What we end up with is part-romance, part-’80s period piece, and part-clunky global political commentary. Oh, and it’s also a superhero movie.But in its attempt to be all these things at once, WW84 does a disservice to what could have been its greatest asset: Kristen Wiig’s devious performance as Barbara Minerva, a.k.a. Cheetah.The iconic comic book villain gets some screen time in the first and second acts of the movie, allowing Wiig to flex her mastery of social awkwardness and cringe comedy as we meet the bookish Barbara. She and Diana are coworkers at the Smithsonian, and they quickly build a friendship after their first workplace meeting.
But after Barbara and Diana make wishes that grant Barbara the superhero strengths and sex appeal she envies of her new friend (and give Diana her boyfriend back), the film largely forgets about Barbara. She becomes nothing but a secondary villain, a footnote in the larger story.Barbara’s relative lack of screen time doesn’t allow us to explore what makes the character tick — how evolving from a sheepish scientist to a sexy femme fatale affects her psyche. Perhaps the movie showed its hand in the first place: We never learn much about who Barbara is, anyway, beyond that she’s nerdy, lonely, and would trade everything in the world to be stylish, popular, and admired. But this surface-level adaptation is a waste of a character who, in the comic books, is Wonder Woman’s complicated, fascinating arch-enemy.
Moretz is matched by the confident direction by Roseanne Liang, who’s also credited with co-writing the script. Liang tackles the various parts of the story with an assured hand, ratcheting up the tension and creating heart-pounding action set pieces that keep the movie thoroughly engrossing throughout its zippy 83 minutes. In addition, the film is peppered with interesting visual and aural choices, including the use of pink and green lighting that mimics the colors of the lights on the plane’s wings, a detailed look at the gremlin tormenting the aircraft and an ’80s-esque score that make the story feel fresh and unique.
Barbara begins the film as an insecure, bookish nerd. “Lonely single woman” is a trope that a lot of superhero movies rely on to create their villains, particularly female villains —like Catwoman in Batman Returns, Poison Ivy in Batman & Robin, and even Harley Quinn from Suicide Squad and Birds of Prey fame. A common flaw in some of these portrayals, though, is that the nerdy-to-sexy transformation is more concerned with aesthetics than character traits. These transformations ultimately leave the character’s intelligence, emotions, aspirations, and interior life unexplored.
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