Wonder Woman’s defeat of The Tetracide in the Battle of Gateway City has finished, but then she falls into the underworld! The new storyline, “The Lady or The Tiger” is a two part story, by Kelly Thompson and new artist Mattia De Iulis. He worked with Thompson on the Image Comics limited series, The Cull. The dark red and black cover by Hayden Sherman has Wonder Woman in closeup holding her Nemesis lasso! Wonder Woman kneels and removes her helmet under the dark words of the ruler of the Underworld, Hades! He is another long time foe making his debut in Wonder Woman #16 (1946)! The ghostly form of Hades in blue, dripping with the ectoplasm, pale eyes, and red crown. He says she cannot leave the Underworld!
Wonder Woman counters that she has already escaped and Hades says he wants to know how she left the Underworld. He commands a spirit servant to remove her weapons. The servant reports that there are no weapons. Hades says she is a weapon and asks her to take off her weapons. Closeups as she removes her tiara, greaves, her leg armor, and vambraces, her armor around her arms. Diana counters that a god wouldn’t be afraid of weapons. Removing her cloak. Hades says back that is curiosity. She asks if she can keep her boots as she removes her cuirass, chest armor, spiked almost like Hades' crown. She hs on a tunic, skirt, gloves, and her boots. Hades says he can smell her enchanted pouch like a cartoon. She empties the pouch. We see three lassos, gold, green, the Lasso of Submission, and red. I like the three lassos like the Lassos of Fate wielded by Trinity, Lizzie Marston!
Hades asks for the red lasso, Diana warns against it, and we get the servant wracked with pain as Wonder Woman says she is only one to use it. She explains that she and her mother live in the deadly Wild Isle so any weapon could only be used by them. Hades steps down from his throne and asks what materials are in the Nemesis Lasso. Wonder Woman says that Circe gave her small plants and this moved to feathers of a fire bird. Finally she sent her to Prometheus, the Titan who gave the gift of fire. This first time that mythological Prometheus has appeared. In the past, Diana is climbing Mount Prometheus, “on the borders of myth and reality.” She climbs the mountain lit by lightning. In a splash page, below the storm clouds is the giant form of the bound Promethesus, and below him is Diana back lit and carrying her axe! Epic poster worthy image!
She cuts her arm on the axe and it begins glowing gold. Diana tosses the axe and it shatters Prometheus’ chains! In the first season of Xena: Warrior Princess, the duo of Xena and Hercules frees the Titan in “Prometheus” (1995). He was freed by Hercules according to Hesiod. Diana says it only a brief time away from his punishment by Zeus. They look up to see dark form of the eagle that will eat his immortal liver. It lands on her arm and she tells it that gods can be wrong. Diana vows her friendship to it for spreading the message to the other eagles. She says that even though eagles won’t harm him, Zeus may find some other animal to torture Prometheus. She offers a pouch enchanted by Circe to always be filled with water. Prometheus says Circe and her daughter are clever. Diana bows and asks for a vial of his blood to power a weapon to protect humanity with a weapon of “fire and justice.”
He says she can cut the tip of his finger for flesh, blood, and “something else.” Prometheus says that he can see into the future, a “dangerous path” is set for her. She agrees slicing into the finger tip! Ouch! Diana collects the piece of flesh and then fills the vial with the blood dripping from Prometheus’ finger. He says he has one last gift and ignites a fire. Prometheus says it was born from Medusa’s blood and killed by Zeus. Now it is reborn from his blood. Zeus destroyed it when the hero Bellerophon tried to reach Mount Olympus. The black skeletal Pegasus rises from the magma. A nice origin. Back at the now of Hades’ throne room, Hades says that he senses another part of the lasso, “dark and venmous”, Wonder Woman responds that it is the basilisk. She says the last basilisk was sent by Zeus to kill her. It rraveled to the Wild Isle to find her, flashback, we have Diana finding it first asleep in its cave. It is a massive, horned serpent similiar to the basilisk in the Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002) film. Pliny the Elder described it as “not more than twelve inches in length.”
Diana approaches it with her enchanted axe. Then, suddenly the eye of the King of the Serpents snaps open and it hisses. Now this feels like the giant snake in Conan the Barbarian (1982). Its gaze is lethal, but Diana is protected by blinding herself with spells. It makes me think of Wonder Woman #210 blinding herself with Medusa’s snake venom to defeat her! The last basilisk rises up and Diaan runs to take out what looks like a glowing eye ball from her pouch. She throws the smellly globe at the basilisk which is vulnerable to the smell. The legendary basilisk was senssitive to weasel scent. It rears up, Diana says she also removed her sense of smell. Then, rushes to defeat the last of the basilisk! Hades mentions that she must have used the body and blood of basilisk with her mother. There is a shocking secret that Hades has been hiding! There is also two stories of “Li’l Diana” with art by Dustin Nguyen. Fun stories like the Young Diana Story backcups that started in Wonder Woman #770 (2021). Absolute Wonder Woman #6 looks back in Diana’s story about her lasso, how Pegasus returned, and one pagers about Li’l Diana!
Four Athena Blades out of Five!
#AbsoluteWonderWoman, #TheLadyOrTheTiger, #KellyThompson, #MattiaDe Iulis, #HaydenSherman, #DustinNguyen, #WonderWoman, #Prometheus, #Pegasus, #Hades
No comments:
Post a Comment