Real Name: Mary Willow Bromfield (her birth name was Mary Batson)

Occupation: College Student, Adventurer

Legal Status: Citizen of the United States with no known criminal record

Identity: Secret

Other Aliases: Captain Marvel

Place Of Birth: Fawcett City, California

Marital Status: Single

Known Relatives: Nicholas Bromfield (adoptive father, "Nick"), Nora Bromfield (adoptive mother), Donald (father, deceased), Marilyn (mother, deceased), Merrill (grandfather, deceased), Jocelyn (grandmother, deceased), Dudley (granduncle), William (brother, "Billy," alias Captain Marvel), Thaddeus Bodog Sivana (uncle), Magnifus Sivana, Beautia Sivana (cousins), Ebenezer Batson (uncle); Sinclair Batson (cousin, deceased)

Group Affiliation: The Marvel Family, formerly the Justice League of America, Super Buddies, The Black Marvel Family, S.H.A.Z.A.M.

Base Of Operations: Fawcett City, California; Queens, New York; formerly Fairfield, California

First appearance: (historical) Captain Marvel Adventures #18, (modern) The Power of Shazam #2

Origins: Power Of Shazam II #3, 4, 16

History: Mary Batson is the daughter of noted Forties archaeologists Donald and Marilyn Batson. As a youth, her best friend growing up was her twin brother, Billy Batson. She accompanied her parents to an expedition to Egypt under Egyptologist, Theo Adam, where they were accidentally killed in a car crash engineered by Marilyn's stepbrother, Dr. Thaddeus Bodog Sivana, who wanted his hands on the Batson Family wealth. Adam was actually the virtually immortal Teth-Adam, a former warrior, champion and chieftain of Ancient Egypt, who had hired the Batsons to help preserve his flagging immortality. He rescued Mary and gave her to his maid, Sarah Primm, who placed Mary in an orphanage. She was soon adopted by Nicholas and Nora Bromfield, a wealthy American couple.

In the United States, Billy inherited his family fortune, but while in the custody of his unscrupulous Uncle Thaddeus, the family fortune was devastated and squandered to finance his sinister experiments. Believing his sister was dead, Billy became destitute, living on the streets in a meager existence until he came under the tutelage and guidance of Teth-Adam's former mentor, Shazam. Using his mastery of sorcery, Shazam groomed the honest and pure-hearted Billy Batson into the costumed hero, Captain Marvel. Mary, meanwhile, lived an idyllic life in a wealthy family conscious of Bill's existence, but unaware of his whereabouts. Her only connection to her past was a stuffed tiger doll which she called "Talky Tawny," which had been shipped to her with the Batson's possessions after their murders.

As Captain Marvel, Billy became a costumed crime fighter battling the evil schemes of his uncle for wealth and power and even Teth Adam as the ruthless Black Adam trying to conquer the planet. In his normal life, he became friends with the lame Freddy Freeman and shared the power of Captain Marvel with him. While working as a newsboy, he worked his way to becoming a photocopy boy and then a job as an assistant for a television station in Fawcett City. With his money, he hired a private investigator named Michael "Muscles" McGinnis to search for Mary.

By now, Sarah Primm learned she was dying and wanted to tell Billy the truth about his sister. Mary had become a contestant on a TV game show called "Mental Marvel Quiz," for which Billy was emcee. Seeing her similarity to his sister, Billy suspected she was his long-lost sister but didn't have any evidence. Primm then sent a note to Billy to talk to him about Mary, planning to reveal her adoption to the Bromfields. After meeting her and realizing the truth, Billy rushed back to the studio to tell Mary the news, but she was abducted by thugs trying to extort money from the Bromfields. Billy and Freddy rescued her with the Captain Marvel powers, and revealed their identities to her, but the thugs recovered and gagged them to prevent them from calling upon their powers. Innocently crying out Shazam's name, Mary was transformed by the mystical lightning that turned Billy into Captain Marvel herself and acquired his godly powers. In her superhuman state, she defeated the criminals and rescued Billy and Freddie.

Consulting the spirit of Shazam, Billy and Freddy eventually learned that the mystical spell that transformed them into Captain Marvel had a dual nature. While their version was linked to the attributes of the Olympian Gods, Mary's version of the same spell called upon the attributes of six Olympian goddesses, namely the grace of Selene, the strength of Hippolyta, the skill of Ariadne, the fleetness of Zephyrus, the beauty of Aurora and the wisdom of Minerva. (Much like Billy's version, the full attributes of this mystical spell are suspect since Ariadne was mortal and Zephyrus was a god.) They also learned that the Captain Marvel spell was finite and that they could only each use a portion of it at a time. Without Freddy or Mary, Billy could wield the full strength of it, but while sharing it with either Mary or Freddy, he was nowhere as powerful as he was wielding it by himself. As Captain Marvel, Mary became an adult version of herself and acquired a female version of the Captain Marvel costume. While she used the name Captain Marvel while Billy was in his civilian identity, she became dubbed Mary Marvel by the media without any knowledge of her true identity.

