Summary
- Wonder Woman‘s ending remains divisive due to the shift to a generic CGI-heavy battle, which some felt undermined the subversive approach and meaningful themes of the rest of the movie.
- The decision for the Ares battle was pushed by Warner Bros., despite director Patty Jenkins agreeing with criticisms about it being too big and lacking terror.
- Despite the lackluster final act, Wonder Woman still received praise for Gal Gadot’s performance and her chemistry with Chris Pine, making the movie enjoyable overall.
As the character’s future in the upcoming franchise reboot remains unclear, Screen Rant‘s own Pitch Meeting series is looking back on its Wonder Woman-focused episode. The 2017 movie served as the fourth installment in Warner Bros.’ DC Extended Universe, exploring the origins of the titular Amazonian heroine and her first interactions with humanity during World War I. Though failing to maintain the franchise’s highest-grossing record, the movie remained the best-reviewed installment in the DCEU up to its recent conclusion with Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, even earning a sequel with 2020’s Wonder Woman 1984, though it scored generally mixed reviews and underperformed at the box office due to its pandemic release.
With the movie quickly approaching its six-year anniversary, the latest episode of Screen Rant‘s Pitch Meeting has revisited its Wonder Woman analysis. The video, as seen at the top of this article, sees host Ryan George looking back favorably on his original episode, which noted many flaws in the DCEU movie, particularly its “silly” second half and falling into certain genre tropes, namely the romance that blooms between Gal Gadot’s Diana and Chris Pine’s Steve.
Why Wonder Woman’s Ending Remains One Of The DCEU’s Most Divisive
While still regarded as one of the genuinely best DCEU efforts in spite of some of the flaws referenced by George in the original Pitch Meeting, the Wonder Woman ending remains one of the more divisive in the franchise’s run. After successfully killing Danny Huston’s Ludendorff, Diana is disheartened to see that the German soldiers continue to carry out their war activities, seemingly establishing that Ares’ grip on humanity had either passed the breaking point, or that Ludendorff wasn’t actually the God of War. The latter ultimately proved true, as David Thewlis’ Sir Patrick revealed himself to be the god in hiding, resulting in an all-out brawl.
Given much of Wonder Woman leading up to this point took a subversive approach to the superhero genre, putting a strong female character at the forefront and making the male protagonist her sidekick instead of vice versa, and explored some meaningful themes, the decision to go for a generic CGI-heavy battle became a point of debate. Some argued that it was a necessity for something in the comic book genre, while others felt it largely undermined what director Patty Jenkins had done with the rest of the movie, as well as that of WWI as a whole. The effects themselves were also largely criticized as being too dull and incomprehensible, with Ares’ design failing to capture the level of terror clearly intended for him.
Patty Jenkins previously confirmed that the original Wonder Woman ending was much “smaller“, but that WB pushed for the Ares battle, and that she “agreed” with many criticisms about it.
In spite of this lackluster final act, Wonder Woman still has enough going for it during the rest of its runtime to forgive it. Gadot not only earned widespread acclaim for her performance as the titular DC heroine, but her chemistry with Pine was considerably palpable, making the fish-out-of-water comedy aspects all the more effective as Diana learned of the world through Steve’s teachings. With James Gunn’s impending DC Universe reboot seemingly killing off any chances of a Wonder Woman 3, one can hope that the new DC Studios co-CEO finds someone as compelling as Gadot to bring the Amazonian warrior back to the screen.
Source: Pitch Meeting
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