Review: Wonder Woman Vol. 8- A Twist of Fate

Quick Summary

Pros: Donna Troy’s story is interesting. Some of the artwork is impressive.

Cons: Most of the main narrative ranges from just average to uninteresting. All of the book’s villains are disappointing. The main storyline stumbles over its own themes. The artwork is lackluster in a few places.

Overall: This collection sees the appeal of the Wonder Woman series continue to wane. The book’s biggest positive is a solid Donna Troy story that continues elements started in the previous volume. However, alongside this one positive, there are problems with the main narrative, problems with the villains, and a general lack of interest developed throughout this read. This book may appeal to those looking for more from Donna Troy but not those looking for a good Wonder Woman adventure.

Story

Wonder Woman Vol. 8: A Twist of Fate, by Meredith Finch, is a mediocre volume that does one thing right but does a lot more wrong. The book’s central conflict is uninteresting and the villains driving it forward are all disappointing. The main narrative even fails to fully justify or explain its own themes and ends up failing to say anything really meaningful. The one exception is that Donna Troy’s story remains compelling and entertaining all the way through. This may make the story worthwhile for those who enjoy Donna Troy or who at least thought her appearances in the previous volume were interesting but will leave it unappealing for most everyone else.

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The vast majority of A Twist of Fate ranges from disappointingly average to downright uninteresting. Wonder Woman’s struggle to balance her complex roles mostly disappears and is replaced with conflict from a new villain. In the end, it feels like the entire plotline was just introduced to bring back Apollo and Ares, which felt like a strange way to close the volume.

The collection also stumbles over its own themes. For a while, it seems like Eirene is making a few good points about times when war is necessary to free humanity from tyranny and oppression. Yet, this argument is never fully elaborated upon and these points are pretty much dismissed. 

Another major problem comes from the collection’s villain. Nikos is presented as a serious threat to Wonder Woman yet never actually feels like the threat he is supposed to be. In multiple separate chapters, he shows up, gets a shot or two in, is quickly defeated, and leaves. This cycle makes him seem weak rather than intimidating. Even when Eirene or Cheeta are cast as villains for a chapter, near the collection’s end, neither one does anything that makes them feel like a viable threat to Wonder Woman’s goals. In general, these problems leave the collection without anything close to a satisfying antagonist.

The most interesting story arc throughout this volume is the story of Donna Troy. Throughout A Twist of Fate, Donna has an entire subplot to herself, wherein she attempts to give her own existence some purpose and stumbles around the human world. Her search for existence is compelling and makes her character more interesting. Meanwhile, her misadventures with humanity are simply entertaining to see play out. Donna’s arc is so successful that I was far more interested in what was going on with her character than in what was going on with Wonder Woman. 

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Art

In a few places, the artwork in A Twist of Fate is able to repeat some of the success seen by its predecessor. David Finch is able to depict scenes that look beautiful and are full of action. They make the collection more interesting and improve on some of the book’s more dull moments.

However, there are also a number of places where Finch’s artwork falters. There are pages where faces look downright strange or where it is unclear what emotions are being expressed. There are also two chapters from other artists. Both of these chapters just end up looking subpar when it comes to visuals and the dramatic shifts in visual quality create a less pleasant reading experience. In the end, the quality of the artwork in this collection is mixed.

Continuity

Wonder Woman Vol. 8: A Twist of Fate continues the story from Wonder Woman Vol. 7: War-Torn (Review).

The story here continues in Wonder Woman Vol. 9: Resurrection.

This volume also makes references to other comic books, detailed below:

• A large portion of this book mentions Ares dying and Wonder Woman taking his role as god of war. This happened at the conclusion of Wonder Woman Vol. 4: War (Review).