Dear Watchers: an omniversal comic book podcast

>> Rob: Grab a box of cinnamon mini buns from 1993, comb your long, luxurious hair and polish your gemstones. Because it's time for Deer Watchers, an omniversal comp podcast where we do a deep dive into the multiverse.

>> Guido: We are traveling with you through the stories and the toys that make up an omniverse of fictional realities we all love. And your watchers on this journey are me, the keeper of the jewel of.

>> Rob: Comics, Peto, and me, Rob, the keeper of the, trying to be comical segues on a podcast, Juewel, that's your jewel?

>> Guido: Yeah. What color is that jewel?

>> Rob: It's brown. Dirt brown.

>> Guido: Yeah. What a trip this is gonna be.

>> Rob: Today it's defunct canceled land, where this episode is canceled before it even started. But before we begin our trip back into the weird world of 1993, Gido, what's new in our little section of the multiverse?

>> Guido: Oh, wow. So much, I feel like. But right now, two things of note that are relevant to our listeners because there's so much new everywhere. my quest to complete X Men, as our long time listeners know, is closing in. I think I'm at 15, maybe 15 or 16 issues left, so make sure to follow us online for updates and you could DM us s if you've got a hookup somewhere, because closing in.

>> Rob: And this is great because now we have a few friends that do have comic shops. So we had a friend, our, friend Andrew, who owns Cromul Lanink Comics in, in Troy, New York. And he reached out to you with an issue. So yes, you have to always have friends with comic shops if you're looking to complete a big collection like that.

>> Guido: Yes. Yeah, because apparently people just walk in off the street and are like, here, buy these from me. Which I can't imagine doing, but I guess people do for some reason.

>> Rob: Well, you also have to imagine that most of the people doing that are trying to sell very bad comics. Comics that nobody wants, I guess most.

>> Guido: Of the time, yes. But once in a while, there's the first juggernaut x number 12.

>> Rob: Yes, those don't probably come by as nearly as much.

>> Guido: It seemed to happen fast here, so let's hope it keeps happening quickly. And I get those low to mid grades that I can afford and I close it in. And the other thing that we'll have more to share about next episode because we're not totally sure when it's coming out, but we were guests on the Retro Gamers podcast, which was so much fun. And regardless of when our episode comes out. We encourage people to go listen to, the Retro Gamers podcast. Wherever you listen to podcasts, they also do lots of video content online. Every day a new retro anniversary or birthday of a game or system. And it was a lot of fun talking comic book games with retro gamers.

>> Rob: And there's only a slim 400 plus episodes that you can listen to. So you could literally listen to one a day for the next year. Plus if you want do it.

>> Guido: It's our challenge to all our listeners's. Yeah.

>> Rob: And if you're joining us here on our podcast for the first time, we have three parts of our journey through the multiverse today. Origins of the story, exploring multiversity and pondering possibilities. So thanks for coming along and remember.

>> Guido: Leave us a five star review wherever you are listening right now.

>> Rob: And with that, dear watchers, welcome to episode 166 and let's check out what's happening in the omniverse with our travel today's alternate universe. And today we want to ma tell you this question.

>> Guido: What?

>> Rob: No, not really.

>> Guido: I don't know what that means.

>> Rob: Mattel. So we're instead of Matte.

>> Guido: Matte O gosh. I was thinking Muutt, which is Mumra's dog in Thundercats. And I'm like, what is he referring to here?

>> Rob: Too far removed from today's topic. I would say in some ways.

>> Guido: What is the question?

>> Rob: Our question is, what if Wonder Woman was crossed with she Ra and Barbie to lead the Star Riders, a team of sparkling super heroines.

>> Guido: People are gonna think we made this up. and we didn't. That question new to us too. We have never done anything like this, episode before. But we're going call this alternate Earth Guido's dream come true. Cause this is. I couldn't believe when I discovered this existed. I knew we had to do an episode about it and I knew I had to do it right away. And I want to live in the world where this line did not get canceled that we're about to talk about. So this alternate Earth is Guido's dream come true, but it involves primarily Wonder Woman. For our past Wonder Woman coverage, you can head Back to episode 79 when we looked at Stan Lee's Wonder Woman, or episode 130 when we looked at the storm Wonder Woman amalgam. And for Sheira, who is a very important inspiration in today's episode, we just back on episode 155 covered her comics and her origin episodes of her show. So go back and check those out. You can go to deerwatchers.com to search.

