- Veronica Cale
Superherobox|
caption=
comic_color=background:#8080ff
character_name=Veronica Cale
real_name=
publisher=DC Comics
debut="Wonder Woman " #196 (November,2003 )
creators=Greg Rucka
alliance_color=background:#ffc0c0
alliances=Cale-Anderson PharmaceuticalsScience Squad
aliases=
powers=|Veronica Cale is a
fictional character who has appeared in variouscomic book s published byDC Comics . Primarily an enemy ofWonder Woman , the character exists in DC's mainshared universe , known as theDC Universe . She was created byGreg Rucka in "Wonder Woman" v2, #196 (November 2003). Rucka has stated his intent as creating a "Lex Luthor for Diana". [ [http://www.newsarama.com/pages/DC/Rucka_WW.htm Newsarama ] ]Fictional character biography
Veronica Cale is a founding partner (with her friend Leslie Anderson) in Cale-Anderson Pharmaceuticals. Having worked hard to get to this position she resents Wonder Woman for finding acceptance in Patriarch's World so easy, and finds her message of peace simplistic, reasoning that it is easy to preach an end to conflict if you are a superstrong demi-goddess. When Diana writes "Reflections", a study of Amazon philosophy, Cale uses selected quotations from the book to spin the media against her.
When the book's most outspoken critic loses a debate, she arranges to have him killed at a demonstration, making it look like the book's proponents are responsible. She also uses
Doctor Psycho to inflame both crowds.Cale is subsequently bound, gagged,and locked in a closet by Psycho who impersonates her for a brief period, before she is rescued by Wonder Woman. This does not change her opinion of the superheroine, but does have an influence on Dr. Anderson which Cale finds worrying.
She is later coerced by Circe into applying as legal guardian of Circe's daughter Lyta as a way of removing Lyta from the Amazon island of
Themyscira . The process is stopped mid-way through once Ares kidnapps Lyta from the island, leaving Circe to abandon her scheme with Veronica Cale.This story plot was to have a larger part in the Wonder Woman comic but was dropped due to the "
Infinite Crisis " storyline. Cale's reaction to the media furore surrounding Wonder Woman's killing ofMaxwell Lord and its consequences have not been recorded.She resurfaces in Week 26 of "52" as one of the abducted scientists on Oolong Island (and the only female among the group). She suffers a breakdown after unleashing the Four Horsemen upon the Black Marvel family. When
Black Adam starts her world-wide crusade for vengeance, her conflicting feelings cause her to seduce the mentally unstableWill Magnus . When Black Adam actually arrives on the shores of Oolong Island she attempts to take the blame for it, walking out to confront the maddened Adam. She is subsequently entirely ignored.According to author notes in the fourth volume of the collected "52" editions, Cale was supposed to originally die at this point, casually slain by Black Adam. Further discussion changed her fate.
Subsequently, Cale leads the remaining mad scientists to form an independent collective. Their first problem is the return of the Four Horsemen of Apokilips. Cale ingests a semi-organic containment unit, and uses it to absorb the Horsemen's essences. She is later seen undergoing an operation to remove the unit.
Other versions
In a pastiche of Golden Age stories printed as a back-up strip in "Wonder Woman" v2, #200, Cale is reinvented as a perfume manufacturer called Veronica Callow. When Wonder Woman refuses to promote her new perfume, Callow tries to discredit Wonder Woman by creating a robot duplicate, Superba, who commits crimes.
ee also
*
List of Wonder Woman enemies Footnotes
External links
* [http://www.newsarama.com/pages/DC/Rucka_WW.htm Newsarama Interview] -
Greg Rucka discusses his take on Veronica Cale
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