The Return Of Wonder Woman
American intelligence agent Steve Trevor convenes an airborne meeting of top nuclear experts to discuss the threat of a reclusive madman gaining access to atomic technology. As it turns out, that madman is already aware of the meeting, and has placed one of his own men aboard to take over. An anesthetic gas is released aboard the plane, knocking nearly everyone out instantly; Trevor manages to pull the saboteur’s gas mask off, meaning that no one is left awake aboard the plane, which goes down near the Bermuda Triangle…on Paradise Island.
Having returned to Paradise Island after World War II, Diana hasn’t aged a day, despite the fact that more than thirty years have passed since the war. Diana is stunned to see Trevor – who bears a strong resemblance to his father, the late Major Steve Trevor – and the truth of what happened aboard the plane is quickly discovered. With the freedom and safety of the world once again at stake, Diana elects to leave her fellow Amazons and return to America, again assuming the identity of Diana Prince and setting herself up as Steve Trevor’s assistant. And almost as soon as Diana is back in the United States, she has to become her alter ego, Wonder Woman, to defeat agents of the mad genius who tried to wreck Trevor’s original mission. With spies everywhere, Dr. Solano is now aware of Wonder Woman, and decides to turn his nuclear and robotic expertise toward setting a trap with an adversary that can defeat her once and for all.
written by Stephen Kandel
directed by Alan Crosland
music by Artie Kane
Cast: Lynda Carter (Diana Prince / Wonder Woman), Lyle Waggoner (Steve Trevor), Normann Burton (Joe Atkinson), Fritz Weaver (Dr. Solano), Bettye Ackerman (Asclepia), Jessica Walter (Gloria), Beatrice Straight (The Queen), David Knapp (Major Gaines), Carlos Romero (Colonel Acevo), Dorrie Thomson (Evadne), Argentina Brunetti (Manageress), Edward Cross (Pilot), Johana DeWinter (Dr. Ross), George Ives (Samuels), Frank Killmond (Logan), Russ Marin (Kleist), William Tregoe (Kalten), Raye Sheffield (Dr. Andrea)
Notes: Effectively a re-piloting of Wonder Woman for its new network home on CBS, this episode does acknowledge the first season with a couple of
very brief clips of the WWII-era Steve Trevor, but other than that could be watched cold by a new viewer. The title of the series is amended to “The New Adventures of Wonder Woman”, with the lyrics of the theme song changed to remove references specific to the first season, though the vocal version of that song was now on borrowed time and would be dropped by the end of 1977, along with the “comics panels” opening credits.
LogBook entry by Earl Green
Cast: Lynda Carter (Diana Prince / Wonder Woman), Lyle Waggoner (Steve Trevor), Normann Burton (Joe Atkinson), Mel Ferrer (Gerlich), Leon Charles (Von Klemper), Barry Dennen (Hitler), Kurt Kreuger (Koenig), Julio Medina (Gaitan), Tom Ormeny (Rogel), Peter Nyberg (Strasser)
Cast: Lynda Carter (Diana Prince / Wonder Woman), Lyle Waggoner (Steve Trevor), Normann Burton (Joe Atkinson), Yuki Shimoda (Ishida), Lew Ayres (Dr. Theodore Wilson), James Hong (Oshima), Alan McRae (Security Officer), J. Kenneth Campbell (Taft), Steven Ken Suehiro (Ishida, as a boy), Peter Kwong (Masaaki, as a boy), Arthur Song (Masaaki)