Comics Are Trying to Break Your Heart #279: Confronting the Pile, Part 3

Wait, where was I from the previous week? Right, Wonder Woman and the slow chipping away at my to-be-read pile. With that last story arc, we saw Diana making her way through various pantheons and multiverses as she attempted to find a way both back to life and to stop the doppelganger of her from burning the past to usher in a new future. The same writing team on that arc is back, but this time we’re leading into a larger, multi-series event that has been building up in the background. Becky Cloonan and Michael W. Conrad bring us the second volume of their run on Wonder Womanwhile also being joined by Stephanie Williams, Vita Ayala, and Joëlle Jones for said event, Trial of the Amazons. 

After returning to the living world, Wonder Woman has to readjust to life itself. So many people had said their goodbyes and given their tributes that it’s difficult to simply get back to work as though nothing had happened. But that’s what Diana does best—getting back to work to distract herself. And there’s enough distraction in Doctor Psycho sending Shining Knight after her, Image-Maker sending mirror clones of her to drag her back to death, and Altuum the Survivor threatening to burn Themyscira to the ground in revenge for stealing the island from his people. And all the while, there’s the rumblings of the disparate tribes of Amazons coming to Themyscira to air their grievances. 

Despite being a multi-series event book, Trial of the Amazons is incredibly focused in the story it’s looking to tell. Instead of the typical event that interrupts a slate of monthly books before going back to normal, what we have here instead is a natural coming together of two series—Wonder Woman and Nubia & The Amazons—while serving as a jumping-off point for another series in Wonder Girl. Due to it concentration on Themyscira and the three tribes of Amazons coming together for the first time, each issue of this event feeds into the next, creating one narrative between the multiple creative teams that feels like a cohesive whole, bookended by Trial of the Amazons #1 and #2. And in the end, it does what any good event book should do: give us enough of a state change for new series, new characters, and new story arcs to lead us into our next volume of the mainline series. 

While these story arcs mark a midway point between the four volumes of Cloonan and Conrad’s run on Wonder Woman, it shows us just what makes a long run on any of these superhero series work: consistent characterization, momentum, and foreshadowing. Diana is Diana throughout—steadfast, headstrong, and continually compassionate. She jumps from conflict to conflict without giving herself much time to rest, even after the death of her mother, and we can see in the background the larger threats building themselves up in the distance. It keeps readers curious enough to come back month after month and rewards them for noticing those background details throughout. 

Get excited. Get back. 

Drew Barth (Episode 331, 485, & 510) resides in Winter Park, FL. He received his MFA from the University of Central Florida.