Paradise Island - Mysterious Island seen on the fantasy action/adventure series WONDER WOMAN/ABC/CBS/1976-79. Located at 30 degrees 22' North, 60 degrees 47' West, Paradise Island was the home of Wonder Woman (Linda Carter) and her mother Queen Hippolyte (Carolyn Jones) who reigned over a race of super Amazonian women who derived their great strength from the prolonged exposure to a rare element known as Feminum which was unique to Paradise Island. Wonder Woman's bracelets (made of Feminum) could deflect bullets. The island's location was protected from the prying eyes of outsiders from light refracted over the island. Queen Hippolyte said of the island There are no men here. It is free of their wars and barbaric ways. We live in peace and sisterhood.  TRIVIA NOTE: The Wonder Woman character first appeared in Golden age comic books in All-Star Comics vol. 1 #8 (Winter 1941-42)  and later in the post golden age comic The Flash vol. 1 #137 (July 1963). According to the comic history, Wonder Woman was immortal as long as she remained on Paradise Island. She lost her immortality if she left the island and began to age, but slower that normal mortals. Everything that Wonder Woman is comes from the soil of the Paradise Island because Wonder Woman was created from the clay of Paradise Island when Hippolyte who longed for a child was instructed by the goddess Aphrodite to mold the image of a child from the island's clay. The clay form was imbued with life and Hippolyte named her child Diana after the Roman name for Artemis, goddess of the hunt. Wonder Woman received her immortality when she drank from Paradise Island's fountain of eternal youth. The one caveat of the island: No men allowed. Why? Well, according to legend some says that a huge tidal wave will engulf the island if men visits the island while another suggests that the God Zeus will reign down thunderbolts to blast the island to cinders, if a man ever set foot on the island. The true reason is revealed in issue No. 216 when Queen Hippolyte tells female superhero Black Canary (a.k.a. Dinah Lance) that men are forbidden on Paradise Island because any Amazon seeing a man standing on their island will instantly fall hopelessly in love with him. So much so, in fact, that they begin to fight amongst each other until the peaceful and loving Amazons are reduced to barbarians. When the Black Canary delivered her report to the Justice League, she left out the secret she learned

Her origin and her creator
William Moulton Marston was an educational consultant in 1940 for Detective Comics, Inc. (now known as DC Comics). Marston saw that the DC line was filled with images of super men such as Green Lantern, Batman, and their flagship character Superman. Seeing all these male heroes, Marston was left wondering why there was not a female hero.
Max Gaines, then head of DC Comics, was intrigued by the concept and told Marston that he could create a female comic book hero—a Wonder Woman. Marston did that, using a pen name that combined his own middle name with the middle name of Gaines: Charles Moulton. Marston reportedly based her physical appearance (including her bracelets) on his former student Olive Byrne, who lived with Marston and his wife Elizabeth in a polyamorous relationship.
Marston was the creator of the systolic blood-pressure test, which led to the creation of the polygraph (lie detector). From this work, Marston had been convinced that women were more honest and reliable than men, and could work faster and more accurately. During his lifetime, Marston championed the causes of women of the day.
In a 1943 issue of The American Scholar, Marston said:
Not even girls want to be girls so long as our feminine archetype lacks force, strength, and power. Not wanting to be girls, they don't want to be tender, submissive, peace-loving as good women are. Women's strong qualities have become despised because of their weakness. The obvious remedy is to create a feminine character with all the strength of Superman plus all the allure of a good and beautiful woman.

Wonder Woman latest reviews

• Comic Reviews: Wonder Woman: Amazons Attack collected hardcover (DC Comics)
  3 Jul 2008 at 3:02pm
  It's something of an understatement that a lot of people didn't like Wonder Woman: Amazons Attack (and some of them even let writer Will Pfeifer know about it). I just read it, and I understand the outcry -- there's a lot wrong with this story. But if you ignore those shortfalls -- and I think Amazons Attack is a story where it's possible to ignore the drawbacks and enjoy it nonetheless -- Amazons Attack actually has a lot going for it on a cosmic, summer-blockbuster scale.
  
  Before the naysayers jump on: I understand the Amazons would likely never act this way. I understand the violence here was considerably gratuitous. I understand Wonder Woman does a lot of standing around and being told what to do by Batman. But man alive, they decimate Washington, D.C. Air Force One goes crashing to the ground. Hippolyta stands in the ruins of the White House, one wall completely gone, and screams for her daughter. Sometimes when I read comic book books, I'm looking for strong characterization and intellectual debate, but sometimes, I just want to see the Justice League fight bad guys and watch things blow up. And in the "things blow up" category, Amazons Attack is bar none.
  
  Pfiefer does a good job with the plot he's dealt. Yes, the Amazons act out of character, and yes, never in a million years would they trust the witch Circe. But in terms of the plot, it makes sense -- the Amazons have been brainwashed. I especially liked the final sequence, where Batman, Supergirl and Wonder Girl, Hippolyta, even the Amazons Phillipus and Artemis who didn't intervene, are all called to task for their role in the battle. Amazons Attack is an ill-conceived lemon, no question, but it's obvious Pfeifer tries his best to make lemonade.
  
  Amazons Attack is also a great Justice League story. Yes, Wonder Woman is largely ineffectual here, and yes, Red Tornado and Hawkgirl don't get speaking roles, and yes, Vixen only appears somewhere toward the end. But in a story that mainly consists of a lot of fighting, it's a thrill to see the Justice League fighting in the background together. Pfeifer also throws in a bunch of nice Superman and Superman/Batman scenes; with art by Pete Woods, Pfeifer's Superman looks like he came straight out of Superman Returns.
  
  Admittedly, Amazons Attack represents some of the worst attributes of the crossover genre, and the collection only makes this more apparent. There were so many crossovers connected to Amazon Attacks that each of the six chapters of the hardcover requires a text page explaining what's happening elsewhere. Indeed, some of the more integral scenes, including Wonder Woman's confrontation with the goddess Athena, appear in a crossover issue instead of in this book. Though Amazons Attack has an ending of sorts, the epilogue serves to turn the story on its head in service of Final Crisis; this is hardly a story so much as an advertisement for another story.
  
  The bottom line is, I understand all the negatives about this collection, and I just don't care. Final Crisis is in the air, and I've got crossover fever. The heroes of the DC Universe come together over the skies of Washington, D.C in a big, monstrous battle royale, and I couldn't be happier. It's Amazons Attack -- buy it, shut off your brain, and let it just wash all over you. The collected Final Crisis can't get here soon enough.
  
  [Contains full covers, more text pages than you can shake a stick at, Pete Woods' sketchbook]
  
  Speaking of the Justice League, we're on now to Justice League: The Lightning Saga, and then we'll check back in with Bart Allen just in time for ... oh, you know. Thanks for reading!---
  

  This post was syndicated from Collected Editions, the chronicles of a "wait-for-trade-er" -- the new breed of comic book book fans who forgo monthly "floppies" for trade paperbacks and collected editions -- reviews, commentaries, low price alerts, news, and the occasional scoop. Visit collectededitions.blogspot.com.