MARIA RAMBEAU
Real Name: Maria Rambeau
Identity/Class: Human, civilian
Occupation: Owner of a seamstress' shop
Group Membership: None
Affiliations: Avengers (Black Knight/Dane Whitman, Captain America/Steve Rogers, Doctor Druid/Anthony Ludgate, She-Hulk/Jennifer Walters, Thor Odinson), Mr. and Mrs. Kozluskies (friends)
Enemies: None
Known Relatives: Frank Rambeau (husband), Monica Rambeau (daughter), Charmaine Romeau (sister-in-law), Charmaine's unidentified husband (brother-in-law)
Aliases: Beautiful (nickname given by Frank Rambeau), M'dear, Momma (nicknames given by Monica Rambeau)
Base of Operations: New Orleans, Louisiana, United States
First Appearance: Avengers I#246 (August, 1984)
Powers/Abilities: Maria Rambeau possesses no superhuman powers. She is a talented seamstress who runs her own succesfull shop in downtown New Orleans. After worrying about her husband Frank's safety during his years as a fireman, Maria grew even more concerned about her daughter, the superhero known as Captain Marvel.
Height: 5'5" (by approximation)
Weight: 135 lbs. (by approximation)
Eyes: Brown
Hair: White
History:
(Avengers I#246 - BTS) - Besides being a
home maker, Maria Rambeau ran a succesfull seamstress' shop in New
Orleans, that employed three other women.
(Avengers I#236 - BTS) - Concerned about her father Frank's
safety, Monica Rambeau decided to start a small business with him.
Before telling her parents about her plans to launch a charter fishing
boat company, she wanted to make sure she had the means to get the
venture off the ground and succesfully applied for a small business
loan.
(Avengers I#246) - After a busy day at the shop, Maria
returned home to her husband Frank who was busy cooking gumbo. Frank
told her she'd missed several dozen phone calls, including one from
their daughter Monica. Immediately returning her call, Maria invited
Monica to dinner. When her daughter knocked on the door no sooner than
she'd hung up the phone at home, Maria and Frank learned that Monica had
recently gained superpowers and had even joined the Avengers as Captain
Marvel. Maria and Frank were initially incredulous, but Monica managed
to convince them by turning into living light. Taking a moment to let it
all sink in, Maria then hugged her daughter and told her how proud
he was of her.
(Avengers I#247) - Still grappling with the notion of their daugher's
new life as a superhero, Frank and Maria grilled Monica while sitting
down to have his gumbo. After a while, Monica turned the tables and
wanted to know how Maria's business was doing. Then, Monica wondered if
her father was still considering an early retirement. Frank revealed
that, while he was definitely entertaining the thought, he would have no
idea what to do with himself. Expecting this answer, Monica was about to
propose starting a business with her father, when an incoming Avengers
priority signal forced her to table the subject. Promising Frank she'd
be in touch about the offer, she flew off. As he watched his daughter go
and possibly risk her life, a worried Frank asked Maria if this is what
she felt all these years when he went off to fight fires. She told him
this was exactly how she felt all this time.
(Avengers I#261 - BTS) - With Captain Marvel and the Avengers on an unexpectedly extended mission in space, Maria and Frank grew increasingly worried when they failed to reach Monica by phone for weeks.
(Avengers I#261) - The fate of their missing daughter weighed heavily on the Rambeaus' mind. Maria tried to persuade Frank to have breakfast, but he had lost his appetite. When Monica popped in as Captain Marvel, assuring her parents she was all right, an overjoyed Frank immediately got up to make a proper breakfast (coffee, bacon and scrambled eggs) for his family.
(Avengers I#264) - After helping her father fight a fire, Monica flew to her mother's shop to assure Maria her husband was safe. She then tried on a dress her mother had made for her, while contemplating telling her fellow Avengers about her civilian identity. After showing Maria how well the dress fit her, Monica decided to take her parents out to dinner.
