Wonder Woman 1984 Star Gal Gadot Explains How Loss of the Amazons Transforms Diana

Gal Gadot returns as Wonder Woman in Wonder Woman 1984, and the first reactions to the movie are strong. The first Wonder Woman movie introduced the hero during World War I. The upcoming DC Comics sequel finds Diana living in 1984 and changed by the decades spent living in the world of man, far away from her Amazon family. Gadot spoke to the press ahead of the film’s Christmas Day release on the HBO Max streaming service and theaters. Gadot discussed how Wonder Woman is different in the sequel without the Amazons and fully immersed in man’s world and her awakened power.

“In the first movie, it was the birth of Wonder Woman, and for the first time, she discovers her full powers, and then she was born,” Gadot said. “From Diana, she became Wonder Woman. In the first film, she’s looking at humanity from the outside, and speaking up when things are not right, and emphasizing how it should be. In this film, she completely and fully understands the complexities of humankind because she is a part of them now. She’s in her full power, and yet she’s lonely, and she suffers from the same problems that everyone else suffers from. So, it gave me a lot to play with, and it was a very different experience than being new and being the fish out of water in the first film. Now I am more experienced, I’ve been there, I have more knowledge and all of that, and now something happens to me.

“I think that it was a very good decision that Patty, Geoff Johns, and Dave Callaham made with the script. And, and it was delightful to play. I love strong, powerful women, and I love to play them and to see them onscreen, but there is something more interesting to me to show the flaws, the imperfections, and the vulnerabilities. This is something that I always look into doing when I portray Wonder Woman.”

Wonder Woman 1984 director Patty Jenkins also spoke to the press. She added, “While I can’t spoil it, for me, it was the fact that even Diana, Wonder Woman made & makes the same mistakes other humans do. And I wanted to walk you as the audience up to that place where you’re like, ‘But I want it so bad!’ And that’s true for all of us. Like we all struggle when we can’t get over grief or when we can’t accept what’s happening in our lives and even when we can’t stop asking for that aspect of ourselves that isn’t present. I loved that even Wonder Woman faces these same things and goes on the same journey as our villains.”

Wonder Woman 1984 debuts on Christmas Day in theaters and on HBO Max.