Female Superheroes Brought to Life

Continuing on with the beautiful women of comics, what about the live-action portrayal of these women?
Yes, many fan-favorites have been brought to life on the big screen and on the small screen.
Of course back in the beginning, the guys grabbed all the big productions.
You had The Adventures of Captain Marvel (1941), Batman (1943), The Phantom (1943), Captain America (1944), and Superman (1948).
The women there were pretty much just damsels in distress.
Yeah, Lois Lane showed up, but she and Jimmy Olsen just gave Supes something too do.
Heck, Batgirl/Barbara Gordon didn't even show up on the Batman TV series till the third season of the show.
So here are some of the ladies that made the jump from the printed page to the big (and small) screen.

Famke Janssen brought Jean Grey/Phoenix to life in X-Men, X2: X-Men United, and X-Men: The Last Stand.
One of the better translations from the comic to the big screen in my opinion.

Who can forget Lynda Carter as Wonder Woman in the Wonder Woman television series?
No one evidently.
Whenever you hear anything brought up about a Wonder Woman movie, Lynda is almost always mentioned.
At five foot nine, 122-130 pounds and measuring 38-25-35, she filled out the red, white and blue costume quite well.

Now Adrianne Palicki (Friday Night Lights)will be bringing the Amazon Princess to life in David E. Kelly's new Wonder Woman pilot.
The story and the outfit has caused some controversy among internet comic book fans, to the point of the costume being changed.
Though the producers seem to be downplaying the idea that outrage caused the change.

Catwoman has shown up several times, but my favorite is the 1960s TV version.
Julie Newmar owned Catwoman like Lynda Carter owned Wonder Woman in my opinion.

In The Dark Knight Rises (2012) the lovely Anne Hathaway will be the sixth actress to portray Selina Kyle aka Catwoman.
I have no problem with this because at least Anne is a BRUNETTE!
::ahem::
Sorry.

Okay...I know Poison Ivy isn't technically a hero.
Well...she could be an anti-hero.
Uma Thurman played Poison Ivy in the film Batman & Robin....
I think she may have been the only bright spot in that film.
Oh she camped it up to be sure, but compared to the rest of the film...she was gold.

Kara Zor-El made it to the big screen in another failed venture, 1984's Supergirl.
Really I didn't think Helen Slater was bad as the Maid of Might, and had the story been better we might have actually had a good movie here.

Of course Helen isn't the only live action Supergirl.
In the 2007-2008 season of Smallville, Kara appeared on the small screen portrayed by Laura Vandervoort.
She made her "pseudo-costume" look good, but how many fans would have loved to have seen her in the full comic book costume?
Whatever it was at the time...Kara changes costumes quite a bit.

Yancy Butler starred as Sara Pezzini, the then possessor of the Witchblade in the 2001 series on TNT.
I really didn't think the show was half bad, but it was canceled in 2002.
The rumor was that it had to do with Yancy's alcohol addiction.
But it was the Witchblade, why didn't they just pass it on to another user?

There's a rumored Witchblade film in the works, but despite a teaser poster and a website, I can't find a lot on it.
 Looking at the poster, it seems they want Hallie Berry to star.

As I mentioned earlier, Batgirl showed up on the third season of Batman, played by Yvonne Craig.

Batgirl returned again in the ill-fated Batman & Robin movie, this time portrayed by Alicia Silverstone.
Of course in addition to screwing up the movie, they screwed up the character, making her Barbara Wilson, Alfred's niece.
Huh?

Batgirl also appeared in the WB TV show Birds of Prey as Oracle played by the beautiful Dina Meyer.
But Barbara did get to suit up once and we got to see a more faithful Batgirl on the screen.

Harley Quinn debuted on Batman: The Animated Series,but we got to see Harley in real life on the before-mentioned Birds of Prey, played by Mia Sara.
But other than calling the Joker "Mr J", she didn't have a lot in common with her animated counter-part.

The She-Devil with a Sword, Red Sonja was brought to life in the 1985 film entitled (appropriately enough) Red Sonja.
There she was played by Brigitte Nielsen.

Sonja is set for a remake, with Rose McGowan as the beautiful barbarian.
The good thing here is that it's being produced by Robert Rodriguez!

Does Psylocke appear in film?
Yeah...kinda.
Meiling Melançon played Psylocke in X-Men: The Last Stand, even though in the original script, her character isn't called Psylocke.
But, on Brett Ratner's commentary on the DVD release, he says that she is Psylocke.

Even though BC was created in 1947, the blonde bombshell really hasn't gotten much screen time.
She has appeared on the small screen a few times though.
In 1979, Danuta Wesley played her on the really bad NBC live-action version of Super Friends, Legends of the Superheroes.

Back to Birds of Prey again where Lori Loughlin played their version of the Black Canary.

Then on season seven of Smallville, Alaina Huffman did their version of her.

Jessica Alba portrayed Sue Storm-Richards in the 2005 film The Fantastic Four and in the 2007 sequel, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.
They stayed pretty faithful to the character I think, and Jessica made a good Sue.
With the announced reboot, someone else will get a shot at the role.

Zatanna Zatara showed up on the episode "Hex" in the eighth season of Smallville played by the stunning Serinda Swan.
The physical look was pretty much dead on, which is unique for Smallville.

The gorgeous mutant that only shops at Victoria's Secret and The White Store has had a few appearances.
Emma Frost showed up in the 1996 live-action television movie, Generation X played by Finola Hughes (General Hospital, All My Children).

Then when Bryan Singer was still attached to X-Men: The Last Stand, he wanted Sigourney Weaver as the White Queen.

And in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Tahyna Tozzi plays a character listed in the credits as "Kayla's sister/Emma".
In the film Tahyna does exhibit the White Queen's ability to turn into organic diamond (which I personally think is a stupid add-on ability).
But I do think Tahyna would make a fine White Queen.

Now in X-Men: First Class, Emma will be brought to life in the 1960s (which totally screws up any time line but hey, go for it guys!) by Mad Men's January Jones.
Visually a pretty good match.

In Iron Man 2 we got to see one of my all time favorite female superheroes make the jump to the big screen.
The Black Widow.
The Widow was fleshed out (ahem) by the lovely Scarlett Johansson.
And Natalia "Natasha" Alianovna Romanova will also be showing up in the upcoming Avengers movie.
AND there is talk of a Black Widow solo film as well.

Just for fun, here is a video that I posted on my Superhero TV Commercials and Movie Clips Hub.
It was made for the Mexican department store chain El Palacio de Hierro and features the 1960 Batgirl, the 1960 Catwoman, and the Lynda Carter Wonder Woman.
You gotta admit, whoever did this, was either a huge fan or did a LOT of research.