(Avengers I#279 - (fb) - BTS) - When the Wasp stepped down as Avengers chairperson, the position was offered to a hesitant Monica Rambeau who wasn't sure if she was ready. Captain America tabled the subject of Monica's nomination until the next meeting, which left her seeking advice.
(Avengers I#279) - Maria and Frank were watching a football game on TV between the Chicago Bears and the New Orleans Saints. With the score at the end of the fourth quarter 21-3 in favor of the Bears, Frank still believed the Saints could turn it around while Maria quietly told him to be realistic. Just then, Captain Marvel showed up on their screen during a commercial break. Initially believing their daughter was doing a public service announcement, the Rambeaus were stunned when their daughter was speaking directly at them and emerged from the set.
Revealing she only pulled that trick to see if they had
company over, like the Kozluskies, Monica then informed her parents
about her dilemma. Frank was elated, proud that even Captain America had
endorsed his little girl and assured her she'd do fine, after all he was
one of the youngest firemen in the history of New Orleans to be promoted
lieutenant.
That still didn't resolve Monica's concerns: if she became Avengers chairman, she'd have no time to start her charter boat business with her father. While Frank assured her that she'd still have plenty of time for that in the future, Monica noticed her mother wasn't too enthused about the notion both her daughter and husbad would continue in their dangerous line of work.
(Avengers I#294 - BTS) - Monica Rambeau nearly died fighting Avengers associate Marrina who had mutated into a giant sea serpent. After managing to restore herself to human form, the emaciated Monica was rushed to the hospital by the Avengers. Afterwards, the team went to New Orleans to collect Frank and Maria Rambeau.
(Avengers I#294) - Maria and Frank accompanied the
Avengers on board their Quinjet to the New York hospital where Monica
was being treated. As they arrived, Thor warned them about their
daughter's changed appearance but the Rambeaus were still ill prepared
to see her, in spite of Frank's claim that after 25 years as a cop (see comments) there
was very little he hadn't seen before. Maria promised her weakened, rail
thin child she'd fatten her up on hominy and chicken.
With Captain Marvel temporarily incapacitated and unable to perform her
duties as Avengers chairperson, the ambitious Doctor Druid moved that
the team immediately voted on who would replace her. Formally requesting
Frank and Maria left their daughter's hospital room during the vote, the
newly elected Druid then assured the Rambeaus he'd personally see to it
that they would be allowed to take Monica home to Atlanta, post-haste.
The next morning, Druid had booked passage on a commercial flight for
them and joined the other Avengers in seeing them off. (see
comments).
(Captain Marvel II#1) - Maria rushed to her daughter's room when Monica woke up screaming from the frequent nightmares she'd been having, always revolving around her recent power loss after fighting Marrina. Maria tried to comfort her, but Monica assured her she was fine. Frank then told his wife to let their daughter get ready for work. Over breakfast, however, he admitted to being worried about her nightmares and the way she'd been pulling deeper and deeper into herself. Maria told him not to worry and that Monica's new job as a ship's captain would be just the thing she needed to get her groove back.
(Avengers III#16 - BTS) - Much to Maria's joy, Frank took
Monica up on her offer to start a business together. During her
recuperation, they launched a charter boat business together. In order
to make sure Monica would not be distracted by any pressing Avengers
business, Maria hid away her daughter's Avengers I.D. Card.
(Avengers III#27) - When Captain America tried to contact Monica Rambeau on her communicard to see if she'd be interested in returning to active duty, her mother Maria answered instead. She frantically pleaded with Cap not to ask her daughter because she'd agree to come back. This would leave Frank alone in the business they'd just started and with him not in the best of health, Maria figured they couldn't afford it if Monica wound up stuck on the wrong side of the galaxy again.
(Avengers Infinity#1) - Monica caught her mother
frantically trying to muffle the alarm signals coming from her missing
Avengers I.D. Card. Realizing Maria had been keeping it in a relatively
soundproof Mason jar in the kitchen, Monica took back the card and
answered the priority summons call. Before she went off, she demanded an
explanation from her mother, who tearfully apologized for her actions.
