Dr. Psycho steps up to the plate.
Creative Staff:
Story: Marv Wolfman
Art: Jose Luis, Jonas Trinidade
Colors: Adriano Lucas
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual
What They Say:
Wonder Woman races to stop Dr. Psycho before he gains control of city and uses the citizens as an army against her.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Marv Wolfman has long been a favorite creator of mine going back to the heyday of first reading his work on Teen Titans and buying up as many back issues as I could. He’s had a few stories in the digital-first realm that have been fun and now plays in the Wonder Woman area where we get something fun if simple. He’s paired with Jose Luis and Jonas Trinidade on the artwork side of things where they handle the action well and the forward momentum just right so that everything keeps building in a solid way to keep building on what just happened. Adriano Lucas puts in a great job on the color design across the board but I really love the way Diana turned out here with all the detail and the color design.
The story here is a solid enough one but also one that just comes at an awkward time. A Wonder Woman story involving Dr. Psycho coming after seeing the Harley Quinn animated series where the two fought early on just leaves me in stitches and it’s absolutely impossible to take this version of Psycho seriously, which is what’s needed. Here, Psycho knows he can’t mind control Wonder Woman so he’s orchestrated events where he has hostages in order to get her to do a little thieving for him. This isn’t just diamonds and jewels or anything but rather some high-tech equipment and some impressive software that in the end allows him to go from controlling a couple of people to potentially controlling entire cities. Diana’s unaware of what the pieces will do when put together and she’s just focused on saving the lives she can.
The book focuses well on how Diana is just trying to get through the events that Psycho has set up because he has them timed in a way where she can’t explain herself to anyone. That means lots of cops showing up trying to get her to stop stealing things but she’s got to hustle. Psycho’s plan does work fairly well with what he’s trying to achieve here and it’s fun watching her react each time like in a whiplash to help others while becoming more and more frustrated by being unable to tell anyone what’s actually going on. The artwork captures this really well with her expressions but also just in the movements as she races to and fro with a real intensity since it’s often kids that Psycho has put in the face of danger.
In Summary:
This is a fun story overall but it’s one that comes up a little short on giving us some real satisfaction with the ending/closure element. Combine that with trying to wrap my head around this version of Psycho to the 20+ TV episodes of him I just watched and that adds another layer of complexity. Wolfman crafts a solid tale here, one that I would easily have imagined reading years ago in my younger days and being quite thrilled with it. And that’s a positive, not a negative, because a lot of the appeal of these digital-first books is trying to capture different things with standalone stories. The artwork is great throughout and it’s definitely an enjoyable fast-paced installment.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 12+
Released By: DC Comics via ComiXology and Kindle
Release Date: July 29th, 2020
MSRP: $0.99
