    |
 By
the mid 1970s there was a substancial growing of female
protagonism on television. That was the perfect moment for a
character -designed as a feminine symbol- to land on the small
screen. Yes, it's Wonder Woman, La Mujer Maravilla. Let's find
out why in spite of its success it was a short-lived series. |
 |
|
Since
ancient times man showed a remarkable tendency to create heroes as a
symbol of liberation. Remember the Gods and Heroes of Roman-Greek
mythology, Hercules, Teseus, Icarus, etc... Modern society it's no
exception, and the American culture proved to be the craddle for
modern myths. By the end of the 1930s and the beginning of the 1940s,
famous comics characters were born to become a cultural phenomenon.
Superman appeared for the first time in Action Comics in 1938 (though
it was created in 1932) by the hand of writer Jerome Siegel and artist
Joe Shuster. The following year and as a response to Superman's
succes, Detective Comics creates a new character by the hand of Bob
Kane: Batman, the caped crusader. It wouldn't take long for these two
characters to become the idols of thousands of kids across the
country. ¿What boy wouldn't identify with any of these two heroes?
However girls didn't have a character to identify with. The answer
would come by the hand of a psychologist named William Moulton Marston
(the inventor of the lie-detector) who, under the pen-name of Charles
Moulton, and, using his vast knowledge of human sexuality, created in
1941 a superheroine which would be the symbol of goodness and
discipline: Wonder Woman. Along with Superman and Batman it would be
the most popular character in comics and the longest running too. |
|
 THE
ORIGINS |
|
| The
first appearance was in the number 8 of All Star Comics. Then it
appeared in Sensation Comics and then in its own publication. Wonder
Woman came from Paradise Island. A lost world of heroic and inmortal
Amazons ruled by Queen Hyppolita -who was guided by Goddesses
Aphrodite and Athena- and whose origins go back to 200 B.C. With the
help of Athena, Queen Hyppolita gave life to her daughter Diana to a
statue embued with "the breath of life". Then Diana was
visited by several Gods and Goddesses who granted her different gifts.
Aphrodite gave her the gift of kindness; Minerva gave her all the
wisdom of the universe; Mercury gave her the speed; and finally
Hercules gave her the strength, even superior to that of his own. When
all men from the kingdom died (and trying to avoid the later
domination by enemy men), Queen Hippolyte decided to migrate to a new
world. This way, after a long voyage, and after crossing the mist of
eternal youth, the Amazons arrive to a paradisiacal island which they
name Paradise Island. So the centuries passed on, until the Gods saw
humanity threated by a World War. It was then when they decided that
Major Steve Trevor would crash land on the isle, and, one of the
Amazons, the strongest of them, should travel with him to the world of
men "to help defeat the forces of hate and repression".
Princess Diana falls in love with the Mayor and in spite of her
mother's wishes she participates in the tournament which would
determine who's the chosen Amazon. It's finally her, who, thanks to
her prowesses in combat, will go with Mayor Trevor back to the States.
With the beauty of Aphrodite, as wise as Minerva, as fast as Mercury
and as strong as Hercules himself, Princess Diana counts with the help
of an invisible plane, a golden lasso who controls the wishes of
everyone who's lassoed, her bracelets which help her to repel bullets,
her golden belt, and a band of teenagers called the Holliday Girls.
Once in the States she adopts the secret personality of Diana Prince,
Navy Secretary, just to be close to the man she secretly loves, Steve
Trevor... |
|
| WOMEN
GET FREE! |
|
| Her
adventures came to life by the naïve and dreamy hand of Harry
G. Peter. With her own scripts the gallery of foes was spreading
to include regular criminals, perverse Gods, and a countless
number of archvillains. Among them we find Clea, the sub-oceanic
Queen, Flamina, Queen of the Sun, and the feline Cheetah. |
|
| Dr.
Marston's stories showed a smart and imaginative use of rules of
psychological connotations, especially those dealing with
domination. For instance, Wonder Woman could only be defeated by
a man only if she was chained with her bracelets together.
