Bonita Juarez (Earth-616)

History

Origin

Bonita Juarez was walking across the desert near Albuquerque, New Mexico when a huge ball of cold fire plummeted out of the sky and struck the sand ten feet from where she stood. Bathed in its extraterrestrial radiation, Juarez soon discovered that she had acquired a vast amount of energy-wielding powers.^[3]

Believing the fireball to be a manifestation of the American Indian legend of the Firebird, Juarez fashioned herself a costume and decided to use her powers to help the people of the Southwestern United States under the name of Firebird.^[3]

Rangers

Firebird intercepted a shortwave distress call meant for the Avengers, and met with four other superhuman crimefighters who were also responding to the call. After handling the menace of the Corruptor, the five champions, Firebird, Red Wolf, Shooting Star, Texas Twister, and Night Rider, decided to band together whenever threatened by a menace that was too large for them to handle individually as the team the Rangers. However, partly because the various Rangers were geographically scattered across the American Southwest, their gatherings were infrequent.^[3]

Avengers West Coast

When an encounter with the sorcerer Master Pandemonium took her to the West Coast Avengers, Firebird assisted the team in their battle against him.^[4] Mockingbird wanted her for membership in the West Coast Avengers, but Hawkeye was more interested in courting their more famous applicant, the Thing. After working with the Avengers for several weeks, Firebird left without joining the team.^[5]

The Avengers

While the Avengers came looking for her to ask her to join, Firebird was starting a spiritual journey which led her to briefly adopt the name La Espirita. As Espirita, she returned to the West Coast Avengers' headquarters the Avengers Compound just in time to stop Henry Pym from committing suicide. The rest of the West Coast Avengers, however, had been lost in time. Together, Espirata and Pym found the time-lost Avengers' message and helped rescue them and defeat the villainous alien computer, Dominus. Espirita did not stay with the Avengers long, but parted with them in good company and presumably accepted their membership offer, as she often served as a reserve Avenger after that.^[6]

Bonita was later captured by various assembled aliens, who revealed to her that the flaming fireball that gave her powers was merely an alien child's discarded experiment. Briefly engaging a crisis of faith, Bonita nonetheless decided that God was still responsible for her powers, but still returned to her other code-name, Firebird.^[7]

Firebird was among the assembled Avengers who have appeared at various membership meetings, and was called in to help clean up their then headquarters Hydrobase during the so-called "Acts of Vengeance" affair, which set her and a group of other female Avengers up against several berserk androids.^[8]

Firebird retains her Avengers status, and while preferring to adventure in the Southwest and do social work, she has teamed up with them for various adventures, notably when the Avengers reformed after many of their numbers had been believed dead, and when the Avengers and the Thunderbolts teamed up to stop the alien Dominex, a remnant of the Dominus computer.^[9]

Civil War

During the Civil War over superhero registration, Firebird joined the anti-Registration Secret Avengers, but after the death in battle of Goliath she decided to register, and later joined Texas' team in the 50-State Initiative, a new incarnation of her old team the Rangers.^[10]

Danielle Cage

She was one of the many applicants for nanny to Luke Cage and Jessica Jones' daughter, Danielle Cage.^[11]

Secret Invasion

During the Secret Invasion, Firebird was with the Rangers when they, 3-D Man, and Ant-Man were fighting a Skrull that was posing as Lobo, Red Wolf's wolf.^[12] The Rangers came into conflict with Kaine, alias Scarlet Spider in Houston, then they joined forces with him to battle a monster made of pure energy.^[13]

Powers and Abilities

Powers

• Energy Manipulation: Firebird possesses the ability to summon and manipulate as-yet-unknown forms of energies that radiate both heat and thrust. These energies, which she taps by conscious effort, can be projected from any part of her body. Usually projected from her hands, the thermal energy has a maximum temperature of 5,000°+ Fahrenheit (sufficient to boil steel alloys) and the thrust energy has a maximum concussive force of 275 pounds per square inch (sufficient to topple a filled garbage truck at 100 feet). She can willfully lower the thermal energy's temperature to a minimum of 120° F and can project the thrust energy alone. Firebird's body is immune to the detrimental effects of wielding her power.^{[citation needed]}

• Flight: By projecting energy beams below her, Firebird is able to produce sufficient thrust to fly. Although she could theoretically fly at supersonic speeds, she is limited by the maximum speed at which she can still breathe, approximately 130 miles per hour.^{[citation needed]}

• Firebird Manifestation: Whenever Firebird summons her power for the first time after a period of disuse or concentrates upon summoning all the power she can at once, she is surrounded by a huge (about 100 feet or more) fiery manifestation of energy in the shape of a bird. Whether she is subconsciously willing the energy into this form or whether the energy somehow projects this form is not yet known.^{[citation needed]}

• Immortality: It has been speculated that Bonita's powers may make her immortal, and indeed on one occasion she survived after drinking an alien poison given to her by the Collector that had killed a group of her fellow Avengers (they were later resurrected).^[14]

Strength level

Firebird possesses the normal human strength of a woman of her age, height, and build who engages in moderate regular exercise.

Paraphernalia

Transportation

Flight under her own power.

Notes

Despite the fiery bird-like form her energy projections can take, Bonita has no known connection to the Phoenix Force or anyone else using the Phoenix identity.

Links and References

• 89 Appearances of Bonita Juarez (Earth-616)
• 3 Minor Appearances of Bonita Juarez (Earth-616)
• Media Bonita Juarez (Earth-616) was Mentioned in
• 26 Images featuring Bonita Juarez (Earth-616)
• Quotations by or about Bonita Juarez (Earth-616)
• Character Gallery: Bonita Juarez (Earth-616) 
• Marvel Directory
• OHMU AVENGERS 2005, 2005, Marvel Entertainment Group

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Footnotes