| “ | Batman: Who are you people? Amanda Waller: That's a national security matter. And if I were you, I wouldn't probe the situation too closely, rich boy. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller to Batman upon first meeting, while hinting at her knowledge of his secret identity. |
| “ | You know, the Lord's been a great comfort to me all these years. Try not to look so surprised. Yeah, I've got a lot to answer for when I meet Him, but I'd like to believe that for all the harm I've caused, I've also done some good. Maybe the angels need a sharp sword too. | „ |
| ~ Amanda Waller to Terry McGinnis |
Amanda Waller is a supporting antagonist in the DC Animated Universe.
She is a high-ranking U.S. government official who secretly leads Project Cadmus, a secret division meant to counter the Justice League if it ever goes rogue like the Justice Lords. Unknown to everyone, however, Waller is one more lackey of a conspiracy engineered by Lex Luthor and Brainiac, realizing too late how she had been played.
She was voiced by CCH Pounder, who also voiced the Golden Queen in the Skylander video games.
History[]
According to Batman, Amanda Waller was born in East St. Louis, the United States of America, back in the 20th century. Growing up, Waller got a Rhodes Scholarship and a PhD in political science, eventually getting to work as part of the country's intelligence accross three administrations. Eventually, however, Waller vanished from public life and went on to join the American government in one of their most secretive endeavours: coming up with ways to counter the world's superheroes in case they ever turned rogue, with experiments like the creation of the first Royal Flush Gang including Waller's involvement.
Another early experiment, to counter Superman presumably due to the instance in which the Man of Steel turned rogue thanks to being brainwashed by Darkseid and Granny Goodness, was enacted under Waller's supervision with Professor Emil Hamilton's assitance, the result being Doomsday, a monster meant to oppose Superman. However, Doomsday was too dangerous to hnadle so Waller and her men sent him to space, but he deviated the rocket back to Earth and provoked a rampage in Metropolis before being stopped by the Justice Lords, an alternate Justice League that went rogue in their universe. The Justice League ultimately returned from the Lords' universe and saved the day, but the Lords' actions were enough for most of the U.S. government to finally approve the creation of Project Cadmus, of which Waller became head of.
Amanda Waller first appears in "Ultimatum", where it's revealed that she finances Maxwell Lord's Ultimen (consisting of Wind Dragon, Shifter Downpour, Juice and Long Shadow), a group of artificial superheroes created by Cadmus for the American government to control. However, once the Ultimen find out the truth about their origins (given their fabricated memories) and that they are disposable with copies ready to replace them upon hearing Waller and Hamilton discussing that they have less than a year to live, they turn against Lord and Cadmus. As such, the Justice League intervene and save the day, after which Waller, Lord and their men come to pick the Ultimen so they can live out the rest of their days in peace under Lord's supervision. However, Long Shadow stays behind with the Justice League, who don't allow Waller to take him away, so she calls off her men under the rationale that Long Shadow doesn't have much time left anyway and leaves despite Batman's attempts to interrogate her, surprising him by hinting about her knowledge of his secret identity.
Waller reappears in "The Doomsday Sanction", where she meets Batman at her house after the Dark Knight silently breaks into it and surprises her after a shower. She proceeds to explain Cadmus agenda to Gotham City's vigilante, commenting that given how the Justice Lords killed their Lex Luthor upon becoming President, the Justice League could very well do the same and overthrow humanity until Cadmus was created. Batman ultimately leaves without achieving anything significant, but his words shake Waller enough much like how her world impact him later on. Sometime afterwards, Waller holds a meeting with other Cadmus heads and fires Professor Milo due to his inefficacy in the splicing field. Spiteful, Milo frees the imprisoned Doomsday so he can enact revenge on Waller and Hamilton, but Doomsday kills him instead and breaks out to kill Superman.
Alerted from Doomsday's escape, Waller promises to deal with Milo personally, but one of her men informs her that Doomsday has killed Milo, so she tells General Wade Eiling to do whatever he deems necessary to stop Doomsday as he fights against Superman during a Justice League rescue mission at the San Baquero island before he becomes a worldwide danger. However, this results in Eiling sending a Kryptonite-covered missile to the island so they could get rid of Doomsday, Superman and the drug trafficking operations over the place. Waller learns about this when Batman orders her to cancel the missile and demands Eiling to stop it, but Eiling has made sure it can't be deactivated, forcing Batman and the League to stop the warhead themselves.
