Revanche
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Revanche (Kwannon) was a short-lived Marvel Comics character, associated with the X-Men. She was created by writer Fabian Nicieza and first appeared in X-Men (February 1993)
Kwannon was an assassin for the Japanese crime boss Lord Nyoirin and lover of Matsu'o Tsurayaba, a high ranking member of the The Hand. After she was mortally injured, Matsu'o arranged for her mind to be switched with the British superhero Psylocke already in their possession, creating innumerable problems for both.
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[edit] Fictional character biography
When the interests of Nyoirin and the Hand came into conflict, Kwannon was prepared to face her lover Matsu'o in combat, however due to the slippery terrain, she fell and suffered a serious injury that left her brain-dead with no hope for recovery. At around the same time, Betsy Braddock (aka Psylocke) was found washed up on the shore of the Hand's island base in the South China Sea after passsing through the Siege Perilous. Matsu'o was told by Spiral (a servant of Mojo) that it would be possible to use Psylocke's telepathy to restore Kwannon's mind. Matsu'o agreed, not knowing that Spiral had a penchant for trickery. Spiral used her reality-warping powers to actually transfer Psylocke's mind, soul and even a small portion of her mutant DNA into Kwannon's body while placing Kwannon's mind in Psylocke's Caucasian form. The result was that Psylocke was now trapped in the body of a Japanese ninja who was now a telepathic mutant as well and Kwannon now inhabited the body of a British telepath. Matsu'o tried to brainwash Psylocke, who he thought was his lover Kwannon, into becoming Lady Mandarin but an encounter with her teammate Wolverine enabled her to break free of his control and eventually rejoin the X-Men.
Meanwhile, Kwannon was recovered by her employer Nyoirin (with the assistance of Spiral). Her new body was retrained in the martial arts and she went to the US to confront Psylocke. However, since Kwannon and Betsy shared the same telepathic powers, they had a subliminal psychic link that let them share memories, so Kwannon believed that she was the true Betsy Braddock. She infiltrated the X-Mansion and fought Psylocke by manifesting a psychic katana that functioned much like Psylocke's psychic knife. When the X-Men arrived to save Psylocke, Kwannon (who assumed the codename "Revanche", which is French for "Revenge") claimed that Psylocke was an impostor. Unable to determine who was the real Betsy Braddock (since the psychic bond Revanche shared with Psylocke made the women's minds an amalgam of each others thoughts and memories), the X-Men went to Japan to uncover the truth. Revanche surprised fellow X-Men Wolverine, Beast and Gambit when she was able to read and speak Japanese perfectly (a talent that the real Betsy Braddock never had), and translated a diary that said that Psylocke had fused her mind with Revanche by accident. They found and confronted Matsu'o, but he would reveal nothing about what had truly transpired.
Revanche returned to the USA as a member of the X-men and found a leper colony for mutants with the lethal Legacy Virus where it was revealed that Revanche herself had the deadly disease. Revanche returned to Japan and confronted Matsu'o, using her telepathy to force the answers out of him, that she was Kwannon in Betsy Braddock's original body. As a way to atone for his mistakes, Kwannon asked Matsu'o to kill her, so she would die by her own choosing and not as a victim of a disease. Matsu'o stabbed Revanche with a ceremonial dagger used for seppuku (honorable suicide) and with her death, the psychic link she had with Psylocke was dissolved and Psylocke's mind was once again the mind of Betsy Braddock. Kwannon's epitaph, left by Elisabeth and Matsu'o on her grave in Japan, read "Kwannon, love that transcended body and soul".
[edit] Powers and abilities
Revanche had the power of telepathy, which enabled her to read minds, communicate with others by broadcasting her thoughts, control minds and create realistic illusions by altering people's perceptions. She could physically manifest her telepathic powers as a blade (like Psylocke's psychic knife), but instead of a small energy dagger, she created an ornate psionic katana sword. The blade could disrupt a person's central nervous system, knocking them out. Revanche could also use her psychic katana to force her way into an opponent's mind and reveal any thoughts that were originally shielded from her telepathic powers.
Originally, Kwannon possessed low-level empathic psi-talents which allowed her to sense the emotional state of others. This ability was what allowed Kwannon's mind to survive a body transfer with a telepath like Psylocke.
[edit] Alternate Versions
[edit] Age of Apocalypse
In the 6-part 2005 limited series, X-Men: Age of Apocalypse written by Akira Yoshida and drawn by Chris Bachalo, which was part of Marvel's celebration of the 10th anniversary of the original AOA, a counterpart of Psylocke was introduced, who was most likely also the AOA version of Kwannon. This Psylocke is a ninja who looks and acts almost exactly like the original pre-transformation version of Kwannon in 616, except with black instead of purple hair, and with the ability to generate psychic blades (an ability manifested by 616 Betsy Braddock only after she body-switched with 616 Kwannon, who was herself a low-level mutant psychic), which she used to make the AOA's version of X-23, Wolverine's daughter Kirika by Mariko Yashida, regain her suppressed memory. After helping the X-Men in battling the Guthrie siblings and thwarting the machinations of Mister Sinister, she then joined the other Japanese members of the X-Men (Sunfire, Kirika, and Silver Samurai) in migrating to the Clan Yashida's refugee colony of New Japan.
[edit] Ultimate Kwannon
In Ultimate X-Men # 18, S.T.R.I.K.E Psi-Division agent Elisabeth Braddock is killed by Colossus in order to destroy Proteus, who has taken her as his host. In #25, she later appears at the gala celebration held at the X-Mansion in the last issue of Mark Millar's run on the title, this time in the body of a Japanese teenager. She explains that after she died, her consciousness migrated to the body of a comatose Japanese girl named Kwannon, who was "happy to go the light", and that despite the shocked reactions of her listeners - "Isn't that obscene?" - she herself is okay with it as she's "never felt perkier".
[edit] House of M
She was seen in the House of M altered reality as a member of Magneto's elite guards, as depicted in House of M#7. It is unknown whether or not she continued to live after the House of M reality was undone.
[edit] Appearances in other media
[edit] Video games
Revanche has a cameo in the X-Men based fighting game X-Men: Next Dimension. In the game, there are actually two separate Psylocke characters, one appearing as the telepathic Psylocke (called "Betsy" in the game), and a second, appearing as the telekinetic version of Psylocke (sporting her trademark psionic katana). Though neither character is technically Kwannon, one of the telekinetic Psylocke's costumes is the Revanche costume. The Revanche costume also alters the look of the psi-katana, making it white with a pale pink aura (while TK Psylocke, shown next to Revanche in the screenshot, has a rose colored energy blade)
[edit] Films
In the third installment of the X-Men film franchise, Psylocke appears in an asian body, which many fans presumed, was Revanche's, as even writer Zack Penn has admitted that he has no idea how Psylocke made it into the final film, since he had no such intentions in his script.
[edit] Trivia
- The name "Revanche" is not simply an alternate derivative of the word "revenge", but rather means a "policy designed to recover lost territory or status".
