A new Wonder Woman trailer was released today, which showed us a lot of Diana Prince fighting in various places during World War I. We highly recommend watching it, because it’s amazing. But since details of this movie’s plot have been kept ridiculously under wraps, it’s also the best chance we have at figuring out what’s going on in this film.
Image: Andrew Liszewski
So we got out our comically oversized magnifying glass and looked for every clue.
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The only part of the trailer set in the modern era is this bit from the beginning. If her clothes didn’t give it away, the glass pyramids at the Louvre would.
As would the mouse in the background of this shot, where Diana (Gal Gadot) digs out the photo that Lex Luthor had a digital copy of in Batman v Superman. These scenes, according to Zack Snyder’s own timeline for the DCEU, take place after Batman v Superman.
So after Bruce Wayne emailed her a digital copy of this photo and asks to talk to her. Did she reprint the digital photo and put it in this case or did Lex have a different copy to hers?
Diana’s voiceover (which I think the end of the movie will reveal is directed at someone else from the Justice League, most likely Bruce) says, “I used to want to save the world, this beautiful place. But the closer you get, the more you see the great darkness within.” She’s definitely back on board with the world-saving by the end of Batman v Superman, though, so maybe it’s just some personal reflection.
It’s pretty safe to say that we’re seeing Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) crash his plane off the coast of Themiscyra here.
This does double-duty as showing us just how outside the realm of regular human ability Diana is and also how she’s the one saving Steve’s life. She will save Steve a lot in this trailer, because he is this movie’s damsel.
Oh, just leave him.
A military landing party arrives at Themiscyra, which is definitely the inciting incident here. I think they’re after Steve because he crashed after discovering something?
This boat – and I swear this is the clearest shot I could get – either says Schwaben or Schwaren. The first refers to a place in Germany and the second is a German coin. Either way, this is a group of Germans that the Amazons are fighting.
See? Fighting!
And more fighting. Incidentally, the weapon, the style of armour and the hair lead us to believe this is Menalippe (Lisa Loven Kongsli), based on that Amazons photo released a while back.
I’ve slowed this down because it’s incredible. Also, horses versus explosives is not a great match-up.
We’re also pretty sure that the Amazon warrior swinging around here is Epione, who is the chief healer of the Amazons in the comics.
Here’s a still of the shot, in case you’ve got a better guess.
OK, bear with me, I think something’s off with the way that this shot is cut into Steve tackling Diana. Because this makes it look like the bullet is way past her before the next shot, when he does that. It seems more likely that either Diana was so surprised to see one of her own taken out that way that she stands in the path of something and Steve has to react. Or Diana tries to deflect shit with her bracelets and Steve doesn’t know what that means, so he pushes her out of the way.
Which would make her both feel guilty and, you know, pissed at Steve for assuming he knows better. But there’s also always the chance that these two scenes aren’t nearly as related as the trailer makes them out to be.
This is also where the voiceover kicks in again. “But the closer you get, the more you see the great darkness within. I learned this the hard way, a long, long time ago.” So something bad is happening here.
“What is your mission?” asks Hippolyta of Steve.
Steve: “To end the war.”
Diana: “What war?”
Steve: “The war to end all wars.”
Oh, Steve, that’s cute that you think that.
I’m pretty sure Steve happens upon the testing of whatever this is – gas that can break though gas masks – and then gets shot down trying to get that info somewhere. Hence why he’s being followed by Germans, who end up finding Themiscyra because of him.
This is the first look we get at this strange woman in half a mask (Elena Anaya). We keep hearing rumours that Circe is one of the villains in this movie, and this… might be her? She’s the closest we get to a female baddie showing up in this trailer. On the other hand, I can’t tell if she’s helping make this gas or it’s being tested on her – the shot makes it hard to tell.
“Weapons far deadlier than you can ever imagine,” explains Trevor.
We also see Danny Huston’s character for the first time. “The world can be ours,” is his line. He’s also clearly one of the film’s big villains, since Wonder Woman fights him hand-to-hand later and he manages to hold his own. If rumours are right, Ares is the other classic Wonder Woman villain popping up in this movie. So he did a stint as a German officer in World War I? Sure.
The masked woman throwing this bomb into the same place we saw Huston walk into a few seconds ago seems to put them on the same side. Or she’s cleaning up evidence for him. Either way, something’s off here.
“Whoever you are, you’re in more trouble than you think,” Trevor tells the Amazons. These shots where he tells them about everything has him without his jacket on – it sounds like he’s trying to tell them things before the Germans arrive for the battle scene we saw earlier. And that fight convinces at least some of them that he’s telling the truth.
