DC’s Wonder Woman 1984 (2020) was met with devastating reviews, with many slamming director Patty Jenkins and star Gal Gadot over the superhero. But, one Marvel director just called out the movie over a “disgrace” over cultural representation.
Warner Bros. and DC debuted Wonder Woman 1984 as its first straight-to-digital release on the HBO Max streaming services, giving fans the first super hero movie of 2020.
While the movie offered many exciting moments and actor, Pedro Pascal shined bright as Maxwell Lord, the movie’s antagonist, WW84 scored a low 5.4/10 on IMDb and received loads of backlash and hate on social media.
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Gal Gadot has been controversial in recent times, with 20th Century’s disputed Death on the Nile (2022) being banned in multiple countries over cultural clashes over Gadot serving in Israel’s Defense Forces for two years.
Now, Marvel’s principal Moon Knight series director Mohamed Diab just slammed Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman 1984, calling it a “disgrace” over misrepresentation of Egyptian culture:
#MoonKnight director Mohamed Diab says #WonderWoman1984’s Egyptian scene is a disgrace. “I remember seeing Wonder Woman 1984 and there was a big sequence in Egypt and it was a disgrace for us,” he said.
#MoonKnight director Mohamed Diab says #WonderWoman1984's Egyptian scene is a disgrace. "I remember seeing Wonder Woman 1984 and there was a big sequence in Egypt and it was a disgrace for us," he said. (Via: @GamesRadar) pic.twitter.com/0j26hcQEma
— Binge Watch This (@BingeWatchThis_) March 22, 2022
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Nonetheless, Moon Knight faces immense backlash over cultural misrepresentation in the series’ cast, with Marvel not hiring a Jewish actor to portray the Egyptian warrior Marc Spector (Oscar Isaac).
Marvel character Marc Spector is the son of a Rabbi who would later go on to defeat anti-semites. Nonetheless, Moon Knight comic creator Alan Zelentz claimed that Marvel is erasing Jewish culture from their Marvel collection.
He told Jewish-American outlet The Forward:
“They’re certainly not bound by any origins. All of a sudden the Jews need to be represented. Moon Knight has to be Jewish — ‘Oh, we’re watching Marvel! The boycott is around the corner.’ I can smell blood in the water already! ‘How could they not make him Jewish? Oscar Isaac is not Jewish, even though he has the name ‘Isaac.’ And they’ve got an Egyptian director — what’s going on here?’”
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Moon Knight series director Mohamed Diab is throwing stones towards Gal Gadot and the misrepresentation in an Egyptian sequence in Wonder Woman 1984 that features Pedro Pascal’s Maxwell Lord strongarming a powerful Egyptian dictator into giving up his oil reserves and more.
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Diab told SFX Magazine:
“You never see Cairo. You always see Jordan shot for Cairo, Morocco shot for Cairo, sometimes Spain shot for Cairo. This really angers us. I remember seeing Wonder Woman 1984 and there was a big sequence in Egypt and it was a disgrace for us. You had a sheik – that doesn’t make any sense to us. Egypt looked like a country from the Middle Ages. It looked like the desert.”
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More about Wonder Woman 1984
Diana Prince lives quietly among mortals in the vibrant, sleek 1980s — an era of excess driven by the pursuit of having it all. Though she’s come into her full powers, she maintains a low profile by curating ancient artifacts, and only performing heroic acts incognito. But soon, Diana will have to muster all of her strength, wisdom and courage as she finds herself squaring off against Maxwell Lord and the Cheetah, a villainess who possesses superhuman strength and agility.
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Gal Gadot is joined by Pedro Pascal (Maxwell Lord), Chris Pine (Steve Trevor), Kristen Wiig (Cheetah), and Lynda Carter (Asteria), with Patty Jenkins directing and writing the film with Geoff Johns and Dave Callaham.
Gal Gadot’s DC Future
Following Zack Snyder’s Justice League (AKA “The Snyder Cut”), Warner Bros. reportedly cut every tie with Zack Snyder, Henry Cavill’s Superman, and Ray Fisher’s Cyborg.
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Reasoning? Reports suggest that Fisher’s blatant calling out of Warner Brothers’ mistreatment of actors of color during director Joss Whedon’s reign of his Justice League (2017) caused the actor to experience intolerable emotional damage.
Ray Fisher called out the mistreatment, and DC reportedly responded by sidelining his character in future projects, including The Flash (2022) and now Peacemaker.
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Ray Fisher called out the mistreatment, and DC reportedly responded by sidelining his character in future projects, including The Flash (2022) and now Peacemaker.
More about Moon Knight
Moon Knight follows Steven Grant (Oscar Isaac), a mild-mannered gift-shop employee, who becomes plagued with blackouts and memories of another life. Steven discovers he has dissociative identity disorder and shares a body with mercenary Marc Spector.
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The Marvel Universe is becoming much more than iconic characters/Earth’s Mightiest Heroes like Star-Lord/Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.), Captain America (Chris Evans), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch), the Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan), Hawkeye/Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner), Black Widow/Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson), and Captain Marvel/Carol Danvers (Brie Larson).
Tom Holland’s Avenger, Spider-Man, is leading the way for Marvel Cinematic Universe newcomers Kate Bishop, Ms. Marvel/Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani), Moon Knight (Oscar Isaac), Agatha Harkness (Kathryn Hahn), She-Hulk (Tatiana Maslany), Eternals’ Thena (Angelina Jolie), and more — especially with his next Spider-Man trilogy that’s currently in the works.
Do you think Wonder Woman 1984 represented Egyptian culture accurately? Let us know in the comments below!