Amanda Waller

"What brings you to see the great and powerful Amanda Waller?"

- Amanda Waller

Amanda Blake Waller (simply known as Amanda Waller) is a character in the DC Comics universe. Waller has had several different incarnations but is almost always a corrupt official linked to Lex Luthor. Waller has devoted herself to undermining the Justice League which she sees as a group of wild cards that threaten the various government networks she draws power from. Aside from this, she also appears to have a one-sided interaction with Batman over various confrontations in different films and TV shows.

Origin
Amanda Waller was the campaign manger for Lex Luthor during his bid to become President of the Untied States. Luthor often gave Waller the task of covering up his many crimes as a private citizen. Luthor won his campaign for President in no small part thanks to Waller and rewarded her with much power and influence in the government. Though Luthor's true colors would eventually be exposed by the Justice League of America and he would lose his station as President, Waller herself remained a public official somewhat loyal to Luthor and was never explicitly indicated in his schemes.

Over the course of the comics Waller would remain a reliable contact for Lex Luthor, although one not slavishly subservient, as she cared more about keeping the clout she had rather than her history with Lex Luthor. Waller continued to be a thorn in the side of heroes like Batman, the Question, Green Arrow and Superman, covering-up or orchestrating various federal initiatives that involved exploiting meta-humans. This included her organization of the Suicide Squad. Waller's Suicide Squad initiative took professional villains looking at death sentences and gave them a chance to work off their sentence for the government as a special black opts unit. This placed several high threat villains like the Clock King, Deadshot and Plastique squarely into Waller's hands once arrested. As the name implies the Suicide Squad's lives were forfeit if they failed their mission or attempted to welsh on their agreed upon service.

When DC later rebooted their series into the New 52, Waller was given a much younger and slimmer appearance. In this continuity, other than the Suicide Squad, she is also involved with Team 7 and is one of the founders of the Justice League of America to undermine the main Justice League team (in this continuity the JLA is a separate group from the JL). Following the release of the DC Rebirth event, Waller was returned to her more classic appearance.

Justice League Unlimited
Amanda Waller was one of the stand-out antagonists of the Justice League Unlimited cartoon series. In the show, Waller's history is reworked as an already influential government official and the puppeteer of a shadow government of Cadmus. In the show, Waller helped establish Cadmus after Superman's assault on Earth while controlled by Darkseid. Though Superman would be freed from Darkseid's control and set out to make amends, many officials began to consider back-up plans to protect the US and world in general if one of their superheroes ever went rogue again. When Earth was invaded by the Justice Lords, versions of the Justice League from an alternate reality, officials previously only spooked began to put together an initiative called Cadmus and Amanda Waller was it's founding member. Waller devoted herself to preparing for the next time the Justice League decided to turn on humanity by doing things like growing her own bio engineered super-heroes, programmed to be loyal to her, collecting DNA from Supergirl to make a clone loyal to Cadmus, spying on the members of the Justice League, kidnapping and attempting to brainwash mutants from around the country as an elite anti-superhero crew, freeing Lex Luthor from jail and indeed sponsoring his bid for President of the United States. Lex Luthor gave Cadmus a one of a kind prototype gun created to permanently rob a meta-human's super powers used once to de-power the Justice Lords, in exchange for the gun and his financial backing of Cadmus to get it off the ground Amanda Waller was Luthor's friend in high-places, although she never fully trusted him.

Luthor turned on Waller and Cadmus by hijacking the Watch Tower's energy gun and attempting to destroy Cadmus' base of operations, fortunately Waller had the foresight to move the base before-hand fearing implication if the Justice League raided the base. Waller followed up on a lead from Batman about the attack being controlled remotely from an outside source and quickly found the signal linking back to Luthor. Luthor had set off the attack to implicate the Justice League, get rid of his debts to Cadmus and destroy any obstacles that could shut down his grand scheme to up-load his brain into an advanced android based on the Amazo android, granting him what her saw as god-hood. Waller, arrived just in time to destroy the android Lex was planning on using as a new body. As the Justice League arrived, Amanda shot Luthor point blank range with an energy rifle as thanks for his treachery, however his body regenerates revealing Lex Luthor was an avatar for Brainiac, unbeknownst to Luthor, and his decisions up until that point had been subconsciously influenced by a piece of the evil AI implanted as genetic code in Luthor long ago. Waller still had a back up-plan though and siced the Justice League on Brainiac/Luthor when he proved more than she was prepared for. After the experience and a public scandal revealing the influences of Cadmus in Luthor's political campaign Cadmus is shut down by the government, though Amanda and other heads of Cadmus are spared arrest much of their previous official powers were destroyed, reducing most of them to normal bureaucrats.

