Wonder Woman 1984 (2020) Movie Review

The opening scene of Wonder Woman 1984 sees us visiting Diana as a child. She is participating in a competition against older Amazon women but is disqualified for cheating. Here she receives a lesson on the importance of the truth and what makes a hero great. This lesson is supposed to be a thread throughout the rest of the movie but it feels a tad forced and not all that relevant.

In the present day which happens to be 1984, we find Diana (Gal Gadot) working as an anthropologist at the Smithsonian in Washington D.C. At work she meets an awkward and insecure woman named Barbara (Kristen Wiig) who is tasked with identifying artifacts including a stone that winds up making wishes come true. Before the stone’s powers are discovered, Barbara wishes to be like Diana and Diana wishes that her lover Steve would be alive again. Both of those wishes come true so we get to see Steve (Chris Pine) and Diana reunited once more.

Things go sideways when a businessman named Maxwell Lord (Pedro Pascal) finagles his way into the Smithsonian as a donor and steals the stone. He wishes to become the stone itself and can now grant wishes for anyone. Obviously as he grants more wishes, chaos ensues and the world turns on its head. Diana must fight Maxwell and find a way to disable his powers in order to save the world.

The problem with making an incredibly successful and entertaining superhero movie like Wonder Woman (2017) is that inevitably you will need to follow it up with a compelling sequel. Wonder Woman 1984 falls short of the magic of the first Wonder Woman movie. The first (and main) issue is the script. There’s really no other way to say it, the plot is just not very good. The message of truth and honesty being at the heart of a true superhero are good in theory but not executed very well. Too often Diana muses about the truth to the point where you might find yourself muttering, “Yeah, we get it.”

The “villain” could be either Maxwell or Barbara depending on how you look at it and neither of them are all that interesting. At one point Barbara metamorphs into some type of cat-like creature that seems over the top and semi-ridiculous. Wiig looks like someone who got cut from the disastrous Cats movie from 2019.

The performances aren’t the problem, as Gadot reprises her role with efficiency and continues her chemistry with Chris Pine. Kristen Wiig was an interesting choice for Barbara as she transforms from an insecure woman who can’t walk properly in heels to the more cool and confident fighter who takes on Diana. Wiig isn’t bad here, it’s just odd to see her in this type of role.

The ending is a bit far fetched as the whole world must come together in order to restore order. We’ve witnessed firsthand in 2020 that this is completely unrealistic as most people won’t wear a simple mask for the good of their fellow humans. But superhero movies aren’t supposed to be realistic so I can forgive Wonder Woman 1984 for its lofty idealism.

The script lacks any type of depth and drags out a bit too long for my taste. There was one particularly neat action scene in Cairo that involved tanks that was completely entertaining. But other than that it’s your pretty standard fight sequences aided by CGI that is, at times, not quite good enough. Wonder Woman 1984 shot for the moon, but unfortunately fell short. Hopefully the third installment will come with an improved screenplay and we can go from Mediocre Woman back to Wonder Woman. 

Film or Movie: Movie
You’ll like this movie if:
1. You saw the first Wonder Woman movie
2. You love superhero movies
3. You want to stare at a beautiful power couple in Chris Pine and Gal Gadot