>> Rob: For our now Guido. I did see though on DC fandom and I don't know if this is actually true or not, but it says according to the Crisis on Infinite Earth'the compendium that this is actually listed as Earth32. I don't know if that where they're taking that from or who made that up.

>> Guido: That's. That's the catch all Earth. So that's the. Can't put this anywhere else. So it guts dropped in there. Believe me. This Earth was never numbered. This earth was never indexed. No one ever referred to this earth again. And that is a shame.

>> Rob: But we're talking she Ra. We're kind of talking Barbie we mentioned and obviously Wonder Woman. So Guido, what is your background with let's call them the quote unquote girls toys of the 1980s and 90s?

>> Guido: I know, I hate that. What else? I don't know what else we should call them but everyone knows what you're talking about when you do say that. So I as our regular listeners know and if they listen to that she Ra episode as I just rem back recommended, no. Shiro is one of my favorite characters ever. So I loved the girls toys of the era 80s and 90s like she Ra Gem and the holograms, those kinds of things. I never got into Barbie. My sisters are older and so I inherited Barbies and I enjoyed doing their hair and changing their clothes and all those typical little gay boy growing up things that happen and that is about it. I was never into like dolls or American Girl or My Little Ponies or I never got into the animals or the baby doll side of things. But anything that was an action figure and had hair still to this day. Now do you think I'HERE for you.

>> Rob: Didn'T get, I don't know into barbing some of those other similar ones because they didn't have the action elements to it.

>> Guido: Yes, I do. And because they didn't have. Maybe if Barbie had like a long running animated series, which is sort of weird, she didn't. I would have gotten more into it. But JM obviously animated series, great show. She Ra incredible show. So yeah, I do think that's a factor. What about you? You didn't have older sisters, so you had even less exposure. What's your background with these girls toys? If we, for lack of a better.

>> Rob: Term, background with them really? I don't know if it was just the social norms or maybe knowing that I was a little gay boy. So extra Wanted to avoid them. But I never went down that pink aisle at Toys R Us. I don't know. And I was so into the action figures. I was such a big GI Joe fan and Turtles fan. But so maybe I just was already had those things as well. But yeah, there was, it was that ale and it was so intimidating, especially to a boy because it was just that pink as far as the eye can see. And that color I think will come up today in our talking about this as well. So yeah, it was just so easy to avoid because you just your eyes went right to it. And like the boys aisle wasn't like that. Right. It was like we think of blue boys. But you did. If you look down that aisle, it wasn't just like a shade of blue like all the te, the Turtles, the Joe'like everything every's different colors. So I really avoided that. It wasn't. I think I became an adult that I even had heard about J.Y. and the holograms obviously. Yeah, you.

>> Guido: Yeah, probably.

>> Rob: I only use she ra from the cartoon. And really even especially like the Christmas special, I was not playing with those toys at all. And they didn't make it easy too because the toys were such different sizes than to the boys toys. You couldn't even easily intermingle them.

>> Guido: Yeah, they weren inc. Tompatible. Yes, that's true.

>> Rob: Well, let's talkes.

>> Guido: Well as. As we learned exploring this episode, there was a ah. Too few of these. Also so many of the girls toys were not very exciting or adventure.

>> Rob: Did have lovely, lovely hair. And you know who else is lovely hair? Wonder Woman. So let's go back to origins of the story, huh? Right now on this very show, you're gonna get the answer to all your questions. Our amazing story begins a few years ago. So you know, let's talk Wonder Woman. But how are we doing that today? Because we've covered her first appearances. We covered her rebirth.

>> Guido: We did. So this, this alternate Earth that we'll get to in our next segment is in 1993 and we have already covered her George Perez post crisis reboot, which is where she is in 1993. So we could chat for just a few minutes about her overall, any reflections. But I also use this as an excuse to get you to read what I think is one of the best Wonder Woman storyies to come out in some time. And it's a simple two issue story from Tom King's current run with Guillme March on Art in Wonder Woman 20 and 21 from just this year, 2020. Five where she teams up with Batman to solve the murder of Ares. And I thought it was absolutely stunning and forced you to read it. So what do you think of that? Even though it's not narratively, tied to our alternate Earth today, let's use it as a way to talk about this great won woman.

