Wonder Woman 1984's New Look Explained
The real history behind Diana's new armour...
The first trailer for Wonder Woman 1984 dropped on Sunday, and with it came our first look at one of two new costumes Gal Gadot will sport in the DC sequel.
A follow-up to Patty Jenkins' 2017 hit, Wonder Woman '84 sees Diana continuing her life in Man's World a full seven decades on from her first mission to destroy Ares in World War I. Steve Trevor has somehow returned (with Chris Pine again reprising his role), while the film's two main antagonists look set to be Maxwell Lord (Pedro Pascal) and Cheetah (Kristen Wiig).
The world's changed, and so too has Diana's sense of dress; her original costume is brighter, and those who caught the first trailer will also have noticed she's wearing a new set of armour near the end - gold from head to toe. Hardcore comics fans will probably have picked up something else though, and that's that the costume in question actually comes from a specific comic - namely Mark Waid and Alex Ross' Kingdom Come.
While it's highly unlikely that Kingdom Come will influence Wonder Woman '84, the decision to take visual cues from the comic will come as a pleasant surprise to fans. Ross' work is fairly legendary, and Kingdom Come was where the artist was really allowed to flex his muscles, with the comic providing a whole host of new designs for iconic characters like Batman, Superman, and of course Wonder Woman among others.
Again, it's doubtful that Jenkins' sequel will take any narrative cues from the comic (which revolves around a semi-dystopian reality where the Golden Age heroes of yore are deposed by a more violent generation of vigilantes), but it's still pretty great to see it represented in live action all the same. What's more is that Ross' redesign of Superman will also be appearing in The CW's Crisis on Infinite Earths, some 23 years after it debuted in his and Waids' comic.
Could interest in Kingdom Come spark an adaptation of sorts? One can only hope...