While we wait for Wonder Woman's second solo DCEU adventure to arrive in theaters, here's
a detailed rundown of everything we know about this '80s-set sequel — and a look at all
the rumors that have surfaced surrounding the project.
Here's your warning now: potential spoilers for Wonder Woman 1984 ahead.
With Wonder Woman, Patty Jenkins became the highest-grossing female director of a live-action
movie, so it should come as no surprise that she'll be the sequel's director.
Meanwhile, veteran comic book and television writer Geoff Johns confirmed he was working
on a script.
Expendables co-writer Dave Callaham was later reported to have been recruited to work on
the script with Johns and Jenkins.
In January 2018, Jenkins spoke to Entertainment Tonight Canada about why she didn't necessarily
see Wonder Woman 1984 as a sequel:
"We're actually making a totally different film… it's its own movie completely, it's
not [Wonder Woman] 'two' to us.
It's an entirely new adventure together."
So what are the details of that new adventure?
The title gives some of it away: the story will take place in 1984.
We'll have to wait to see how Diana's experiences in the New World inform her in important decisions
— like where she falls in the David Lee Roth vs. Sammy Hagar debate, or if she thought
David Lynch's Dune adaptation had enough guitar solos.
Jenkins also told Entertainment Weekly in June 2017:
"The story will take place in the U.S., which I think is right.
She's Wonder Woman.
She's got to come to America.
It's time."
As for just when the follow-up will hit, the release date for Wonder Woman 1984 has moved
around a bit.
Currently, it's scheduled for June 5, 2020.
We got our first look at Gal Gadot on the set of Wonder Woman 1984 and in costume in
June 2018.
With the caption "She's back…"
Gadot posted a shot of herself dressed as Wonder Woman to her Instagram account.
Wonder Woman's garb in that shot doesn't seem to have changed much from her first film.
It seems a bit shinier than it did in Wonder Woman, but that's about it — and that could
be the effect of lighting rather than the clothing itself.
But that wasn't quite the case by early June 2019, when director Patty Jenkins revealed
a dynamic poster featuring Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman in a stunning new gold costume set against
a colorful kaleidoscope background.
It's only speculation but considering the more regal feel of the outfit, one possibility
is that it points to a possible return to Themyscira.
Diana is, after all, literally a princess and might be expected to look the part if
and when she goes back home.
In December 2017, Jenkins took to Twitter to counter what she called "false assumptions"
about the romantic aspects of the upcoming Wonder Woman 1984.
Pointing to a Collider article headlined "Wonder Woman 2 will have a new love story," Jenkins
tweeted:
"Quite a few people, including this headline, seem to be completely misunderstanding or
making some pretty false assumptions based on one of many vague quotes I made about something
I can't say anything about."
The "false assumptions" Jenkins referred to were rumors flying that — in light of Steve
Trevor's death at the end of Wonder Woman, the hero would have a completely new love
interest.
The quote from the Collider piece that sparked all the speculation was from a broad description
of the film.
Among other things, Jenkins said Wonder Woman 1984 would have:
"[...] a great love story again and a couple new unbelievable characters who I'm so excited
about, who are very different than… in the last movie."
Considering the quote, it's difficult to blame people for speculating.
But as fans would eventually learn, it was a little too soon to count Steve Trevor out
of the dating pool.
Though the dashing pilot went boom at the end of 2017's Wonder Woman, rumors swirled
he'd his return in Wonder Woman 1984.
In June 2018, Patty Jenkins confirmed it, tweeting "Welcome to WONDER WOMAN 1984, Steve
Trevor!" along with a production photo of Chris Pine as Trevor in '80s-era clothes.
As a transplant from nearly a hundred years ago, Tevor's time shift will likely be even
more jarring than it was for that other veteran named Steve who woke up decades after serving
in a World War.
Trevor will likely be very confused once he sees some of the more extreme '80s fashions,
and equally bewildered the first time he hears Devo.
In late July 2018, The Hollywood Reporter broke the news that Natasha Rothwell was joining
the cast of Wonder Woman 1984.
Known best for her work as Kelli on HBO's Insecure, Rothwell has joined the Wonder Woman
1984 production, but nothing has been revealed about her character.
Rothwell responded to the report by tweeting simply "I have no words."
Meanwhile, Rothwell fans responded to that by flooding her with congratulations and support.
One possibility that seems likely is that Rothwell will play an '80s answer to the first
film's sidekick role of Etta Candy who was played by Lucy Davis.
After all, Rothwell's work in show business has mostly been in the realm of comedy, so
it seems pretty likely that she'll provide some comic relief in this film as well.
Interestingly, when the DC comic book universe went through yet another reboot a few years
ago, a new version of Etta Candy began appearing in the comics, and she definitely bears a
resemblance to Rothwell.
Time will tell if or how this particular connection could pan out, or if Rothwell is playing someone
else entirely.
In February 2018, That Hashtag Show reported that the Cheetah — a supervillain known
for locking horns with Wonder Woman in the comics — would be Diana's antagonist in
Wonder Woman 1984.