>> Rob: A really great two issue little mini story there. Or not so many. But I loved it. It had lots of shades for me of Alan Moore, ah, in the detective element and in there some metaness. There's Batman and Wonder Woman commenting on themselves characters. And also I think back when we were exploring Promethea as well, exploring some of the God worlds that Mo also does. But that the largeness of his stories distilled down into a two issue series.

>> Guido: M and Guiem marches art, which I actually am normally not a huge fan of. but I loved in these two issues. And he uses a lot of nine panel breakdowns, which of course Watchmen is almost entirely nine panel breakdowns. So it's probably in the art also that you're seeing it. And I don't know if that's intentional or not, but yeah, I think, I think in terms of the character, since we're talking about her, I think Tom King, Tom King is one of my favorite writers. So I'm quite biased. But I haven't always loved this run of Wonder Woman. But I think what Tom King always gets, well in anything he writes pretty much is the voice. And in this like having Wonder Woman's voice and Batman's voice and having them play off each other having their. These great conversations. I mean, there's one I find actually really touching it. I think it moved me to near tears when I read it first about Batman reflecting on the power Wonder Woman had in his life when he first met her. And in terms of how kind and good she is as a person and how much that reminded him of his parents. And it really is. And that's such a subtle brief moment in this larger murder mystery. Like it's not the point of the story. So it's that kind of dialogue that.

>> Rob: King does so well at the same time, I think.

>> Guido: Yeah, that just made me love was coming.

>> Rob: What I was getting from it as well is these two characters that obviously love each other, known each other for a long time, but probably wouldn't be normally just hanging out together. Like we all have those friends.

>> Guido: That'ite true group.

>> Rob: And like here like Clark is the connecting tissue. And sometimes we have that awkward moment where suddenly it's us and that friend that we hang out with all the time but never just solo. So you kind of get a little bit of that here where they, there's a one great moment where they're actually commenting on the fact that they're both, they both might not have the best sense of humor or Bman thinks he has a good sense of humor, but he was like, oh, Wonder Woman. Like you're not known for being fun as well. And it's Tom King kind of commenting on. Oh yeah, I've put these two characters that aren't really known. They're not the quippy characters that I'm putting together. Which is what you'd usually get, right? You'd get the serious one in the when character together.

>> Guido: Yeah, when she's like at ah, one point she's like, I want to ask you a question and it's like a serious question related to the narrative. And he's like. And then he makes not even a joke. He's like, I didn't. I let Dick pick his own costume. He went with the circus colors. Like he thinks that she's going to ask him about why Dick'costume was so ugly or something like that. So it's just, it's fun speaking to what you're saying. Like they don't see each other a lot so they don't really know each other'rhythms even though they know each other really well and support each other. So I think it's a great two issue story that'completely accessible. You need no background knowledge to read this two issue story and get a lot out of it. Especially about Wonder Woman. Because the other thing I shared with you, my experience of reading this is, is I think Tom King. It reminds me of James Gunn's writing of Superman in the movie. He writes her as a human being. And I think some too many people get stuck in trying to write her and Superman as perfect and it's like she's not perfect. Like she's gonna get angry. At one point she threatens Dionysus. She, she smashes the columns because she's getting so pissed off at Zeus. Like I appreciate that she's, she's a human and, and in fact you have Batman's voice there to keep reminding you why she's so special is that she is in spite of all of this, all of her reactions, her anger, her fear. Batman's life is in jeopardy here. Her mother's life is in jeopardy here. She is going to be a, ah, good person and want to take care of people.

>> Rob: And both her mother and then eventually Wonder Woman herself bring this up that I think a lot of her humanity comes from being. Being in the world of men as well. She might not be such a human character if she had remained on paradise island. But her mother, who keeps saying like, oh. Like her mother has this very pious like removed voice throughout this. And she kind of keeps saying that, oh, Wonder Woman, like you're almost soft. And that I think actually ultimately plays into the narrative behind the two, the greater mystery here. But I think, yes, Wonder Woman would not be the Wonder Woman we know if she wasn't around men. And there's also talk about the influence that the Steve Trevor character had on her and now his absence has on her. And what does that mean having her feel these human emotions? Especially since other than Batman, all the other characters in these two stories are gods who are very much removed from. How we think people should act. They do not have empathy.