“I cannot stand by while innocent lives are lost,” Diana tells Hippolyta (Connie Nielsen).
Diana grabs the shield, sword and outfit she’ll take out of Themiscyra and into World War I.
Just pointing out that the war planning meeting Steve walks into appears to be going great.
The face you make when some arsehole dude calls you his “secretary”.
Diana’s bracelets do get to stop a bullet this time. As Entertainment Weekly‘s Anthony Breznican pointed out on Twitter, this acts as an homage to Christopher Reeves’ Superman stopping a bullet from hitting Lois – right down to Diana’s disguise having glasses for some reason:
The #WonderWoman trailer has a nice homage/reversal to Christopher Reeve’s Superman blocking the bullet from hitting Lois Lane: pic.twitter.com/aOu9xx1YGb
— Anthony Breznican (@Breznican) November 3, 2016
When an Amazon stops your bullets, do check the gun.
For all the giant spectacle in this movie, I like this little fight most. Also, what on Earth does Steve know to warrant all these people trying to kill him?
Steve and Diana are well out of London now. In case you were wondering if World War I was bad:
“It is our sacred duty to defend the world,” says the voiceover.
“And it’s what I’m going to do,” says Diana, before shedding the cloak covering her full costume. Also, while in a trench.
I do love the shot of Steve yelling, “DIANA!” He is every damsel in every hero movie ever. She does not need your help. I also like the way that the bullet POV of this shot echoes the one from Themiscyra, only this time she’s able to deflect it.
Hero walk.
This bit is shot so differently from the rest of it, I’m almost positive it’s Steve from right before he crashes off of Themiscyra’s coast. Also, thank God (or the costume designer) for his coat, which makes him relatively easy to pick out.
Diana jumps through a window on a raid that’s got to be late in the movie, since it’s also where she ends up fighting Huston’s character. All of those shots are this shade of washed-out blue, which helps put together that they’re from the same part of the movie.
Never go to a formal event without your sword. There’s also a shot of Steve that makes me think they’re undercover here? If he’s both a spy and a pilot, that explains why he knows so much important stuff that’s making so many people try to kill him.
Diana on a horse… maybe after the raid? Or chasing someone down?
I’m beginning to think Steve is an awful pilot.
Here’s something that makes Steve look competent!
Diana shoots off the ground and over the barbed wire of this compound, which I think has the same watchtower as the one in the explosion shot after the woman in the mask tossed a bomb into it.
And here she is again.
On top of that watchtower, Diana uses her lasso and it is beautiful.
However, I do not think that move caused this explosion, as the trailer is edited to make you think.
Here’s the only shot of Diana and Huston’s character going one to one. She’s definitely got the upper hand, since his sword is no match for her bracelet. But it’s still suspicious that he’s even able to get that close to her.
This shot and the next one – Diana in an office – are from a different raid than the nighttime one on the facility that Huston and Anaya’s characters keep popping up in.
But these people seem a lot less prepared for her than Huston’s character was.
I think this is the final battle and I think it’s at the place with the watchtower.
The trailer ends with a bit of classic fish-out-of-water comedy. And, yes, Diana, this is a fair reaction to trading out clothing made for fighting for this thing.
“How can a woman possibly fight in this?”
Here’s a close up on Etta Candy’s (Lucy Davis) face, because she is a treasure.
Also damn near perfect? Diana trying to smell the fake flower on this hat. Gal Gadot is so good in this role.
Etta gets the last word: “Fight? We use our principles. Although I am not opposed to engaging in a bit of fisticuffs should the occasion arise.”
The official synopsis of this movie only tells us that Diana leaves Themiscyra to help fight in World War I, after Steve crashes near her island home. Based on this trailer, it seems like he’s more than just a pilot. I think he sees the gas test and books it out of there. And that’s when he crashes. A combination of him knowing something important and Ares and Circe being involved explains the giant German force making it to Themiscyra.
Steve crashes, tells them all about the war, the Germans arrive and people die. So Diana decides to leave with Steve. In London, life blows because, you know, being a woman in WWI. Somehow, she and Steve make it to the front where she gets to be Wonder Woman in the trenches. Then Steve, Diana and her team start trying to track down whatever Huston and Anaya’s characters are up to. First thye end up in that town, then the compound with the watchtower.
It definitely feels like the movie’s going a similar route to the first Captain America movie, where the historical army our heroes fight are rapidly discarded in favour of being covers for more classically comic-booky (and less real life baggage carrying) villains.