Huntress (Helena Bertinelli)

Huntress
Huntress on the cover of Birds of Prey #57 (September 2003). Art by Ed Benes.
Publication information
Publisher	DC Comics
First appearance	The Huntress #1 (April 1989)
Created by	Joey Cavalieri Joe Staton (based upon the Helena Wayne character created by Paul Levitz, Joe Staton)
In-story information
Alter ego	Helena Rosa Bertinelli
Team affiliations	Birds of Prey Batman Family Justice League Outsiders Checkmate Spyral
Partnerships	Black Canary Batman Dick Grayson Robin (Tim Drake)
Notable aliases	Batgirl, Matron
Abilities	• Highly skilled gymnast • Highly skilled in hand-to-hand combat

• Highly skilled gymnast

The Huntress, also known as Helena Rosa Bertinelli, is a fictional superhero appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Based on the Earth-Two Huntress (Helena Wayne), she is one of several DC characters to bear the Huntress name. She was also, for a time, one of the versions of Batgirl and was a longtime member of the Birds of Prey. In DC comics New 52 continuity, Helena Bertinelli is an alias used by Helena Wayne while the real Helena Bertinelli is an agent of the spy organization Spyral.

Helena Bertinelli was introduced in her own Huntress series, written by Joey Cavalieri and drawn by Joe Staton, co-creator and long-time artist of the Helena Wayne Huntress. Staton recalled, "I think Paul [Levitz] realized that I felt my involvement with Helena had been abruptly cut short [by the events of Crisis on Infinite Earths], so I was always in line to be a part of any reworking of the character. I don’t recall how Joey Cavalieri came to be the writer on the Helena Bertinelli version, but I think we did some nice work on that run. Helena Bertinelli could never have the deep resonance of Helena Wayne, because she didn’t have the whole Batman/Catwoman backstory at her command, but Joey worked her into a different mythos, that of the mob, also dark, noirish."

In the 1989 Huntress series, Helena Bertinelli was born into one of Gotham City's most prominent Mafia families. In this iteration of the character, she was kidnapped as a child (aged 6) and raped by a rival mafia don purely to psychologically torture her father, and is a withdrawn girl. Her parents, Guido and Carmela, send her to a boarding school and assign a bodyguard for her protection where she learns all forms of combat. After she witnesses the mob-ordered murder of her parents at the age of 19, she crusades to put an end to the Mafia. She travels, accompanied and trained by her bodyguard Sal, before returning to Gotham to make her debut as the Huntress.