>> Guido: Yes, yes. No, no, no. Which makes it very entertaining. But yeah, so it's great. you've never been, you've never had a deep sense of Wonder Woman. And before we get into this alternate universe today, like, does this give you more of a sense of her or you feel like you're getting a deepening sense of her or even appreciation?

>> Rob: The point I just as a character had was, gives me that deeper sense of her that. And I think we. It's very similar in that way to Clark. And even what James Gunn talks about in the new movie where Clark is a God but he is grounded by his connection to people. So I think that is very similar to the two of them, I think where there's still not necessarily confusion for me, but where she is a tougher character. And we talked about this in some of our under Wonder Woman issues is just getting into even some of the backstory because you can read these two issues without having read anything. But even the fact that here gods exist. Right. And it was. Couldn't help a think about Thor, where yes, the gods exist, but they're really kind of aliens. They're not like he's not actually Odin, he's not actually Loki from mythology. They're kind of these other characters that have these names and some of these characteristics. But Zeus here, Ars. it is Zeus. It is Ary. So there's this almost magic element that, I don't know, it makes it a little bit more complicated for me in that way.

>> Guido: Yeah, well, why don't we try to. Try to remove it from the groundedness of Earth as far as we possibly can and see what happens to the.

>> Rob: One story ever comic in a cereal box or candy box. This is time for exploring multiversity.

>> Guido: I am your guide through these vast new realities.

>> Rob: Follow me and ponder the question. And today we are ask what the question. What if Wonder Woman was cross with Shea and Barbie to lead the Star Riders, a team of sparkling super heroines. And this is Wonder Woman and the Star Riders. It's their origin comic, which is from a toy catalog, as well as a mini comic called Star Riders versus Persia, which was found in a box of cinnamon miniuns from 1993.

>> Guido: Yes, ceal cinnamon mini, but cereal, just to be clear. So these comics were probably drawn at least, at least the origin one by, Jose Luis Garcia Lopez, which is wild. So this is the iconic DC house style artist of the bronze into modern age. And so having him on this is really crazy. It is not clear who wrote it. It might have been Louise Simonson. A few other people did some work and I'm going to explain that right now. So let's get some background on this line before we get into the story and what this does to Wonder Woman. So this is a new toy line in 1993 getting a full court press launch at Toy Fair at San Diego Comic Con. There's a huge feature in the Mattel catalog. It's over 10 pages. There's promo comics, there's over a dozen toys fully developed and realized. These are created, they're photographed, there are prototypes, but they are real. They're not just designs. And this started with a link between DC and Mattel trying to get superheroines from DC to be more popular. So this is in the era of the animate series, super the Animated Series. But of course we're missing a whole chunk of characters, not the least of which is Wonder Woman, which we've talked about a lot on the show, that she's always missing from things. In fact, on the Retro Gamers podcast we talked about her video game debut is not until 1995. So it's actually after this. So you can see why DC is like trying to get her out there more because there is just not a lot of Wonder Woman content for fans who want content. So Mattel, meanwhile, it's been a few years since she ra and is looking to get more quote unquote girls back into their lines and develop more to sell, to sell to them ultimately. So this is like someone took Wonder Woman and pushed it through a girl's toy marketing blender. It really is like, let's just take every piece today and we'll explain it all in.

>> Rob: I think you would call throw it in Gener AI version of this. It's like, what do girls like?

>> Guido: Like, they like it as if chatty.

>> Rob: P. They like the environment, they like colors.

>> Guido: So. But then, the whole thing is canceled. The line is never gets made. There is just an end. In fact, there's a San Diego Comic Con clip shown in 1993 for 30 seconds of an almost completed animated series pilot that gets cancelld. They actually don't color it. They decide not to send it off for coloring. At that point, there's a series of mini comics that would have been given out with the toys in various states of production before the cancellation. Gone. That's where who knows who wrote what and where it came from. And this one came out. So some say it's from disinterest that retailers were not interested in carrying these toys. Others say there could have been a possible legal issue between Mattel and DC because who would have owned what? Who would have owned the rights to the Animated series? Who would have owned the rights or the profits off the toys? Ultimately, they did repurpose the molds for these toys. They went to a Disney princess's line through Mattel, and to Princess Tenko and the Guardians of Magic, which is a Saban series. Mighty Morphin, Power Ranger Saban a few years later. So why don't we get into the actual narrative here?

