Wildcat

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Background

Powers and Abilities

Wildcat has superhuman speed, reflexes and agility, and increased strength. She also has retractable catlike claws in her fingers and toes, which she uses for fighting, scaling obstacles, and ruining her hose. She also enjoys night vision.

Though they’re fairly small, Yolanda’s claws are very sharp and can withstand a surprising amount of mechanical pressure. She could tear through the inner tissues and eventually skin of a giant prehistoric shark, and can scale down brick walls face first to go faster.

Note that in DC Heroes terms she has Acrobatics (Climbing) and not Cling. If she cannot fit her claws within cracks (or create them), she can’t scale a surface.

Wildcat enjoys performing spectacular acrobatics and climbing atop stuff just because she can.

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History

On pre-Crisis Earth-2, “Mauler” Montez was a well-known heavyweight boxer of the Greatest Generation. He fought heavyweight boxing legend Ted Grant several times, and from those matches they gained great mutual respect.

Grant became a friend to the Montez family. He visited them whenever he was on the West Coast. On one such occasion he became the godfather of one of the Montez kids, little Yolanda.

From her childhood onward, Yolanda developed strange, catlike traits. She kept these hidden from all. These long remained a mystery until members of the Helix “family” told them what they knew. From their accounts, Yolanda’s mother was one of the pregnant women upon whom gynaecologist Dr. Love performed secret research.

From Dr. Love with love

Love chemically altered their embryos, and arranged for all the women to give birth on the same night so he could round up the “genomorphs” (many of whom, unlike baby Yolanda, were not expected to look human) and run.

One part of his plan did not work out, though. Two of the women had to travel back to Mexico before giving birth, due to immigration issues. They were sisters, and though Mrs. Montez’s baby looked normal and healthy, her sister’s baby was monstrous. He would become Carcharo.

As for the rest of the genomorph babies, they were raised by Dr. Love in seclusion as Helix.

Though the words of Helix and Carcharo are not particularly reliable, other sources of information (chiefly Mrs. Montez, who recounted the birth of Carcharo and Yolanda) seem to confirm this account. They kept those events a secret from Yolanda, but eventually revealed the truth when the government investigated Helix.

Once the sisters had given birth, Mrs. Montez came back to the US and raised Yolanda there. Her sister, whose legal situation was much less favourable, had to stay in Mexico. As she grew up, Yolanda was the favourite of “uncle Ted” Grant, and the champ told her stories of his adventures as the original Wildcat.

She never told him about her own abilities, though.

Growin’ up

While most youths in her barrio never completed high school, Yolanda was pressured by her parents to study seriously until she got her diplomas. She presumably conducted undergrad studies in English, creative writing or journalism.

Montez became a journalist, covering L.A. news and modern music for Rock Stars Magazine. This mag was apparently the Earth-2 equivalent of Rolling Stone . Among other things, she covered the launch conference of Infinity, Inc..

She later accompanied her tio to the private engagement beach party between Hector Hall and Hippolyta Trevor – Infinity Inc’s Silver Scarab and Fury. During that party she became a friend of Trevor, and caught the eye of Nuklon.

Yolanda occasionally used her abilities to get some scoops, such as when she used rooftops to sneak into the private wedding reception for Green Lantern and Harlequin.

Crisis on Infinite Earths

When Earth-2 was engulfed in the Crisis on Infinite Earths events, Yolanda did her best to help. She briefly ended up rescuing civilians near her “uncle Ted”. However, Wildcat was struck by a random lightning bolt as he was trying to save a little girl from a collapsing building.

Yolanda, who hadn’t even had time to greet him, saved the girl. But Wildcat ended up with his legs shattered.

Silently watching from outside the window as Grant was told that he may never walk again, Montez decided to become the new Wildcat to honour what he represented and help the other heroes. However, when the moment came to introduce herself to the JSA veterans in the middle of the Crisis, Yolanda got cold feet.

She decided to prove her worth first, so they would not think of her as an opportunist.

Wildcat (Montez) was part of the small army of heroes that fought super-villains over 3 Earths, via the cosmic treadmill two Flashes used to transport them across dimensions. She was also part of the first assault against the Anti-Monitor. Yolanda survived the whole thing, though she was saddened by learning about the deaths of so many heroes.

