Joss Whedon

There are no shortages of actresses who want to play Wonder Woman. Even Beyoncé Knowles has expressed interest. But when Hollywood finally does get around to making a film about the 69-year-old female superhero in the star-spangled short-shorts — sometime this millennium, one hopes — there’s really only one actress Joss Whedon sees in the role. When the Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator was writing his never-produced WW script for Warner Bros. five years ago, he modeled the character on the closest thing he could find to a real Amazon goddess. “For me, Wonder Woman was basically Angelina Jolie,” he says. “She spends a lot of time flying around. She works in a lot of different countries. She’s very global. And she’s appalled by the way people treat each other.”

For more on why Wonder Woman still doesn’t have a film of her own — and what Whedon and other filmmakers have tried to do with the character — check out this week’s issue, on stands Thursday.