>> Rob: Sure.

>> Guido: Why don't you start us off?

>> Rob: We have, the Wonder Woman and the Princesses of Power. Oh, I mean Wonder Woman and the Star Riders.

>> Guido: No, no. Oh, I thought you. I thought. I thought that was an actual mistake.

>> Rob: Well, each Star Riders has their own jewel, their own power that gives the Earth color. But of course, then these jewels are going to get stolen and that color is disappearing. So our characters here, we've got Ice, Solara, and Dolphin. And these are Justice League characters, but I don't remember the name Solara Keito. So what happened there?

>> Guido: Yeah, because she's Fire. So this is a wacky thing. And we're going to focus on Wonder Woman. But just to make this whole story even crazier, three of the four Star Riders are based on actual DC characters, but with completely original designs. So you've got Ice. But even in Ice's backstory, they call her Torah. They use her name from dc. Solara was renamed from Fire because supposedly, in some research we saw, Mattel didn't want to encourage kids to be playing with Fire. And Dolphin is an existing bar. Very barely used. Existing.

>> Rob: Ye. And obviously, we've got very obvious elws. We've gotce. Ice for Ice. I, got it. So fire for Solara, water for Dolphin. And then we've got a new. A completely original character. This is Star Lily. And that name is not as obvious as the other ones, which are like, oh, okay, ice is. Is with ice, but Star Lily is of the Earth, so she's. She's the Green Thumb character as well. Lily.

>> Guido: That's the Lily. Makes sense. The star part does sort of throw it off, though.

>> Rob: Then we have our villain. This is Persia. That. That'spelled P. Yes, of course.

>> Guido: Can you spell that, though?

>> Rob: R. R, S, I, A. And she has a cat as well. And. Yeah, so Persia, which is. So I guess it's the common theme of cat villains. Of course, we've got the Catwoman, the most famous of all. But then this especially feels like it's taking elements of Cheetah, Wonder Woman's probably most famous villain who's a cat, and then especially the one who's this mostly ripped off of, which is Ktra from She Ra. They have a very similar look as well.

>> Guido: Yeah. To. To the point where her cat. I don't even remember its name. But her evil cat is actually the mold. Mattel reused the mold of Ktra's cat from the Sheira line, Claudine. So it's the same mold. and they're not the only ones that have the same mold, because the Star Riders have some other characters who.

>> Rob: Repurpose Sha mold, too, are the trusted Steeds. So Swift Wind becomes now a horse that Wonder Woman flies around, and then we all.

>> Guido: Yeah, yeah, The Guardian Steeds, they call them. And there's Cloud Dancer and. Wait, let me see. I don't remember what the other horse's name is. Nightshine. So Nightshine and Cloud Dancer are the Star Riders trusted?

>> Rob: Every superhero team needs a secret headquarters or so. In this case, it is the Star Riders palace, which is not quite the Crystal Castle, but it's actually like, But it's a cheaper version of it. There's a lot less bells and whistles.

>> Guido: That's true.

>> Rob: Yeah.

>> Guido: Maybe because it's a prototype.

>> Rob: Because everything had to have an elevator.

>> Guido: There's still an elevator. Every single castle needed an elevator back in the 80s and 90s toys.

>> Rob: That's.

>> Guido: That's for sure. So, yeah. So the other thing is, each of these characters has a bio written up. It's in the catalog. It's Put into the mini comics. So there's a background on all of them. But let's focus on Wonder Woman because this is essentially like an elseorlds Wonder Woman that we get. So she has her lasso, she has her bracelets. She looks like Wonder Woman, but she also has a wonder wand, which is basically an excuse to give her. I think you saw it and said looks like a maple. Like she has this giant on the top with all these sparkling ribbons coming off of it. Because her jewel is the jewel of the air. Which also no, idea why she's the jewel protecting the jewels of.

>> Rob: She should have been like the jewel.

>> Guido: But Wonder Woman protect the air.