Unto Infinity

The Star-Spangled Kid (Sylvester Pemberton) later introduced three new heroes to Infinity, Inc. and the JLA – the second Hourman (Richard Tyler), the second Doctor Midnight (Dr. Beth Chapel) and Wildcat.

Wildcat (Montez) revealed her identity to Wildcat (Grant), who still was in a wheelchair. She thus received the blessing of the initially hostile Grant.

Mere hours after she started associating with Infinity Inc., the aircraft Montez was on was savaged by a monstrous white shark. She saved Nuklon by ejecting him, was swallowed by the shark, clawed her way free from its stomach, and got captured by the shark’s master – Carcharo.

Carcharo had actually tracked her down after learning she was a genomorph. Whilst she was his prisoner, he introduced her to Helix, who told her about their apparently shared origin. Yolanda refused to join them, however, and fought along with Infinity, Inc. when they arrived to rescue her.

Montez did not mention to the Infinitors her shared origins with Helix, fearing it would lead people to consider her a villain.

Infinity vs. Helix

Yolanda’s relationship with Infinity, Inc. started rough. She hadn’t been voted in yet and had already gotten the Infinitors in a fight. The others were not terribly interested in helping her investigate Helix, and she couldn’t tell them why it was important to her. She thus stormed off to confront Carcharo and Helix by herself.

Predictably she got captured, but a conflict erupted between the genomorphs present. Yolanda ended up allying with Helix member Kritter, who helped free her and contact Infinity, Inc.. Neither Yolanda nor Kritter were fans of the Infinitors at that point, but Wildcat thought it was the most reasonable solution.

During the climactic fight between Helix leader Mister Bones and Carcharo, Yolanda intervened in the melee, likely saving Bones’s life. Bones ended up with a leg chomped off, and Carcharo was apparently killed. The Infinitors learned Yolanda’s secret origin from Helix members.

Though the indomitable Wildcat (Ted Grant) recovered the use of his legs, he and the entire JSA roster disappeared in an otherworldly limbo. Most Infinitors lost their parents that day. With Yolanda’s godfather Ted gone, she again became the holder of the Wildcat legacy.

It was Nuklon who came bearing the sad news to the Montez household, while Yolanda was away covering a club opening. As per Grant’s wishes, Nuklon gave the champ’s title belt to “Mauler” Montez.

Voted in

Feeling blue due to the JSA’s disappearance and wanting to spend time with Montez, Nuklon found her working and told her the news. They grew a bit closer.

A few days after that, the three newcomers (including Montez) were voted in as Infinitors. While investigating a drug trafficking ring along with Mr. Bones, Wildcat stumbled upon the robot Mekanique and was wounded – but quickly recovered.

Some days later she discovered that her 13-year-old brother José was skipping school. He accidentally discovered that she was Wildcat. Impressed by the revelation that his big sis was a super-heroine with claws and stuff, José promised to stop skipping school.

During a mission in Calgary, the Infinitors and the Global Guardians were forced by the hostages-holding Injustice, Unlimited to work for them. Wildcat went to Vegas with the Tasmania Devil to force a casino owner to keep his establishments open. As they did so, Injustice, Unlimited member Hazard had the casinos lose all that they had to avenge her grandfather.

Wildcat and Nuklon apparently vaguely started dating at around this point. Howbeit, the somewhat clueless Nuklon had to be advised that Yolanda was angling toward real dating. They apparently never had a relationship — despite Yolanda’s interest, Nuklon kept pining about the married Lyta.

Infinity fading out

Some weeks later, Yolanda was part of the team of Infinitors who rescued Lyta from a possessed Hector, who died at the conclusion of the case. That was the beginning of the end for Infinity, Inc. Still, they handled a few more notable notable cases :

• A fight against a creation of the Ultra-Humanite along with the Teen Titans.
• A team-up with the Outsiders to stop a conspiracy in Markovia involving US intelligence factions.
• Helping fairies in the dream dimension against the Wizard.
• And of course their participation in the Millennium crisis.

Though Hector did return from the dead as the Sandman (to Yolanda’s delight, as it made Nuklon’s designs about Lyta impossible), tragedy soon struck again. Harlequin II manipulated Bones and Grundy into killing Skyman (Sylvester Pemberton), and the team did not survive that tragedy by much.

