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Janet Van Dyne (Earth-20051)

Revision as of 16:37, 2 September 2019 by Marvelous25 (Message Wall | contribs)
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History

Early Life

Janet was born into the wealthy family of Vernon van Dyne, owner of Van Dyne industries. Not much is known about Janet's early life, but she received formal schooling and had always been close to her parents and brothers.

Becoming Giant-Girl

Janet quickly achieved high social status and used her wealth and fame to try to bring aid to those who needed it. She joined charities and did many other things to achieve this goal, but felt her calling was more along the lines of crime-fighting. Janet asked Van Dyne Industries' top scientist, Hank Pym, to make her a superhero. Pym, luckily, had been working on a device that, when worn like a harness, allowed the user to reduce their size to that of an ant. The lab was invaded by Hydra agents in exo-suits after one of Pym's inventions, to which Janet responded by demonstrating to Pym that his harness could also allow the user to grow in size as well, an ability she used to drive off the Hydra goons. Pym worked on several versions of the harness until he finally incorporated it into a form-fitting suit that Janet decided to wear as Giant-Girl.[3]

Avengers

Janet soon joined the Avengers and aided them on many of their exploits, her growing powers lending them a massive advantage against many adversaries.[4]

When going up against A.I.M., the Avengers and Janet were reformatted the same way M.O.D.O.C. had been, under sway of the mental control of M.O.D.O.C. himself. The Avengers went around as M.O.D.O.C. wannabes for a time, using their newfound brain power to better the public by placing them under the rule of the M.O.D.Avengers. Luckily for the public, a mishap by Wolverine (then called WOLDOC) proved the transformation to be temporary, and the team, including Janet, returned to normal. [1]

On one mission to rescue some miners, the Avengers encountered the Insectoid People, led by Psyklop. The insect monarch was using his mind powers to control his minions, and at one point increased his mental exertion, his influence finding its way into Janet's mind. Her suit had been built with a secondary power of insect communication, making Janet susceptible to Psyklop's control. She unwillingly fought her friends for some time until Wolverine slashed her insect-control headset as well as damaging her mask which revealed her identity to the public. Hank Pym then gave her a new suit, this one with higher efficiency and no unnecessary features.[3]

In Love with Hank Pym

After Psyklop's defeat, Janet continued to aid the Avengers until another issue brought her home, this time bringing Spider-Man with her. Hank Pym, who Janet had been slowly falling in love with, had just gone missing. Janet and Spidey began to search for him, with the real situation turning out to be that Pym was just working on an experiment in an anthill and his assistant, Erik Josten, was keeping it under wraps because of jealousy. Erik tried to get Janet to fall for him instead of Pym, which resulted in a giant-sized brawl, Josten having taken another size-changing suit from the lab to impress Janet. He knocked Jan over, to which Pym responded by defending Jan, supersizing several ants to fight Josten into submission. After Josten was restrained, Janet and Hank embraced, officially beginning a relationship.[5]

Wasp

Sometime later, Janet apparently had Hank do some more work on her suit, adding the ability to shrink back into it and causing it to form wasp-like wings for her from the suit's substance. Janet planned to use this new ability to better serve humanity interchangeably being two different superheroine identities, Giant-Girl when large, and Wasp when tiny. She used her new powers to assist Spider-Woman and Beast in taking down a pair of Hydra bases while following a trail of clues left by Hercules.[6]

File:Giant-GirlGrowing.jpg

Giant-Girl growing

Attributes

Powers

File:Janet van Dyne (Earth-20051) Marvel Adventures Super Heroes Vol 1 16.jpg

Janet as Wasp

  • Size Addition: Janet can increase her size to a maximum of about 120 feet in height, through a Pym Particle-initiated process performed by her suit. However, she cannot maintain a size larger than sixty feet without proper focus. If she is struck hard enough to lose concentration, or simply loses it at all, she will shrink to about sixty feet if she was larger than that. Because of the effort needed to maintain such a size, Janet normally limits herself to sixty feet anyway. Her proportional strength appears to increase as well, but to what degree is uncertain.
  • Size Reduction: Janet can also reduce her size to about an inch or so. The compaction of her body's atoms increases her muscle density, granting her proportionally superhuman strength, the exact limit of which is unknown.
  • Flight: As Wasp, Janet has artificial wings that grant her the ability to fly with great speed and agility. The wings appear when she shrinks below a certain size, somewhere around a few inches tall.
  • Wasp's Sting: With the densification of Janet's body mass comes increased bioelectricity, which she can channel into blasts fired form her hands. These blasts are comparable in power to Spider-Woman's, and can cause damage to people and objects much larger than Janet.