Mary Marvel joined Billy and Freddie in several adventures against Dr. Sivana and Black Adam, gradually building a large gallery of super-powered criminals as foes. Dr. Sivana eventually tried to imprison them in another dimension, but the technology back fired and he was instead imprisoned with them. They were trapped in limbo reliving their battles in a cycle for over forty years until they finally escaped. As Captain Marvel, Billy became a member of the Justice League of America which Mary soon joined herself. However, during the Crisis of Infinite Earths, their histories were altered and both Billy and Mary's started in the present than during the 1940s without ever being trapped in limbo.

In the altered timeline, Mary learned that she had been granted the power of Captain Marvel through her old "Talky Tawny" doll, which had been transformed into a large talking humanoid tiger by Lord Satanus, a dark magician, now revealed to be the son of Shazam. Eventually wearing a white version of her costume to stand out from Billy as Captain Marvel, Mary also became a member of the Super-Buddies comprised of protégés of the Justice League of America. Her innocence and naiveté often frustrated her teammate, Fire, and further discomfit came from Warrior making lewd comments about them and the other female teammates. After learning the truth about the source of her powers from Lord Satanus and Talky-Tawny, Mary was abducted along with Blue Beetle and Booster Gold and imprisoned in the underworld where Shazam's magic did not work and she briefly lost her powers. They were eventually rescued by Doctor Fate.

After the final death of Shazam, Mary lost her Captain Marvel powers while flying and crashed to to Earth, ending up in a coma that left her debilitated. Freddy spent his entire life-savings to nurse her to life. He eventually left her to try and reclaim the Captain Marvel powers on his own. Eventually regaining her mobility, Mary tried to regain her powers through Madame Xanadu, but after she was unable to help, she decided to travel back to the subway station where Billy first became Captain Marvel, even as Madame Xanadu warned her not to go there. Running into criminals, Mary was rescued by Black Adam who then turned his power on her. Eventually taking pity on her, he surrendered his powers to her. As a result, Mary regained the godly power she had as Mary Marvel, this time with a black version of her costume, and with the full breadth of his power without having to share it with Billy and Freddy.

Black Adam's powers, based on the Egyptian Gods rather than the Olympian Gods, eventually began corrupting Mary. While learning to control them under Zatanna's tutelage, she became irrational and falsely believed Zatanna wanted them for herself. She shared a portion of them with Klarion the Witch-Boy while trying to control them, but when he tried to steal all her power, she took that portion back and then beat him into unconsciousness. After a campaign of cruelly-twisted justice, punishing terrible crimes in an excessive manner, Mary encountered Eclipso, hoping to please his master, Darkseid, by offered him Mary, but Mary learned what he was doing and beat him up unmercilessly as well.

Eventually realizing how corrupted she was becoming, Mary surrendered her Black Adam powers and ended up on Paradise Island where Queen Hippolyta took her under her tutelage. Following the Olympian Gods retreat to Earth after the devastation of Olympus to Mikaboshi, Mary rescued the Olympians from Apokolips, Zeus restored her godly powers and made her Mary Marvel once more, this time with a new variation of her costume.

Mary eventually regained the Black Adam powers through Darkseid trying to control her. She joined Black Adam's Black Marvel Family and became corrupted once more. Battling Wonder Woman, Freddy as Captain Marvel, Tawky Tawny and Black Adam, she tried to kill Supergirl, but Freddy called upon the power of Shazam to strip her of her powers and render her mortal to stop her.

Bereft of her powers once more, Mary was almost seduced by the demon Blaze promising to restore them in return for the soul of Freddy Freeman, but Freddy and Mary instead plotted against her and eventually exiled her back to the underworld.

Eventually, Professor Zoom, an enemy of the Flash, altered history so that his nemesis never existed. In this timeline, Mary never became Captain Marvel and shared the Shazam powers equally with five other children, each granted with a different aspect of the power of Captain Marvel known collectively as S.H.A.Z.A.M. Together, they could merge together to become Captain Thunder. Realizing that history was altered, Billy encouraged Mary and the others to help Cyborg, the Flash, Batman, Enchantress and Element Woman defeat Wonder Woman leading the Amazons into an attack on the United States. Although Billy was killed as a result, the heroes restored the timeline, and history was restored to normal.