In "Task Force X", Waller dispatches Colonel Rick Flagg, Jr. to assemble a new version of the Task Force X unit, this time formed with Deadshot, Plastique, Captain Boomerang and the Clock King, to infiltrate the Justice League's Watchtower II and steal the Annihilator armor. The operation is ultimately a success though at the cost of leaving a maimed Plastique behind, but Waller obtains the armor and praises Flagg by telling him that his father would be proud of him. Meanwhile, thanks to the mission, the Justice League grows distrustful of their staff.
Waller makes a cameo appearance at the end of "Clash", where at the end of the episode, it's revealed that she helped Lex Luthor in his plot to gain more positive publicity for his presidential campaign (disturbingly mirroring the actions of his counterpart in the Justice Lords' universe) in exchange of his funding for Cadmus by supplying him with a power generator for Lexor City, which tricked Superman into believing it was a bomb and setting a chain of events that makes everyone sympathize with Luthor and blame Superman for ruining a charity event meant for poor kids, leading Waller and Luthor to toast for their success.
In "Question Authority", Waller informs Luthor that the Question and the Huntress stole important Cadmus files from them, which leads Luthor to later catch the Question and send him to Waller, who has him savagely tortured under Doctor Moon's watch until the Huntress and Superman break into their facilities and free him.
In "Flashpoint", Waller warns Luthor that if the Justice League exposes what was in the stolen files, Cadmus will deny any involvement on his endeavours after Superman and Huntress escape with Question despite Captain Atom's attempts to stop them at Eiling's behest. Shortly afterwards, however, the Watchtower II fires it binary fussion cannon and obliterates an evacuated Cadmus facility, but it causes too many collateral damages to the city, making the public distrust the Justice League. Unable to wait for the President's orders and at the subtle insistence of Eiling, Waller deploys Galatea and their Ultimen clones to break into the Watchtower and destroy it with all the Leaguers inside.
In "Panic in the Sky", Waller's plan starts despite six of the founding members surrendering to the government in an attempt to gain the world's trust back, but Batman stays behind to discover who framed the Justice League, ultimately finding his way into Cadmus new headquarters, where he knocks Eiling out and proceeds to tell Waller the truth about what he discovered. Waller vehemently refuses to believe Batman's points that Lex Luthor was the one who hacked the Watchtower II to destroy Cadmus old base, but still investigates alongside Hamilton and Eiling, finding out to her horror out that Luthor manipulated all of them and shipped Cadmus technology to LexCorp, which he uses to build himself an Amazo-like body to become a god.
Now knowing what to do, Waller tries to call off the Watchtower's attack, but Galatea refuses to back off, so Waller frees the six founding Leagers while she goes to LexCorp alongside Batman to arrest Luthor. Once there, Waller surprises Luthor as he prepares to download his consciousness into his Amazo copy and uses one of Lex's own nanodisassembler beams to melt the robotic body, foiling Luthor's plans. Lex complains about his work's loss, but Waller declares him arrested for trying to use the League's binary fussion cannon to murder all of Cadmus, so Luthor attacks her, yet Waller reveals that she brought all seven members of the Justice League with her. However, just as Luthor seems screwed, Brainiac resurfaces from his body, revealing that he was the true mastermind of the Cadmus Crisis.
In "Divided We Fall", Waller teams up with the Justice League to stop Luthor and Brainiac from using the Dark Heart technology Cadmus confiscated from the League long ago to become a god and remake the universe to their liking, but unknown to the League, she secretly orders a massive air force strike on stanby to the city where they are fighting so the government may kill her, the Leaguers, Luthor and Brainiac if they are unable to stop the latter two. Fortunately, the League prevails and Luthor/Brainiac are defeated, leading Waller to abort the attack.
In "Epilogue", which takes place decades after Justice League Unlimited around the Batman Beyond era, an octogenarian Waller is visited by Terry McGinnis, Bruce Wayne's successor as Batman, who found out that he is actually Bruce's biological son because of Bruce's DNA being inside his father Warren. Realizing that Cadmus may have had something to do with it (likely because their technology was used by the Joker to transfer his mind into Tim Drake's body), Terry breaks into Amanda's house and demands answers. In contrast to her younger days, Waller is much more warm and friendly with Terry, offering him to drink tea with her as she explains the origins of Project Batman Beyond, the events that culminated in his creation: at some point during the present day, former Royal Flush Gang member Ace endangered part of the United States by using her psychic powers to create a second Royal Flush Gang, so Waller gave Batman a device to put Ace down before she could cause a catastrophic psychic backlash that would kill everyone nearby. However, Batman preferred to offer Ace some compassion and spent her last moments with her, saving the day more peacefully, much to Amanda's surprise.
