Monica Rambeau was a lieutenant in the New Orleans Harbor Patrol when she received her powers in an accident (she was bombarded by extra dimensional energy by an energy disruptor weapon), and since then has dedicated her powers and talents to saving the world. Early on in her career she met (and schooled) Spider-Man, who introduced her to the Avengers.
First known as Captain Marvel, Monica had a lengthy run with the Avengers and even became the leader at one point. During her time as an Avenger she fought off many threats to the world such as Magneto and even extraterrestrial and more divine threats such as Kang the Conqueror and Zeus: The Greek God of Thunder and Sky father of the Greek Pantheon.
Near the end of her Avengers run, Monica changed her name from Captain Marvel to Photon out of respect to the actual son of the original Captain Marvel, and soon was forced to retire from the active roster due to injuries. Despite that, she remained one of the more reliable and active reserve members and even regained her role as Leader a couple of times.
Lately, Monica was recruited by Black Panther to fight an outbreak of vampires in New Orleans and teamed with Blade, Brother Voodoo, Luke Cage (and Black Panther) to form an all-black super hero team.
After that (and after changing her name to Pulsar and then to Spectrum) Monica joined the Mighty Avengers in an effort to fight off Thanos’ invasion of the earth. They were successful, but Monica was hurt in the process by Proxima Midnight: one of Thanos’ generals. Proxima’s spear, an unusual weapon made of strange light that was boasted to never miss, ended up disrupting Monica’s powers and temporarily incapacitated her. Luckily one Adam Brashear (better known as Blue Marvel: super hero and scientist) was able to return her to normal by using his powers of anti-matter and energy manipulation.
With the return of her powers, Monica was able to help Blue Marvel, Luke Cage, Power Man and more, fend off a weakened Shuma-Gorath (a magical powerhouse who has conquered countless dimensions) using her abilities to mimic Shuma-Gorath’s magic and shield herself and her teammates from its effects. Eventually Monica was the one to put down Shuma-Gorath, exploding his brain by manipulating the electricity inside of it, with the aid of Power Man and Spider Hero who were able to destroy him on the Astral Plane by using the Tiger God. The Earth was saved yet again, and by the end of it all, Luke Cage had named everyone involved as Avengers. Once again she regained her membership on the active roster.
Monica’s powers are the ability to manipulate any form of energy from the Electromagnetic Spectrum from light to lightning to infrared heat to radio waves and more. In addition to energy control, Monica also turns into an ‘energy form’ (turning into pure energy that retains her shape and physical features).
Her manipulation of energy has allowed her to hurt Zeus more than any mortal ever has, to destroy beings that Thor and She-Hulk couldn’t match, to bypass and overload the force fields of Magneto and Kang the Conqueror, and to even destroy an unknown enemy who constantly adapted (which she accomplished by constantly changing the energy she bombarded him with).
Monica has proven to be a very powerful energy manipulator: her lightning has hurt Hercules and Namor, she was able to destroy Shuma-Gorath’s physical form, she hurt Zeus as mentioned before, she was able to easily absorb extra dimensional energy, and she was even able to absorb the energy in a hole between two universes (one that would grow to planet sized within the day and destroy both universes), which is her most impressive feat yet.
Overall, Monica is a very powerful superhero and a true leader. She has always done her best to protect the Earth and its people from threats, and will continue to do so with her incredibly powerful and useful abilities.
Copyright © WarWithWords 2014