Currently, Billy and Mary Batson no longer possess their powers as Captain Marvel or Mary Marvel. However, a young boy named Billy Vasquez in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania has began appearing as a hero named Shazam. His connections to Billy, Mary or Shazam have yet to be revealed.

Height: 5' 6"
Weight: 120 lbs
Eyes: Blue
Hair: Brown

Strength Level: In her mortal form, Mary possesses the normal human strength level of a girl of her size, height and build who engages in extensive regular activities. As Mary Marvel with the full power of the Captain Marvel powers, she has Class 100 level strength, she can lift (press) over 100 tons under optimal conditions. When split with Billy and Freddy, her strength is far less and she can only lift around 25 tons under optimal conditions.

Known Superhuman Powers: None

Former Superhuman Powers: Mary Marvel possessed the conventional physical attributes of the Olympian gods, including superhuman strength, endurance, stamina and resistance to conventional injury. If she were somehow wounded, her godly energies would enable her to recover with superhuman speed. It would take an injury of such magnitude that it dispersed a major portion of her bodily molecules to cause him a physical death. Even then, it might be possible for a god of significant power, such as Zeus, Poseidon and Apollo or for a number of Olympian gods of equal power working together to revive her. Her Olympian-level metabolism provides her with far greater than human endurance in all physical activities. (Olympian flesh and bone is about three times as dense as similar human tissue, contributing to the Olympians' superhuman strength and weight.)

In order to change form, Mary was required to call upon the name of Shazam, thereby invoking spells involving the energies of those extra-dimensional beings once known as gods on earth. This spell adds almost a hundred pounds of impervious godly muscle and tissue to her frame as well as aging her into adulthood. This spell seemed to be solely vocal; she could not access this spell if she were gagged or hampered in some way from speaking. The precision of this spell is somewhat askew and finite. She was required share his power with Billy Batson and Freddy Freeman, but while in this state, each person is only in possession of a fragment of the full power of Captain Marvel as opposed to one person commanding its full power. By calling upon Shazam again, each member of the Marvels can once again return to their normal form and size; thereby allowing one of their number, such as Billy or Freddy, to have the full power of the spell. Any injuries incurred while in godly form vanished upon returning to mortal form, but injuries attained in mortal form remain even after losing them in godly form, especially in the in the case of Captain Marvel Jr.

In addition to her strength and invulnerability, Mary Marvel had other powers derived from the strengths and gifts from the gods and mortals invoked in Shazam's spell. She could move at incredible speeds, possibly equal to Superman, but maybe approaching that of Quicksilver and the Flash who can attain speeds up to the speed of light (182,272 mph). She can move fast enough to not register in the normal peripheral range of humans and seemingly vanish and disappear at will. At this speed, her mind processed information at least on a subliminal level that she was aware of her surroundings. Mary Marvel also had near-clairvoyant skills to perceive stimuli from beyond her other senses and exceptional photographic recall and mental acuity allowing her to read and decipher hieroglyphics, recall everything she has ever read, solve long mathematical equations instantaneously and make intuitive guesses based on limited data to the point her guesses are almost always correct. She was always supported by an innate and harmonious presence of good will and strength of perseverance that she never backed down from a challenge.

Mary Marvel could also mystically fly through the atmosphere through sure act of will, enabling her to soar through the atmosphere at sub-orbital levels and travel across the planet. She was immune from the effects of extreme height, such as dizziness and lightheadedness. With effort, she could travel from the earth to the moon, but she required extra-precautionary paraphernalia for interstellar travel.

Through her life, Mary Marvel went through several variations of power with minor fluctuations in her power levels. While augmented by Darkseid's Anti-Life Energies, she was bolstered by energies akin to magic and allowed her to perform for extended periods of time without eating or sleeping. A side effect of this power was that her mind became much more irrational, forcing out aspects of her mind which it rendered illogical, such as her emotional ties to her past. Unhindered by her human emotions, she was able to able to overpower Supergirl, Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel. She no longer possess this power.

Limitations: Mary Marvel was particularly vulnerable to magic. Several sorcerers on par and above that of Shazam have been able to manipulate and control the spells that gave her her godly power. In human form, Mary Batson is also lactose intolerant.

Comments: Mary Marvel is a character from Fawcett Comics, licensed to DC Comics.

Photo courtesy of Brian Humphreys, courtesy of HimeArts.

Last updated: 10/22/12