As she tells Terry, this was the moment in which she realized how much she admired Batman and realized that someone like him would always be needed, so she obtained blood samples of him and go the help of her former Cadmus contacts to create a new Batman. To do so, her men found Warren and Mary at New Gotham and found that they were psychologically compatible with Bruce Wayne's parents Thomas and Martha, so Waller had Bruce's DNA overwrite Warren's through a flu injection. This led to Terry's birth as Bruce's biological son, and several years later, Waller tried to replicate the scenario that led to Bruce's transformation into Batman by hiring the Phantasm to kill Warren and Mary after leaving a movie theather with Terry, but the Phantasm backed off at the last minute, telling Waller off for her actions, leading her to scrap the project. However, Terry would ultimately become Batman anyway through a different set of circumstances thanks to Derek Powers and Mr. Fixx. Nevertheless, because of his discovery, Terry now felt that he was Bruce's clone and had to push away his loved ones to focus on his mission, but Waller assured him that he was Bruce's son and not his clone, so he was still his own person capable of making choices of his own, advising him to hold on to those he loves and live as he wishes.
In "Flash and Substance", Waller is mentioned by Batman to have informed him about Captain Boomerang's release from the Task Force X, helping him and other Leaguers to help the Flash during the Flash Appreciation Day to stop the Rogues from enacting their revenge on him.
Waller is last seen (by release order) in "Patriot Act", where she has dinner with a resented General Eiling, who still insists that they did nothing wrong and that they shouldn't be punished for Lex Luthor's actions, feeling that the Justice League is still a threat. However, Waller tells Eiling that they should instead be grateful for not going to prison after their actions and expresses her opinion that while she may not admire the League as a whole, they are well-intentioned and can collaborate together if they need to do it. Eiling persists, so Waller storms off by telling him to accept reality and live with it. Eiling doesn't get the message, however, so he later steals the Project Captain Nazi serum to attack the Justice League himself.
Quotes[]
| “ | Amanda Waller: Security can't find a trace of our Ultimen. But I want you to find them, Mr. Lord, and bring them back. Maxwell Lord: They're not gonna trust me or anyone now that they know that... Amanda Waller: Bring them back, or I'm calling in the squad to put them down. I want this laboratory dismantled and relocated. No loose ends. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller tells Maxwell Lord to stop the Ultimen. |
| “ | Batman: Amanda Waller. Born in St. Louis, Rhodes scholar, PhD in Political Science. Served in Intelligence, under three administrations. Disappeared from public life, four years ago. Amanda Waller: Am I supposed to be impressed? Maybe I should rattle off your resume now? Y'know, I could blow the whistle on you any time I want... Batman: Fine, why don't we step into the light together? I'm sure the American people will be just as interested in your activities as mine - Secret weapons, illegal cloning experiments, bypassing Congress... Amanda Waller: What do you want? Batman: I want to know what you think you're doing. Amanda Waller: Did Superman ever mention that to get Luthor's pardon, he had to tell us about your parallel universe adventure? All about it? We started to wonder what would happen if you took the same action that the Justice Lords did, so I had my people run some computer simulations. If the Justice League ever went rogue, what do you think would be the result? Batman: That's moot. Amanda Waller: Humor me. In every single scenario, you beat us. Badly. But that was before Cadmus. Now we have the technology to defend ourselves. Batman: [Threatening] Whatever you think you're doing, if you present a threat to the world, the Justice League will take you down... Amanda Waller: [Angry] If we present a threat!? You got a spaceship floating over our heads with a laser weapon pointing down. In another dimension, seven of you overthrew the government and assassinated the President. We're the good guys, protecting our country from a very real threat: you. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller confronts Batman. |
| “ | General Eiling: GPS puts the stolen pod on San Baquero. Doomsday went right back after Superman. I love a well-conditioned soldier. Amanda Waller: And what will your soldier do after he's killed Superman? We can't leave him loose. For all we know, he'll try to kill everyone on the planet. He has to be stopped before he leaves that island. General Eiling: But how am I supposed to...? Amanda Waller: I don't care. Get it done. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller tells General Eiling to stop Doomsday. |
