Raquel Thomas

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Ronnie Mathis

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   Shantel †
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**Raquel "Raq" Thomas** is the unseen overarching antagonist in Power and the deuteragonist on the Starz original crime drama *Power Book III: Raising Kanan*. She is portrayed by Patina Miller.

Raq serves as one of the two main protagonists in season 1-3.

She was also mentioned in Power Season 2.

Raq is Kanan's mother. To him, she may be loving, but in the streets, she is a cold, hard, and fierce woman taking names in a man's world. She is tough, resolute, ruthless and yet, Raq is still capable of love, the sole recipient of that affection being Kanan, as he is everything to her. As much as she cares for him, though, there are many instances where one wonders if she loves him for who he is, or if she loves him merely as an extension of herself. Being the middle child of three, Raq also carries the heavy burden as the earner for her two brothers, Lou-Lou and Marvin.

## Biography

### Past

When she was sixteen, Raquel was involved with Rondell " Def-Con" Stark and she had a son by the name of Kanan, who later turned out to be Malcolm Howard’s son, a cop who was investigating Def Con. According to herself, Def wanted to be sure she was loyal by keeping her out of the loop while she was pregnant with Kanan. It's also revealed that Def Con was Left handed and was paying her to act as his cover to keep up his reputation and that people wouldn't think anything if they thought Kanan was his. When Def Con went to prison, Raquel continued her business with her brothers Marvin and Lou. Raquel was previously the second in command of her siblings until Marvin got himself locked up after becoming a drug addict. As a result, she took care of her niece Laverne until her father was released.

Prior to 1985, she met High Post, who became her boyfriend. He introduced her to the drug business and helps him counting his money and sell drugs. As mentioned by Kanan, he liked Post because he treated Raquel right and they were said to be in love.

During 1985, Raq was with her boyfriend doing business before her son returns home from the park crying and Post told her that not every kid is made for the South side. Raq told him that her son is and goes to talk to him. Kanan told her he got beaten up and got his money stolen. Raquel scolded him for talking about his money then obliges him to go back and defend himself from the boys with a sock filled with batteries, stating if he didn't then he would deal with her. She casually smokes, while watching him take care of the bullies who are left crying and bleeding on the ground. Thanks to her, Kanan got revenge and respect from the other kids who start to talk highly about him.

In 1986, High Post got killed for snitching and Raquel was obliged to take control of the business of her late boyfriend with her two brothers Lou-Lou and Marvin Thomas.

### Season 1

During Back in the Day, Raq learns that her son Kanan has the potential to get into one of the most prestigious schools of the city and encourages him to succeed to the entry exam and get out of the streets but Kanan shows that he doesn't want to quit his high school with his friends and he wants to stay with her. However she assured him that when he succeeds she succeeds. After that, Raquel learns that Unique, the biggest drug dealer in the city and her rival, attacked them again. In fact, since she took the reins of the business, Unique keeps attacking her to take control of the entire territory. While Marvin advises to clap back, Raq just want a conversation with him. Raq and Lou-Lou go to a nightclub to talk with the owner to sell their drug but they meet instead Toni Deep who starts talking harshly to Raquel, saying their drug is bad because it's from ghetto. Raq and Toni start fighting but Lou interrupts it. Raq then goes to the bar and meets Symphony Bosket, the barman. They start talking and Symphony invites her to a date, which she accepts. She then sends Scrappy to kill Toni's dog for revenge from her disrespect.

Later that night, Raq and her family eat in their favorite restaurant known as Lamont's Diner and the Figueroa siblings, Famous and Jessica, join them. When they exit, Marvin sees a car passing in front of them and then tells everybody to get down. Kanan sees that the shooter was his Rival "Buck Twenty" starts shooting in the air giving warning shots. Raq understands that the shooters were sent by Unique. Later, Kanan tells his mother that he's ready to help them in the business but Raq refuses, saying that he has to get in that school and get out of the hood. The next day, Raq meets Unique and they both agree to divide the territory in both sides for each of them. Raq offered 140th Street to 143rd Street for Unique to take while she holds down 144th Street to Sutphin Boulevard. Unique agrees by saying "Word is Bond", and they shook on it

