Cassandra Sandsmark couldn’t believe her luck. As long as she could remember, the Amazonian Princess Diana, known the world over as Wonder Woman, had been the object of Cassie’s hero-worship. So when she finally met her idol in the flesh, she was ready. By the time their fantastic adventure had ended, Cassie Sandsmark had earned the powers and title of Wonder Girl, as well as an even greater prize, the approval and friendship of her idol.

Once before, Wonder Woman found a young woman with the courage to live up to the utopian ideals of Amazon culture. The first Wonder Girl, Donna Troy, grew to be a great hero in her own right, outgrowing the title in the process. Now, Diana has passed the torch once again. Okay, technically Cassie snatched the torch. Nevertheless, she stands ready to bear it. It’s time for her education to begin.

Cassie is just entering her freshman year at Gateway Northern, a huge public high school. Since her parents’ divorce, her mom can’t afford to keep her in private school any longer. On her museum curator’s salary, even with the child support payments, belts have to be tightened. Ebullient, smart and funny, Cassie was a natural leader in middle school and pretty close to the top of the social heap. But that was last year. Now she’s just another new girl, a freshman, as she puts it, "without a friend in the whole school." Cassie tends to exaggerate, slightly. She does have a few casual friends and two very good ones.

First among equals is Cassie’s best friend since kindergarten, Darnice "Niecy" Lawson. As Cassie likes to characterize the relationship as, "we ate sand together." The two share all of their most intimate secrets including, all knowledge of "who likes who," full access to each other’s diary, and slightly less importantly, Cassie’s secret identity. This makes Niecy a crucial ally in Cassie’s crime-fighting career. Cassie’s mom, who also knows her secret, all but forbids her to go out as Wonder Girl. Alleged trips to Niecy’s house often provide convenient (if increasingly implausible) cover for Cassie’s absences. Niecy also aids in Cassie’s never-ending attempts to make a tiara that "looks like Wonder Woman’s." So far, their attempts have been fairly pitiful. Their best-looking effort wouldn’t stay on her head, which was no big deal, considering. The star was a blue decal, because they couldn’t find a red one (and the Tiara was painted with yellow latex, because the store wouldn’t sell gold spray paint to minors). Several store-bought Tiaras fail to pass muster because they "look like dumb princess hats." The struggle continues.

New to Cassie’s social circle is Tia Lopez. Unlike Cassie and Darnice, Tia knows a lot of the freshman class, having gone to middle school with them. In the course of the mini-series, Cassie helps Tia stay out of a gang that wants to induct her. In return, Tia introduces Cassie to a boy who is the first of many crush-objects to come. Darnice refers to the three friends as "The Heroic Trio." Cassie doesn’t get the joke, because she thinks Hong Kong action movies "bite," and refuses to watch. Tia doesn’t get the joke either, because she doesn’t know that Cassie is Wonder Girl.

As if the new social and academic challenges of high school weren’t enough, Cassie has decided that it’s past time she began intensive training with her new powers. Brazenly interrupting Wonder Woman in the middle of a battle with a half-dozen super-powered assailants, Wonder Girl asks her hero to start training her, "so I can be, like, your sidekick." A bemused Wonder Woman has a better idea. After the two of them mop up the bad guys and save the day, Wonder Woman calls in a marker from Donna Troy. The original Wonder Girl reluctantly agrees to tutor Cassie in the fine points of super-heroing. It isn’t long before Donna is won over by Cassie’s spirit and warmth. At the end of the series, Donna gives Cassie her old lasso as a way of passing the torch.

Wonder Girl’s first solo adventure is the result of mistaken identity. An old enemy of Donna’s from back when she was Wonder Girl (I could make up somebody new and implant the continuity, or better yet, we could find some old Teen Titan villain with a grudge against Donna and use him –or her) sees Cassie aiding Wonder Woman. Our Villain never made the connection between Wonder Girl and any of Donna’s later personas. He thinks that Wonder Girl simply dropped out of sight, and now she’s come back. Very slight alterations in his master plan will allow him to get revenge on Wonder Girl, and take over the Pacific coast underworld in one stroke. Wonder Girl’s single-handedly going to stop him, rescue her dad (the assistant DA), save the city and try to get home before her mom finds out.

Hey, three out of four ain’t bad.

Wonder Girl is intended to be lighthearted super-heroic adventure about the discovery of power, potential and responsibility. Wonder Girl’s major themes are; adapting to change; the potential of youth; the responsibility of the individual to society vs. her responsibility to herself; and youth coming of age. I'm sure we'll discover more as we go along. I see this series as being in the tradition of Lee-Ditko Spider-Man, but updated for contemporary tastes. Perhaps, with its similar approach to supporting casts and civilian life, it would be more accurate to compare this book to Impulse or STATIC.

I hope for this mini-series to be a romp through spectacular set-piece battles set within a very human story filled with wonder, humor and a touch of high-school madness. When it's all over, we will have renewed respect for Wonder Girl’s heroism, greater knowledge of her character (in both senses of the word) and her status quo will be set, leaving her in an ideal position for sequels or spin-offs.