>> Rob: Right. Or. Or honesty or truth.

>> Guido: I guess they really wanted to go with.

>> Rob: But they could have had her be the maie of. Of the planet Tes. Kind of where she's more like heart or honor or something like that. Yeah. Compassion.

>> Guido: She's compassion. Well, they talk about her being compassionate in her bio, but then the other thing is. So she has her wand. It amplifies her powers over corrupt foes. They talk about, how compassionate she is. Yes. And she's a doctor. So this is just so wild because here is the Wonder Woman we know and love. An attempt apparently to get her out. Get more people playing with her, wanting to follow her, wanting to do stuff with her. Find they're lifting it out of comics, they're adapting it, but then they make her a doctor, which is just never in the comics ever.

>> Rob: Wonder women can be doctors tooet at all.

>> Guido: That's true. I'm not saying she can't.

>> Rob: She at the scope around like, The lasso.

>> Guido: Yeah, exactly. The wonder wand is disguised as her stethoscope. She also has a lot on and where's tight. But otherwise is wearing the fabric. The won Woman outfit. Well, the.

>> Rob: The.

>> Guido: So it'sort of.

>> Rob: It's more to get the clothing fabric kind of element of it. Yes.

>> Guido: And se. To get lot of sequins on things.

>> Rob: I was gonna say the plot. Well, of this as well is basically Persia. So Persia is also like a sorceress. There's a little bit of eviln in her as well. She's also purple like Evelyn. So I think, like, there's a little sprinkling of that. And her goal is to capture all of the gems. And she really. It's almost like she has a jealousy here because she actually wants to be the defender of the world. Like she wants to be the earth's protector rather than Wonder Woman and the star riders. So she's out stealing these gems. And when she steals, say, like the water gem, then the ocean becomes, unruly as well. So it's also like gonna destroy the Earth. They even talk about, like, that the ice caps are melting and there's a bit of this environmentalism. It's giving me a little, Wolverine global jeopardy, like, that we talked about. Like, there was a lot with like.

>> Guido: As Ra and stuff around. Definitely Captain Plan and Captain Planet.

>> Rob: Of course she's out to steal these gems. And of course also. And I think this is an element. I don't know if this was with Catra then, but it was certainly like with the Netflix series of she Ra, where Persia's like, she's not really. They want her to not be actually bad. Like, they want her to become a star writer, but of course she just refuses. And she's doing her own thing and she's. She can never truly be trusted, but at the end of the day, they kind of want her to become, good.

>> Guido: Well, in, in, in her bio, it says her. She basically, it calls her the greedy sorceress is what it calls her. So, yeah, I think that's her issue. I also have to tell you in her bio, her official canonical B bio, peering through her glittery cat eyed glasses, she can spot magical gems and disappearing gems and every other sort of enchantment. And she could have saved her planet from ruin, but she stole her jewels and now she loaths all goody goodies and Det.

>> Rob: Test Wonder Woman. She's also an alien, or they're all aliens.

>> Guido: But yes, yes, she is from a distant dimension. Yeah, yeah. So there is so much going into this. And again, what I think is most wild for our listeners who are comic book fans is this whole project was, let's take these existing characters. There is even a prototype for Supergirl, who is going to join in year two. So they were going to take all these characters who. Wonder Woman had her own comic book series going on at this time with stories to mine, characters to mine, and yet instead they were going to totally transform them into these sparkling superheroines. So do you think this would have worked?

>> Rob: Yeah, I mean, I think so, because there's so many other things that this is ripping off of or then like when also later, like do it. Sue M. See elements of Sailor Moon in this, which is, which is happening also at the same time in Japan. And it hasn't quite come to the US yet, at least down, in mainstream for a couple more years. But you can solely see the connection there to Sailor Moon, which is still so popular today. So I don't think there's any reason why this shouldn't have been a success if they went with it. What do you think?

>> Guido: Yeah, I mean, I want these toys. So I guess that answers the question to a certain extent. What I think is so odd though is there's. What is so, fascinating about this from m. Our perspective in terms of alternate universes and what's canon and in DC's nomenclature, Elseworlds. I can't think of another example where this happened, where they took a character and transformed it so far removed from its original and created a whole world around that. Like, I really, truly can't think of an example. Obviously you have variation, right? There's variation in the animated series from Batman 66, from the Batman comics, but there's not something like this. It's such an unusual thing to take this very well established character with tons of lore, to take three other established DC characters, not that they're the most popular, but still. And to just completely disregard the vast majority of the lore, and then apply to something else. It's such an interesting project, but we.

