There might not be 84 minutes of Wonder Woman in the two-and-a-half-hour Wonder Woman 1984, a woefully misconceived sequel to the 2017 film. Set, for little reason, in the year of the title, the movie gives most of its running time to Maxwell Lord (Pedro Pascal), a shady con man whose greedy business aspirations get a boost when he steals an ancient, wish-granting gem from the museum where Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) works. Pascal, the stoic lead in the Star Wars series The Mandalorian, shows a distinctly different gear here, turning Lord into a comic, flop-sweaty variation on Gene Hackman’s Lex Luthor and the unfortunate real world’s Donald Trump. Speaking of Luthor, Wonder Woman 1984 evokes the era of its title with forced, groan-worthy references (“Those are called breakdancers…”) and a corny tone that’s more reminiscent of the gee-whizziness of 1978’s Superman than the regal nobility of its predecessor. Gadot appears in brief flashes early on, performing Supermanesque rescues of people about to be hit by cars, etc., but then largely disappears for long stretches while we follow Lord and his elaborate machinations. (The few action scenes we do get are defined by surprisingly shoddy special effects—and I watched this on the same screen, via the same Internet connection, as The Mandalorian, which is richly envisioned.) Chris Pine returns—still game, but unnecessary—as Steve Trevor, while Kristin Wiig also plays against type as Barbara Minerva/Cheetah, a potential Wonder Woman rival. Unfortunately, she too is sidelined by all the time inexplicably spent with Pascal. When you hit a home run with Gadot, who was so thrilling in the 2017 film, you might want to make a sequel that keeps her at the center.
