Zero month hits everyone’s favorite Amazon Princess in a very original way. Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang channel their inner golden age storytellers and show us an early meeting between Diana and Ares starring the Minotaur. Get ready for a trip back in time for this original take on DC’s Zero issues!

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So far all the #0’s have been standard pieces of origins that give us some insight to what happened in these series before they began a year ago. Most of them show us something from about five or six years ago, but Wonder Woman goes back much farther, not only to when Diana is a preteen, but it goes back in the style of storytelling by completely invoking the golden age, superfluous text boxes and all. It’s actually really interesting how well they translate this into a golden age tale, but it can be a bit distracting (and possibly disappointing) for a reader who doesn’t get what they’re trying to do here. 

As far as the story goes, it’s an entertaining look at how Diana became the warrior that she is, and it also gives us an early look at how much heart she has always had. Aside from the fact that Ares (War) has been playing a part in the ongoing story of Azzarello’s Wonder Woman, it’s not really clear if anything that happened in this #0 will be resonant in what will happen as we move into the second year of the title. Perhaps the newfound friend that Diana makes by the end of the issue will make an appearance later on, but until then, this one works as a nice one and done story.

Cliff Chiang is wonderful as always, and his interpretations of the younger Diana and younger Ares are really great. There’s a definite sense of familiarity between Chiang and these characters now, and it drives forth the quality of the artwork and the story. 

The issue, as far as writing goes, is obviously very different from the usual fare. Typically, this series runs under the idea that less is more as far as text and dialogue goes, but being that this is supposed to channel the golden age, we have tons of words on every page making this a much more dense read than the series usually is. It makes for a fun novelty, but some readers might be turned off by it, especially when waiting for the follow up to come from last issue’s huge cliffhanger ending. We’ll just have to wait another month to see how that plays out.

GO Rating: 4/5

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