Amanda still had the right clout to make things happen behind the scenes though, just not in any official capacity anymore and knew enough to pretend she had been robbed of all her influence like the other members of Cadmus. 65 years after the events of Justice League Unlimited's era, Amanda Waller is still alive and kicking as a retired but still powerful woman feared in underworld circles. In her old age Waller admits that at a certain point she began to fear less of what would happen if the super-heroes of the world went rogue and more of what the world would do without them, this mentality would push her to clone Bruce Wayne and set up psychological conditions to turn the young boy into the next Batman. The assassin she sent to kill the boy's apparent parents had a history with Batman and refused to pull the trigger, however the boy's father would be killed anyway thanks to Mr. Fixx and Derek Powers, triggering events as Waller had foreseen even without becoming an orphan like the original Batman.

Smallville
Waller hired Cameron Mahkent aka Icicle to hunt down and kill members of the Justice Society of America, using his anger towards them as a catalyst. She later sent clues to Lois Lane about the JSA and Icicle to which she began investigating. After giving Lois time to investigate, Waller visited her, telling her that she planted the classified information and gave her a phone before leaving, all this without introducing herself. When Icicle failed in his mission, Waller took him into custody and revealed that he had actually succeeded, having been used in order to shake up the JSA and bring them back together. She then aimed a gun at him and said "Welcome to the Suicide Squad" before shooting him. Waller then met up with Tess Mercer in the Checkmate base, at which point revealing that Tess is a Checkmate agent.

When Tess failed to kidnap Green Arrow and recruit him for the government, Waller threatened to terminate her. Later, at the Checkmate Castle, John Jones attempted to destroy the Kandorian blood sample that Dr. Burgeon took from the Kandorians, but Waller managed to trap the Martian Manhunter. After taking her form to fool a Checkmate agent, John escaped. Later, while she was in her office, Waller had her men kidnap Watchtower. When The Blur came into Waller's office, she showed that she had Chloe and that she knew what she's doing. When she finally made Clark step into the light to reveal his identity, the power went out. After Clark and Chloe escaped, the Martian Manhunter came back to the Castle and erased her memory of Clark, Chloe and Oliver's identities. She later found a Red Queen on her chess board and swiped it off in anger, realizing that she wasn't the only player in the game.

Waller had her men search for Tess until she realized where the Kandorians were. When she and her men had captured them, she ordered her men to execute the Kandorians. Clark, as the Blur, arrived just in time to save them all, except for Faora, whom Waller was talking with. As Waller was threatening Faora, Major Zod arrived and threw her into her car. Fortunately for her, Clark came just in time to stop Zod from murdering Waller. Waller later told Stuart Campbell that he needed to stop his mission against Tess, but he ignored her order. Later, Zod tracked Checkmate down and, as Amanda and Stuart were in the hallway, he used his heat vision to burn down the castle. Waller and Campbell's fate are unknown.

Young Justice
In this series Amanda Waller is the former warden of Belle Reve Penitentiary. She is portrayed as tough, intimidating, stubborn, and harsh, traits required for a job as intense as warden of Belle Reve. Even when in danger, her strong attitude is just as salient, as exhibited during the prisoner takeover of Belle Reve. Unbeknownst to Waller, Superboy and Miss Martian were on an undercover mission at Belle Reve as Tommy and Tuppence Terror. When they arrived along with Mister Freeze and Icicle Jr., Waller introduced herself and explained the basics of the inhibitor collars. She then stated the prison walls were thick enough to hold even Superman, and went on to say that no one had and never would escape Belle Reve.

After a "scuffle" in the mess hall, Mr. Freeze was brought before Waller. Freeze froze the prison guard, and broke his cuffs with an ice gauntlet. Waller activated his collar, but Freeze tore it off, and froze Waller's arm before she could fire a gun. Freeze shut down the collars and cell doors, allowing the prisoners to break free. He imprisoned Waller, Dr. Hugo Strange, and the guards in the cells.