Unfortunately, when she thinks that tensions with Unique finally stopped, she learns from Lou-Lou while on her date with Symphony, that Kanan killed one of Unique's men, Buck Twenty. She gets home and scolds her son for his actions. She then explains to him and her brothers that she splits their territory in half for her and Unique, which Marvin doesn't understand. Kanan defends himself, saying that he did this to defend his mother's honor and says again that he's ready to help her in the business but Raq still refuses and sends him to his room. Later, Kanan comes back and tries to talk to his mother but she refuses and reveals that he's going to move at his grandma's. She then sends him take out the trash but Kanan gets attacked by Unique's men. Kanan is okay. The police and detective Howard come investigating and Raq tells him that it was just a misunderstanding, saying that Kanan was confused with someone else, which Howard doesn't believe. He tells Raq to watch her back and Kanan to keep his eyes open before leaving. LouLou tells Raq that he would never tell his sister how to raise his son, but Nique's crew was coming for Kanan, and Stuyvansent wasn't going to save him from that. Marvin agreeing said that his mother could not either. This left Raq in a state of where she needed to think on how to fix this. The next day, Raq meets Unique and gives him money to give to Buck's family and apologizes for Kanan's mistake. Unique all heated underneath his professionalism tells Raq that he's taking over the whole territory. Raq then asks him to tell his men to stop attacking Kanan but he responds that he can't control his men but he'll do what he can. She even tries to convince him that Kanan was not in the game, though because he was really under Def-Con's roof, Unique tells Raq that Kanan's been in the game from before he even started.

That night, accepting what Marvin, Lou-Lou, and Unique had told her about Kanan, Raq takes her son to a Beach and teaches him how to hold and shoot with a gun. She then reveals to Kanan that he's officially part of the family business. Or is he?

## Murders committed by Raquel Thomas

* **Gabriel:** Shot 3 times for abusing Juliana.
* **Scrappy:** Shot in the head for supposedly snitching which was told by Howard.
* **Cartier Freed:** Shot to death to decrease competition. (w/Lou)
* **Italian Mob Member:** Shot to death.
* **Juliana:** Shot to death for betraying her.

## Murders connected to Raq

* **Toni Deep's dog:** Asked Scrappy to burn the dog to death in the microwave.
* **Buck Twenty**: Indirectly caused when she had a deal with Unique to split the territory in half without saying it to her family. She then helped cover up the crime after Buck was killed by Kanan or D-Wiz.
* **D-Wiz**: Ordered Lou Lou to take out D-Wiz in order to protect her son. This was also done to tie up loose ends because he was bragging about doing the killing. Plus, it was to get the target off Kanan's back for Buck's Murder.
* **Frank The Inspector**: Told Marvin to make a meal out of him after, she knocked him out with a hammer soon after he tried to rape her. Marvin then killed him, shooting a nail gun in his head.
* **Crown Camacho**: Told Lou that Crown visited her discussing about getting him out the label, manipulating, leading Lou beat and strangled him to death.
* **Kenya Pierce:** Shot and killed by the italians while trying to kill Raq.
* **Dario:** Shot from by Unique to save her.
* **Sal Boselli:** Ordered Marvin Thomas to assassinate him.
* **Shantel(Scrappy Mamma):** Telling Marvin to deal with Lou, which convince him to kill her.

## Goals

* Protect Kanan (Ongoing)
* Work with Joaquin (Succeeded)
* Defeat Nique and take the role of the biggest drug dealer for Southside Jamaica (Succeeded)
* Have Kanan kill Howard in order to protect Kanan, and to hide the truth about who he really was. Showing a sign of manipulation. (Failed, as Howard survived)
* Kill Sal Boselli (Succeeded)
* Reconnect with Kanan (Ongoing)

## Trivia

* Like her son, she is intelligent with her interests being in astronomy.
* She mentioned that she had Kanan when she was 16. Kanan was born in 1975 which makes her date of birth in 1959.
* By 2018, it's unknown of what became of Raquel or of her whereabouts since Kanan mentioned that he had to go see his mother.
* It's unknown how she interacted with her grandson Shawn.
* It's unknown what her reaction was to Kanan dying.
* As mentioned by Kanan, Post got her into the crime business.
* Raquel was the second person to learn that Jukebox was lesbian, like Kanan she accepted her for who she was.
* Raq is the secondary protagonist of Raising Kanan.
* Raquel was the person who got Jukebox to become a cop by telling her "Sometimes, cops are good friends to have".
* Raq can also be seen as the main antagonist of the Power universe as she taught Kanan the game. Kanan and Breeze later taught Tommy and Ghost the game. Kanan then later taught Tariq who is now working with Brayden and the Tejada Organization.

## Appearances

### Season 1

* Back in the Day
* Reaping and Sowing
* Stick and Move
* Don't Sleep
* Choose Your Battles
* Level Up
* Stay In Your Lane
* The Cost of Business
* Loyal To The End
* Paid In Full