Yolanda got to briefly confront Dr. Love, the man responsible for her powers, before the team folded. However, Love was soon killed by Mister Bones to save Helix.

After Infinity

Holding two jobs — as an Infinitor and a journalist — had been running Yolanda ragged, though her journalism gig afforded her an enviable degree of freedom in her schedule and travels. Thus, after Infinity, Inc. blew up, Wildcat seemingly scaled back her costumed activities.

From 1988 onward, she was only seen in big gathering of heroes such as the Invasion or Superman’s funeral. She likely maintained some small-scale vigilante activities, though (or at least her counterpart in the The Nail continuity did).

Yolanda’s last battle occurred in 1993, when Amanda Waller assembled a task force of minor costumed and/or superhuman adventurers to put an end to Eclipso’s reign of terror. Montez was recruited along with her fellow former Infinitor Dr. Beth Chapel, aka Dr. Midnight.

Pitted against a dark god of vengeance with numerous mystical abilities and the ability to possess all sorts of people and creatures, Waller’s team suffered heavy casualties.

While rushing to the rescue of the Creeper (Jack Ryder), Yolanda was ambushed by an army of people possessed by Eclipso. She had her torso slashed open. Chapel reached her and tried to staunch the wound, but was herself attacked while performing first aid.

Both women are thought to have been killed in this debacle, and were never seen again.

Description

Yolanda is young and very fashionable, which in 1984’s LA chiefly means post-punk, new-wave-inspired clothing. One of the most recurrent elements of her ample wardrobe is the black leather miniskirt or microskirt, as was the style of the day. She also has collection of modern cocktail dresses and other formal but non-traditional clothing.

Wildcat is not very good at staying put. She tends to do acrobatics to pass the time.

She can hiss like a cat.

Personality

A young, daring rock journalist who grew up listening to tales of the Wildcat and lives in a trendy, creative world. Since this is 1980s DC comics, she interjects a lot of Spanish in her English (though it’s not really Spanglish either). “por Dios !” is her favourite exclamation.

She also likes making small puns and jokes about cats, given her code name. She also makes regular references to cliché aspects of Hispanic-American cultures back then. Most of what she says in Spanish are dated folk sayings.

Like most everybody in Infinity, Inc., Yolanda is on the proud, self-reliant side and has a bit of a temper. One probably can throw in “self-centred” and “impulsive”, too. Though these traits were possess by most team members, even Nuklon commented on Yolanda’s “rush-to-assumptions-and-barrel-in-with-claws-blazing” style.

Montez is also a tad judgemental.

She’s the kind of person who drives a bright red customised, convertible muscle car with a “YOLANDA” vanity plate. She also is rather jealous, and was possessive of Nuklon and cranky toward Lyta Trevor Hall – even though Nuklon and Montez weren’t really dating. I guess those are things you were expected to do as the token comic book latina back then. The 1980s were… different.

Quotes

“They need Wildcat, Ted. And I’ve decided to make sure they have one.”

“About time you opened the door to let in the cat !”

“¡Tengo suerte al cabo ! He’s going right past…”

“Grab some tacos ! My mother made enough to feed Pancho Villa’s whole army.”

“Just what do these vatos think they are, anyway — rock stars on tour ?”

(About her car) “No way José ! I wrote a lot of articles and put up with a lot of rock star egos for this little beauty… and nobody drives her but me !”

(After dodging by leaping up a tree) “Think you got me treed, do you, fangface ? Well, we have a saying ! ¡ Gato encogido, brinco seguro !”

“And what am I around here — chopped catnip ?”

“I didn’t put this costume on to run from crooks !”

“I had to hit the clubs last night for the rock magazine, and I never got to bed at all. Anybody got an aspirin ?”

Prototype

An in-book advertisement before the Infinity, Inc. launches shows a prototype version of Wildcat, who was apparently modified late during the process. Her appearance is roughly identical, except that the costume is of a… fetching orange hue, and she has a cat-themed motorbike. This is in the illustration bar.

This character was named La Garro™, which is double-bad Spanish. Presumably what was meant was la Garra (“the Claw”).

By Sébastien Andrivet.

Source of Character: DC Universe (chiefly Infinity Inc.).

Helper(s): Alan Wilkinson, Darci.