Marston (or Moulton) designed his character for the girls as an
enduring symbol for their feminist adulthood. Moulton dealt with
topics such as "The cruel despotism of masculine
agressiveness"..., and his character was shouting:
"Think and get free!" |
|
|
Dr.
Marston died in 1947, only a few years after Peter's death.
After their deaths, the comic changed considerably losing the
direction designed by the creator. Writer Robert Kanigher was
the new one in charge and artists Ross Andru and Mike Epsosito
gave her a new life in a lighter version. 20 years later, in 1968,
Mike Sekowsky (responsible for Supergirl) and Samuel R. Delany
reshaped Wonder Woman once again with a modern look and a
partner called I Ching. Though Sekowsky's reshaping was far |
| from
Moulton's original ideas, it provided with stories full of
action and sadism (cool!). In 1972 the feminist mag Miss
published a compilation of Wonder Woman stories. But the sales
indefectibly decreased and in 1973 they tried to go back to
Moulton's concept. It was late though and it would
never be the same. |
|
| A
PRODUCT OF ITS TIME |
|
| By
the beginning of the 1960s television was escapist, but the times
and the American society were changing. This way, the period
which expanded from the late 1960s through the mid 1970s was flooded
with atypical programming for the American TV. The level of
violence was raising and it was common to see murders and rapes
in prime time. And not only in drama series but also in sitcoms.
Another topic changing was that of the role of women, who were
leaving behind the image of the typical dependant wife to become
the liberated woman trying to equal the position of men. While
the level of violence was cooling down by the mid 1970s, the
feminine protagonism started to grow by 1975. |
|
|
At
that time half of the television shows had women as their leads,
and at least half of them were also leading in the ratings. By
the other hand ABC (under the direction of Fred Silverman) had
already started the "Age of Fantasy" with a lot of
successful shows of light plots and women as lead stars.
Among them Charlie's Angels and The Bionic Woman. In 1967,
William Dozier, producer of the Batman series, showed interest
in developing a series about the Amazon Princess. He summoned Stan Hart
and Larry Siegel to develop a script for a half an hour series.
There were some retouches by the hand of Stanley Ralph Ross, but
with the failure of The Green Hornet, the idea never went
further than a 4-minute presentation. Apparently everything was
given for Wonder Woman to take life of its own into the small
screen. |
|
|
The
project was in the hands of Warner Bros. Television who owned
the rights of the character. The first attempt was by the
beginning of 1974 with a pilot telefilm shown by ABC on
March 12, 1974, starring tennis pro Cathy Lee Crosby, a plain
blonde whithout too much luck in show bussiness. That telefilm
was no exception in her career. |
|
|
In
fact the film gained a poor ratings level... Ironically,
while Wonder Woman was trying to go back the her origins in the
comics, the classic costume and the classic stories, the TV
counterpart was doing the opposite. This first attempt with
Crosby, was a light-hearted version set in modern times,
obviating its origin. By the other hand (and continuing with the
infidelities to the comics) this Wonder Woman was blonde and her
costume showed no resemblance to the one of the comics. Diana
(her last name is never mentioned) is a special government agent
whose code name is "Wonder Woman" -though there's no
wonder in her. No powers were shown either: to transform into Wonder Woman
she only has to let her hair loosen. In a few words,
unrecognizable for those who have followed the character
faithfully. Beyond that, the script was dull and the direction
lacked of any wit, brilliance or anything that deserves to be
mentioned for a second. The plot was childish, the rhythm
monotonous and the sets were not the envy of any school
production. John D.F. Black was the script-writer and, to have a
more precise idea of his intelligence level we have a clear
example: when Abner Smith runs away with the money, Diana takes
a look around in search of something that helps her to pursue
the villain. By pure chance -or rather thanks to the prodigious
magic of television and Black's prolific imagination- there's
(surprise! surprise!) a motorcycle standing in the middle of the
living room awaiting for the Amazon... This kind of occurences
are recurring during the 78 minutes in an inconceivable
exhibition of incompetence... Vincent McEveety, the director,
was no less and contributed generously with the failure. As for
the cast, if the insipid Crosby gave master classes of a bad
performance, the rest of the cast surpassed her thoroughly,
including Ricardo Montalban who ruins those almost imperceptible
moments of attraction in Black's script and (with stone
ductility) McEveety contributes to make of this pilot a monument
for the television disaster... |
|
|
In
spite of the fiasco, luckily Warner and ABC didn't gave up and
started to work on a new project with The Douglas Cramer Co,
responsible for such TV hits as The Love Boat, Vega$, Matt
Houston or Dynasty. This time producers Douglas S. Cramer and
Wilfred Baumes thought to develop the character more truer to
the original comic, trying to avoid the parodic style of the
Batman from the 60s. The key was to find the appropiate star. At the
beginning they contacted well-known actresses but with the
Crosby precedent they rejected the role whithout thinking too
much about it. It was then when they began a frantic search to
find their Wonder Woman. Lyle Waggoner was chosen to play Major
Steve Trevor, though there was a slight difference in
comparission to that of the comics. Waggoner was not blond.