| “ | Amanda Waller: What were you thinking? You're gonna kill Superman and everyone else on the island. General Eiling: We have to sanction Doomsday, we were gonna get to Superman somewhere down the line, and we've been trying to stop drug traffic from San Baquero for years. The way I see it: three birds, one stone. Amanda Waller: Call it off. General Eiling: Anti-abort safeties have already engaged. I couldn't stop it now if I wanted to. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller is too late to stop Eiling. |
| “ | Amanda Waller: You might be in the middle of a hornet's nest. Question and Huntress have copied files from a high-security Cadmus terminal. Lex Luthor: What did they get? Amanda Waller: Tech Support can't tell for certain. Maybe everything. Lex Luthor: For all our sakes, we better hope that the encryption on those files is as good as we've been told. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller warns Lex Luthor about Question and Huntress. |
| “ | Amanda Waller: It's Waller. Superman broke into Cadmus. When he left, he took Question and Captain Atom with him. Lex Luthor: That was fast. Still, opportunity knocks. Amanda Waller: What? Lex Luthor: Sorry. I'm working on something here. Go on. Amanda Waller: The continual security breaches are bad enough, but now the Question's back with the League, and we still don't know what he's learned. Lex Luthor: What's the worst-case scenario? Amanda Waller: If they've got enough to tie you to this, they'll head right for your doorstep. Lex Luthor: Let them come. I've got a full pardon from the president. Amanda Waller: Not for any new crimes, Lex. If you get arrested, we'll disavow any knowledge of your actions. Lex Luthor: Well, that would be inconvenient. But I wouldn't worry about the Justice League quite yet. They have problems of their own. Goodbye Mrs. Waller. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller warns Lex Luthor about The Justice League. |
| “ | The President: I'm surprised to hear from you, Amanda. My boys at NSA are reporting that you're dead. Amanda Waller: We had a security breach at Cadmus. I had the facility scrubbed and moved per standard protocol. The Justice League fired on an abandoned facility. The President: So there were no casualties? Amanda Waller: Not for lack of trying. The President: We don't know that for sure yet. Amanda Waller: This was retaliation, sir. Pure and simple. We captured the Question, they bust him out, and an hour later, it's death from above. The President: If you're right, it's our worst fears realized. Amanda Waller: Yes, sir. What are you gonna do about it? The President: I'm weighing my options. Amanda Waller: Mr. President, if we're where I think we are, Cadmus is your only option. The President: I'll let you know, Amanda. Stay on high alert. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller speaks to The President. |
| “ | Batman: We've got business, Waller. You told me once that you were a patriot. Well it's time to step up. You have to know that the Justice League would never have fired that weapon at you. Amanda Waller: Sure you would. It was retaliation for kidnapping your man, the Question. Batman: And yet, you weren't home. We've had you under surveillance for months. You don't think we saw you evacuate your offices? Amanda Waller: A warning shot then. Batman: Don't be dense. Someone took over our fusion cannon by remote control. There are maybe three people on Earth smart enough to pull that off. Two of them were already on the Watchtower. And that leaves... Amanda Waller: Luthor. That's where you're trying to lead me, right? Batman: You're too smart to trust him. Amanda Waller: Who says I do? He provides off-the-books funding for Cadmus. As far as I'm concerned, that's all he's good for. Batman: Then you must know he's got his own agenda. Amanda Waller: He wants to be President. That's agenda enough for anybody. Batman: Almost anybody. If I were you, I'd start looking at him, hard. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller gets a warning from Batman about Lex Luthor. |
| “ | Amanda Waller: He played me. I knew he was a snake, and I still let him bite me. He's recently had copies of a lot of our new technology shipped to LexCorp. That's what he's stolen, Professor. Could he have taken control of the Watchtower weapons system with that stuff? Emil Hamilton: Theoretically, yes, but that's the least of it. Good Lord, I think I know what he's planning to do. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller discovers that Lex Luthor has betrayed her. |
