Black Canary
Black Canary, American comic strip superhero created for DC Comics by writer Bob Kanigher and artist Carmine Infantino. The character first appeared in Flash Comics no. 86 (August 1947).
Although she would go on to become one of DC’s most-enduring street-level heroes, Black Canary began her career on the wrong side of the law. Originally appearing in the Johnny Thunder comic strip that ran in Flash Comics, Black Canary was not unlike Catwoman, in that she stole from criminals but kept the money for herself. She was persuaded to turn her talents to heroism, and she soon gained a solid fan following. She took over Johnny Thunder’s slot in the comic and replaced him as a member of the Justice Society of America in All Star Comics.
Dressed in a dark halter top, shorts, a jacket, boots, and fishnet stockings and armed only with her detective skills and martial arts knowledge, Dinah Drake, Black Canary’s alter ego, took her inspiration from heroes such as Batman. In a reversal of the “damsel in distress” cliché, she devoted much of her time to rescuing her boyfriend, Larry Lance, from the clutches of villains. The Black Canary strip ran until Flash Comics was canceled in 1949, and, with the end of All Star Comics in 1951, Black Canary faded into obscurity.
When the Justice Society was brought back in the 1960s, Black Canary resurfaced, having apparently gone into semiretirement and married Lance in the interim. Lance is killed in an encounter with the sentient star Aquarius in Justice League of America no. 74 (September 1969), but Black Canary would continue to use his surname in her civilian identity.
A heartbroken Canary promptly jumped ship to the Justice League, where she became romantically linked with the Green Arrow. When he joined with Green Lantern in their groundbreaking early 1970s series, she went along as well. Green Arrow became an antiauthority radical, and Black Canary advocated on behalf of the women’s movement, operating with noticeably more self-assurance. Throughout the decade she appeared both with and without Green Arrow in stories in Adventure Comics, Action Comics, and World’s Finest Comics, and she became an integral part of DC’s lineup.
The 1980s were a less auspicious time for the character. In an attempt to simplify a half-century of complicated and occasionally self-contradictory continuity, DC rebooted its entire comic universe with the Crisis on Infinite Earths event. As a result, Black Canary, who was a full generation older than her Justice League contemporaries, was rewritten as two different characters. The “Golden Age” Black Canary was Dinah Drake Lance, now portrayed as a much older woman. Her daughter, Dinah Laurel Lance, was henceforth regarded as the “modern” Black Canary. Reflecting the decade’s trend for grittier stories, Black Canary was shown being savagely attacked and tortured in Green Arrow: The Longbow Hunters (1987), going from powerful superheroine to powerless plot point in one story. In time the romance with Green Arrow soured, and the couple split.
The 1990s saw a renewed interest in the character, with a short-lived solo series and a starring role in the Birds of Prey comic. In Birds of Prey Dinah Laurel Lance moved to Gotham City to join Oracle and Huntress in a mixture of crime busting and female empowerment. A television adaptation of Birds of Prey (2002) lasted only a single season and proved to be something of a disappointment to fans.
In the early 21st century Black Canary finally married her longtime boyfriend Green Arrow, but their marriage ended after he was arrested for killing his adversary Prometheus. That marriage and the events surrounding it were completely undone in the “New 52” event, which rebooted the entire DC universe again. In addition to appearing in numerous animated television programs, Black Canary was featured in the Superman origin series Smallville (2001–11), and she had a prominent role in the Green Arrow series Arrow, which began in 2012.