Jump to content

Renee Montoya: Difference between revisions

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Browse history interactively
← Previous editNext edit →
Content deleted Content added
VisualWikitext
Marcus Brute (talk | contribs)
16,331 edits
Line 77: Line 77:


=== Detective Comics ===
=== Detective Comics ===
{{see|Batwoman: Detective Comics}}

Montoya takes the case of a missing [[illegal immigration|illegal immigrant]] &mdash; the young sister of the man named Hector Soliz seeking her detective services. She follows some leads to their hideout and discovers [[pornography|pornographic]] pictures of the girl, indicating she may have become involved in a [[child pornography]] or [[sexual slavery]] ring.<ref>Detective comics #854</ref> While investigating a businessman who she believes is involved with the slavery, Montoya is kidnapped and left to die after being tied up in the trunk of a car that was driven into a river. She easily escapes and eventually tracks the slaves to a boat owned by the businessman. After a brief fight with several henchmen, the police arrive and rescue the women, reuniting Hector with his sister.
Montoya takes the case of a missing [[illegal immigration|illegal immigrant]] &mdash; the young sister of the man named Hector Soliz seeking her detective services. She follows some leads to their hideout and discovers [[pornography|pornographic]] pictures of the girl, indicating she may have become involved in a [[child pornography]] or [[sexual slavery]] ring.<ref>Detective comics #854</ref> While investigating a businessman who she believes is involved with the slavery, Montoya is kidnapped and left to die after being tied up in the trunk of a car that was driven into a river. She easily escapes and eventually tracks the slaves to a boat owned by the businessman. After a brief fight with several henchmen, the police arrive and rescue the women, reuniting Hector with his sister.


Revision as of 21:10, 18 March 2010

The Question
Renee Montoya as the Question
Art by Darick Robertson.
Publication information
PublisherDC Comics
First appearanceBatman #475 (March 1992)
Created byPaul Dini
Mitch Brian
Bruce Timm
In-story information
Alter egoRenee Maria Montoya
Team affiliationsGlobal Peace Agency
Gotham City Police Department
AbilitiesSkilled martial artist, detective, and marksman with gun-like device capable of instant vaporization.

Renee Montoya is a fictional comic book character published by DC Comics. The character was initially created for Batman: The Animated Series, and was preemptively introduced into mainstream comics before the airing of her animated debut in 1992.[1]

The character has developed significantly over the years. Renee Montoya is initially characterized as a police detective from the Gotham City Police Department, assigned to the Major Crimes Unit who comes into frequent contact with the masked vigilante, Batman. Over the course of her comic book history, Renee is outed as a lesbian, and later resigns from the police force, disgusted by its corruption. After being trained by the first man to bear the name, Montoya now operates as the Question out of her predecessor's hometown of Hub City.

Fictional character history

Renee Montoya was created for Batman: The Animated Series, in which she is voiced by Ingrid Oliu and then by Liane Schirmer as a uniformed officer partnered with Harvey Bullock. In the follow-up The New Batman Adventures, Montoya has been promoted from police officer to detective. Montoya was also a recurring character in the third season of the web cartoon Gotham Girls, in which she is voiced by Adrienne Barbeau.

Montoya is a recurring character in the Batman-related comics after Batman #475. After she is promoted to homicide detective by Commissioner James Gordon, Montoya is partnered with Harvey Bullock. After Bullock is promoted to Lieutenant, Crispus Allen becomes Montoya's new partner.[2]

Gotham City is destroyed by an earthquake in the Cataclysm crossover. It is soon closed off from the rest of the United States in the No Man's Land story arc. Montoya and Bullock are two of the many Gotham police officers to stay behind with James Gordon in order to keep the peace among the people who have stayed behind.

Montoya is the focus of an uneasy truce between Gordon's forces and the crime boss Two-Face. She reaches out to Two-Face's Harvey Dent persona in helping with aid and relief efforts, and he falls in love with her. He in fact, keeps her restrained in his headquarters against her will. She becomes involved when Two-Face puts James Gordon on trial for perceived wrong-doing. Montoya persuades Two-Face to offer a more fair trial, giving Gordon a defense lawyer. Two-Face's Harvey Dent persona takes on this role, and ultimately convinces Two-Face to allow everyone to go free.

Gotham City is later re-opened thanks to humanitarian efforts spear-headed by Lex Luthor. Montoya, Gordon, Bullock and the surviving officers are re-instated as official police.

In "Officer Down", Montoya is hit hard by a murder attempt on Gordon, and when the assassin walks free, goes to seek vengeance. However, Bullock catches her in the act and persuades her not to pull the trigger, telling her that revenge isn't worth her career.

Gotham Central

Montoya and Two-Face. Art by Michael Lark.

