What happened to the most powerful Wonder Woman?

‘In the Tangent universe, you only know the names.’

This is the mantra for a series of comics by DC put forward to writers as a challenge. The brainchild of Dan Jurgens, the Tangent Universe was to give a fresh take on a world with superhumans. Writers and artists were to forget what they knew about a character and build them from scratch. Tricky enough, but it got harder as these characters had to fit into each others’ storylines and plots, forming a fleshed out world and overarching narrative.

Earth-9's Wonder Woman lands from a jump, armed with a Bahtarang

One such character reimagined for the Tangent Imprint was an alternate version of Wonder Woman. Although Tangent Comics started in 1997, Wonder woman had to wait until phase two, published the following year, to be included. Her standalone issue was written by Peter David, illustrated by Angel Unzueta, with inks from Jaime Mendoza.

Unlike many of the other Earth-9 (originally called Earth-97) heroes, Wonder Woman’s appearances are few and she’s been left forgotten. Even ignoring how other characters have popped up in other comics, this is interesting given its unique take on the character and how powerful she is. You might struggle to recognise this Wonder Woman though, as David stretches the concept.

This Wonder Woman arrives in the Tangent Universe with a crash, as her ship smashes into a newly opened Super Friends casino. Wonder Woman is an alien, not of this planet, and her look reflects this; lime green, a tail and with little left to the imagination. A far cry from the traditional Wonder Woman look.

Wonder Woman lands on Earth-9 and meets Lori Lemaris

Stepping forward from her crashed ship, this green alien was met by reporter Lori Lemaris who asks the alien who she is. She replies ‘I am Wanda, girl’. Mishearing, Lori queries ‘Wonder Girl? More like Wonder Woman!’

‘Wonder Girl? More like Wonder Woman!’

This Wonder Woman is from the planet Gotham, where the Gothamites’ genders, Element Girls and Beast Boys, are at war. Both look different from one another and this dimorphism was the result of genetic experimentation to halt aging.

In their war with one another, they use different weapons. The Beast Boys use Bahts and the Element Girls use Arrangs. Wonder woman uses a combination of these called.. you guessed it – an Arrangbaht! Just joking, it is of course a Bahtarrang. This weapon is chosen because she was created to be a mix of both genders, in an attempt to end the conflict, bringing peace and unity.

Ironically, Wonder woman did bring about some cooperation between the two groups who saw her as an abomination. They sent Beast Boys and Element Girls after her Bahtwing and caused her to crash on Earth.

Wanda has a companion robot who helpfully explains a lot of this, called Woo-Z. It was created to help teach Wanda how to fight, but she was easily distracted. You see, Wanda wonders a lot. Get it? Wanda is deeply concerned about her purpose and role in the universe, voicing her thoughts out loud regularly.

Her really special power, other than the fighting skills, is that if Wanda wonders hard enough, she can rewrite time. So she does that in this issue and casually removes her pursuers from existence, wrapping the story up and jetting off on her very much visible ship.

Wonder Woman becomes a founding member of Earth-9's JLA — *Wonder Woman becomes a founding member of Earth-9’s JLA*.

Having this ability to rewrite history makes Wonder Woman incredibly powerful. Possibly too powerful as she only appeared in one other issue – Dan Jurgens’ Tangent JLA. After Wonder Woman defeats Johnny Double, a member of the JLA sent to destroy her, she forms a new JLA with the Green Lantern, Batman and Superman.

After that though, nothing. It is not until 2008 that the Tangent Universe is picked up again in any meaningful way with Superman’s Reign. Wonder Woman is conspicuously missing from this storyline though and what happened to her in those intermediary years remains a mystery. However, with the return of Earth-9 in Green Lantern Dark, surely there is the possibility for this Wonder Woman to return?