Maria explained how happy she was when she got her husband to quit his
dangerous profession and that she couldn't stand the thought of seeing
her daughter return to an equally dangerous line of work. Monica then
hugged her mother, explaining that while she understood her concerns,
she simply couldn't turn away when she was needed. A reluctant Maria
said she understood, after all Monica was her father's daughter in that
respect.
Comments: Created by Roger Stern (writer), Al Milgrom (pencils), Joe Sinnott & crew (inks)
Maria Rambeau's plight is an interesting one, to say the
least. Her decision to hide away her daughter's Avengers I.D. card might be
considered selfish, it could even make her an accessory to whatever
disaster that would have occured because the Avengers couldn't reach
Monica. Still, how would you feel when, after decades of watching
the man you love risk his life on a daily basis, your only child decides
to do the same? First by joining the police and later as the Avengers,
which almost killed her once already?
In Avengers I#294, Doctor Druid wanted to ship the Rambeaus
off to Atlanta while they're cleary from New Orleans. An obvious and
innocent oversight by incoming writer Walter Simonson, but it might also
be indicative of how dismissive, uncaring and overbearing Doctor Druid had
become by that point. Then again, Simonson really did Maria a great
disservice when he suddenly reverted her speech patterns to that of what
can most favorably be described as a loving caricature of an
African-American woman, right down to the use "oh, honey child!" and
bringing up chicken. Talk about on the nose.
Incidentally, though only a handful of artists drew Maria, she's sported a
wide variety of looks. Starting out svelte with a salt and pepper afro,
she was turned into a plump elderly woman with white hair, only to be
mysteriously deaged and slimmed down considerably, even as she got an new,
frizzy all black do. Must be hard for Maria to be perpetually in-between
sizes. Thank heavens she's a professional seamstress.
In Avengers I#294 Frank accidentally
called himself a cop even though he had been a fireman for decades.
Presumably this was a mistake by Simonson like the Atlanta situation
discussed above.
--Markus Raymond
Profile by Norvo.
CLARIFICATIONS:
Maria Rambeau has no known connections to
images: (without ads)
Avengers I#246, p7, pan3 (main image)
Avengers I#246, p7, pan2 (face)
Avengers I#279, p6, pan5 (doesn't want Monica to do it )
Avengers I#294, p14, pan4-5 (suddenly fluent in ebonics)
Avengers III#27, p9, pan9 (hides the communicard)
Avengers Infinity #1, p12, pan6&7(apologises to Monica)
Appearances:
Avengers I#246 (August, 1984) - Roger Stern (writer), Al Milgrom (pencils), Joe Sinnott &
crew (inks), Mark Gruenwald (editor)
Avengers I#247 (September, 1984) - Roger Stern (writer), Al Milgrom (pencils), Joe Sinnott
(inks), Mark Gruenwald (editor)
Avengers I#261 (November, 1985) - Roger Stern (writer), John Buscema (pencils),
Tom Palmer (inks), Mark Gruenwald (editor)
Avengers I#264 (February, 1986) - Roger Stern (writer), John Buscema (pencils), Tom Palmer
(inks), Mark Gruenwald (editor)
Avengers I#279 (May, 1987) - Roger
Stern (writer), John Buscema (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks), Mark
Gruenwald (editor)
Avengers I#294 (August, 1988) - Walter Simonson (writer), John Buscema (pencils), Tom Palmer
(inks), Mark Gruenwald (editor)
Captain Marvel II#1 (November, 1989) - Dwayne McDuffie (writer), Doc
Bright (pencils), Stan Drake & Frank Bolle (inks), Mark Gruenwald
(editor)
Avengers III#16 (May, 1999) - Jerry Ordway (writer and penciler), Tom Smith
(inks), Tom Brevoort (editor)
Avengers III#27 (April, 2000) - Kurt Busiek (writer), George Perez
(pencils), Al Vey (inks), Tom Brevoort (editor)
Avengers Infinity#1 (September, 2000) - Roger Stern (writer), Sean Chen
(pencils), Scott Hanna (inker), Tom Brevoort (editor)
Last updated: 12/25/13
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
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