| “ | Amanda Waller: Hey, Lex. That android is Cadmus property. You're going to have to find somewhere else to keep your brain. [destroys the Amazo body] A nano-disassembler beam. Your design, I believe. Lex Luthor: Arrogant COW. It'll take weeks to build myself another android body. Amanda Waller: You ain't got weeks, baldy. You're under arrest for trying to use the Justice League's space-gun to murder everyone at Cadmus. [Luthor charges at Waller, smacking the weapon aside and throwing her to the floor] Lex Luthor: Did you really think you could take me down all by yourself? Amanda Waller: Actually, yeah. But on the off chance I might've been wrong... [Luthor turns and sees the Leaguers standing there] Flash: TADA. Superman: It's over, Lex. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller and The Justice League confronts Lex Luthor. |
| “ | Amanda Waller: That's right. Brainiac is neutralized. It's all over. Call off the airstrike. The President: You absolutely sure? Amanda Waller: Positive, Mr. President. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller tells The President that Brainiac has been defeated. |
| “ | Amanda Waller: You look well. General. Past few months have been good to you. General Eiling: Mrs. Waller, all due respect, this reassignment is a joke. Never thought I'd become a desk drone. Amanda Waller: I can't help you there. Langley all but scrapped Project Cadmus and insisted on your transfer. We're lucky we're not all in jail. General Eiling: Look, the only mistake we made was trusting Luthor. Amanda Waller: Wade. You know better than to dwell on the past. General Eiling: I'm talking about right now. The Justice League is still the single greatest threat to global security. Amanda Waller: I used to believe that too. But remember: we used to say the same about the Soviets. Our enemies are never as evil as we imagine... and maybe we're never quite as good. General Eiling: Nuts. Don't tell me the bleeding hearts in Congress got to you. Amanda Waller: I'd eat them alive. General Eiling: You would too. You've got some onions, Amanda. Amanda Waller: Then listen to me. I'm not the League's greatest fan, but their intentions are good. I can work with them. General Eiling: What if you're wrong, though? Turns out the metahumans aren't on the side of the angels? We won't have any way to defend ourselves. Look what happened last year: Superman walked into Cadmus and tossed our best men like a salad. Amanda Waller: Oh, for heaven's sake. General Eiling: What's to stop him from doing it again? They're all orbiting us with a space weapon, supposedly decommissioned. That's a much bigger threat than the Russians ever were. If we'd rolled over like this with the Soviet Union, given up our nukes... Amanda Waller: We'd all be living under a red flag? General Eiling: Yes, ma'am, you'd better believe it. After all our work, what did Cadmus accomplish? You get a reprimand, I'm pushing pencils, and the League gets another base here on Earth, that Metro Tower. When one side loses ground and the other side gains, that isn't a truce - it's a surrender. Amanda Waller: It's a different world, General. Learn to live in it. |
„ |
| ~ Amanda Waller and General Eiling talking about The Justice League. |
Trivia[]
- It's exactly unknown how Amanda Waller became aware of Batman's secret identity, but it's possible that Hugo Strange may have told her about what he found out in the Batman: The Animated Series episode "The Strange Secret of Bruce Wayne" given how Strange was shown working for Project Cadmus in the Justice League Unlimited episode "The Doomsday Sanction".
- According to Bruce Timm in the DVD special features of the home media releases of Justice League Unlimited, CCH Punder surprised the crew every recording session by giving an amazing performance even before reading the script that had been sent to her in advance, which made her performances even better due to being unrehearsed.
- Amanda Waller's role in Terry McGinnis' origins as revealed in the second season finale of Justice League Unlimited was a leftover of a second Batman Beyond direct-to-video movie that was cancelled after the controversies surrounding Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker. In it, Catwoman would have been revealed to be the one who created Terry McGinnis with Bruce Wayne's DNA, but once the project was scrapped (though to be fair, it never went beyond a few conversations between Timm and Glen Murakami), its main ideas were reworked into the second season finale of Justice League Unlimited (which back then was planned to be the series finale of all DCAU shows), but Catwoman was replaced by Amanda Waller to tie-in into the Cadmus story.
- A common theory about Amanda Waller's tampering with the birth of Terry McGinnis and Matt McGinnis is that by replacing Warren McGinnis' DNA with that of Bruce Wayne, she possibly caused Warren to assume that his wife Mary cheated on him. Of course, the DCAU shows being aimed at a younger audience would have made impossible to adress such possibility onscreen, but given how Warren and Mary were natural redheads and both of their sons had natural dark hair, it may be plausible.
External Links[]
- Amanda Waller on the DC Wiki
