Why Wonder Woman Is Set During World War I - IGN

WONDER WOMAN | Trailer #3 OFICIAL en Español (HD) Accion 2017

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Producer Charles Roven discusses the Amazon heroines journey from the comics to Batman v Superman, her solo film, the Justice League and beyond. By Scott Collura

Producer Charles Roven has got several superhero movies on his long list of credits, not the least of which are the Christopher Nolan Dark Knight films. More recently, though, hes helped bring to the screen Man of Steel, Batman v Superman, and very soon, Wonder Woman.

I spoke to Mr. Roven when he was still shooting Wonder Woman last year, as the production neared the end of its time in England and was preparing to move to Italy for its Themyscira scenes. Read on for the full chat, where we discuss adapting the Diana Prince of the comics, introducing her in Batman v Superman before her solo film, setting the movie during World War I, and more.

Some minor spoilers follow.

IGN: The decision to set Wonder Womans solo film in World War I is very interesting. It"s not a time period we"ve seen a heck of a lot of in movies these days. Can you talk a bit about that decision?

Charles Roven: One of the reasons that we picked World War I was we felt that it [worked] in terms of that war and what it meant to Diana. Diana was raised on Themyscira with the lore, the history of the Amazons, and the Amazons, you know from the canon and the New 52, were created to be inspirations towards mankind. And [they] helped promote peace and goodwill amongst men and mankind. But at some point, they were enslaved by mankind and they had to break their shackles, which is why they wear the bracelets, as symbols of that. And they were given Themyscira by Zeus.

But they"re always training and they"re warriors, and there"s great pride to their abilities, their fighting abilities, etc. And even though they haven"t had any war on Themyscira, they"re used to fighting being an honorable thing. They"re used to one on one combat, or even if it"s armies fighting each other, ultimately that great legacy of fighting hand to hand. The best warrior wins. There"s a lot of contact, and World War I was the first war where that changed, where it became more remote. You were killing people -- whether it was through guns, through rifles, through mortars, through bombs, through gas attacks -- that you didn"t even know, that you never looked into their eyes. And it ceased to be what I would call an honorable war. And so we wanted that culture shock. And those images of no man"s land and the trenches and fighting for years against an enemy that you really don"t see, who"s a hundred, two hundred yards next to you, but you never see their face, we just wanted those images in the movie because we thought that it would be very, very symbolic to her.

IGN: Can we talk about the challenges of debuting Wonder Woman in Batman vs Superman, knowing that you were then going to give her her own film shortly thereafter?

Roven: Obviously we had the goal of making our character very compelling and interesting and exciting, and hopefully making you engage with the character so that you would want more. Obviously that"s the big goal in terms of Wonder Woman. But in terms of making Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice, we wanted to make sure that, on the one hand, you had these two amazing icons and clearly and interestingly explained why these two guys would end up having conflict with each other. But at the same time, we wanted to make sure that we were also using the film as a gateway for the Justice League characters. And that gateway starts with wonder woman. so we wanted to make sure that [in BvS] she is mysterious, but not so mysterious that she"s off-putting, but mysterious where she"s engaged you and you want to go, who"s this woman? Hopefully by the end of the film, you"re going, I really want to know more about her.

Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman.

IGN: Coming off of BvS, do you have room to play with the tone of the solo film?

Roven: I think that"s one of the exciting things with working with all these varied talented writers and directors. We create sort of a road map, but the road map really has destination points in it and it allows for somebody like Patty [Jenkins] or [Aquamans] James Wan or [Suicide Squads] David Ayer to come in and say, well, that"s great, we understand that we need to get to this point, but I don"t want to take that route, I want to take a different route. And as long as we can get there, and we all talk very collaboratively, it"s really great to have somebody who"s talented and comes up with a different point of view. I would say that the tone of Wonder Woman is certainly action/adventure, but also has got some really wonderful funny, witty opportunities of fish out of water. Steve Trevor is a fish out of water in Themyscira and Diana is completely a fish out of water when she goes to Man"s World.

And, you know, there"s some sobering things about it. We just talked about the World War I aspect, but she"s also coming to London where women have won the vote politically but are still not allowed in the hallowed government halls, are not part of the shaping of the government or the shaping of the laws. And so it allows for a wonderful ability to have some satirical moments. And then her relationship with Steve is really incredibly charming and very fun and quite romantic.

IGN: If you look back at the superhero movies from just the past 10 or 15 years, initially there was a resistance to delve too much into the more fantasy type elements. Almost like there was an expectation that audiences couldn"t bite off too much of that. Obviously you guys feel completely confident that this is something that audiences are ready for.

Roven: A Superman movie like Man of Steel is going to have, in some cases, a sobering tone, but it"s also going to be very distinctive, have more light if you will than a movie about Batman. Because Batman"s a much darker character. Superman became Superman because he didn"t plan on becoming Superman. The circumstances got him to Earth, and through inspiration by his two fathers and his mother, he came up with the idea of actually revealing himself to mankind. Batman, on the other hand, he did it because of the tragedy of his life, so that"s why he"s darker, grittier, etc. Wonder Woman is really one of the few, if not the only, superhero who grew up with this legacy of heroism. And so from the time that she was a little girl, it was her goal to fulfill the mandate that was given to the Amazons, and she can"t wait to do it. So that"s a different character from any of the others, not to mention of course that it"s the first female superhero. So it gave us a lot to work with and a lot to make sure we were telling a different story.

IGN: Now assuming that the Wonder Woman solo film does well, and you decide you wanted to make a sequel -- I know its very early to talk about something like this -- but could it be the kind of thing where the future Wonder Woman films continue to explore her past? We know that she"s immortal, basically, and she"s been around for all this time. Because it strikes me that one of the things about setting the film in 1917 or in 1918 is that all of her supporting cast is sort of stuck back there now, so Gal [Gadot] can come forward with the Justice League and everything in the modern times, but Steve Trevor and Lucy [Davis] and the rest are still in the past.

Roven: Well, I don"t want to say anything is off the table. You know, we just want to make sure that we come up with really good compelling stories, but for now all of the movies have a certain kind of they"re kind of intertwined. So Man of Steel gave you some nuggets that allowed you to see that it was connected to Batman v Superman. You don"t have to have seen Man of Steel in order to enjoy Batman v Superman At the end of Batman v Superman, Diana is in a certain place. We"re gonna learn about her in Wonder Woman but you know she"s also in Justice League. So we have a lot of flexibility to go back and revisit things if they make sense, from anywhere from when Wonder Woman ends to any period of time up to and including Batman v Superman, or Justice League quite frankly. Or to just pick up her story after JL1.

Wonder Woman stars Gal Gadot, Chris Pine, Robin Wright, Connie Nielsen, Lucy Davis and Danny Huston. The film will be released on June 2, 2017.

Talk to Senior Editor Scott Collura on Twitter at @ScottCollura.

Source: http://www.ign.com/articles/2017/03/10/why-wonder-woman-is-set-during-world-war-i