Dinah Lance

* Dinah Lance
* Black Canary
* DCIU Concept Art

Dinah had a normal childhood in Gotham. Her dad, Quentin, was a cop and her mother, Laurel Lance, was a florist. When Dinah was eleven, her somewhat idyllic life was strained by the birth of her sister, Sara. After giving birth, Laurel was diagnosed with throat cancer. As the florist shop was the family’s primary source of income, the family’s financial stability dissolved. To make up for this setback and to help cover medical costs, Quentin left Dinah to care for her mother and Sara as he pulled in multiple overtime shifts. This may have kept the family afloat for a few years but it also stressed Quentin to drinking and eventually caused him to work the shift in which he was shot and crippled.

To help support her family with her father confined to a wheelchair and her mother still fighting cancer, Dinah dropped out of school at seventeen and began working full-time at the florist shop with Sara chipping in after-school. The stress eventually got to Dinah. After dealing with a rather stressful customer, Dinah let out a scream in front of Sara that shattered every window in the shop. The two sisters blamed the broken windows on hoodlums and since it’s Gotham, the Lances accepted the excuse.

In secret, with Sara acting as a cheerleader and coach, Dinah learned to use her power to render metal and topple over full-size cars. But the gift was not purely destructive, with Sara’s help, Dinah developed an incredible degree of control over her vocal cords, allowing her to generate any sound she desired. Dinah and Sara kept this secret for four years.

When Laurel's cancer returned more severe than before, Dinah needed to look for an alternative to the dire financial circumstances. Disguised with a blonde wig, fishnets leggings, and a sexy black dress Dinah applied for a singing job at the Iceberg Lounge.

Rumor has it her audition moved Oswald Cobblepot to tears. Whether that's true or not, Cobblepot hired Dinah immediately, giving her a five night per week contract, and offered her a signing bonus large enough to pay off her parents' outstanding medical bills.

Using the stage name "The Canary," Dinah managed to maintain an air of mystery about her despite her near-instant fame and fortune among Gotham society's elite and criminal elements. With her family bills secured and the florist shop running smoothly, Dinah used her excess wealth to pay for private lessons for Sara and herself at Wildcat Gym. The Lance sisters were exceptional students.

But even among birds, what goes up, must eventually come down; and down it did go, hard and fast, when Dinah realized that the man who had shot her father was none other than Ignatius Ogilvy, the Penguin’s right-hand man. What is it they say about a woman scorned?

Let me tell you something, cops’ daughters know how to kick some serious butt. I can attest to that from personal experience. Dinah Lance is no exception. As a kid, Mr. Lance had both of his daughters in Judo and Tae Kwon Do classes. As a teenager, Dinah and Sara studied Krav Mag, Muay Thai, and Capoeira. When she started working at the Iceberg Lounge, Dinah expelled the stress she endured working two jobs to provide for her family and keep her sister in college by sparring at the Wildcat Gym with a world champion fighter in boxing, mixed martial arts, and savate (among others). Yes, I’m talking about Ted Grant. At least three times she put rowdy patrons at the Iceberg Lounge in the hospital for trying to grab her during a song. Oh, and remember this is the same woman who can easily blast through a brick wall with the power of her voice alone? So I think I’ve painted a vivid picture of what kind of wrath a woman like this might unleash upon the men responsible for her father’s injury. Hell hath no fury, indeed. I never met Oswald Cobblepot until after his run-in with Dinah, but I like to think that Dinah had something to do with the peculiar way he walks… err… waddles.

After giving the Penguin a beating so bad he turned himself in to the GCPD for protection, Dinah decided she would go into busting the heads of criminals regularly. Dinah put what was left of her nest egg from the Iceberg Lounge earnings to build her first costume and moved her family to Star City to get away from the stink of Gotham. Of course, it didn’t take long for Green Arrow to introduce himself to this new vigilante in his turf and the two’s romantic escapades started off with a bang. With Oliver taking care of Sara’s education and the Lance medical bills, Dinah focused on becoming a full-time crimefighter and with all the time spent training, she honed herself into a fighting machine that does not have to rely on her powers to get by.

With Oliver, Dinah was invited to join the Super-Friends and she was the one who got the finishing blow on Prometheus in the proto-League’s first encounter with that menace. While with the Super-Friends, Dinah did have a traumatic event. In 2003, Dinah went missing while on patrol. The clues pointed to the League of Assassins being behind the abduction and as a result, Bruce and Oliver were especially worried. This prompted them to finally came out as being former assassins. So the “big capes” launched an intensive search. Eventually, Dinah was found by Oliver in some warehouse lab in Evergreen City and by the time the others had arrived, there was no one left to question about why Dinah had been take, Dinah herself was unable to shed any light, having been sedated most of the time. The trauma of the event left Dinah left without her Canary Cry for a few months, but when Brainiac invaded Earth, Dinah found her voice once more. I don’t know about this “fat lady” everyone’s always on about, but when the Canary sings, it’s over.