"Wonder Woman" is one of the best movies in DC's Extended Universe. Given the quality of the other films though, this is a fairly low bar to cross. Patty Jenkins brings some much-needed competency to the previously established world of Batman and Superman, but the final result is ultimately no better than a standard superhero affair. This begins feeling like a Marvel movie and ends as a DC movie in the worst way possible - somewhere in the middle, however, there are glimpses of promise.

Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) is the titular character, an Amazonian princess shut off from the world outside, incomparably strong but lacking in experience. When a British spy (Chris Pine) unintentionally lands on the shore of the Amazon's secret island, Diana is thrust into the First World War in order to find and stop Ares, the god of war supposedly behind it all. Gadot's acting is often subpar, especially in more dramatic scenes, though she certainly looks the part and is a very capable model - she spends much of the film posing, even looking like she's auditioning for a shampoo commercial in one of the movie's sillier moments. Surrounding her is a cast of refreshingly talented character actors, including David Thewlis ("Naked") and Ewen Bremner ("Trainspotting").

Narration is used in a painfully clichéd and lazy way to bookend the story. The first 40 minutes take place on Themyscira, the paradise island inhabited only by Amazon women, including several scenes with Diana as a child. This is a tired way to build the audience's affection, hurt even more by her having to try to replicate Gadot's accent. These early scenes mainly function as a way to serve heaps of exposition, including dreadfully obvious setups for a later twist ("You have greater powers than you know"; "She must never know the truth about what she is"). The film as a whole is overlong, and could have benefited from some trimming at each end: the focus on Themyscira is reminiscent of the drawn out sequences on Krypton which plague adaptations of Superman.

Well-saturated colours may surprise those who have watched DC's previous, miserably dark affairs; the crisp and bright blues and greens of Themyscira serve as a noticeable contrast to the greys of wartime Europe. The visual style as a whole is pleasant, with an unfortunate over-reliance on slow motion which has been an annoying feature of Snyder's projects as well. Some of the visual effects work is also unconvincing. It is clear that Jenkins is not an action director. The action sequences are not awful, but often feel less well crafted than simple dialogue scenes. Certain parts - such as a confrontation in an alleyway - are a bit of a mess. Overhead shots are used effectively among other commendable camerawork.

The score is overbearing throughout, and Wonder Woman's electric guitar theme is jarringly out of place. It has been heard previously in Batman v Superman and is even less fitting here. Thankfully the song is played only a handful of times towards the third act. Overly sappy music is used in a laughably poor death scene before we leave the island, and again to little effect in later sections in which we are expected to well up.

Pine and Gadot have surprisingly solid chemistry, and as such their scenes are the best in the picture. Interactions in a boat and a Belgian town are both warm and convincing. There are attempts at comedy, most of which fall flat: only so much laughter can be drawn from Diana not understanding the customs of our world. As expected, there is some welcome feminist commentary, though its handling is indicative of the film's lack of subtlety. Little of substance is communicated and the messaging is entirely shelved in favour of war scenes fairly quickly.

The plot, involving Steve Trevor (the hilariously generic name of Chris Pine's character) and Diana trying to put an end to World War One, is often clunky. Throughout there are convenient and questionable beats used to establish or resolve different elements of the story (he doubts whether Diana is strong, so let's have a man come in and threaten them with a gun!). Clearly the film wants the German villains to be Nazis - the politicians and military leaders of the Kaiserreich were not this comically evil. "Dr. Poison" (Elena Anaya) conducts chemical experiments similar to Josef Mengele, and General Ludendorff (Thewlis) consumes what I can only describe as magic super cocaine.

While watching, I was pleasantly surprised in the direction the film was going, as it seemed to be setting itself up for a more mature ending than previous DC movies. Trevor tells Prince: "You don't think I wish I could tell you that it was one bad guy to blame? It's not!" Quite right. Unfortunately I gave it too much credit. Wonder Woman's naïveté is proven right as, yes, it turns out to win the war you just have to kill one guy. A fake-out ending is set up - apparently just to work in a twist for the sake of having one - by having the supposed villain act so cartoonish that the film overcompensates and it becomes clear something fishy is going on. The twist is nonsensical from a script standpoint and only serves the role of allowing the last half hour to be a complete shit-show of ridiculous monologues and ugly CG fighting.

It seems that Diana's inexperience is only rewarded throughout. She is told not to go into no man's land, yet she waltzes right in and wins a great victory. What are we to learn from this? Her arc appears to be that she learns to trust in humanity ("only love can save the world" is the final line) but she was the only Amazon in the first place to want to help Steve Trevor. This is not the only way in which the film contradicts itself; for all her constant insistence that every life is valuable and we should help innocent people, Diana certainly shows little hesitation in killing conscripted German soldiers and mercenaries. A strange morality to be sure.

Wonder Woman has long stretches which are overwhelmingly superior to every other film in the DCEU. All the more shame, then, that it reverts to stupidity in the end.