Only a few days later, Deadline reported the surprising news that Saturday Night Live alum
Kristen Wiig was the top pick to play Wonder Woman's feline nemesis, a report that was
confirmed the next month with a tweet from Patty Jenkins, along with what could be a
still of Wiig as the cat-lady from the production.
If nothing else, it probably rules out Wiig appearing as this cat lady:
"A cat is an angel that poops in a box."
Though she's known mainly for her work in comedy, Wiig has clearly been making strides
to show her dramatic range in movies like 2017's Mother!, 2015's The Martian, and 2014's
Welcome to Me.
Wiig will be playing Barbara Ann Minerva — an ambitious, ethically questionable archaeologist.
She gains her powers and new half-human half-feline form when she interrupts a ritual to an ancient
African god.
While Cheetah is one of Wonder Woman's oldest villains, some are speculating she won't be
the only bad guy in Wonder Woman 1984.
At the end of March 2018, The Hollywood Reporter revealed actor Pedro Pascal — perhaps best
known in his role of Oberyn Martell in HBO's Game of Thrones – had been cast in an undisclosed
role for Wonder Woman 1984.
In July 2018 Patty Jenkins tweeted a photo of Pascal in character.
Jenkins had nothing to say about exactly who Pascal was playing in the photo, but the most
popular theory so far is that he's playing Maxwell Lord — an enigmatic businessman
who was first introduced to comics when he helped fund a new '80s iteration of the Justice
League.
Years later he would be revealed to be much more villainous: During the lead-up to DC
Comics' 2005-2006 line-wide event Infinite Crisis, Lord kills the Blue Beetle, one of
the heroes who was on Lord's '80s Justice League team.
Wonder Woman is branded an outlaw in the Infinite Crisis prologue series "The OMAC Project"
when she kills Lord on live television by snapping his neck.
In January 2019, We Got This Covered cited sources who delivered Wonder Woman 1984 story
details that would solve the mysteries of Pedro Pascal's casting as well as how Steve
Trevor could've been resurrected.
According to the report, Pascal is indeed playing DC Comics' Maxwell Lord.
He's searching for artifacts to grant him godlike power, and in this endeavor he enlists
the aid of archaeologist Barbara Ann Minerva.
It's during the search for these artifacts that Minerva is transformed into the Cheetah,
and she blames Lord for the curse.
Not yet having the power to protect himself from someone as strong as the Cheetah, Lord
asks Wonder Woman for help.
Using one of the artifacts he presumably finds before Minerva's transformation, Lord resurrects
Steve Trevor in return for the Amazon's protection.
Obviously none of these details have been confirmed, but it could explain not only why
Trevor is back but why he apparently hasn't aged.
Footage of an action scene from Wonder Woman 1984 was shown in July 2018 at the San Diego
Comic-Con Warner Bros. film slate panel.
The footage wasn't released online, but according to reports, the footage was well-received
in spite of being a rough cut.
Viewers reported the scene begins with Wonder Woman crashing into a shopping mall to stop
two armed men.
In the middle of the action a little girl puts herself in danger when she walks up to
the superhero and exclaims "Oh my gosh!"
Once Wonder Woman gets the little girl to safety she takes out the gunmen, leaps to
the mall's ground floor, and runs out of the mall and on into the city.
One writer at Birth.Movies.Death. noted happily how, compared to 2017's Wonder Woman, this
scene was, quote, "decidedly brighter, faster and — brace yourself — sillier."
While appearing on Deadline's "Crew Call" podcast, Patty Jenkins spoke to the question
of why she chose 1984 America as the time and setting for the sequel to Wonder Woman.
Jenkins didn't get too deep into it, but she said more about it than she has previously:
"I picked 1984 for a very specific reason.
I think it was the pinnacle of the success in the '80s in my opinion, because it's before
the market started to get a little more struggling as the '80s went on, and it was like the top
of the top, y'know?
It was such an incredible time.
And I feel like there's something about the excess of exactly that period of time, which
is so linked up to where we are right now in the world."
While there's no way to know for sure what Jenkins means until the movie is released
— or alternatively until she opens up more about it — she seems to be pointing to social
and/or political themes and subtexts.
She's set the film specifically at what she calls the "pinnacle of success" right before
things got shakier.
It's only speculation, but maybe she wants to warn us that we're getting ready for a
similar decline...
While we still don't know for certain exactly how Steve Trevor will be returning to the
land of the living in Wonder Woman 1984, Chris Pine spoke with Wonder Woman co-star Robin
Wright in early June 2019 about the upcoming film as part of Variety's Actors on Actors
series.
Pine didn't get too specific, but what he said hinted at the notion that his role in
Wonder Woman 1984 won't bring him into the action quite so much:
"The tables had turned on me as a man in terms of how I interacted and played on screen,
whereby I loved my lady."
Pine also told Wright that the tables turning in this way didn't represent an easy transition.
He talked about trying to get Patty Jenkins to let him in more action scenes, and joked
about how the mantra of the production for him became, "Not about you."
"My ego comes out, and, like, 'I want the big f---in' fight!
Let me climb something!'
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