>> Rob: Still see this to varying degrees in certain other projects. And I'm thinking of the first two Fox Fantastic Four movies where you've got such a rich character in Doctor Doom, but when they created Doctor Doom for that movie, they basically gave him a whole new set of power. Like, he's not wearing an iron suit that has that metal. He's taking over his body. Or even then that decided to have Galactus be this giant cloud. Like, I guess there's, I'm sure, reasoning that they had that. But even when you see that today, I feel like you go, well, why not just go off of all this rich background?

>> Guido: But those are still, those are still variations. This is like the Star Riders don't exist. The Star Riders are made up, right? So this would be like creating Fantastic Four and the, ah, galaxy Pirates.

>> Rob: Just like M. I don't know what I think, the root of this is, is showing that DC and probably comics in general just didn't have the female bench at the time or felt they were interesting enough. Because even, like you were just saying, like fire, ice, dolphin, these are not characters that most people, even myself, like, I don't even know dolphin like you. I don't know these.

>> Guido: They don't know their names.

>> Rob: So. And yes, you've got Spatgirl and you've got Supergirl, but both of those are also female variations. On a male character. And maybe that was thought to be.

>> Guido: That's boy.

>> Rob: Like, we need it more separated in that way. So we have to create these because other than, like Power Girl, like, there's not too many other female characters, I'd imagine, at least in 1993, that you could have then had a team around Wonder Woman. And she needed a team. So I get that. To me, that's why this was all created.

>> Guido: Yeah. No, I get why it was crazy. But it's just a fascinating project. And then when you put in the fact that they're hiring just top talent, Louise Simonson, Jose Luis Garcia Lopez, like, they really wanted to build this whole world. It's fascinating to think, like, if this had been popular, would they have tried to put some of this lore in DC canon? Like, would you have started to see a push toward this? Would. Would Persia have debuted in DC Comics? Would the Star palace be in there? Or this whole notion of jewels or Wonder Woman's Wonder Wand. Like, would you see any of the show up in the comics, do you think?

>> Rob: Some of that.

>> Guido: Yeah.

>> Rob: goes back to the quote unquote problem with Wonder Woman that we've discussed on, many other episodes here where unlike her two male counterparts in dc, she has not had this consistent backstory. She's not even had, like, consistent powers all the time. So that gave them the license to do this and almost would have given them license if this was popular to, like, introduce this. Like, you're not changing Superman because everyone knows Superman's story, but Wonder Woman, they've changed her story. Like, people don't know. If you ask the average person on the street, what's Wonder Woman's origin story like, probably half of them wouldn't know. Versus Superman.

>> Guido: Yeah. Though I also think had Superman not been. Had Superman and Batman not been riding high on their own success at this point, I could see them doing it to them. I don't think there was greater fidelity to the canonical story for Superman and Batman necessarily. Maybe I'm wrong. I don't know. But I think it has more to do with it being 1993, it being like, sure, fair game at this point. Also, kids. Kids and adults are like true separate you. So I could see them have developing some.

>> Rob: Yeah. But if you look propert Superman, the series, those have a lot of fidelity to. To the comics, even though they're introducing new characters and playing with that a bit. But, like, those are spanning both for more for adults as well. Like, an adult could enjoy both of those. I don't think any adults other than you now would have been dying wanting to buy these or to read this comic. This is clearly geared at children.

>> Guido: No. Or watch the Animated Series. Because even the Animated Series apparently was going toa change the lore. I mean what's funny is there's variations on the lore in of this tiny little world. But I guess from what we read in the Animated Series, the other star writers were going to be teenage girls that use the JL to transform into their heroing characters which of course then gives like a young girl an enting into.

>> Rob: That's, that's Sailor Moon. Right. Like that is all this other stuff.

>> Guido: Oh yeah. It apes so much for sure. Yeah, without a doubt it does. So really one of our most fascinating alternate universes I'd say that we are covering here. I don't know if I'd recommend people go read the mini comic, but I'd recommend people go find the pictures. We'll be posting them online for sure because.

