We watched Wonder Woman over the weekend. I liked it. I have some questions but I liked it.

We can get the big questions out of the way first. I accept that this movie is based on a comic and that Zeus created a race of warrior women who are all extremely fit and fight in brass bikinis. I appreciate the selfish, if not sexist, designer who went to great lengths to protect the important parts of a woman while leaving vulnerable things like arteries and connective joints fully exposed. All that is good with me. At least they don’t glitter in sunlight and turn into rocket fuel when their heads come off. I understand all of the above. There are, however, two points in the movie that stumped me.

First, the battle scene where the German soldiers row up to Amazon Island and have a back and forth murder fest on the beach with deadly archer women on horses. After all the soldiers are dead the women grab up super spy Steve and go to the house. No one mentions the fact that there is a German battleship anchored in the harbor. I assume it has deck guns and lots more than the thirty soldiers who came to shore in a row boat. Did the captain just say never mind?

Second, super spy Steve crashed his plane near the beach of the Amazon Island. What is the average flight range of the paper airplane that he was flying. His flashback shows us that he took off from Turkey at a secret weapons installation. Somehow, he is still in flight all the way back out into the Atlantic Ocean. They never really say where exactly but in the following scenes they sail a wooden boat to London, in what appears to be, two days tops. If this is World War I, which I assume it is because of the aircraft and heavy use of trenches and mustard gas, then they didn’t have sophisticated radar to track a small paper plane. This means that once he eluded the ground crew it would be almost impossible for a naval group to pick him up and track him quickly.

Third and really small, the porcelain faced lady who makes the gas. If she was testing a gas that could crack the eye pieces on a gas mask… what was she using to contain it? Wouldn’t the glass bubble have exploded too? See, that one was nit-picky. I’m sorry. I’ll get back to the heart of the matter.

This movie was really, really good. It took someone who was naïve to the horrors of war and someone who was experienced and helped bring the audience along through the tough reality. The action was action-y. The writers did a great job with the sexism of the times. They showed us that sexism is very real but if you are a half-naked gorgeous Goddess then you can ignore the social norms. Cast off your trench-coat and strut in your bronze undies with pride. For the children.

I liked that her powers increased as the movie progressed and that she didn’t become fully “woke” until her final fight with Aries. The latest Star Wars jumped the gun a little with Rey’s powers going from mind suggestion to Jedi ninja in a couple of scenes. The tie-ins with Batman were good and should be helpful to the franchise to try and accomplish what the Avengers has done in the Marvel Universe.

One thing that bothered me, external to the movie, was two teenage girls sitting a couple of seats to my right. They giggled the entire movie. They are the exact reason that Jimmy Fallon made the “EWW!” characters. There was one place in the movie where Wonder Woman lands hard and the camera angle is on her legs as she hits the ground. The girls both gasped and said, “Oh my god! Did you see that jiggle?” They were talking about the back of her thigh. Of all the take-aways from this movie that is what they came up with. Here before you is a woman protagonist who is badass in every sense. Smart, powerful, independent, beyond beautiful, and pure of heart and her biggest critique comes from two tweens who thought her leg jiggled too much. (I was there. It didn’t. It was a very normal leg jiggle after landing from a thirty foot leap.) As a father of girls, it was a disheartening moment to be reminded that a woman’s biggest opponent is other women. I hope my girls don’t pick up that toxic attitude. Where no matter who you are or what you accomplish, if your leg jiggles, then you could have done better.

I hope my girls grow up knowing the dirty little secret… that women could rule the world. They allow men to play the leading roles but we all know that is a façade. A fluke. If women held a secret meeting and all agreed that man rompers were the sexiest thing since Brad Pitt in Legends of the Fall, guess what? Department stores couldn’t stock them fast enough. Women are trained well enough to follow a man’s lead and take a role of support. That’s fine and well as long as it is a conscious decision and they agree with the direction the man is going. But don’t follow an idiot just because that’s how life works. Oh well. I’m wandering here so I’ll wrap it up.

If you like action movies and heroine stories, this post is for you. Not like the drug heroine. Women heroes. See. I told you women were powerful. There is a drug named after them. One of the most gripping addictions known to man. Synonymous. You’re welcome.

-Underdaddy to the rescue.