Review: The Kinky Throuple Behind Wonder Woman

Hi cutie,

It's review time again! Today we'll be looking at the real-life throuple behind the creation of Wonder Woman, as portrayed in Professor Marston and the Wonder Women.

This will be a longer one, because there's a lot to discuss.

Spoilers Ahead. And a quick content warning for sexual assault in the film. I won’t describe it here, and it’s rather brief in the beginning, but stay cautious if you’re sensitive to that kind of imagery.

We meet psychology Professor Bill Marston in his 1920’s classroom at Harvard. His assistant and wife, Elizabeth, is also a brilliant mind and published author. However, Harvard won’t let her pursue a PhD because she’s a woman. She works alongside her husband as an equal, even if institutions won’t recognize her as such. Their current goal is to create some measurable way to detect when a person is lying.

Bill's captivated by a student, Olive Byrne, and floats this interest past Elizabeth.

Elizabeth: “Do it.”
Bill: “You won’t be jealous?”
Elizabeth: “No, I don’t experience sexual jealousy. Who am I to fight nature? I’m your wife, not your jailer.”

Intellectually, she’s fine with it. When Olive joins their research team, though, she feels territorial and fearful.

For “research purposes,” the couple watches Olive spank a sorority pledge. Elizabeth is aroused, but feels ashamed. Bill presses Olive to know how it felt. Olive feels ashamed too, and is scared to say that she was also aroused. Her voice quivers as she denies liking it.

A bit like a lab rat, Olive’s breathing and blood pressure are studied. Her heart rate went up when she lied. In that moment, they discover how to measure dishonesty, and the lie detector is born. Bill kisses his wife passionately, and then twirls Olive around with joy. “That’s it! Your body will always betray you! Your heart pumps a record of the truth.”

We see all three of them gradually get comfortable, tender, and connected. After a rocky start, the dynamic feels more balanced and mutually beneficial. Finally, they test the lie detector with questions about love. It comes out that Bill loves both of them, and Elizabeth flees the room, convinced that her worst fears came true. Olive runs after her.

Olive: “I don’t love him.”
Elizabeth: “I’m not a fool. I may be many things, but I’m not a fool. Don’t you see? This is all over. Whatever this was, it’s over.”
Olive: “I love you.”
Olive kisses her. Elizabeth kisses back, but then pushes her off and rejects her.

“You’ve been sad since she left,” Bill observes. “Maybe I love her, too.” Elizabeth says quietly. 

They talk frankly about this newfound capacity to love more than one person. He describes how different they both are, how "together, you are the perfect woman.“ Elizabeth rolls her eyes at this, as do I. (I had the same issue with the film Bandits, when Cate Blanchett said this line to her 2 male partners). It might be a nitpick, but this framing implies that neither person is really enough on their own.

Elizabeth to Olive: “We asked you here today because, well, we are in something. I’m not quite sure what it is, but we are in it. And I believe I’ve violated my raison d'etre as a psychologist by running from alarming emotions rather than confronting them. So, we were thinking that we could confront whatever these emotions are together.”
Olive: “Fuck you.”

I appreciate this exchange so much, because it shows both the value of intellectualism, and the drawbacks. Without intellectualizing it, Elizabeth might not have reached out again. But, Olive is so frustrated and angry because she isn’t being vulnerable. After a few minutes, Elizabeth finally softens and says, “We miss you, Olive.”

Already engaged to another man, Olive asks to be put under the lie detector to find out what she really wants. Together, they discover that she is in love with both of them, and wants to sleep with both of them. This time, Elizabeth kisses Olive first. She’s finally open to the fact that Olive can be her love interest, not her competition.

I absolutely adore how much this story centers queer, feminine love. When the triad forms, both women invite him to join them. It’s a very uncommon way to see an FFM triad represented on screen. As well, Olive initiates sex with each of them, showing that she has full agency in this dynamic.

But reality crashes back in. 

The school finds out, and the Marstons get fired. Olive breaks her engagement off, and Bill gets her pregnant. No one can get hired, as financial pressures mount. 