>> Rob: Yeah. And there's a great website that had a lot of this info on. So maybe we can add that in our show notes. Wey looking. Check, check it all out there.

>> Guido: Yes. That are archiving the things that do.

>> Rob: Exist for this line us ponder some possibilities. Will the future you describe be avertederttedertted? So you know, last I checked, on deadline they had not yet announced a Wonder Woman in the Star Riders feature film.

>> Guido: In the work we have to start the lobbying of James Gunn now. Let's begin. Now that is the case.

>> Rob: What are we talking about for our pondering possibilities?

>> Guido: Well, this will be a brief follow up segment. There is nothing else with the Star Riders to discuss. So let's just explore. Should they come back. Do we want this now? Would you read a comic? Now is this use of the lore interesting in Wonder Woman? Let's stick in the Wonder Woman, not the business side of it. Is this a narratively interesting concept that you want to see explore?

>> Rob: You know what I could see and here's my pitch would be like you don'it's not Fire and Ice like the, the pre existing characters. Instead maybe there are other Amazonians that have powers as well. So like you keep them all, you make them all Amazons and each Amazon has like a power over one of those elements and they're led by Wonder Woman and like that gives her the team and then it's a little bit more streamlined. What do you think about that idea?

>> Guido: I think it's interesting. I think it's an interesting idea. Because like Superman and Batman haven't really led a team. But I'd say actually more and more over the last few years. In particular you have like the family books where that's a. Essentially a team and you have the House of L, which is essentially a team M for Superman. Like you've got all these characters assembled. So I think that's an interesting idea to have Wonder Woman lead a team. I don't know that it needs to involve magic jewels, but I will say I want to see Persia. So let's have Persia be a character that someone creates for dc. I bet Maall'part of the right. And we'll never see it.

>> Rob: Yeah.

>> Guido: But Persia is just so weird and funny and has a really cool design. Even though it is just like a. I don't know, a hipper purpler catra. But it's still a cod design. It's very. It's very elegant.

>> Rob: And I feel for. For your own future. Since we don't can't talk as much about the characters. I feel for your own future. Guido. This is go going toa be a new grail item for you because according to one of the articles, there is some animation cell. There's some original artwork out there. Like it does exist somewhere.

>> Guido: Private collectors, the whole. Because again, the whole pilot was animated. The lines were drawn. It just wasn't colored. So. Yes. and that website that you mentioned has a few sheets archived that they must have gotten or someone had. So yes, for sure I'll be hunting this down and probably never see. Because the other thing we didn't mention, in addition to the animated clip that they showed at San Diego Comic Con, they had a live action commercial. So they had a live. A live person playing Won Persia as well Star wrt.

>> Rob: So I want to know who they were. Was it like Courtney Cox is Wonder Woman? Like, I don't know, like. Like.

>> Guido: A little late for that, I'd say. But there might be someone fun that. Yes, we could imagine.

>> Rob: Kka Jense Won Woman. Maybe like Young or Persia that e part. Yeah. So, yeah, I think, I think. And we were just at a toy store this weekend and. And you were mentioning this, to them as well. And there was talk that there are these prototypes out there. And like we know from watching some toy store shows that often these prototypes are floating around. So like that's the other real grail item or like let's get the prototypes. Because it's not just as you said mentioned, just for the characters that we talked about. There were other characters that were prototyped as well, so maybe they exist somewhere.

>> Guido: Yeah. Yeah. Or we can get some. Some custom.

>> Rob: Oh, I love that make. Yeah.

>> Guido: So, Ethan, make mine amalgam. If you're listening, m, look at those designs and see what you can do. So this has just been a wild ride through the earth of my dreams, where Wonder Woman mixes with Sheir Ra and Barbie to become the leader of the Star Riders. But that is a wrap on these sparkling superheroines. So, dear watchers, thank you for listening. I have been, the protector of.

>> Rob: Jewel of comics, protector of the transition on podcast DL. Rob.

>> Guido: The reading list is in the show notes to follow us online on social media at deeratchers.

>> Rob: We'll be posting pictures from where you listen. We'll be back soon with another trip to the holers.

>> Guido: Keep pondering the possibilities.