A few pieces of Lynda Carter merch (photos come from eBay and Google):
Cryptozoic Entertainment’s Wonder Woman, from 2018:
Noir Edition:
A caped variant of the original figure/statue:
Below is arguably the best Lynda Carter Wonder Woman figure ever made. It hails from the Signature Collection portion of the DC Multiverse line, by Mattel.
Top view:
Front view:
Promotional out of package picture:
Tweeterhead has made a few maquettes that featured Ms. Carter’s likeness:
And that’s the impact of her playing a character for three years in the 1970s. Should be putting up a couple of polls tonight about her iconicness versus some others. Thanks @Vroom
Another question, beyond just our favorite Amazon. If the Wonder Woman figure is done in Lynda’s image, does she get a cut?
Re Poll 1
Who was more significant?
I picked Adam West
In many ways it depends on.how old you are and whether you are male or female.
I am not sure if the Adventures of Superman was ever an evening show. If it was nobody here is old enough to remember it. That affects influence. I saw it in the afternoon and I am 69. It was a show for kids.
The other two were evening shows for a wide range of audiences.
Adam West dominated as a version of Batman. So much that the Silver Age might be separated into.two parts Before the TV show and after.
Adam West.WAS Batman and he did this version well. But The show caused the comics to reflect it. And I was 16 and the comics were unreadable. The writers could not write the way the show was but they tried and failed miserably. So i left comics for 7 years.
Batman TV show was such that the Batman movie of 89 was difficult to.sell. Batman was Camp and Camp didn’t sell.
Even ten years later you can see the influence of the Batman TV show on.the Wondet Woman show. It had elements of tomgue in check at best and parody at worst. Like Cloris Leachman and the harp.
Lynda Carter almost caused the show to rise above that but couldn’t. She was true to the character and never made fun of it. But the show did.
If I was a young female watching the show that would be enough. At last a female character that was brave honest true powerful and many other things. But I am male
Poll 2
Who was more true to the original
The Batman TV show ruined the character and established a foolish version.as the version for decades.
Superman.was limited by the special effects of the day The flying was unconvincing and only the bullets bouncing off his chest worked… Superman in.the last episode of Justice League Unlimited said the world was made of paper.mache. that was clearly evident on the walls and props on this show.
George Reeve as Clark Kent was much better than the one in the Comics. He was warm and masculine, winking at the audience. Not like the comics
Wonder Woman was a model for everybody. She was not knowlegable about Man’s World. But again she was the most brave honest truthful empathetic strongest and smartest person in the room as either Diana Prince or Wonder Woman
I have this one!
I’m not a fan of the Pop giant heads, but this is beyond adorable.
So, on the poll questions. For which lead actor had the most significant impact on our perception today, I went with Lynda Carter’s Wonder Woman. It’s really a two person race between her and Adam West. But, while West undoubtedly had the bigger impact on the broader culture at the time, his impact fades until it is completely replaced in the 80s/90s with the Dark Knight of Miller/Nolan. The camp has decamped. Lynda on the other hand gave us a happy warrior, somewhat bemused by how ‘man’s world’ operates. Her’s is a smiling, compassionate butt kicking version of Wonder Woman. Sound like someone else? You can draw a straight line between Lynda and Gal.
On which program most closely reflected the intent of the characters creators, I went with Wonder Woman again, but I do think there’s a good argument to be made for Reeve’s Adventures of Superman. No he’s not the social warrior of Action #1, but that version of Superman lasts less than two years. By mid-1941 Superman had stopped trashing used car lots full of lemons, and concentrated on stopping organized criminals, bank robbers, etc, just like Adventures. Wonder Woman season 1 reflects the anti-Nazi Wonder Woman adventures, but never includes the more ‘fantasical’ elements of Golden Age Wonder Woman. But, still they do such a good job that I voted that way.
Hard to say. Given how excellent the likeness is, I would hope she’d get a cut.
Same for John Wesley Shipp and his Flash figure in the same collection.
When I picked Adam.West
I didn’t pay attention to the word “todsy”
Adam.West and Lynda Carter played these characters so long ago that few people today were dramatically affected by the originsl.shows
So the question is how did these shows affect people through
Syndication
Cable
VCR
DVD
Streaming like DC Universe
Or how available was these shows to people who did not watch the shows originslly on ABC or CBS?
Neither show was widely availabe through VCR or DVD
in our video library
Nicola Scott explains how she didnt read comics
but before she could tell time or read
she watched Wonder Woman
(She also discusses George Perez Adam Hughes and Greg Rucka)
https://www.dcuniverse.com/videos/dc-university/147
scrern shot.
How many young girls were affected in.the same way?
For Batman 66
Were these videos more accessible to the young than Batman 66?
Batman The Animated Series
Tim Burton Batman
Nolan Batman
Even so these shows were affeted by Batmsn 66
Without Batmsn 66
In comics O’neil and Adams take may not have happened
Without Batman’s Camp stigma
Michael Uslan would never have gotten rights to Batman at an affordable price
And Tim Burton’s Batman
would nevet happened.
That is Adam West’s legacy in a mostly negative way
if he hadn’t bern so good at that version
All the above msy never have hsppened.
Rest in peace Old Chum.