Former Powers

  • Super-Intelligence: As GI-DOC, Janet had massive intelligence surpassing any normal human.
  • Psionic Powers: As GI-DOC, Janet also had access to several mind-based powers that M.O.D.O.C. also exhibits.
    • Telekinetic Force Blasts: GI-DOC could fire concussive blasts of pure mental force.
    • Mind Control: GI-DOC had the power to control beings with weaker minds than hers, but never used this power.
Insect Communication and Control: The secondary function of Jan's original suit was the ability to control insects using the antennae that adorned her mask. This ability was one that Janet did not use, and presumably did not known about. This power was used by an insectoid race to control Janet, but was later lost when the mask and antennae were destroyed.

Abilities

  • Bilingual: In addition to English, Jan began taking Maori lessons, with overall success.[7][8]

Weaknesses

  • It is possible to use Janet's own size against her. Giant-Girl can lose her balance in small spaces when supersized, and it is more damaging if she falls over when giant, because of her greater mass.[9] When giant, Janet also makes a very large target. When reduced in size, Janet is more vulnerable to damage despite her higher muscle density. As Wasp, it is far easier to damage her due to her tiny size.
  • It is also possible to remove all her powers completely by doing significant enough damage to her suit. In its first incarnation, the suit's functionality was tied to the a headset contained in the mask. When it was destroyed, Janet lost her powers until her suit was replaced.
  • As GI-DOC, Janet had such a massive head her that body could not support it, thus restricting her to a hover chair. Her limbs were also unable to reach past her head, thus limiting the normal use of her powers.

Paraphernalia

Equipment

File:Janet Van Dyne (Earth-20051)Giant-GirlGiveThemAShow.jpg

Giant-Girl in her old suit, which resembles that of Giant-Man.

Janet wears a Pym Particle-producing suit that enables her to change size. This first version of the suit had a headset with antennae that allowed Jan to communicate with and control insects, but Jan never used this feature. Not only that, the whole function of the suit was tied into the headset, which meant that once the antennae and/or headset was damaged enough, the entire suit would stop working.

Pym Particle storage chamber on her belt.[10]

Version 2 of her suit had no antennae or mask, and had an access to the Pym Particle storage, of which Jan could use the contents to alter the size of other beings or objects.[3]

Version 3 changes appearance and creates artificial wings when Janet chooses to become the Wasp.[6]

Transportation

Quinjet, Hoverchair (As GI-DOC)

Notes

  • Janet is an alternate version of her Earth-616 alternate, Wasp. But unlike Giant-Girl, Wasp rarely uses growth powers. In this reality, Pym Particles do not seem to have the same effects on the users as they do in the mainstream, which may keep Janet from ever abandoning her Giant-Girl alias as mainstream Hank Pym abandoned Giant-Man.
  • Jan's hair has appeared to change color from red to brown on numerous occasions. Her hair was red for a short time then consistently brown or auburn for another period, then red for a long time before going back to auburn-brown. Also, before ever gaining powers or joining the Avengers, her hair was always colored auburn-brown. Recently, her hair has consistently only been dark brown when she is in Wasp form and auburn when normal or giant. This is possibly from the fact Jan's molecules are much denser when shrunk, which could darken her hair's color.

Trivia

  • Janet likes the fact that her suit changes with her size, because it gives her a more diverse wardrobe. She also spends much of her spare time dreaming up alternate costume designs.[6]
  • Janet used to play Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots with her brothers when she was younger.[11]
  • Jan thinks towering over other people is quite fun.
  • Despite her wealth, Janet had issues with tax payments for a time. This was probably simply due to forgetfulness and her busy superhero lifestyle.[12]

See Also

Links and References

References

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