Wonder Woman/Conan #2 review: Things get chummy
By Barlow Adams
A face-off for the ages, and a pirate’s life for me in Wonder Woman/Conan #2.
Wonder Woman/Conan #2
Writer: Gail Simone
Penciller: Aaron Lopresti
Colorist: Wendy Broome
Inked by: Matt Ryan
There is a point in nearly every crossover featuring two well-known heroes where the pair, through some series of unfortunate events or due to an unexpected misunderstanding, square off against each other. It can even be argued that the crossover was born primarily as a vehicle to settle the hypothetical debates of who would win between two heroes who were previously inaccessible to each other due to copyright law.
Gail Simone, the writer of Wonder Woman/Conan, knows that a sizable chunk of her audience has tuned in just to see the Amazon and the barbarian go at it, and she wastes no time pitting the two against each other. The beginning of the second issue finds the two legendary warriors participating in a fight to the death inside a gladiatorial arena.
The Amazon and the Barbarian go toe-to-toe. Credit: Lopresti (DC Entertainment/Dark Horse Comics)
Instead of the grand brawl you may be envisioning, the battle–true to the Hyborian setting and the comic’s Dark Horse influence–is a short, brutal affair, which Conan wins in somewhat dubious fashion when Wonder Woman’s glitchy memory leaves her open for an opportunistic sucker-punch from one of the best to ever do it. Though, it seems clear to me that this won’t be the last time these hot-headed warriors come to blows, the tally has to stand at Conan 1, Wonder Woman 0, two issues in.
While the one-on-one brawl may get top-billing, this series continues to offer as much intimacy as violence, and the relationship between Conan and the amnesic princess continues to deepen in panels that are subdued, poignant, and sensual without being saccharine.
Of particular note are the scenes of a young Conan and his time spent with Yanna, a girl with whom the would-be-barbarian was infatuated with as a child, and who may or may not have grown-up to be the woman we recognize as Wonder Woman.
These sections introduces us to a confident, independent girl who, through the sheer force of her worthiness, challenges not just Conan’s traditionally misogynistic views, but those of the Hyborian Age itself. It’s a credit to Simone that these scenes come through clearly and unapologetically without seeming preachy or political.
A young girl dreams of endless possibility in a world that would limit her potential. Credit: Lopresti (DC Entertainment/Dark Horse Comics)
Wonder Woman, as has always been the case in her strongest incarnations, fights stereotypes not through pithy dialogue or prolonged speeches, but through her simple presence, by exuding the quiet, inarguable certainty that she is the equal of any man she shares the page with. In this regard, she has never had a better foil than the uber-masculine Conan with whom to play off of.
It should be said that this theme of discovery and evolution never distracts from true hallmarks of a Hyborian story: action and adventure in a brutal, pragmatic world.
After Conan refuses to kill his unintentional adventuring partner once he has subdued her in the arena, the two are sold onto the crew of a pirate ship (another setting Conan is intimately familiar with) where, still chained together, the uneasy team is forced to toil in an almost obligatory montage of menial labor scenes that drive home the bleak reality that is Conan’s classic setting.
Before long, the men on the pirate ship start to act like you might expect men on a pirate ship to act in a world where kindness and decency is always in short supply, and Conan and Wonder Woman find themselves in a brief scuffle with the crew before a Zinigarian patrol slams into the pirate ship, opening up a clear, if potentially deadly escape route by way of diving into shark-invested waters, which Diana–bolstered by remembering her true name just moments before–takes without hesitation, dragging her chained, cursing companion along with her.
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Heading into the next issue, romantic tension and violent potential battle with each other for supremacy, and a mysterious set of shape-shifting sisters calling themselves the Corvidae, who seem to be the cause behind the luckless heroes’ misfortune, look poised to step into the spotlight.