Opposing a Wonder
Unlike Superman or Batman, Wonder Woman hasn’t got an extensive rogues gallery, but here are some of the more significant villains she has come up against.
AFTER the year we’ve been having, we all need a little wonder in our lives. Thankfully, we have Wonder Woman 1984 (WW84) to look forward to at the end of the year.
Initially slated for June this year, the movie was delayed numerous times due to Covid-19, and was just recently moved again, from Oct 2 to Dec 25 (now that’s the sort of Christmas gift we can look forward to!).
While we don’t need more reasons to look forward to WW84, we do have one slight concern – Wonder Woman’s rogues gallery. With Marvel setting the benchmark for ‘quality’ villains with Thanos, just being plain evil or despicable doesn’t quite cut it anymore.
Like Superman, Wonder Woman tends to be so powerful that it is had to find villains that can match her level. While Cheetah is arguably her bestknown arch-nemesis, the only antagonists that can arguably rival Wonder Woman in terms of power and status are the Godlevel ones such as Ares, Circe, First Born and even Artemis (who is more of a rival than a villain).
To make things worse, a quick look at her regular rogues’ gallery throws up frankly ridiculous names like Egg Fu, Blue Snowman, Crimson Centipede, Inversion The Inside-out Man, Paper Man, Mouse Man, Doctor Domino and Fireworks Man.
With Ares already dealt with in the first movie, I’m hoping that the long-awaited appearance of Cheetah, and the threat of Maxwell Lord will be able to make a bigger impact. For now, let’s find out more about the main villains in Wonder Woman 1984, and also check out some of Diana’ more prominent adversaries.
Cheetah
Created by William Moulton Marston, Cheetah has been Wonder Woman’s arch-enemy since 1943 (Wonder Woman (Vol.1) #6), which automatically grants her top billing in any article featuring the Amazonian Princess’ villains.
In total, there have been four different incarnations of this character – Priscilla Rich (Golden and Silver Age), Deborah Domaine (Bronze Age), Barbara Ann Minerva (the current Cheetah), and Sebastian Ballesteros (a man who briefly assumed the role in 2001 but was later killed by Minerva).
While the first two Cheetahs were just criminals who dressed up in cheetah costumes, the Minerva and Ballestros versions at least have superhuman powers, which makes them more than a match for Diana.
For what it’s worth, Minerva is the most significant Cheetah of them all. A British heiress with a passion for archaeology, she gained her powers during African expedition in which she became a servant of the ancient plant god Urzkartaga. By eating a combination of human blood and the berries or leaves of Urzkartaga, she is given cheetah-like powers, complete with orange skin with black spots, a tail and claws.
Maxwell Lord
In the comics, Lord is famous and infamous for two things – forming the Justice League International and having his neck broken by Wonder Woman
(Infinite Crisis).
Traditionally, Lord isn’t a pure Wonder Woman villain, and I suppose his inclusion is more because of the significant role in her comics story, especially the aforementioned neck-breaking episode, the
Wonder Woman: Earth One tale and the Cold War setting of WW84.
Circe
Now here’s someone who is more on the same level as Wonder Woman. Circe is modelled after the same Greek mythology sorceress who imprisoned Odysseus, and has a passion for humiliating her opponents. More of a schemer (ala Thanos) but also able to go mystical as well as physical when needed.
Though, Circe first appeared in 1949 (Wonder Woman (Vol.1) #37), she only gained prominence 40 years later, courtesy of George Perez’s post-crisis reboot. Since then, her level of villainy has increased, among the reasons include the confusion over a prophecy regarding who will get to possess the soul of the goddess Hecate.
First Born
In terms of brute strength, none of Wonder Woman’s rogues can rival the First Born – who has even strangled Ares to death and pried open a Boom Tube with his bare hands!
He’s not pure-brawn either, as the First Born also possesses the telepathic ability to manipulate and control lesser beings.
Co-created in 2012 by Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang (Wonder Woman (Vol.4) #13), the First Born is the “first born child” of Zeus and Hera. However, his birth was kept a dark secret due to a prophecy that he would sit upon the throne of his father with the rest of the family, with corpses all around him.
To prevent this, Zeus arranged for his infant son’s death, but this eventually led to a long battle between father and son, with Wonder Woman caught in between.
Veronica Cale
Every nigh omnipotent superhero needs a Lex Luthor-type villain and Cale is Wonder Woman’s own personal megalomaniac nemesis. Introduced in 2003 (Wonder Woman (Vol. 2) #196), Cale is extremely wealthy, resourceful, influential and an evil genius to boot. Her hatred for WW is practically fuelled by jealousy over the latter’s power and stature.
Giganta
Possessing the superhuman ability to increase her physical size and mass (becoming, well, gigantic), Giganta has been a Wonder Woman villain since the Golden Age (Wonder Woman (Vol.1) #9).
Her origin story is pretty far-out – Giganta is a gorilla who is artificially mutated into a red-haired strongwoman by a scientist called Professor Zool.
Artemis
Artemis has the indisputable honour of being the only person who has defeated Wonder Woman, and even replacing her.
Hailing from a separate Amazon tribe called the Banamighdall, Artemis bested Diana in a contest (Wonder Woman (Vol.2) #92) arranged by Queen Hippolyta (Wonder Woman’s mother), who rigged the contest to let Artemis win the mantle of Wonder Woman after having visions of her daughter’s death.
Eventually, Artemis found the role too big for her, as she not only struggled with the expected diplomacy in Man’s World, but also failing to win the support of the public and fellow superheroes. Having been in the comics since the 1990s, Artemis may not be a true villain, but she at least has the physical prowess to be a great adversary of the Amazonian Princess.