When DC rebooted its comics line with the New 52 initiative, Wonder Woman found her origins, her powers, and her relationship with the Amazons of Themyscira transformed for a new era. As Diana learned that she wasn't made from clay but was actually a demigoddess, her interactions with the gods of Greek mythology began to peel back the illusions and lies masquerading as truth, exposing dark secrets about her people - especially regarding their mating rituals and the fate of any male Themysciran children.
Although the series was a commercial and critical success, this particular story drew much criticism for its portrayal of the Amazons and how it dealt with the themes that Wonder Woman was founded upon. Having learned she was the daughter of Zeus, Diana's mission in the series became to protect Zola, a woman carrying Zeus' latest offspring, and being targeted by a range of supernatural forces.
In Wonder Woman #7 by Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang, Diana and her allies meet with the smith god Hephaestus, hoping to gain assistance in getting to the underworld to save Zola. After fending off an attack from Hades, Diana is shocked to learn that Hephaestus' helpers are not machines but actually young men, who Hephaestus calls her brothers. Originally told that the Amazons' lack of male children was due to divine will, Hephaestus busts that myth by revealing that in the past, Amazons would travel to find ships full of male soldiers. They would seduce and then kill these men, dumping their bodies into the sea. After birth, the Amazons would keep the girls to be raised as the next generation of Amazons while the males were considered failures, traditionally tossed into the sea before Hephaestus - who had survived that same fate - began trading weapons for Themyscira's male children.
Wonder Woman creator William Moulton Marston conceived of Diana as an ideal woman from a morally advanced society; an ambassador for enlightenment and emancipation in a world sorely lacking both. Azzarello and Chiang's changes were controversial in making Themyscira's paradise a lie, as the Amazons were less bastions of morality and more sirens luring men to their doom. They kept the girls and discarded the boys, considering weapons more important than men, and building up their own connection to the divine to hide the truth. It makes Themyscira seem less like the idyllic society Marston imagined and more like the compromised world of man that they look down upon.
In the end, Wonder Woman tried to free her Amazon brothers, but they chose to stay with Hephaestus, who not only took them in but also raised them and gave them purpose when their mothers would have killed them without mercy. This emotional revelation continued to deteriorate Diana's faith in her people, a reinvention that chose to explore the darker side of Greek mythology. With DC's Infinite Frontier era declaring all past stories relevant - returning to the comic heroes in flashes of alternate "memory" - it remains to be seen how Wonder Woman's adventures might incorporate this dark version of Themyscira's secrets.