Stanley Ralph Ross, responsible of developing the script,
decided to use Waggoner for the role, and he in turn contributed
to choose the main character. The chosen one emerged among 2000
applicants, though it was not difficult for her, her stunning
beauty and personality helped to stand out easily among the rest
of the girls. Her name was Lynda Carter, a newcomer who was
climbing the first steps in the stairway to success. Once the
star was chosen there was nothing left but to start to work and
begin with the shooting. Leonard Horn was the chosen director,
in whose resumé we found episodes of series like Hawaii 5-0,
Ironside, The Mod Squad, Police Woman and Voyage To The Bottom
Of The Sea. The telefilm was premiered on Friday November 7,
1975 at 8:00 PM on ABC, who in spite of being eskeptical at the very
beginning they accepted the new challenge and made a good promoting
campaign. The ad read: "The most fantastic woman you've
ever seen is on the screen!". |
|
|
Although
Lynda Carter was not a very experimented actress she made a perfect Wonder Woman. At least she overcame vastly the
producer's expectations. In an interview to Lynda Carter
published in The Los Angeles Times on 1977 they
concluded: "Her chat is always accompained with a dazzling
smile, so naïve and delicious that she seems to mock of the
things she says..." The executives of Warner and ABC were
worried because they thought Lynda's voluptuous figure would be
more noticeable than the role itself. But her smile was the
solution. "The naïvete of that smile would bring balance
to the sensuality of her body" said the producers. No real
Amazon would give the character the beauty and imposing of
Lynda. Her height and size, her long legs and her stunning
blueish-greenish eyes filled Wonder Woman's gear with grace. Her
presence was strong and noticeable. The telefilm was all a
success and Wonder Woman fans from the comics easily identified
with the character. |
|
|
Wonder
Woman left her home on Paradise Island to travel to the USA and
defend the country of the German threat during World War II. Her
enemies were mainly a gallery of Nazi agents in their different
shapes, and even an alien from outer space. All of them ended up
under Wonder Woman's domination who saves with grace her lovely
Steve Trevor (Lyle Waggoner) a countless number of times proving
that those stories of the week sex were only a myth. This first
series was colorful and the scripts were closer to Moulton's
original concept. Queen Hyppolita, played by Cloris Leachman, is
in charge to describe us the life of the Amazons as a society,
which has its origin after a rebellion against the Roman men's
domination. Hyppolita highlights the benefits of a society of
women and states: "that's why sisterhood reigns". This
super woman arrives to the United States and finds a new world.
Not so much later our Amazon wants to make her ideals shown and
when she faces Nazi spy Marsha (Stella Stevens) she let her know
that "Nazis, like all civilizations who defer women are
destined to disappear". Marsha replies that it's beens
everal years since the Nazis have been slowly conquering the
world, and Wonder Woman says: "I heard the same from the
Romans". Nevertheless, subtlety, the script writer makes it
clears who dominates who when we see a Nazi reading
"Time". Undoubtedly, the responsible for this sutile
and sarcastic touches was Stanley Ralph Ross -to whom we should
thank many of the best episodes of Batman, The Mod Squad or
Starsky & Hutch. |
|
|
Ross'
script was adequate, and smartly avoided the typical Batman
dialogues. Nevertheless, sometimes it dangerously reached the
edges of campiness, something that they were trying to avoid.
