Short history lesson. The modern comic book industry peaked in 1992, the bubble burst in the spring of '93, and a precipitous decline followed year after year throughout the rest of the decade. Desperate to stop the bleeding, the Big Two North American super-hero comics publishers set aside their differences to unite against this threat to their market. This massive cooperative also happened during a brief period when both companies were being run by fans/creators who could set their egos and rivalries aside to make true a lifelong dream, spearheaded by former co-workers Mike Carlin at DC and Mark Gruenwald at Marvel (probably the latter's last great accomplishment in the field before his untimely death at just 43 years old.)
DC Versus Marvel #1 launched a four issue mini-series in December of 1995, in which two cosmic "brothers" representing the individual publishers' universes become aware of each other, and engage in a proxy war between the super-humans of their respective continuums in an existential conflict. As I recall, there were a total of 10 decisive matches, 5 determined in-house, and 5 voted on by readers. Marvel predictably won, but rather than let the DC Universe "die," three entities within the story worked to merge the two universes into an amalgamated one to "save" both. For one week across twelve one-shot titles, as well as a tie-in card set (two if you count 1995's Fleer DC vs. Marvel Comics,) this (more) fabricated single universe of Amalgam Comics was documented. The seeds were also planted for a means to divide the universes again, and to reach a stalemate between the cosmic "brothers" to allow for continued publication of the lines. There were two additional total universe crossover mini-series, a second slate of one-off Amalgam Comics, and a bunch of isolated inter-company crossovers. Then corporatism and aggressively competitive choads took over the individual companies around the turn of the century, and we waited another couple of decades to get Marvel and DC talking about this sort of thing again.
In another sign that this was as much about unleashing the inner child of the participants as it was corporate synergy, Wonder Woman managed to score two titles in the initial Amalgam Comics wave. In the imaginary history of Amalgam Comics, the property had "54 years of continuous publication", which would mean 1942 at the time. That aligns with the real world release of
Sensation Comics, which appears to be
Astounding Comics in the Amalgam Comics continuity. Things get quite muddy from there though, as the heroines of the two titles seem too Modern Age inclined to support over a half-century of continuity. I'd guess that the event reflects a new continuity that spun out of a more recent rebooting event, such as
Secret Crisis of the Infinity Hour.
What we do know is that Ororo was introduced in 1975's
Giant-Size Tales of the Amazons #1, having been rescued from drowning by Queen Hippolyte as an orphaned toddler. From there, the related ongoing series offered bifurcated 12-page stories of Princess Diana of Themyscira and her now-adopted sister Ororo. Diana saw Ororo as an interloper and a non-Amazon outsider whom she fought with throughout childhood (at least from Ororo's perspective, in her first-ever spin-off solo series.) Eventually, a contest was organized to determine which of the Amazons would serve as an ambassador to Man's World. However, Diana refused to follow her mother's rules, and left her island home to explore "Man's World." This took her first to Wakanda, whose ruler Bronze Tiger gifted her Adamantium bracelets from his country's exclusive supply of the unbreakable metal. Also armed with a mystical bow, the Princess ended up in New York City, where she became Diana Prince, Freelance. That seemed to frequently be shortened to just "Prince." She eventually made the acquaintance of the Spider-Boy antagonist sometimes called The Punisher. Marine Captain Trevor "Castle" Castiglione was on leave when his wife and children were murdered by gangsters right in front of him. Going AWOL, Castle sought murderous revenge against the mob, at least until he met Prince during a mutual encounter with the Pelt Man. "Doomed by an ancient ritual to change into the form of a blood-thirsty cheetah, Billy Minerva now takes out his bestial anger on beautiful people- clawing their faces to scar them as horribly as he's been scarred!" Prince and Castle became an item, married, conceived a son (Ryan,) separated, and reunited after their child disappeared under mysterious circumstances.
Ororo won the initial contest, and claimed the title of Wonder Woman. She seemed to prefer working solo, refusing overtures from male-led super-teams, presumably a bias from her Amazonian upbringing. I could go a lot deeper into her origin story, especially because wires got crossed and we ended up with numerous cards drawn by Stuart Immonen devoted to her connection to Poseidon (including an especially ridiculous solo card.) However, that's also the focus of
Amazon #1, so we'll save those details for later. Following the cancellation of
Tales of the Amazons, "Amalgam Comics finally gave the fans what they wanted- the Amazon brawl of the century, where it was plain to see that Ororo's mutant weather-manipulation and Diana Prince's god-given abilities made them perfectly matched combatants." This coming from the text of the
1996 SkyBox Amalgam Classics Power Blast limited edition foil-etched trading card #6 of 9. The image purported to be the cover of
Amazons: The Contest #1, dated "June, 1995," and is the Steven Butler image presented in the scan from the
Amalgam Age of Comics TPB. Unusually, this was an homage to a cover produced by Mike Deodato Jr. exclusively for the trade paperback collection
Wonder Woman: The Contest, rather than a regular comic. Anyway, that card text indicated some sort of draw, but the fake letters to
Amazon #1 stated that Ororo was the definitive winner, as was the case in
DC Versus Marvel.
The four issues of
Amazons: The Contest also featured the teaming of longtime villains Professor Psycho, Panthera, Circe, and Giganta. Wikipedia supposes that they combined Doctor Psycho/Professor Power, Pantha/Feral, Circe/Sersi, and Giganta/Gargantua, while sourcing the obscure and dated internet reference site
The Appendix to the Handbook of the Marvel Universe. I strongly question the validity of this citation and its presumptions. For instance, the Pelt Man is pretty clearly Cheetah + Jigsaw, as referenced on Amalgam card #50 (art by Yancy Labat.) Bruce Wayne: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. was apparently key to the resolution of the mini-series.
As mentioned, some of this information was conveyed through mock letters columns that ran through most of the one-shots, including
Amazon #1. I couldn't find my copy of
Bullets and Bracelets #1 in my shelved comics under the letter "B" or in the Wonder Woman section, in my uncollecting short boxes on top of the shelves, or in the Wonder Woman boxes at the bottom of my closet that were covered in stacks of still-packaged toys that I had to displace throughout the room. The things I do for you people, or more accurately, my obsessive tendencies. There wasn't a letter column for
Bullets and Bracelets scanned online, and I don't own
The Amalgam Age of Comics: The Marvel Comics Collection, so hopefully that was one of the ones that got skipped during initial publication. Also, I don't have any other ancillary material that might have been in that trade paperback, which is why I'm relying on the trading cards. What is nice though is seeing the card art mostly unmolested in the tpb reproduction, like Butler's details unobscured by a gimmick, or joining two-card images into a smooth whole.
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