Warning: This review contains spoilers regarding the plot points of Wonder Woman 1984.
There have been some superhero movies that have transcended the genre and given the film world a legitimate jolt, and prove that the medium can make an artistic contribution to the field. There are others that are perfectly fine; they aren't going to take home any awards for performances or direction, but they have enough cool things happening to make you feel like they're not among the worst superhero movies, which can truly feel like a waste of time. Somewhere between those two levels, the first Wonder Woman movie exists. It's perfectly fine, but the fact that it was the first warmly-toned, optimistic and actually good movie that came from the DC Comics cinematic universe made it all the more compelling. It certainly made a sequel all the more enticing, if not inevitable.
Unfortunately, said sequel falls into that third category I mentioned.
As I sat into a theater (just hold on a little while longer, AMC!), I was feeling good about this film. It's got Gal Gadot remaining the superstar that she is, and embodying a role that so many thought was above her paygrade when she first took it on. It's got Chris Pine, returning for reasons no trailers even hinted at. It's got Kristin Wiig making a turn many didn't expect for her, perhaps showing that Patty Jenkins was ready to help make another star turn the way she help Gadot make hers. And it's got Pedro Pascal. Yep, that's him. No, it's really the Mandalorian. I get why you wouldn't know. His face is actually totally out there in this one. With this talented of a cast, both returning and incoming, the sequel had to be great, right? Like the film tries to point out, be careful what you wish for.
One way in which Wonder Woman 1984 succeeds is in the usage of this talent. Gadot and Pine's chemistry was what sold the first movie in what will be at least a trilogy (announced the day after opening, and after the 2nd movie's Rotten Tomatoes scored had dropped 20+ points overnight), and they shine again here, swapping roles as initiator and initiated to each other's culture. Wiig's introduction to her character has her playing to her strengths, but she's also adding new ones as well. Pascal, freed from being helmeted for another season of television, truly goes all out in this one, and his character benefits from the larger-than-life performance.
The actors on-screen are doing great, but what they were given was not great at all. Apparently given free reign, those who worked on this story fell into the classic pitfall of trying to jam too much into a superhero movie. The film switches its focus intermittently to prepare for all four main characters' eventually meeting in a second-act showdown, but that showdown feels as if it's taking forever. The clear focus is the rekindling of Diana Prince and the ridiculously-reincarnated Steve Trevor. In a twist that must be spoiled to be explained, Diana wishes for Steve to return to her life, but throughout their journey together, it's revealed that this wish she's made--and others made by those around her-- is coming with a cost attached.
This meditation on the pursuit of what you want is an interesting one, at the very least. So much of life is spent thinking about what we want the most, but it's difficult to imagine the sacrifices people are willing to make for it. In the end, getting the thing you want may not be the best thing for you. That's essentially what Wonder Woman 1984 is trying to say, although for the world it was released in, it feels like an awfully idealistic and unattainable thought. We've seen throughout society that there are people in this world that will do whatever they need to do in order to achieve what they want to achieve. While the film would like to assume that people would give up something they wanted in order to help others, that simply wouldn't be the case if applied to the world we live in. It's a great argument to use when showing Diana as an ideal to strive towards, but it falls short in terms of real-world application.
Kristen Wiig ends up doing really well with the action opportunities she's given, and she's a convincing villain. I get the comparison between her character's final look and the Cats film abomination, but when you're making a character that transforms into a cat-like assassin, what other roads were there for the design team to take? I'm sure Warner Brothers and DC saw the reaction to Cats and poured themselves a stiff drink.
To see Gal Gadot in full action as Wonder Woman is a true thing of beauty. She really steps up again to play this role, and does the character a dignified justice. The scenes she's kicking ass are by far the best ones, which only adds to the disappointment of the movie, since there's so little of it. While it's appreciated that she spends a chunk of the runtime with Trevor, a character who very clearly didn't need to be killed off in the first movie, the focus required to build two villains at once is what likely takes away from the titular character's screen-time, and adds to the bloat. Things move slowly throughout the first two acts, there's enough to keep you intrigued. Where the movie really loses steam is in the final battle, which you'd assume to be with Wiig's Cheetah, and you'd be wrong. What we get instead is a messy scene that throws away all momentum, makes very little practical sense, and just feels really dumb. There's not another great way to put it.
We've gotten so many of these superhero movies at this point, it's inevitable that we get a few whose storylines cross over. In this one, it's the struggle of the civilian outside of the suit vs the hero that wears it, and how the individual with these powers balances the two. We've seen it done in Spider-Man 2, Logan, and a few others (even this universe's Batman v. Superman shows Superman reckoning with his balance). With Steve Trevor representing the life that Diana wants, you can feel the struggle of Diana trying to remain the hero she wants to be, while being able to live the life she wants outside of the suit. Again, we've seen this struggle before, but if even Wonder Woman goes through it, it must be a pretty worthwhile exploration. It certainly pays off with a scene where Diana's inner strength is restored in a phenomenal sequence.
There are pieces of Wonder Woman 1984 that belong on the same level as the first film in this franchise, that much can be said. But those pieces were not woven together well enough for the movie to earn its two-and-a-half hour runtime, and the drags and missteps in the plot are too much for the heroine to overcome. There will be another Wonder Woman movie, and there's a great chance that they can course-correct on that one, but the disappointment is palpable in this sequel.
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