The action scenes lacked of any display of special effects, but
they revealed a great creativity. The producers tried to capture
the main features of the comics and bring them into the screen
with a good setting of the 1940s and the rhythm of the 1970s.
Although some aspects were not so carefully developed (like the
setting of Paradise Island who resembled a modern loft instead
of the home of the inheritors of the culture of the Aegean Sea),
they tried to fix this little by little. The heart of the series
was shown in the opening titles: colorful vignettes synthesise
the skills of the Amazon Princess, they come to life in the
stunning image of Lynda Carter in a victorious pose admitting
complicity with the audience, all of this accompanied with a
typical 1970s beat presenting Wonder Woman in society. |
|
|
Inexplicably, and in spite of
the success of this second pilot, ABC did not know how to develop the series, and so, only two more episodes were ordered, both of which would be presented as specials toward the end of the season: WW Meets Baroness Von Gunther, and Fausta, The Nazi Wonder Woman. It was not a question of network executives not appreciating the series. Actually, they were quite pleased with viewer response. The truth is that the series was used by ABC as a secret weapon against rival networks CBS and NBC. In fact, Wonder Woman saved the network on several occasions. ABC erratically used the series as a filler for The Bionic Woman while Lindsay Wagner recovered from a car accident. These two follow-up specials, like the pilot, were also successful, although viewers were left in the dark regarding the series' continuity, as well as when to expect new episodes. All would become clear the following season. At the start of the season, ABC once again irregularly aired three episodes, which were later followed by several episodes which were aired semi-regularly between December, 1976 and January, 1977. |
|
|
Lyle Waggoner made an ideal Major Trevor, who in spite of the character's traits, was warm and affable, without necessarily having to come across as an idiot. Another character which stood out in the series was the chunky Etta Candy, played by Beatrice Colen. Cloris Leachman was Queen Hyppolita, and Debra Winger (in her small screen debut) made a perfect Drusilla/Wonder Girl. Without a doubt, the first season of Wonder Woman was well fleshed out in every respect. Even though the range of villains was limited to Nazis, the writers knew how to confer sufficiently individual personalities onto them, and in many cases the actors playing these roles filled their characters' shoes very well. |
|
| CRITICS,
IDENTIFICATIONS AND JUSTIFICATIONS |
|
| In
Argentina the pilot was aired Wednesday, August 31, 1977 at 9pm, as part of La Noche del 13, and the series was thenceforth aired every Thursday in the same time slot. Wonder Woman was channel 13's most popular show that season, and was very well received by critics. Argentina's leading newspaper Clarín wrote: "The show acknowledges and does not deny its style, the heritage of the comic strip. Purposely unpolished, mocking and sarcastic as well... More fun than other series which attempt to integrate the feminine into the world of violent adventure, without falling prey to the obvious clichés of The Bionic Woman or Charlie's Angels, this Wonder Woman is as mad as the comic strip, something which turns out to be invigorating for television." |
|
|
Wonder Woman became a hit on Argentine television, and beat out its two big competitors at the time, The Bionic Woman and Charlie's Angels. As early as its first month on the air, the show easily made its way to first place in the ratings, peaking at 31.9 points. Competing in the same time slot were Esta Noche Show on channel 9 (5 ratings points), another show on channel 7 (6 points) and Raiz y Canto on channel 11 with 10 ratings points. Even though no other show in the same time slot could overshadow its success, neither was any other series which exceeded its ratings. The much hyped and awaited Charlie's Angels achieved an average of 22 points, while The Bionic Woman averaged 21.7 points, and all other shows averaged under 10 points. In contrast with Charlie's Angels, which was widely advertized and promoted, Wonder Woman made it to the small screen with barely any publicity. Nevertheless it became an immediate hit, and steadily maintained its ratings average. The thoroughly feminist message of the series quickly took with local audiences, which had been bored by a regimen of shows which were neither wondrous nor womanly. |
|
| THE
RETURN |
|
