A week after James Cameron came under fire for attacking Wonder Woman’s feminist credentials because the character is “an objectified icon,” the Amazon warrior punched back with an inner monolog in the pages of the Wonder Woman comic. In the book, Bounty hunters literally want Diana’s body as they will be paid top dollar by sinister forces who want it for medical research.
Writer Shea Fontana gave us this amazing meta-commentary.
Ever since I came to the world of humanity, my flesh has been the subject of intense speculation. They dissect my body with their gaze.
The comments sections rage about the circumference of my waist, the curl of my biceps, the curve of my thighs.
Many have long talked as if my body were theirs to own, a prize to be won, a golden fleece to be captured, expended and discarded.
Of course, Fontana wrote the script for this book months before Cameron’s boneheaded comments, but the criticism seems intricately tied to Wonder Woman actress Gal Gadot.
After she was chosen to play Wonder Woman in the movies, Gadot’s body was put under a microscope. She was too skinny.
https://twitter.com/harrygato/status/870025649687150592
Too pretty.
Gal Gadot looks too pretty to be Wonder Woman???
— ricky (@rickyhlam) December 4, 2013
She wasn’t muscular enough.
Disappointed, #WonderWoman has no muscles. But why? Is it mainstream beauty?! Come on @GalGadot, make the character a stronger role model ?
— Liv Nøhr (@LivNoehr) June 9, 2017
Her chest was too small.
https://twitter.com/BnBncentralPA/status/881630409129435136
Even her armpit hair became the point of heated discussion on Internet forums.
Wonder Woman should have had armpit hair cos she is from a place with no male standards of beauty. She wouldn't gaf about body hair
— Mr. Cheeks (@KonotoMochitele) July 17, 2017
Fontana essentially confirmed this was a response to the criticism of Gadot, as well as the controversy that caused the UN to remove Wonder Woman as a global ambassador and the general tendency of the Internet to reduce women to a collection of body parts that must meet arbitrary standards.
https://twitter.com/SheaFontana/status/902940500679725056
But perhaps the best response to all the haters came from Diana herself.
Word.
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