The original Wonder Woman has the new one’s back.
Lynda Carter — who portrayed the Amazonian hero in the 1970s TV series — slammed filmmaker James Cameron for his repeated criticisms of the new “Wonder Woman” film starring Gal Gadot.
Cameron first referred to Gadot’s portrayal of the character as an “objectified icon” to The Guardian before doubling down to suggest there’s nothing ground-breaking about casting a beauty queen in that role during an interview with The Hollywood Reporter.
“To James Cameron -STOP dissing WW: You poor soul,” Carter, 66, began in an impassioned Facebook post. “Perhaps you do not understand the character. I most certainly do. Like all women–we are more than the sum of our parts.”
“Your thuggish jabs at a brilliant director, Patty Jenkins, are ill advised,” she continued. “This movie was spot on. Gal Gadot was great. I know, Mr. Cameron–because I have embodied this character for more than 40 years. So–STOP IT.”
Cameron — who is known for directing blockbusters including “Avatar” and “Titanic” — sparked controversy in August when he said he didn’t understand the nearly universal praise surrounding the first full-length “Wonder Woman” film in the history of the character.
“All of the self-congratulatory back-patting Hollywood’s been doing over Wonder Woman has been so misguided,” he told The Guardian at the time. “She’s an objectified icon, and it’s just male Hollywood doing the same old thing! I’m not saying I didn’t like the movie but, to me, it’s a step backwards.”
He went even further in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter that was published on Wednesday to explain he didn’t see the casting of Gadot as influential.
“I mean, she was Miss Israel, and she was wearing a kind of bustier costume that was very form-fitting,” Cameron told THR. “She’s absolutely drop-dead gorgeous. To me, that’s not breaking ground. They had Raquel Welch doing stuff like that in the ’60s.”
In both of those interviews, he said the character played by Gadot greatly contrasted another iconic female film character Sarah Connor, whom Linda Hamilton played in “Terminator” in 1991.
“She just wasn’t treated as a sex object,” Cameron told THR. “There was nothing sexual about her character. It was about angst, it was about will, it was about determination.”
Carter posted her criticisms of Cameron a day after the THR interview was published.
Jenkins, who directed the “Wonder Woman” film, also took issue with Cameron’s comments.
“If women have to always be hard, tough and troubled to be strong, and we aren’t free to be multidimensional or celebrate an icon of women everywhere because she is attractive and loving, then we haven’t come very far have we,” she said in a Twitter statement after Cameron’s original remarks to The Guardian. “I believe women can and should be EVERYTHING just like male lead characters should be.”
“Wonder Woman,” which premiered this past March, grossed over $820 million worldwide and boasts a robust 92% fresh rating on the review website Rotten Tomatoes.