| The new season was about to begin, and ABC seemed none too decisive about continuing with the series. It was then that Alan Sloane (chairman of Warner Brothers) offered to sell it to CBS, which offered a fixed weekly time slot. The producers accepted without a second thought, and began developing the show for CBS. It occured to them that they should make some changes in the series, as had been done with the comic book at various times throughout its history. The bulk of the viewing audience was comprised of adolescents, but now the producers wanted to attract a more adult audience. It was for this reason that they decided to modernize the title heroine. A new version of the show was developed, set in the seventies, titled The New Adventures of Wonder Woman. The new season opened with a two-hour special titled The Return of Wonder Woman, in which the stage was set for the amazon's return to Man's World after a 32-year retirement. The new production updated her costume and changed the format, adding more action, a new rogue's gallery, and a more "geopolitical" tone, in keeping with the times. So as not to kill off the character of Steve Trevor, in the new series he was passed off as the son of the Major who fought in the Second World War. However, in the updated version the character lost the warmth of the first version, and became an irrelevent and almost unnecessary character who wound up making fewer and briefer appearances toward the end of the series. The only thing which remained from the show's prior format was its feminist message, albeit with slightly differing connotations. |
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|
At the start of the new season Steve Trevor, a government agent, together with Diana Prince, were sent on missions by the Inter-Agency Defense Command. Diana Prince, who now owned a Mercedes convertible, was sent on assignment by Steve Trevor, who once more became her boss, and she sometimes received help from the I.A.D.C.'s super computer, IRAC. No longer bound by the limitations of the WWII era, the villains were no longer restricted to Nazis. However, despite the profusion of villains which appeared in episode after episode, the second series did not manage to equal the success of the first, which had been more faithful to the comic book, and it turned out to be just another typical '70's show. After two years it was cancelled. |
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|
The first episodes of this new season lacked the suspense and action needed to consider them superior to their predecessors, but at mid-season there was a rapid change in tactics, as producer Bruce Lansbury was added on. He tried to recapture the innocence and charm of the ABC shows. At first the ratings were successfully raised, but much of the adult audience which had been won was now lost. The producers exploited Lynda Carter's beauty to the utmost, showing as many action scenes as possible featuring the super-heroine, who was ably doubled by stuntwomen Kitty O'Neal, Jeannie and Stephanie Epper, and Debbie Evans. The Amazon Princess ran and leapt ceaselessly, in unnecessary ostentation of her powers. Diana Prince figured more prominently in the stories, although she had lost the characteristic of being Wonder Woman's alter ego, which had been what made the character relevant. Also lost was the humorous touch which had characterized the original series. Lynda Carter made a notable effort to make her lines seem humorous but the scripts did not help much, and so the show wound up falling back on those stupid jokes which no one gets. This is why it is better to recall that first version of the show which, as Clarín stated when it first aired: "Is full of subtleties, but never denies its basic nature as mad adventure, heir to a tradition in which punches are multi-colored stars whose effects are spirals and singing birds, something which our TV lacks." But, for a more exact impression and a more personal evaluation, we can still view this classic on Universo every Sunday at 11am on our local cable systems. |
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|
Recently an attempt was made to resurrect Wonder Woman for television, but the project was put on hold indefinitely. However, there are rumors that the much requested and anticipated major motion picture is currently in production. Even if no one knows exactly what treatment comics' premier super-heroine will undergo, it is highly probable that the production will follow the style of the Batman films of the '90's, with the big screen version of the character closely resembling that of the current comics, while reflecting the acidic and penetratingly gritty face of our times. Nevertheless it will be difficult to forget the impacting presence which Lynda Carter infused into the character. And who, as in the case of Christopher Reeve (his tragic ordeal notwithstanding), can convince us that Lynda Carter is not
really Wonder Woman? |
