Knowledge Waits is a feature where I just share some bit of comic book history that interests me.

Recently, there was an article on CBR about how the Titans TV show handled the origins of Donna Troy. Kevin Melrose explained:

To call Donna Troy's comic book history convoluted would be a serious understatement. The one-time Wonder Girl was introduced as Wonder Woman's younger sister, only to later be depicted as an orphan rescued by the superhero and raised on Paradise Island. But that was before Wonder Woman's timeline was rebooted in 1987, severing her connection to Donna, whose own origin -- and alter ego -- was changed again and again. That left fans to wonder which version of the character would arrive on DC Universe's Titans.

They will undoubtedly be happy to know she's the original Wonder Girl, more or less. As she was for decades in DC comics, she's the adoptive sister of Wonder Woman who was raised by the Amazons on Themyscira. And on Titans she isn't "Troia" or "Darkstar"; she is (or at least was) most definitely Wonder Girl. However, she's hung up the costume -- they're too expensive to burn, she chides Dick Grayson -- even if she hasn't entirely turned her back on fighting crime.

My friend Sam took issue with this, as the first time we meet Wonder Girl in the comics, she was simply a younger version of Wonder Woman. However, Kevin knew that, he was just explaining the origin of the Donna Troy Wonder Woman, the character who made her first appearance in The Brave and the Bold #60, where she was a member of the Teen Titans for the first time (the team got their name for the first time in that issue). Kevin is absolutely correct that in Wonder Girl's first appearance as a distinct character (years before she was officially given the name Donna Troy), she was specifically Wonder Woman's sister, as we see her calling Hippolyta her mother...

After I explained this to Sam, I noticed something fascinating. For years, people have given Bob Haney a bit of a hard time over the fact that he used a character who technically did not exist as part of the Teen Titans. From a description of the Donna Troy Wonder Girl on Comic Book DB:

The character probably never would have come into existence had the writer of her first appearance, Bob Haney, actually been a careful reader of Wonder Woman (1942). He believed that the Wonder Girl depicted there was a different person—in the same way that Kid Flash and Aqualad were distinct from The Flash and Aquaman. Thus, he included an un-named "Wonder Girl" in the pages of The Brave and the Bold #60 without giving the matter a great deal of thought. He even had the temerity to include Wonder Woman in his story, which would've caused faithful readers of Wonder Woman a great deal of confusion at the time.

However, looking at the Wonder Woman comic books that came out around the time that Haney would have been writing Brave and the Bold #60, though, things aren't nearly as clear cut as all that. I don't think that it is necessarily fair to knock Haney for not being a "careful reader" of Wonder Woman.

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Obviously, Wonder Girl was first introduced in the Wonder Woman comic books as simply a younger version of Wonder Woman, who would have adventures in flashback stories similar to Superboy and Superman.

Bob Kanigher then took things to another level when, in 1961's Wonder Woman #124 (drawn by Ross Andru and Mike Esposito), he introduced the concept of the "impossible story," where Queen Hippolyta would splice together different bits of film to create "impossible" stories featuring Wonder Woman, Wonder Girl and Wonder Tot going on adventure together...

The stories were big hits, so Kanigher soon made the "Wonder Woman Family" a regular feature in the series.

However, by late 1964 (around the time that Haney would be sitting down to write Brave and the Bold #60, which came out in April of 1965), things were not quite so clear.

In Wonder Woman #147 (released in May of 1964), we got a reference by Wonder Woman in the front of the issue...

but that's it. Everything else in the issue treats Wonder Girl very much like a distinct character...

However, four months later, in Wonder Woman #150, there is no introductory explanation...

It's just right into a story starring Wonder Girl...

featuring Wonder Woman, like it's totally normal...

And the next issue, specifically starring Wonder Girl, also doesn't explain it as anything but a story featuring a teen hero who fights alongside Wonder Woman, the point where she dreams she IS Wonder Woman...

Check out when she meets up with the other members of her family, calling Hippolyta "mother"...

There is no "careful" reading of that comic book that would get you to believe anything other than Wonder Girl being Wonder Woman's teen sister.

#152 is also like that, but since that came out in December, I think that's pushing things for a comic book (Brave and the Bold #60) that came out in April. But a Septemebr and November comic book would be right in line with when Haney was writing Brave and the Bold #60, so it all makes sense why he would think Wonder Girl was a distinct character who was the OTHER daughter of Hippolyta.

I'm sorry for ever doubting you, Bob!

Thanks to Sam for kind of sort of suggesting this one!

If anyone else has an interesting piece of comic book history that they'd like to see me write about, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!