THE WILD WORLD OF WONDER WOMAN : THE PLANETARY CONQUEROR

Space Angelina Jolie versus Space Jennifer Aniston

Wonder Woman was right on the cusp of hanging up her star-spangled spanks and eagle-emblazoned bustiere when this intergalactic romcom-slash-disaster film rolled off the presses in July-Aug of 1968 (Wonder Woman vol.1 No.177, "Wonder Woman and Supergirl vs The Planetary Conqueror"). As this story went to press, Denny O'Neil had been handed the keys to the Amazing Amazon and had stripped her down for parts, eschewing her supernatural origins and colorful costume for some down-to-Earth jiu-jitsu skills, a dab of greeting card Eastern mysticism, and a boutique full of tight white bodysuits. To this day, it's Wonder Woman's most controversial narrative among the fans, but if we're to judge entirely based even on this one story alone, it was worth the experiment.

The interplanetary conqueror of the of the title is the impressive Klamos, a purple-clad and visor-masked alien overlord bearing tremendous power and an indomitable will. Also, it's worth mentioning that he started his career under the name "John Klamos" on the show "Space Full House," but that's beside the point.

Wonder Woman, where is your head even at?

Assisting Klamos is his second-in-command Grok, and together the two horny girl-watchers are basically the Van Wilder and Raj of the cosmos. Klamos conquers start systems like they're going out of style, but what he's really doing is space-cruising on a space-Saturday night looking for space babes. "There remains one thing missing to make me completely happy," he explains to a crowd of military advisors, collected under threat of his all-destroying visor ray laser, "A queen fit to rule with me! But she must be the most beautiful and powerful female in any world!"

With these words, the story becomes the cosmic equivalent of The Bachelor, with Klamos' soldiers finding the most powerful female beauties of a dozen worlds, and also a few very delicate-looking males, I can only assume. Aliens, man, who can tell what gender is which under all those scales and jelly-arms.

Naturally, Klamos' quest takes him to Earth, where he becomes infatuated with Supergirl and Wonder Woman, much like me when I was nine. Capturing Supergirl is a matter of turning the Earth's son yellow, which is a pretty impressive feat and speaks well to the Maid of Might's canniness and power. As for Wonder Woman, she gets nabbed by a con man with a crate of costume jewelry, because she's apparently a nitwit.

Klamos does not have a type.

Specifically, Wonder Woman saves an old deaf peddler from being crushed by a train. In gratitude, he rewards her with a cheap-ass string of pearls made of toothpaste and whiteout. "They're not my style," she thinks, "But I can't refuse...might hurt his feelings." You see what women have to put up with, being considered the caretakers of men's feelings?

Anyway, it turns out the pearls are actually space handcuffs and that's the end of that. Next time around, they could probably catch Wonder Woman with a box on a stick with a string on it, and like a can of Amazon Chow underneath it, I dunno. It just feels like capturing Wonder Woman ought to be more difficult.

Supergirl and Wonder Woman end up in Klamos' Lingerie Bowl of Space, and in short order make corpses of the other lovely contenders for title of TV Champ, Mid-Galactic Division. Reducing the pool to just the two of them, and with the safety of Earth at stake, the two heroines are forced to battle one another in what you can only imagine is probably a pretty erotic clash of titans. Let's check DeviantArt out later to see how that might turn out...

"Also one of you needs to give us a ride home!"

In the end, the heroines figure out that Klamos is just a hollow machine directed by alien hands, although I could have told you that just by watching him on ER. In fact, the "dwarfish and ugly" Grok is the actual guiding hand of the intimidating Klamos, only his looks and small stature kept him from being a convincing ruler, evidently. Just like our own political system, if you think about it ::cue rainbow, "One To Grow On" logo::

Supergirl and Wonder Woman return to Earth relatively unbothered by their mutual time in captivity and forced battle, while the book promises a "real end" on the final page of the book, advertising Wonder Woman's upcoming dramatic, thematic shift. The next few years would be a little weird, but at least they weren't more all-girl intergalactic pillow fights for horny robots...