Montoya is one of the main characters of Gotham Central, a comic book series about the Gotham City police department. Believing that the only way to have Montoya is to take everything away from her, Two-Face outs her as a lesbian to the public and frames her for murder. He then kidnaps her, making it look like Montoya has escaped. Two-Face becomes more unstable and the two fight for control of his gun until Batman arrives to save them. Montoya is cleared of all charges and Two-Face returns to Arkham, but Montoya's personal life becomes chaotic, especially with her family: while her younger brother knows about and accepts her sexuality, her religious parents disown her.[3]

In the 2004 War Games crossover, Montoya and Crispus Allen are ambushed by the Black Spider, and Allen shoots the villain.[4] A corrupt crime scene investigator named Jim Corrigan steals and sells the bullet on the Internet, but the bullet is needed to prove that the shooting was self-defense. In her pursuit of the bullet, Montoya beats the name of the buyer out of Corrigan.[5] Although Allen is cleared, Montoya becomes obsessed with exposing Corrigan. Allen tries to persuade Montoya to let it go, but Montoya refuses, so Allen investigates Corrigan independently. During his investigation, one of Allen's informants is murdered shortly before Allen himself is shot and killed by Corrigan.[6] Montoya takes it upon herself to bring Corrigan to justice. Tracking him down, Montoya beats Corrigan's girlfriend unconscious and draws a gun on Corrigan. He begs for his life, and Montoya finds she can't pull the trigger. Montoya quits the GCPD the next day, disgusted and broken.[7]

52

In 52, Montoya, now an alcoholic ex-cop, spends her days in bars and her nights obsessing about the loss of her job and girlfriend. The Question shines a Bat-Signal, modified to throw a question mark, at her window, asking if she is ready.

The Question believes that Intergang is preparing for an invasion of Gotham, and to that end, hires Montoya to surveil a warehouse in Gotham City, where they uncover futuristic weapons.[8]

During Week 14, Montoya and the Question fly to Kahndaq, and track down some leads on Intergang. Abbott, the wolf creature, tracks them. After they leave an empty warehouse, they are taken prisoner by members of Black Adam's army.[9]

While a prisoner, Montoya prevents a girl from detonating a bomb at Black Adam's wedding to Isis by shooting and killing her. In thanks, Adam bestows the two with the highest honor Kahndaq can give to those not born in the nation. When Montoya fails to appear, Adam finds her guilt-stricken and drunk, in bed with a woman. Montoya and the Question track down Intergang, which is forcing children to become operatives. During this time, Montoya and the Question find Isis's brother, Amon.

The Question takes Montoya to Nanda Parbat to train with Richard Dragon. There, Montoya discovers that the Question is dying of cancer and that the Question wants her to replace him. The two discover a prophecy written in Intergang's "Crime Bible" about the death of Batwoman, Montoya's former lover Kate Kane. They return to Gotham and join Batwoman's fight against Intergang, preventing her death. As the Question lies in hospice care at Kate's, Montoya begins to adopt some of his traits, such as meditation. While taking care of the Question, Montoya and Kate celebrate Hanukkah and Christmas together, sharing a kiss on Christmas.

That New Year's Eve, Montoya keeps vigil over the Question's bedside at the hospital until she finally decides to take him back to Nanda Parbat. Kate asks Montoya to stay, but Montoya says she owes everything to Charlie, and has to try to save him.

The journey is difficult and harrowing, and Montoya fears for Charlie's life more than once. As she nears the city, he awakens enough to tell her that she needs to figure out who she'll become before finally dying.[10]

Back in Nanda Parbat, Montoya struggles as she attempts to become Charlie's heir as the Question. Richard Dragon accuses her of running away from her self and not accepting the grief, and orders her to deal with who she is first. Afraid, Montoya runs off and meets a woman who tells her to look for the answers to her questions within her. Montoya realizes that her curiosity outweighs her fears and returns to the ice cave to meditate. As her candle goes out, the smoke forms a question mark, leaving Montoya in the darkness, alone. After four days in darkness, Montoya lights a candle and looks at the reflection on the ice and sees a reflection of herself without a face.

Montoya leaves the cave shortly before Isis dies. After speculation on how Black Adam and Osiris are taking her death, she is urged to go to Khandaq by Aristotle Rodor and Richard Dragon, both friends of the Question. Putting on the Question's fedora, Montoya goes and attempts to console Black Adam, since she understands what its like to lose loved ones. Black Adam spurns her sympathy and tells Montoya to go back to Gotham. Upon her return, Montoya finds Kate missing and her apartment ransacked. With the help of Nightwing, she begins to look for Kate.

