I finally got to watch Wonder Woman and I have to say, it's amazing what color and fun can do for a movie.
The film is everything I hoped that it'd be. It was fun, interesting, exciting, thrilling, touching, and they even added in some humor for good measure. The scenes on Themyscira were gorgeous and vibrant. I kept having to remind myself that this was actually a DC movie because, again, colors. They don't make you wait long at all to get the meat of the story either. The battle that takes place on Themyscira happens relatively early in the film. For those concerned about Gal Gadot don't be. Her acting in this movie was top notch. Her chemistry with Chris Pine was one of the absolute best things about the movie. She more than lives up to the potential she showed in BvS. Of course the big story here is the movie being a female led movie with a female director. Yay woman power, but the film doesn't hit you over the head with that at all. Yes it's a female led movie, however, never once did I get the impression that they were trying to say that this is finally a woman's time or that men are dogs. Sure they talk about the vices and corruption of men all throughout the movie but that was more about mankind, not just the male sex. Then there's the action, OMG the action. The action in this movie was wonderful and also practical. Anyone who is a comic book fan knows that Wonder Woman is very durable but she's not invincible. So throughout the movie she's constantly shifting from offense to defense and back again. She'll take out a bad guy, block a few bullets with her wrist bands or shield and then go back to kicking ass. It was very well done.
All in all, what really makes this movie so much better than the other DCEU films is that it has heart. It's not just throwing action and special effects at the wall to see what sticks. It has a clear and rather simple message and it does a damn good job of conveying that message. Diana is very naive in the ways of mankind and throughout the movie that creates numerous funny fish out of water scenes, but it also creates very touching and emotional scenes where Diana is angry at people for not trying to do all they can to help. When she climbs up that latter out of the trench to cross no man's land, I got kind of teary eyed. That entire sequence is breath taking. Not just for the superb action but for the acting and the message that it conveys.
The only gripe that I have about this movie is that the villains are too Saturday morning cartoonish. There's even a scene where two of the villains begin to laugh and cackle over their diabolical scheme. Also, the main villain isn't nearly fleshed out enough. They could've done so much more with them. It seems that Ledger's Joker and Hiddleston's Loki is going to forever be the yard stick for great villains. That's a Marvel gripe too. Get it together people.
Wonder Woman is a damn good film and far and away the best in the DCEU. I know that's faint praise so let me clarify. It's the best DC film since Dark Knight. Even better than Dark Knight Rises and better than a lot of the solo Marvel films as well. If I were giving a grade, it'd be an A-.
To each their own.