When Brick taunted Waller about being warm due to their thermal uniforms, Waller incited him. Brick grabbed her through the bars menacingly, but Hugo Strange convinced him to spare her.

Eventually, Superboy (still disguised as Tommy Terror), turned the collars back on. This angered Icicle Sr., who assumed it was Waller. He confronted her and as he was about to land a blow, Hugo tackled Icicle Sr. and knocked him out. After Superboy walked out with Miss Martian, the prisoners were put back in their cells, and Belle Reve was scheduled to be up and running the next day.

Unfortunately, the breakout attempt cost Waller her job as warden, and she was replaced by Hugo Strange.

Arrow
In this series Amanda Waller is the leader of A.R.G.U.S.. In the season 2 episode "Keep Your Enemies Closer", she captures John telling him that she needs his help to rescue Lyla Michaels as she has gone dark in Moscow. She parts with a statement saying that A.R.G.U.S. are aware of what Oliver and him do at night. In the end of the episode "Tremors" she takes Bronze Tiger out of jail and recruits him for the Suicide Squad.

Superman/Batman: Public Enemies
Amanda Waller appeared in the movie adaptation Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, with C. C. H. Pounder reprising her role. This version is depicted as more sympathetic, betraying President Lex Luthor's offer of a prominent position in his "new world order" to provide Superman and Batman with information that they can use to destroy a Kryptonite Asteroid that is heading for Earth.

Green Lantern (2011)
Amanda Waller appeared in the live-action Green Lantern, played by Angela Bassett. This version is a scientist who works for the DEO under the command of Senator Robert Hammond, father of xenobiologist Hector Hammond. After Hector acquires the power to read minds from exposure to Parallax's DNA (a fragment of which remained in the body of Abin Sur until Hammond was called on to perform the autopsy), contact with Waller reveals that her family was killed by an unidentified gunman when she was younger. Hammond attempts to kill her using his telekinetic powers in a later confrontation, but Green Lantern caught her in a ring-formed 'pool' of water that subsequently carried her out of harm's way.

Batman: Assault on Arkham
Amanda Waller appeared as a supporting character and the main antagonist in the animated movie; Batman: Assault on Arkham.

For the backdrop of the story, Waller puts together the Suicide Squad on a special mission: infiltrate Arkham Asylum and take down the Riddler, who has stolen top secret information on potential Squad members from Waller's COMPUTER. During the mission, Killer Frost learns that there is no information and the real reason is Riddler knows how to disarm the nanobombs in their necks. After realizing that the Suicide Squad knows how to disarm the bombs, she attempts to detonate them, only to kill King Shark and Black Spider, the latter of whom at the time was in Batman's batsuit due to Batman stealing his so he could be closer to the Suicide Squad. At the end of the film, Batman confronts her in her office where Batman warns her to stop her games and there won't be a next time, where she mocks Batman telling him that she is the U.S. Government and no one can stop them. Batman leaves in the middle of the conversation, which she calls Batman a punk after noticing it. When she turns around, she notices a laser sight on her chest and then moves between her eyes. She realizes it is Deadshot taking revenge and only lets out a shocked "motherf-" (the remaining part of the f-word is omitted due to it zooming out). Deadshot is shown in the distance with his daughter. As Deadshot is shown peering through his sniper, he says aloud "Bang" before smiling.

Suicide Squad
Amanda Waller appeared in the 2016 movie Suicide Squad where she convinced the government to allow her to create the Task Force X as a last way to save the United States from alien or metahuman attacks. Undeliberately, this results in the Enchantress being set loose on Midway City, where Waller and a group of ARGUS agents are located. The Squad is sent into the city to retrieve Waller but Waller's escape helicopter is destroyed by Enchantress' brother Incubus. Amanda is ultimately saved by the Suicide Squad but true to her cold-hearted nature forces the teammembers to resume their prison sentence.

DC Universe Online
Amanda Waller appears in DC Universe Online, voiced by Debra Cole. In the Bludhaven Alert, Major Force mentioned to the players that Waller has sent him to Bludhaven to gather samples of Chemo and to test out the Chemoids.

Batman: Arkham Origins
Amanda makes a brief appearance in a post credits cutscene in Batman: Arkham Origins. She enters Blackgate Prison and gives Deathstroke the opportunity to work for the Suicide Squad.