Nightwing and Montoya eventually find a strange device in a warehouse guarded by hybrid creatures, which Nightwing hypothesizes is a bomb. Attacked by several Intergang henchmen, the pair are surprisingly helped by a disillusioned Kyle Abbot. The device is activated, erupting a pillar of flame, at the same time numerous other devices are also activate, as Intergang attempts to turn Gotham into a firepit. Montoya wears Charlie's mask for the first time, going after Bruno "Ugly" Mannheim as the Question, and finds Mannheim and Whisper A'Daire about to sacrifice Kate, who is shackled and gagged to a stone altar. Montoya sets Whisper A'Daire on fire, but is about to be killed by Mannheim when Kate stabs him with the sacrificial knife and collapses in Montoya's arms.

Kate survives and returns to her penthouse to recuperate. Montoya, as the Question, shines the Bat-Signal into Kate's apartment and asks, "Are you ready?"

One Year Later and Final Crisis

Montoya appears in Countdown #40 where Oracle solicits her help in capturing the Trickster and the Pied Piper, who have been offered partial sanctuary by the Penguin following the murder of Bart Allen. Despite using Oracle's services, Montoya reminds Oracle that this does not make her one of "her Birds". The duo escape the Suicide Squad only to have Montoya catch up to them with Batwoman in tow, although Montoya eventually permits their release, concluding they're too stupid to be murderers. Despite this, Oracle calls upon the Question and Batwoman's assistance alongside her Birds in Gotham Underground #2.

She later stars in a 2007 5-issue limited series written by Greg Rucka entitled Crime Bible: Five Lessons of Blood, which focuses on the Question's pursuit of the Crime Bible, and its adherents' efforts to convert her to their cause in turn. Appearing in Grant Morrison's Final Crisis (2008), Montoya is seen informing Dan Turpin of her own investigations of the Dark Side Club run by Boss Dark Side, and later battling Frankenstein and the agents of S.H.A.D.E. as part of her struggle to put together an apocalyptic conspiracy related to the Crime Bible (now in possession of Libra) and Darkseid. She is accosted by S.H.A.D.E. agents however in her civilian identity when she stops to attend the body of a dying German Supergirl from a parallel world.

Simultaneously, Montoya appears in the Final Crisis: Revelations miniseries, by Greg Rucka. While trying to stop members of the Religion of Crime from obtaining a mystic weapon, she is confronted by the Spectre (whose current host is Crispus Allen, Montoya's former partner), who states that she is about to receive judgment. He is stopped by Radiant, the Spirit of Mercy, who embodies the ideal of Christian love as introduced by Jesus.

Maggie Sawyer, corrupted by the Anti-Life Equation, emerges from Gotham Central along with the rest of the brainwashed police force. They attempt to unleash the Equation on Montoya, but are stopped by the intervention of the Spectre and Radiant. The Spectre is not able to hold them off for long, because they are protected by the same force that protects Libra. Instead, Radiant makes sure that Montoya can't be brainwashed, and teleports her away. Observing the surroundings, she finds Batwoman lying in the streets. When she goes to check on her, Batwoman reveals that she now obeys Darkseid as well, and starts to recite the Equation. It appears, however, that Montoya is completely immune to the Equation; in the following issue, she is seen in complete control of her own mind.

Montoya appears in Final Crisis #5, recruited by the underground resistance movement organized by Checkmate. She is told that she must travel the DC Multiverse and gather help for New Earth. In Final Crisis #7 She is seen accompanied by Captain Marvel (of Earth 5) where she gathers a group of alternate versions of Superman that help end the Final Crisis and defeat Mandrakk the dark monitor. She identifies herself as a "Global Peace agent" in Final Crisis #7.

As of June's Detective Comics #854, Montoya will appear in an ongoing co-feature written by Greg Rucka, with art by Cully Hamner.

Detective Comics

Further information: Batwoman: Detective Comics

Montoya takes the case of a missing illegal immigrant — the young sister of the man named Hector Soliz seeking her detective services. She follows some leads to their hideout and discovers pornographic pictures of the girl, indicating she may have become involved in a child pornography or sexual slavery ring.[11] While investigating a businessman who she believes is involved with the slavery, Montoya is kidnapped and left to die after being tied up in the trunk of a car that was driven into a river. She easily escapes and eventually tracks the slaves to a boat owned by the businessman. After a brief fight with several henchmen, the police arrive and rescue the women, reuniting Hector with his sister.

