Like Wonder Woman in the film, the movie starts strong and then loses its powers halfway.
In 1984, Diana (Gal Gadot) struggles to find her place in the world of men while continuing to mourn the loss of Steve Trever, who sacrificed himself in the first Wonder Woman film.
Diana starts to develop a friendship with a coworker named Barbara Minerva (Kristen Wiig), but the arrival of a magical rock disrupts her life as a museum curator and undercover superhero. You see, Barbara gets her hands on a mysterious stone that claims it fulfills wishes. When Diana and Barbara try it out, Diana's wish is to bring her long-deceased lover Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) back to her. At the same time, Barbara's wish was to be more like Diana; unbeknown to her meant getting Diana's powers.
Diana's reserved existence takes a turn when the soul of Steve Trevor possesses another man's body. What they didn't know when they made those wishes is that you lose something for what you gain. Diana begins to lose her powers, and Barbara, with her newfound power, begins to lose her humanity. Meanwhile, the stone finds its way to failing businessman Max Lord (Pedro Pascal), who wishes to "become" the stone and gains the ability to grant wishes for people while also taking from them what he sees fit. He becomes wealthy and drunk on power, creating mayhem around the world.
If that all sounds confusing, that's because, well...it is. The plot has a lot going on with it for no reason and too many main players to focus on. It would've done better to have Kristen Wiig's Cheetah be the only villain in the movie. We don't even get to Wiig's full transformation into the iconic villain until near the end of the film when Wiig makes a wish to Max Lord to be an "apex predator." She fully transforms into Cheetah for a final battle with Wonder Woman, who now dons a winged suit of armor once worn by the legendary Asteria. The suit is comically torn apart within minutes of Diana fighting in the battle, which begs the question, what was the point?
While I love Pedro Pascal, his character just added more to the plot, and maybe it could've still worked if it all was connected better, but it simply didn't.
Also, there's no explanation for why Steve Trevor is put into another man's body. If the stone is "all granting," why would it not grant Diana the Steve she knew physically too? And the man's body she took over, did he have no family? Were people not worried for him? When the entire world started making wishes, did no one ask to be able to find him? I could go on because the movie has plot holes for days which maybe would be easy to overlook if it was at least enjoyable, but it wasn't.
The most enjoyable part was Kristen Wiig, who really blew me away as Barbara Minerva, which is why it's so sad she spent so little time as the actual villain Cheetah. By the end of the film, everyone loses their wishes, and so she is back to having no powers, which is disappointing as it feels like that means she won't be in future films, but of course, we can never say never.
Overall, I was thankful I could stream it on HBO Max from home without paying extra, as I would've then actually been upset for the waste of money.
Rating: D