User Reviews

From the moment Marion Mariposa (Henry Gibson) drops deliriously from the skies and into "Wonder Woman," you know that the tense criminal atmosphere of the previous episode ("Light-fingered Lady") has been blown away by campiness more typical of "Batman" (appropriately, series developer Stanley Ralph Ross did write for that 1960s spoof-a-rama) even if Diana Prince is almost blown away by Mariposa's capricious calling card in the first few minutes of "Screaming Javelins."

This was Brian McKay's second and final script for the series (although he was the executive story consultant throughout season two and helped script "The Pied Piper"), and like his previous story, "The Man Who Made Volcanoes," it features an obsessed mastermind bent on attaining his objective at any cost. And like Arthur Chapman in "Volcanoes," Mariposa also has a global vision, although his ultimately has a microscopic focus. The self-proclaimed emperor of "Mariposalia," an island micronation that seemingly exists only in his own mind, plans to secure global recognition for it by kidnapping top Olympic athletes to garner the gold for Mariposalia at the next Olympic Games and thus show the world its--and his--greatness. Or something.

The two Summer Olympics held earlier in the 1970s were both historic. The 1972 Munich Games saw American swimmer Mark Spitz win seven gold medals, at the time a record for a single Olympics, but are infamous for the killing of eleven Israeli athletes by the Palestinian terrorist group Black September. The 1976 Montreal Games saw Romanian Nadia Comaneci become the first gymnast in Olympics history to score a perfect 10.0, a feat she accomplished seven times in Montreal.

Indeed, next on Mariposa's list is Nadia Samara (Melanie Chartoff), an Eastern Bloc gymnast who recently defected to the United States. Obviously inspired by the real Nadia, she gains protection from Diana (who remarks to Steve Trevor that she had first met Nadia in Munich) but winds up getting kidnapped by Mariposa anyway as there isn't much else to "Screaming Javelins" except Nadia's subplot with her American boyfriend Tom Hamilton (Rick Springfield), a minor annoyance who fills the time, and the gloriously rococo megalomania that is Mariposa.

Ah, the joys of Henry Gibson. The elfin industry veteran whose career ran the gamut from "Laugh-In" to "Nashville" and "The Blues Brothers" owns this episode so completely that Lynda Carter is left to chase after Mariposa's mooks as both Diana and Wonder Woman. Clad in purple silk pajamas, Mariposa, Spanish for butterfly, flutters about like a cross between Hugh Hefner and Liberace so, ah, "flamboyantly" that he has to be flanked by two buxom blondes (twins Beth and Kay Kearney) else viewers get the Wrong Idea. At one point, one of the twins massaging his back hits a G-spot that causes Mariposa to react so orgasmically that you wonder how that made it onto prime time.

Mariposa's whole Olympics plot is a big fizzle, Chartoff struggles with where exactly behind the Iron Curtain she got her accent from, and Carter, projecting ever-more confidence, still has to play second fiddle to Gibson as the butterfly spreads his flamboyant wings.

At last we have in this episode a picturesque villain who differs from the boring gangsters in suits and ties. The idea is good and well developed. L fails is in the end, the capture of Mariposa is too simple, the twins do not even manage to stop Wonder Woman, I think the ending should have been more shocking to give a good closure to the story. As has happened with other villains whose capture remains unfinished and they threaten to return, they never do. Mariposa could have returned in another episode but this never happened. Acceptable episode.

How would Wonder Woman be able to compete at the Olympics? Obviously her belt which gives her her powers would be considered an advantage so she would need to remove them which would make her powerless. Obviously without her belt/powers she would not be able to compete in athletics/swimming/strength sports where she would have an advantage because of her powers.

Given that in a couple of episodes she showed what could be considered some gymnastic ability on the bars, perhaps she could compete in gymnastics, which would introduce another costume - the Wonder Woman leotard, as I doubt her WW costume would be allowable for her to compete in the Olympics

Several of America's leading college athletes disappear in baffling circumstances, but Wonder Woman is soon on the trail of the vainglorious Marion Mariposa, whose bizarre scheme to gain recognition for his private 'kingdom' hardly conforms to the Olympic ideal!

Henry Gibson plays Mariposa, a creepy basket case who kidnaps a Olympic team to play in his country. Dressed in purple silk, he struts his stuff, ordering his minions around. This character definitely belongs in 1966's classic Batman. Actually he makes this ok episode enjoyable with his charming yet menacing presence.