I also went with Lynda’s Wonder Woman for the poll questions. It really feels that because her version stuck closer to the source material, that we see her version still reflected in today’s versions of Wonder Woman. Adam West’s Batman is definitely engrained in pop culture, but it feels like Batman himself went against the camp iteration and went darker since then. I’m also just not as aware of the Superman listed.
Quick bio hit: Season 3 episode stars a talking chimp, a cruise ship captain, and a dude who rides buses.
A couple of quotes of how some comic creators viewed Lynda Carter’s Wonder Woman.
Alex Ross: Carter is of “near equal importance to the legend of Wonder Woman…as the creators.”
Andy Mangels: “Other than Christopher Reeve, there has never been a single actor who has so embodied a comic book character as Lynda Carter did; she was the epitome of everything Wonder Woman was in the comics.”
Despite the difference in tone and obviously budgets, I think you can draw a straight line between Lynda and Gal and how the character is depicted.
I also voted Wonder Woman. Lynda Carter with a limited budget and ‘70s special effects used her charm, acting skills, and personality to put an indelible stamp on Wonder Woman. She is the gold standard. 
Charm is the right word, isn’t it. As for her acting, she’s very natural and improves substantially in season 2
The camera loves her and she was just so comfortable in her own skin. It made you believe her as both Diana and Wonder Woman.
I think her acting skills were very well used in Season 1. It was done in a style that was period correct, especially given that it was also in the military which had VERY strict rules for female behavior in place. My mom was a WAVe in Korea, and the same rules and refs for women in the service occurred then as well. Diana’s power, given the massive limitations and requirements from an acting style and then moving into modern day and changes in identities of women working for the goverment fit the period piece. LC’ acting chops from season 2 & season 3 got stinger in a more “natural way of writing dialogue happened.
A few interesting that by episode 8 of season 2 the went away fringed all computer aided graphic for the show opining and at season 2 &3 I found much he hair I the transformation scenes In season 1 here hair made hair flip for the change perfect. The stylist band maybe hair designer could get the hair to release correctly. flipped around episode eight, then they moved to making the costume 12 foot or larger so you couldn’t see the mistake of the hair coming out no the same time.
Also it’s worth noting that she never punch a guy in the whole series,. It was mostly throws. Thank the censors for that
In reference to his difference regarding old age Wonder Woman. It is clear that the tone down in many ways removed from The show do you sexual implications of all the bondage that was in the early golden age Wonder Woman comics
As many have stated already it was a breaking in point for female stunt performers in television.
The simple fact that Lynda Carter created still the most iconic version of the character even given these limitations shows how great an actress she was and how good the show was even relevant to its time.
Kyle Wagner was such a Putz it was nice to see that by the third season he had pretty much been removed as a recurring character and they had a little if any scenes together.
It was a disappointment although not surprising given the impact in reach of the moral majority of the time that the mythological parts of wonder woman were greatly downplayed.
Through it all Lynda Carter, especially having to work with the sexiest Views of that time created the truly in the most iconic wonder woman to date including Gal Gadot.
One is left to wonder if you had a time machine and could take Lynda Carter in her Wonder Woman prime and put her up against Gal Gadot in the ability to play a modern Wonder Woman given modern characters and characterizations and substantially less censorship on women’s roles. Who would’ve actually been the better Wonder Woman. To me, it would’ve been Lynda Carter hands down…l.
I do love the Golden age WW comics, as they Were the most socially subversive. A lot of sex and bondage in those mags. As the woman’s movement gained steam WW was restablished as a cultural force. The TV show cemented her in as the first Feminist icon into public consciousness.
I think that dovetails into a couple of other thoughts I’ve had on the series. First, Yeoman Diana Prince is more of an alter ego than Agent Diana Prince. Agent Prince is as competent in her way as Wonder Woman and moves the story forward far more than Yeoman Prince does. Yeoman Prince also comes across as more as a young woman than the fully formed Agent Prince.
As for how being a WAVE effects Diana and her presentation. I don’t understand why they demoted her from a Lieutenant to a lower enlisted Yeoman. Being an LT would have given her greater ability to impact the action as her alter ego. Now, one thing that would never happen is a yeoman calling a major by his first name in the office. As an NCO, I had officer friends but it was always sir or ma’am in uniform for lots of reasons. Minor quibble, it is tv. I do love the episode where Steve gets sick of Diana’s arguing with him and he calls her “Yeoman Prince” she comes back with an exaggerated “Sir, yes, sir!” with a salute. Nice way to say ‘kiss my butt, Steve’
The buck down from Lieutenant to yeoman was done after the pilot which did not take into account the actualities of women serving in World War II. This was fixed post pilot. I agree that it was more of a secret identity. However one must also look at the time period. Given her yeoman rank and that wonder woman would have been out selling war bonds rather than seeing any real action is also a reason for having a secret identity in the first season.
Moving the second and third seasons into a different structure where she was an agent certainly fit with the emerging roles of feminism of that era. So less focus on the need for secret identity makes sense when they went to seasons two and three.
As a side note: I recall the episode that you mentioned with her giving him a “sir yes sir”. There was such great sarcasm in that line and I think it’s one of the reasons why you get those moments in that series where you actually see Lynda Carter really having strong acting skills even though most of the work had to be done the stylized fashion.
