Runner Up: Wonder Woman #78 – G. Willow Wilson, Tom Derenick, Trevor Scott, Norm Rapmund, Romulo Fajardo Jr. and Pat Brosseau

Love is dead. Cheetah has killed her.

The fallout from Cheetah’s actions continue as Wonder Woman has lost her will to fight and is easily overpowered by her most deadly foe. Things begin in the most bleak way possible as illustrated by Tom Derenick. We cut back and forth from the immediate past to the current present as Cheetah wrests or destroys Wonder Woman’s armaments. 

Her sword is cut in half and her shield is demolished after swipes from Cheetah’s new Godkiller sword. Her tiara is broken and sent flying after a solid punch. The Lasso of Truth is snatched away as Cheetah mocks her, asking who is truly worthy. Even the Gauntlets of Submission are absolutely destroyed after being hit with the sword. 

Cheetah smiles with absolute glee as Diana is driven before her, helpless and unable to defeat her with her new and powerful weapon. She manages to escape into a nearby river and calls Atlantiades to help her. The demigoddess hears her call and with the help of Steve Trevor, they find Wonder Woman, broken and defeated without love.

Superman is commonly thought of as being the main hope in DC and there is a lot of merit to that, but at the same time, Wonder Woman is just as much of an inspiration to some if not more. She has almost never given up hope, even after killing Maxwell Lord in the past or losing her ability to see, hell even after fighting the Amazons after they invaded Man’s World she wasn’t at all fazed. Losing to Cheetah and feeling the crushing weight of the world on her shoulders now that she doesn’t have the hope of love to keep her head up high. It’s even worse when Steve Trevor is also suffering from this lack of love. Even while giving Diana a soothing bath for her injuries and trying to console her, his eyes are empty of the love they had and she can tell. 

Not only is love gone, but so is compassion as we see in a short scene shortly after the bath. A mail carrier on a bike accident hits a car and no one does anything to help him. It’s telling that people just either drive around him or stand idly by seeing no reason to try to walk through traffic. We see even later on that people are far more willing to commit crime, especially after Lex has been offering people gifts and changing how they think, bringing out the darkness inside.

Eventually Wonder Woman is left with no other choice than to ask Veronica Cale for help. Veronica Cale, who has nothing but enmity for Wonder Woman, decides to help her as she doesn’t even remember the feeling of dread that she had when her daughter was trapped in Themyscira and see this as an opportunity to show the Gods that mortals can see what they cannot.

In a way, Cale and Cheetah are similar in that regard. They have nothing but hate for the Gods and Wonder Woman and will do everything they can to tear them down, Cale with wit and guile and Cheetah with pure rage. 

G. Willow Wilson is absolute bringing out the bloodlust from Cheetah that we haven’t seen in some time and is making her a pretty credible threat. If her trajectory continues the way that it has, then there’s no doubt in my mind that this entire run of Wonder Woman will end in one of their deaths and that is exciting.