Dinah Drake


 * For others characters with the same first name, see Dinah.
 * For other people who used the "Canary" identity, see Canary.

Lieutenant Dinah Drake, known undercover as Tina Boland, is a meta-human vigilante and a former police detective of the Central City Police Department. She was eventually recruited into the ranks of Team Arrow by Oliver Queen, who was searching for a successor to the Black Canary mantle. Later, on John Diggle's advice, she set her roots down in Star City by getting an apartment and a job in the Star City Police Department. She was promoted to lieutenant between May and October 2017.

Early life
Dinah was born and raised in Central City, where she later joined the CCPD sometime in 2003, becoming a detective, and specializing in undercover jobs. Her first undercover assignment was with the street gang called the Pilgrims, where she was trained in bo-staff fighting.

Becoming a meta-human
In 2013, Dinah was an undercover cop going by the name Tina Boland in order to go after Sean Sonus. Sonus discovered that Tina was an undercover cop and he tortured her for 2 weeks. Sonus captured her partner Vincent Sobel and "killed" him. The S.T.A.R. Labs particle accelerator exploded subsequently, which gave Sonus, Vincent and Dinah their powers. She screamed as the particles from the accelerator went into her system, giving her sonic screaming abilities. In her grief over Vincent's "death" she used her sonic scream, attacking Sonus.

She handed in her badge after her partner's funeral and went rogue becoming a vigilante all across America never settling down her roots. While doing this, she always kept track of Sonus's movement.

Recruited in Team Arrow
In late 2016 to early 2017, knowing Sonus was in Hub City, she indirectly caught the attention of Team Arrow when Curtis showed them video footage of her fighting and using her sonic scream against a group of criminals. Agreeing that she was perfect to be the next Canary, Curtis, Rene, and Oliver went to recruit her.

After joining the SCPD, she would eventually be promoted to the rank of lieutenant. She continued to be a member of Team Arrow and became close friends with Rene and Curtis. She also became friends with Quentin Lance who eventually gave her the codename of Black Canary after his late daughter.

Dinah would meet Black Siren, the Earth 2 doppelganger of Laurel Lance and the two would end up in a feud with Black Siren always defeating Dinah every time they fought even when Dinah was armed with a weapon and Laurel was not.

Dinah eventually discovered the identity of Vigilante to be her old partner Vincent Sobel, she allowed him to go and he started sending her texts and leaving her gifts. This eventually caused Dinah to confront him and tell him to leave town, unfortunately for her, Oliver discovered that a member of Team Arrow had betrayed him and setting him up to be arrested and sent to prison, and he discovered the meeting between Dinah and Vincent. Oliver confronted Dinah and accused her of being the traitor, but Rene stepped forward and admitted to being the traitor. Dinah still remained in the team but when Oliver kicked out Rene after he went off on his own, he gave everyone a speech about trust in which Dinah agreed and told him that she didn't trust Oliver anymore and left the team. She later met up with Vincent and told him that she needed a friend she could trust.

Potential future
In a potential future that Eobard Thawne hails from, Black Canary is one of the several heroes remembered in the "Age of Heroes", whether this refers to Dinah or her predecessor Laurel Lance is unknown.

Personality
Before being subjected to inhumane torture and witnessing Vincent Sobel's death, Dinah was presumably a happy and carefree individual who cared deeply for the ones she loved. She even went far to legally change her name to keep her family safe as she went undercover in Sean Sonus's gang. Dinah never revealed to anyone she was a meta-human following the particle accelerator's explosion and cut all ties with her former life the day following Vince's funeral.
 * -|As a civilian=

Unable to understand herself and the powers she gained, Dinah started to travel all over the USA, protecting those who needed help. Still wired like a detective, she kept track of Sean's movement, which paid off in killing him. However, she admitted to Oliver that killing him didn't give her closure, despite making sure that one less killer was on the street.
 * -|As Black Canary=

Dinah stated to John that since Vincent's death she never had a normal life, so he convinced her to move on and take up a job at the SCPD, which she eventually agreed to. After joining the team she was shown to have a jovial personality among the members and she was shown getting along with them very well, especially with Curtis and Rene and even being concerned about them, willing to risk her life to ensure their safety, she can also be quite probing into people's personal problems, shown when she tries to make sure Quentin doesn't go back to drinking and showing concern for John when he was distracted and unable to shoot properly in the field due to his nerve damage, she eventually even pressed him to tell Oliver, though he did not. Dinah is very similar to Helena Bertinelli and Laurel Lance. The difference between Helena and Dinah, both of them had the same vendetta, but Dinah has a lot of remorse. She can be forgiven and took responsibility for everything.

When Dinah discovers Vigilante is in fact her ex-boyfriend Vincent Sobel, she was not only shocked to discover he is alive, but horrified at what Vincent has become, despite claiming to John that she will take down her ex-boyfriend, the next time she sees him, she ultimately chose to let him escape; indicating that she is still in love with Vincent, despite the ruthless vigilante he has become.

Dinah has a sense of justice, honor and good morals; when she learns that Oliver had her on surveillance (as he believed she was the witness that testified against him in court, regarding his identity as Green Arrow) she became completely disgusted by his actions, she became even more disgusted when she discovers that even John Diggle and Felicity Smoak respectively did not trust her simply because she was meeting with her ex-boyfriend Vincent, even after she had proven herself trustworthy, after Oliver unfairly kicked out Rene; Dinah ultimately left the team, having lost complete trust and respect for the original members of Team Arrow.

