There's a certain subset of superheroes who move past obscurity into a level of ironic notoriety, wherein the character is best known for the fact that few people know them. Or, worse yet, perhaps people know the jokes at their expense before they get to know the characters themselves.

Social media was bombarded with references to The Wonder Twins thanks to some new announcements about the upcoming HBO Max film adaptation. Riverdale star KJ Apa and Young Sheldon star Isabel May were cast as the powerful siblings, sparking newfound interest in the project. The duo is not known for much more than the occasional cameo appearance these days, but the film could catapult them into the spotlight in a way they've never enjoyed before.

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The Wonder Twins are DC Comics characters, but like a lot of fan favorites, they didn't originate on the comic book page. The Wonder Twins were created by Norman Maurer in 1977 for The All-New Super Friends Hour. The pair replaced Wendy Harris and Marvin White, two powerless teenagers who stood around watching the Super Friends save the day. Donny and Marie Osmond were cited as sources of inspiration, as the musical family was absurdly popular at the time. The Super Friends series introduced the characters, but it phased them out in favor of more popular teen characters like Cyborg over a short period. Comics picked up the slack, introducing a backstory and continuing the story after the cartoon that they were designed for came to an end.

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The Wonder Twins are Zan and Jayna, a brother and sister from a planet called Exxor (sometimes spelled Exor). Thanks to a genetic link to an ancient ancestor, Zan and Jayna are capable of shape-shifting, but this power makes them pariahs in their home society. Their parents die in a wave of plague, and they are not adopted by any of their fellow Exorians. They are instead picked up by the purveyor of a space-faring circus, and raised by a friendly clown. Said grease-painted performer gives the duo a pet that's a lot like a monkey, whom they name Gleek.

The trio then makes their way to Earth to warn the Justice League of an impending alien threat. Once there, they embed with a scientist and begin attending Gotham High, while training with the Justice League to become heroes in their own right. While later versions have made changes to that initial 1977 backstory, most of those future iterations have faded, leaving something close to the original still intact.

The Wonder Twins' powers are a little unusual. They're both shape-shifters, but with radically different abilities between them. Zan, the brother, can transform into any form of water, with some absurd limits. This includes in any conceivable container, ice in any physical shape, vapor, storms, blizzards, tsunamis, even liquid nitrogen at one point. While a bit ridiculous, a creative mind can turn this into an incredibly versatile power. Conversely, Jayna, the sister, can turn into any animal. While there are certainly other DC beings who can do the same, Jayna's power includes alien beings as well as fictional beings. The only limitation is that it has to have a name that she is aware of. Both Zan and Jayna must vocalize their transformation and make physical contact to activate their powers. Their classic "form of" and "shape of" catchphrase is probably the most memorable aspect of their presentation.

Outside the comics and beyond their initial cartoon run, the Wonder Twins have had a very limited presence in DC media. Prior to the upcoming HBO Max adaptation, the most time they've enjoyed on the big screen was a couple of minutes in Teen Titans Go! To The Movies. Teen Titans Go! also provides the Wonder Twins with one of their biggest showcases on TV, when they replace Beast Boy for a single episode. Justice League Unlimited featured a version of the Super Friends called the Ultimen, which featured analogs to Zan and Jayna called Downpour and Shifter. Their primary live-action appearance comes in a single season 9 episode of Smallville. The episode plays up the duo's attempt to play themselves off as Swedish exchange students and integrate into human society.

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The Wonder Twins have been background players in the overwhelming majority of the content they've appeared in. The show that introduced them intended to make them the audience surrogates, only to phase them out. Most of the projects that have kept them alive were jokes at their expense, strange half-references, or lovingly crafted by long-time fans.

The upcoming HBO Max film has revealed astonishingly little about its plot or involvement with the larger DCEU. Writer/director Adam Sztykiel is best known for Scoob!, Rampage, and Undateable. If the film does tie itself into the DCEU, the Wonder Twins are best known as team members, so a future Justice League film could benefit from their involvement. Fans will have to wait and see how Zan and Jayna's first full-length feature film goes first.

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