Amidst the DCEU receiving criticism for being too dark in its approach, Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins has revealed it was always her intention to make Diana Prince's solo vehicle a "funny film." It's easy to say that the DCEU got off to a bit of a rough start on its expansion last year. After beginning with 2013's Man of Steel, Warner Bros. and DC went full force into their new cinematic comic book universe with the theatrical releases of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Suicide Squad, both of which were met with disappointing and divisive critical receptions. Fortunately, hope seems to have arisen once again within a majority of the DC community heading into 2017, with the release of not only Justice League but the highly-anticipated Wonder Woman standalone film.
Wonder Woman will be Gal Gadot's first solo adventure as the beloved Amazon warrior, following her debut in Batman v Superman last year, and before she teams up with Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck) once again in Justice League. The hype surrounding the film has been almost universally positive up until this point, thanks to the truly impressive trailers and images that have been released from it thus far.
That anticipation is no doubt in part thanks to the fact that Wonder Woman also looks to be the lightest film that DC has made so far, with noticeably more humor (particularly from Chris Pine's Steve Trevor) than Man of Steel, Batman v Superman, and Suicide Squad had. While recently speaking with Comic Book.com, Jenkins revealed that the film's lighter, more comedic tone was intentional, as she tried to capture the same adventurous feeling that films like Indiana Jones or Richard Donner's first Superman had:
"We definitely went for making a funny film. I was always basing it on Superman I and on Indiana Jones. I wanted to make a classic film where you're laughing and you're in love with them and then they're off on a fun great adventure. It's definitely in the pursuit of our film."
Jenkins' comments here and her comparisons to the film's inspirations stay fairly in line with the tone and look of Wonder Woman up until this point. From the banter between Steve and Diana, to even just the global scope of it, Wonder Woman very clearly has a lot more in common with the grand cinematic adventures of the 1980s Amblin era of movies than anything else. That will likely come as welcome news to the DC fans out there also, who have been looking for some kind of reprise from the somber, dark tones of both Man of Steel and Batman v Superman.
That doesn't mean Wonder Woman won't have its fair share of drama and darkness either, though, especially since the film looks to be dealing with the very real destruction and impact of the first World War. With Ares confirmed to be the villain of the film as well, Diana's first trip into the human world will have her fighting to protect its very existence, which should inject the film with enough dramatic weight to be taken seriously enough. The fact that there's still room for an adventurous spirit to exist signals, hopefully, a bit of a long-awaited maturation of the tones in the DCEU moving forwards.
Source: Comic Book