Powers

 * Meta-human physiology: After Dinah was struck by the energy of the S.T.A.R. Labs particle accelerator explosion, her DNA and cells were altered to augment her vocal cords.
 * Superhuman sonic scream: Dinah is able to emit a high frequency scream able to easily turn over a moving armored truck and kill a man at close-range.  Her scream is able to reach at least 183 decibels.

Abilities

 * Expert hand-to-hand combatant/Martial artist: As a former field police detective, Dinah is a highly proficient fighter, as noted by various sightings of her. In one such sighting, she was shown capable of dispatching three much larger men with ease. After taking the mantle of Black Canary, Dinah can now easily defeat many criminals both armed and unarmed, stay in combat with China White and effectively hit Vigilante. However, despite being a highly proficient fighter in her own right; Dinah's unarmed fighting skills are ultimately inferior to Laurel Lance's, the latter who has bested her on several occasions relatively easily. Even with help from Curtis and Rene, she could not take down Oliver/Black Arrow.
 * Expert marksman/Firearms: Having been a high-ranking police officer in two cities separately, Dinah is trained in the usage of at least standard firearms. During the shoot out with Sean Sonus' men, she was able to effectively fire even while dodging incoming shots.
 * Expert stick fighter: Dinah's first undercover assignment was with the street gang, called the Pilgrims, where she used bo-staff fighting. Dinah used a bo-staff while sparring with John Diggle, who praised her skills. Since joining Team Arrow, it has become her signature tactic in battle. Now using her stick she has been able to defeat many armed and unarmed criminals with relativa ease.
 * Free-running/Acrobatics: Since becoming a vigilante, Dinah had developed free-running skills and could drop from a height of several feet without injuring herself.
 * Indomitable will/High pain tolerance: Despite her personal demons, Dinah is shown to be a very resilient woman. Despite weeks of constant torture from Sean's men, she remained defiant throughout. She is also very driven, having spent three years alone hunting down her lover's killer.
 * Keen intellect: Dinah is a very sharp-witted individual. During her undercover work within Sean's gang, she proved to have excellent subterfuge, having spent three years without being caught. She is also a very skilled tracker, having formulated a network to figure out where Sean was hiding.
 * Peak of human physical condition: As a trained policewoman, Dinah is in top form. She is shown to be very nimble, performing noticeable free-running/parkour off a building to escape her assailants.

Weaknesses

 * Dampening device: Dinah's powers can be neutralized by using a dampening device.
 * Vocal cords: Presumably like Laurel, if someone is able to grip Dinah's throat tight enough she is unable to use the scream to defend herself.
 * Superhuman sonic scream: Unlike Laurel Lance, Dinah is not immune to her own powers or any other meta-human with the same abilities; evidenced by the fact that after she and Laurel were both hit by each other's own sonic scream, she was barely able to move, if it had not been for the intervention of Quentin, and if Dinah had taken another sonic scream, she most definitely would have been killed. However, this could be due to her pain tolerance not being as high as Laurel's.
 * Inferior superhuman sonic scream: Dinah's scream is not as refined as Laurel Lance's, as she requires help from Curtis' device, she is able to reach at least 250 decibels, equaling Laurel's own scream as the two meta-human's sonic-clash ended in a stalemate. Without the device, her highest recorded decibel output was 183.

Equipment

 * Black Canary suit: Dinah wears a protective black leather suit as Black Canary, to hide her identity from her enemies, when she goes out fighting crime. She was presented by Felicity with a mask to wear in the field to better protect her identity. She later got a new mask after the death of Adrian Chase.
 * Bow-staff: Dinah carries a bo-staff and she first was seen using it while training with John Diggle.
 * Sonic amplifier: A device created by Curtis Holt that boosts her scream, allows her to more easily focus her Canary Cry and bypasse the effects of a sonic dampener.

Former equipment

 * Leather jacket: Before joining Team Arrow, on missions, Dinah wore a leather jacket for her gear.
 * Gloves: Before being recruited by Oliver, Dinah wore gloves suitable for her in fist-fighting.

Arrow
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Trivia

 * She is the only known character who has worked for both the CCPD and SCPD.
 * Vincent Sobel stated that the both of them were cops for nearly ten years before the particle accelerator exploded.
 * Assuming that they both joined the CCPD between the ages 18-21, and including the three years between the accelerator explosion and Dinah becoming Black Canary, that puts the both of them around the ages of 31-34.

Behind the scenes

 * In the DC comics, Dinah Drake (later known as Dinah Drake-Lance) is the first person to take on the legacy mantle of Black Canary and is also the mother of her successor, Dinah Laurel Lance. In the New 52 reboot, Dinah Lance (née Drake) is the only Black Canary ever existed on Prime Earth, with the two previous versions being combined into one.
 * On the show, the character is split into two altogether separate individuals; Dinah Drake, the meta-human Black Canary-in-training and Dinah Lance, the civilian mother of Sara and Laurel Lance, the Canary/White Canary and first Black Canary, respectively.