Latin. The Amazons have Greek roots. Unless Hippolyta took some strange fancy to Latin over the centuries, it makes little sense. The Perez explanation worked quite well; it was a foreign name to them, they wanted to honour Trevor's mother.

I'd also love to see some solid father-daughter interaction between Diana and Zeus if he ever shows up. I mean, there's no point in adding him to her origin if he's not explored directly i.e. we actually SEE him and not just know of his personality from venomous hearsay. Juicy character development for Diana in store there.

@akindoodle:

Are you serious?

We are talking about Diana/Wonder Woman who was raised by a race of warrior women on an island the gods made possible and who for most her life she thought bestowed her with life. Her whole world consisted of knowing and worshipping them-- not just Sundays and bible study week. It's not like she has denounced them or changed denominations.

Comments like yours supports the idea that there are readers who truly do not know Wonder Woman which makes it easy to accept anything just called Wonder Woman.

Religion is not central to all characters, but it is a core essential to characters like Wonder Woman, Thor, Shazam, etc. as it is part of their origin, source of their power, and raisin d'être.

@sinisteri: No, no, no. I'm not saying that at all. I was simply including the opposite argument in my post to balance it. I also said I believe religion's essential to her character and stories because - oh for God's sake, go back and read my post in it's entirety; I'm not explaining myself all over again. In fact, I think if they wanted to continue down this non-religious path, she should at least be having a crisis of faith. Comic characters rarely have that. The only one I've seen is Helena Bertinelli in Birds of Prey.

@akindoodle:

Most of what you are saying is solid, but the opposing argument could only work with Diana if she was only focusing on her religion on Sundays and it was not part of every bit of her world, an isolated world based on the gods who visited and interacted with her.

WW could have a crisis of faith, but she has not.

Something is terribly missing with this current version of WW.

@sinisteri: The opposing argument works with anyone, at any time; even people who have never seen the inside of a church or mosque before. It doesn't have to be part of their lives at all. It's just what they call themselves. Besides, Ancient Greeks didn't worship on Sundays; Sundays didn't exist back then (Joking, I know I'm not supposed to take it literally... am I?)

Anyway, I agree. The religious aspect is missing despite the presence of the gods (well, some of them). I remember an issue in the Rucka run where Athena manipulated Diana and a few others into killing Medusa. Diana lost her eye sight and the life of a close friend's son. She was heart broken but even when she questioned Athena's actions, she did it through Ares with respect and caution because she was scared of what she might do and its consequences if she asked in person (though the being blind part may have played a little role too). That kind of character development appeals to me; it's not just social or psychological but... spiritual, I guess.

@akindoodle:

Agree.

It could happen to anyone. With Diana, it would not just be a loss of faith but a parting of ways. And as noted, she would still not tread lightly in the presence of the gods or not respect their power.