The Average Comic Nerd

Absolute Martian Manhunter #6 (2025)

DC Couples.

Wonder Woman #18 - The Sovereign vs. Washington..'s Painting

*sigh* Y'know, if someone other than Tom King had created the Sovereign, the current villain of his Wonder Woman run, the idea of the Secret King of America who embodies the nation's self-deception (lies about history to fuel its own sense of superiority) and entitlement (the idea that what's best of America...'s ruling class is best for both its citizens and the world), y'could have had some actual meat to the story.

Take, for example, the much mythologised George Washington. Made his money from land speculation, and after America gained independence went on to make an even larger fortune from the land that the British told the colonists not to settle due to treaties with native people.

Or how he is lauded for representing the idea of liberty but habitually cycled his slaves back to his estates in Virginia when he worked in Philadelphia due to Pennsylvania law stating that if an enslaved people lived in the state for more than six months they would be free, so he'd have them work with him for five months and then ship them back to Mount Vernon so the legal timer would reset.

Or when one of his enslaved people, Ona Judge, fled north and refused to return to his family (along with her children, whom the Washingtons deemed to be their property too), he spent years raging about how ungrateful she was and attempting to have her illegally brought back by force.

Just saying, due to Wonder Woman representing the idea of Truth both in a meta context and her being the literal Goddess of Truth for a time, Diana being used to deconstruct the shell of lies and mistruths America has built up around itself could have been really interesting?

But no, George Washington's superhuman honesty makes him the only person besides Diana to resist the Sovereign's mind-controlling Lasso of Lies. Because he can not tell a lie, yo.

Hell, I've even seen some folk speculate that the Sovereign had constructed a fake history of his family's involvement in American history (including seemingly ordering the assassination of Lincoln among other things), but, no turns out that it's real, and the issue is that he usurped his sister's place on the throne after his bad behaviour got him disowned by their father.

So even the Sovereign working as a metaphor for how America has always been run by rich old white dudes for their own enrichment and sense of entitlement kind of falls apart because... there's a One True Monarch of America who is a theoretically better person? Implying that the idea of a secret monarchy ruling a nation that pretends to shun that kind of thing (just don't tell that to families like the Kennedys etc.) isn't bad, the issue is that there's currently the wrong person in charge?

*sigh* Yeah, I know. Shouldn't expect too much from the mainline DC superhero comics, it's just funny that Chip Zdarsky final storyline on the main Batman book explicitly had the message that right wing populism is intentionally fuelled by billionaires as a means of sowing division and thus justifying the implementation of a police state... And then you have this, I charitably call confused, storyline and character concept.

A. The story doesnt affect anything currently going on because its in a different universe

Or

B. He uses a lesser known character that not many people know about so he's free to do whatever.

Mr. Miracle. Vision, Strange Adventures, Human Target, and Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow are all good to great comics because he's not tied down to continuity. Though books like Danger Street show that he can sometimes get TOO crazy.

Wonder Woman #18 - The Sovereign vs. Washington..'s Painting

*sigh* Y'know, if someone other than Tom King had created the Sovereign, the current villain of his Wonder Woman run, the idea of the Secret King of America who embodies the nation's self-deception (lies about history to fuel its own sense of superiority) and entitlement (the idea that what's best of America...'s ruling class is best for both its citizens and the world), y'could have had some actual meat to the story.

Take, for example, the much mythologised George Washington. Made his money from land speculation, and after America gained independence went on to make an even larger fortune from the land that the British told the colonists not to settle due to treaties with native people.

Or how he is lauded for representing the idea of liberty but habitually cycled his slaves back to his estates in Virginia when he worked in Philadelphia due to Pennsylvania law stating that if an enslaved people lived in the state for more than six months they would be free, so he'd have them work with him for five months and then ship them back to Mount Vernon so the legal timer would reset.

Or when one of his enslaved people, Ona Judge, fled north and refused to return to his family (along with her children, whom the Washingtons deemed to be their property too), he spent years raging about how ungrateful she was and attempting to have her illegally brought back by force.

Just saying, due to Wonder Woman representing the idea of Truth both in a meta context and her being the literal Goddess of Truth for a time, Diana being used to deconstruct the shell of lies and mistruths America has built up around itself could have been really interesting?

But no, George Washington's superhuman honesty makes him the only person besides Diana to resist the Sovereign's mind-controlling Lasso of Lies. Because he can not tell a lie, yo.

Hell, I've even seen some folk speculate that the Sovereign had constructed a fake history of his family's involvement in American history (including seemingly ordering the assassination of Lincoln among other things), but, no turns out that it's real, and the issue is that he usurped his sister's place on the throne after his bad behaviour got him disowned by their father.

So even the Sovereign working as a metaphor for how America has always been run by rich old white dudes for their own enrichment and sense of entitlement kind of falls apart because... there's a One True Monarch of America who is a theoretically better person? Implying that the idea of a secret monarchy ruling a nation that pretends to shun that kind of thing (just don't tell that to families like the Kennedys etc.) isn't bad, the issue is that there's currently the wrong person in charge?

*sigh* Yeah, I know. Shouldn't expect too much from the mainline DC superhero comics, it's just funny that Chip Zdarsky final storyline on the main Batman book explicitly had the message that right wing populism is intentionally fuelled by billionaires as a means of sowing division and thus justifying the implementation of a police state... And then you have this, I charitably call confused, storyline and character concept.

DC Pride #1 - "The Heart Wants" (2025)