WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Wonder Woman #765, by Mariko Tamaki, Steve Pugh, Romulo Fajardo Jr. and Pat Brosseau, on sale now.
Wonder Woman #765 has found Diana of Themyscira on another mission with Max Lord, as they head to Zandia to retrieve scientific tools his company peddled on the black market years ago. It's mind-control tech his daughter, Liar Liar, recently used to cause a wave of bloodshed across the planet, and Diana wants to ensure it doesn't fall into the wrong hands again.
Unfortunately, she runs into a major villain from the Young Justice cartoon, and this tyrant deals Diana a major blow that injures her in the war to come.
Diana and Max find themselves amid a villain civil war in Zandia. Thankfully, they get their hands on folks who reveal the tech was auctioned off to Vlatava, and more importantly, Count Vertigo. As fans will recall, Count Vertigo led the Injustice League in the pages of Young Justice and tried to stop Kid Flash from bringing his niece, Queen Perdita, a heart so he could take over the European kingdom. He failed and was eventually thrown in jail. This isn't typical of the cutthroat behavior we've seen him employ when fighting the likes of Batman and more so, Green Arrow, in the comics.
Here, Vertigo is clearly as unforgiving as ever, as he wants to use Max's work to quell dissidents and take all of Vlatava back as he feels this is his birthright. Wonder Woman and Max have different plans. They hop in her invisible jet to stop him, only for the Count to unleash his vertigo-inducing powers. It seems he's used Max's work to amplify his powers as he emits a large green energy blast which causes Diana's jet to crash.
When Max gets out of the wreckage he finds Diana has been blinded. She has no clue what happened but it seems Vertigo's powers have been magnified in ways he couldn't even predict. At this point, Max could cut and run but he does want to get all his tech back as he hates when other people profit off of his work. The problem is, without Wonder Woman he simply doesn't have the muscle. Ironically, Max's mental powers might be able to command her to see again, but it's unknown if his powers are strong enough to undo Vertigo's work. Also, he can't gauge the effects of what Vertigo has done but if the villain can harm a goddess and an Amazonian warrior, it stands to reason Max could be at risk too.
Max is going to have to play this by ear but this is a chance to prove he can be a hero. He has hinted he wants to make the world a better place so now's the time to show it. That said, a blind Diana can still be a formidable ally, but until we know more of Vertigo's side-effects, it's hard to say how effective she will be. And the intriguing thing is, while she couldn't trust Max face to face, now she'll be even more skeptical of what he's doing behind her back.