When Montoya briefly returned to Gotham City, she worked with the new Batman and quickly realized that he was Nightwing. Her old partner Bullock also discovered that Renee is the new Question, pointing out that he worked with her long enough to be able to recognize her rear end.[12]

Blackest Night

During the events of Blackest Night, Renee is tracked down by Lady Shiva, who claims that she wishes to test her in combat to see if she is a worthy successor to Victor. The two women engage in a brutal fist fight, only to be interrupted when Victor, now resurrected as a Black Lantern, arrives on the scene and attacks them. After a drawn out battle, Renee discovers that Black Lanterns feed on emotions, and that if she is able to cut herself off from her feelings, she will become invisible. She does so, and angered, Victor stalks off into the night, searching for easier prey. Shiva reveals that she never intended to actually fight Montoya, but felt that attacking her would draw Victor out into the open so she could face him again.[13]

Some time after this, Renee teams up with the Huntress in order to bring down a criminal enterprise. Eventuall, the hitman known as Zeiss attacks the women, having been ordered by an unknown client to kill them. Renee appeals to the hitman's greed, offering him more money if he simply fakes their deaths and leaves them be. After this, Huntress takes Renee to Oracle for help in tracking down the client who put out the hit, and is flabbergasted upon discovering that Oracle is in fact "Comissioner Gordon's daughter". The two women eventually make their way to Oolong Island (home of the Doom Patrol), where they are arrested.[14] The story is ongoing.

Equipment

  • Montoya uses an advanced energy pistol she found while fighting with Intergang, as well as her police sidearm.
  • After the death of Vic Sage, Montoya inherited his costume, mask, fedora and trench coat, all of which have been treated to react to the binary gas created by Aristotle Rodor. In addition, Rodor provided Montoya with a shampoo that causes her hair to change color when exposed to the gas. According to the Question: Secret Origin backup in 52, this substance was developed using technology lifted from an old Batman foe named Bart Magan (Dr. No Face) and Gingold Extract, a fruit derivative associated with the Elongated Man. The Question's series by Denny O'Neil presented Pseudoderm as Rodor's attempt to build an artificial skin for humanitarian purposes.
  • The mask adheres to her face and renders it as a featureless blank when exposed to the binary gas. The binary gas is expelled from a special belt buckle worn by Montoya. The gas also causes her chemically treated costume, fedora, and trench coat to change color, typically to a dark blue.

Appearances in other media

Renee Montoya, as she appeared in The New Batman Adventures.

Montoya was a recurring character in Batman: The Animated Series and The New Batman Adventures, often serving as a more open-minded and tolerant foil to the more belligerent Harvey Bullock. Like Commissioner Gordon, Montoya was openly supportive of Batman and even worked with him in the episode, P.O.V. She was voiced by Ingrid Oliu.

Montoya was played by Lorelei King in BBC Radio's 1994 adaptation of Knightfall.

Video games

Montoya, partnered with Harvey Bullock, appeared in a short cut scene in Batman: Dark Tomorrow for Gamecube, and X-Box.

See also

Biography

  • 52 #1-2, 4-7, 9, 11-16, 18, 23, 26-28, 30, 33, 34-36, 38, 41-45, 47-48, 52
  • Adventures of Superman #645
  • Batgirl Vol. 1 #12
  • Batman #475, 491-493, 496, 504, 520, 53, 549, 587, Annual #27
  • Batman Allies Secret Files and Origins #1
  • Batman Chronicles #14, 16
  • Batman: GCPD #1-4
  • Batman: Gotham Knights #13
  • Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #117, 142
  • Batman: No Man's Land #1
  • Batman: Orpheus Rising #1
  • Batman: Prodigal #1
  • Batman: Shadow of the Bat #17, 36, 39, 87-88, 100000
  • Batman: Turning Points #4-5
  • Batman: Vengeance of Bane #1
  • Birds of Prey Vol. 1 #27, 114
  • Catwoman Vol. 2 #7, 31
  • Countdown #38-41
  • Crime Bible: Five Lessons of Blood #1-5
  • Detective Comics #642, 661-664, 670, 672-675, 677, 680-681, 742, 744, 746-747, 754755, 758-762, 774, 854-present, Annual #6, 11
  • Final Crisis #1, 3-7
  • Final Crisis: Revelations #1-5
  • Gotham Central #1-40
  • Gotham Underground #2
  • Infinite Crisis #1
  • Joker: Devil's Advocate #1
  • Joker: Last Laugh #3
  • Man-Bat Vol. 2 #1-2
  • Robin Vol. 4 #2, 8-9, 11, 13,-14, 86,
  • Teen Titans Vol. 3 #17

References

  1. ^ Comics Should Be Good: Comic Book Urban Legends Revealed #22!
  2. ^ Detective Comics #642 (January 2000)
  3. ^ Gotham Central V. 2 tpb/V. 1 HC
  4. ^ Gotham Central #23 (November 2004)
  5. ^ Gotham Central #24 (December 2004)
  6. ^ Gotham Central #38 (February 2006)
  7. ^ Gotham Central #40 (April 2006)
  8. ^ "52" Week Four
  9. ^ "52" Week Fourteen
  10. ^ "52" Week Thirty-Eight
  11. ^ Detective comics #854
  12. ^ Detective Comics Annual #11
  13. ^ The Question #37
  14. ^ Detective Comics #862
Wikiquote has quotations related to Renee Montoya.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Renee_Montoya&oldid=350665620"