Elizabeth swallows her pride, and takes an entry level typing job. Bill tries to write short stories to make cash. Somehow, the three are determined to survive together.

Throughout the film, we see Bill defending Wonder Woman to the Children’s Board of Ethics, a framing device that draws parallels between the comic and his personal life.

Commissioner: “Wonder Woman has a secret identity. Why is that?”
Bill: “Yes, she does. She has to hide her true self from man’s world.”

Cut to all three of them living in 1930’s suburbia with their four children (two from Olive, two from Elizabeth.) Their story for the neighbors is that Olive is a widow, and the generous Marstons took her in.

Bill passes by a burlesque shop and gets curious. The owner invites them to a rope tying class, where Bill notices the psychological power dynamics at play in kink.

He starts to tie Olive, but Elizabeth won’t have it. She's not jealous this time, she's protective. "Don't let him do that to you!" she shouts, before running out. Bill chases her. Meanwhile, Olive stays behind and tries on some outfits and gear. When Elizabeth returns to rescue her, she sees how Olive chose these things for herself. “Is this what you really want?” she hesitates, as she approaches Olive, and picks up the rope.

Elizabeth was only bothered when she thought it was a coercive act. By stepping into a domme role herself, she sees how this exchange of trust and power can be intimate. She makes a simple, gentle tie of the rope around Olive's torso. I rarely see such non-sensationalized kink on screen.

Bill writes Wonder Woman immediately after this. His heroine is decked out in a bodice, boots and cuffs, with a rope that makes people tell the truth.

Commissioner: “Wonder Woman is filled with violence, torture, and sadomasochism.”
Bill: “I’m teaching readers to submit to a loving authority. And that submission is pleasurable.”
Commissioner: “You don’t even deny that these images are overtly sexual.”
Bill: “An erotic component is necessary! Otherwise, how is submission supposed to be pleasurable?”

Before long, their kinky lifestyle gets discovered by a neighbor. They're outed, attacked, and their kids get bullied. We see them being loving parents to an injured child, just one scene after a kinky threesome. I love the well-rounded nature of this character development.

Elizabeth goes into a fearful survival mode, shuts herself down, and kicks Olive out of the house. They don’t speak again until Bill collapses, and is rushed to the hospital.

Bill: “I’m going to die, and you will both be left all alone.” (Turns to Elizabeth) “Alone with your bitterness and your rage and your knowledge that you loved her, and she loved you, and you threw it away.”
Elizabeth: “Our kids don’t deserve to be attacked, to be ostracized.“
Bill: “Our kids are inheriting your shame. Is that how you want them to live?”

I don’t usually think it’s a great idea for partners to urge exes to get back together. However, Bill only does it when he learns that he’s dying. He doesn’t want them to go the rest of their lives as single mothers, when they could have each other.

Mirroring the first time that Elizabeth asked Olive to come back, she’s unmoved until Elizabeth is willing to make herself vulnerable. She and Bill both get on their knees. “Please forgive me,” Elizabeth pleads. “I thought I knew everything. I thought love wasn’t enough, but it has to be enough, because we cannot live without you. I cannot live without you.” Olive starts crying. “I want a new stove.” They all start laughing with relief.

We wrap things up with a compelling speech from Bill about how Wonder Woman is a powerful role model for children. We see the loves of his life watching proudly. “Wonder Woman can reform people, make them tell the truth, and make them see the truth.”

He died in 1947 of cancer. Elizabeth and Olive lived together for another 38 years until Olive’s death. One of their sons, Peter Marston, created a Wonder Woman museum as a tribute to his mothers. We close with photos of the real throuple and their 4 kids, along with a photo of Olive and Elizabeth, holding hands as elderly women.

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TLDR - This movie is a realistic depiction of a throuple forming and sustaining their love, despite social pressures from a conservative environment. It could’ve easily played like unicorn hunting, but it felt organic and earned. The dysfunction could’ve been dismissed as inherent to non-monogamy, but they handled the topic with nuance and compassion. This story is very focused on sapphic love and female pleasure. It’s a beautiful film, and I definitely recommend it.