Anne-Marie

**Sister Anne-Marie** is a fictional character in comic books published by the American company DC Comics. She first appeared in Swamp Thing Vol 2 #37 (June, 1985) and was created by Alan Moore and Jamie Delano.

## History

As a young British girl, she discovered to have a deep sensibility that allowed her to see and hear things that other people couldn’t. Making some research on her “gift”, Anne-Marie discovered she was a psychic, able to sense the spiritual world, to feel the presence of angels and demons, to communicate with the dead to a certain extent. Desperately curious about her nature and looking for somebody she could share her experiences with, Anne-Marie entered in contact with a small group of amateur occultists: among these, there was a young man named John Constantine, who she immediately fell in love, despite being twenty years older (she was around her forties at this point). Anne-Marie enjoyed her time with the other mages as they explored their powers and talents, having fun while playing around with spells and occultism. Everything changed the night Constantine brought the entire crew to Newcastle, to investigate the strange phenomena haunting his friend Alex Logue‘s house. Once there, they found Alex and all his guests slaughtered, and his daughter Astra chanting and dancing, possessed by a fear elemental. Despite lacking the experience to do it, John, Anne-Marie and the others decided to exorcise the girl summoning a more powerful demon, bending him to their will and forcing him to cast away the elemental: the plan succeeded only to a certain point, as the demon, Nergal, came, he annihilated the lesser one, but wasn’t under the Newcastle Crew‘s control at all, and he pretended Astra’s soul as payment for his “service”. The mages couldn’t do anything to stop him, and Anne-Marie herself got disfigured by Nergal’s ichor during the attempted ritual to cast him away. For Anne-Marie, this was the trauma of her life, one that changed her completely.

Just before leaving, Nergal had mocked the disfigured Anne-Marie quoting Hamlet, telling her: “Get thee to a nunnery”; pretty ironically, the woman took him by his word. Deeply traumatized by the events, the Newcastle Crew, and Anne-Marie found herself scared of pretty much everything after what she had seen and done. She turned herself to religion, looking for consolation from her fear and atonement for her sins. Eventually, wanting to leave everything behind, she moved to Washington and became a nun, embracing a new life enlightened by the grace of God and free from darkness… at least, this was what she wanted. The sense of guilt, the shame and the terror that followed Astra’s gruesome death never left her, and she was always tormented by her past… and also by the present. When Constantine’s girlfriend, Emma, unwillingly summoned a demon known as Invunche, thanks to the bond the Newcastle Crew shared, each and every one of them could see the twisted monster kill the girl: Anne-Marie was holding a friend’s newborn baby and, scared by what she was seeing, she squeezed him more than she intended, hurting him. Wanting to know what was happening, and believing she could lend a hand, Sister Anne-Marie came back to London with the idea of looking for her former companions. Unfortunately, someone else found her first: deep in London’s underground, while she was waiting for her train, the Invunche appeared to Sister Anne-Marie. Terrified, the nun could do nothing by cry in fear as the demon slew her.

Sister Anne-Marie is, despite her frowned and hard appearance, a gentle and kind woman, with a wide sensitivity and and a naive heart. She’s an amateur psychic, and she uses her natural gift mainly to “see” spiritual trails and to sense the presence of supernatural beings. After the experience in Newcastle, she became a woman haunted by fear and guilt, and she turned to religion mainly to get rid of those nightmares tormenting her by night and by day… with little or none success.

## Powers and Abilities

* **Magic**
	+ **Light magic**
	+ **Dark magic**

## In other media

Sister Anne-Marie Flynn appeared in the Constantine episodes The Saint of Last Resorts" and "The Saint of Last Resorts: Part Two" portrayed by Claire van der Boom.