Primarily an action-packed visual treat, "Wonder Woman" is a coming-of-age love story based on Greek mythology that gets bogged down by wooden voice acting before it becomes anything more than an interesting premise.
Continuing up the side of the wall with the Amazon queen in tow, her opponent's body inevitably lands on the summit. Although impossible for the body to keep flying upward without its head, the sequence is still incredible.
Equally powerful about this sequence is that the rape of Hippolyta by Ares (Alfred Molina) is implied, her bastard son's head is sliced off and an appropriately limited amount of gore tell the graphic story about how The Amazons as a race of women pushed themselves as warriors to escape being slaves to the god of war and his adherents.
Everything that needs to be said about the origin of their way of life and the birth of Wonder Woman (Keri Russell) is done so by the stylistic wielding of bloody swords in the first 10 minutes.
Superb property damage-causing animated violence is one of several great aspects of the 75-minute-long film, most likely because the title character, who is tougher than most mortals, primarily combats supernatural forces.
Clearly more adult than past Warner Bros. Animation-made movies, "Wonder Woman" features moderate curse words, slang and naked Amazons bathing near a waterfall that serve a purpose in humorously showing the differences between the uncouth, violent world of man embodied in the Col. Steve Trevor character (Nathan Fillion) and this paradise populated by eloquent, but painstakingly warrior-like women represented by Diana. These otherwise tasteless elements are not included simply to appeal to the lowest common denominator.
Diana's interplay with Trevor reveals the not-so-feminist argument he makes that not all men want to control women as she was reared to believe, providing the story with a message that is rarely touched on in other films, let alone those that are presented in an animated format. It could have gone entirely the other way.
Ensuring that Diana is not simply portrayed as a femme fatale, she is shown confronting a Manhattan woman who unlike her uses femininity to attract a man of which the Amazon princess seems somewhat possessive, instead of choosing to rely on her own inner strength. Diana also dislikes empty flattery.
As much as the dialogue between Diana and Trevor takes a socially progressive tone, much of it comes off as though not a lot of effort was made by the voice actors to do anything in terms of improvisation to create a convincing sense of romantic chemistry between the two characters other than reading from their scripts.
Overall character dialogue comes off as too dispassionately expositional for viewers to care enough about what happens to the main characters.
Off about the story is the lack of concern Hippolyta shows when Diana, her gift from the gods, turns out to be the one who will be The Amazon's emissary to the outside world when the queen is earlier against allowing her daughter to compete in the qualifying games. Hyppolyta's battle-hardened spirit and respect for the way of the warrior might be enough to excuse her apathy in this instance, but it is very noticeable how her lack of emotion takes away from this sequence.
Even if anyone chooses to accept this explanation, the seriousness of the fatal games in which Diana engages against her mother's wishes is underscored by The Amazons suddenly showing up to aide her in the closing battle against Ares and his myrmidons. Why did they not all leave Themayscira to stop the warring god?
Therein lies the problem that makes "Wonder Woman" an aesthetically stunning cartoon too prone to engage its main characters in battle than have their voice actors explain why anyone should care that they prevail against their enemies.
In the end, it is a battle not worth fighting or watching with too much anticipation to see what happens next.
"Wonder Woman" hits stores in DVD and Blu-Ray format on Tuesday, March 3.
Popcorn rating:(3 1/2 out of 5 pieces)
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