Anissa Pierce

“	Does crime fighting always involve running away from explosions? We seem to do it a lot.	”
	— Anissa Pierce to Jefferson Pierce

Anissa Pierce
General Information
Born	June 28, 1994
Age	25
Gender	Female
Residence	Freeland
Species	Metahuman
Alias	Thunder Blackbird
Status	Alive
Affiliation
Relatives	Alvin Pierce (paternal grandfather; deceased) Jefferson Pierce (father) Lynn Pierce (mother) Jennifer Pierce (younger sister)
Occupation	Teacher at Garfield High School Medical Student
Series Information
First appearance	The Resurrection
Portrayed by	Nafessa Williams

Anissa Pierce is the tritagonist in the CW series Black Lightning.

Early Life

Anissa was born on June 28, 1994 to Jefferson and Lynn Pierce. When she was little, she used to witness her parents argue until they got a divorce. Anissa always felt the need to help people. Once when she was in second grade she got suspended for kicking her teacher because she thought that they had made her friend cry.

Throughout the Series

Season 1

In The Resurrection, Anissa was first seen walking up to her dad at the Freeland Police station after being arrested for protesting. She sighed after he ignored her and walked out the station to the car. Jennifer gave her a dress and told her to hurry up and change.

While in the car, Jefferson scolded her for protesting the One Hundred instead of attending the fundraiser. They started to argue about the situation until they were pulled over by the cops. When one of the officers used excessive force with Jefferson, she started to record the incident. One of the officers told her to stop recording and put her hands on the dashboard, but she refused until Jefferson told her to do as they said. After Jefferson was let go, they continued on driving to the fundraiser.

At the fundraiser, Anissa and Jefferson listened to Senator Nina Turner make a speech about all that Jefferson has accomplished since becoming principal. When she talked about Jennifer, they noticed that she wasn't there; so she went looking for her. She found Jennifer in the bathroom with Kiesha. She asked where they were going, and Jennifer lied about going to house party and pleaded with her sister to let them go. After some hesitation, Anissa told Jennifer to be home by 10:15 pm.

Later on, when Jennifer didn't come home on time, Anissa tried texting her to see were she was. After she did come home, Anissa berated Jennifer on what could have happened to her while Jennifer ignored and shrugged the situation of. She explained how going to Club 100 was a dangerous thing to do and sat down to watch the news on the incident.

The next day, Anissa was getting out of the car and noticed Will harassing Jennifer. She intervened and told him to leave before she called the police. When he refused, she started to call the police. He grabbed her, but she punched him and lipped him on the ground. She along with the other faculty escorted the students back inside. In Jefferson's office, he asked her what was she thinking for beating up Will in front of the entire school. He told her that she not only put herself in danger, but also the school. She told him that violence is all around the city and that it was going hit the school at some point. Anissa said the community would fall if no one helped save it. Jefferson told her that he was saving the city before her birth, but it isn't about that as he only wants to keep her and Jennifer safe. The bell rang, and before leaving, Anissa asked what happened to Jefferson that made him quit on his people.

Later on, she was in class asking her students for their homework until Will barged in. She and Jennifer were kidnapped by Will and taken to the Seahorse Motel. At the motel, she and Jennifer cried as they were being held hostage. They watched as Lala beat Will for kidnapping them which brought trouble. When they heard Black Lightning outside, Lala told Will to "take care" of the Anissa and Jennifer. He held them at gunpoint and walked them outside. Black Lightning was already outside the room which shocked her and Jennifer. They ran off as Black Lightning attacked Will. After awhile, she and Jennifer gave their statements to the police on their kidnapping and were taken home.

When they arrived home, she embraced her parents with a hug. She and Jennifer slept in the same room until she awoke from a nightmare. Anissa went to the bathroom and started having a panic attack. Her panic attack caused her powers to activate which ended up with her breaking the bathroom sink.

In LaWanda: The Book of Hope, she was with the other Garfield High School faculty in the gym with concerned parents. She looked away in guilt after LaWanda asked why only she and Jennifer were saved.

Later in the week, she was having sex with Chenoa. Chenoa told Anissa how she wanted more out of their relationship as Anissa has not met her parents or friends. Anissa said that's she been busy.

Physical Appearance

Anissa is a young woman in her early twenties. Standing of slightly taller than average for her present age, she has a slim and athletic physical build. Her hair is naturally curly and dark brown.

Personality

Anissa is an intelligent, open-minded young woman. She is not afraid in standing up for what she believes in such as protesting the 100 and is nicknamed "Harriet" by her sister as a reference to Harriet Tubman. Despite her intelligence, Anissa can be hot headed and impulsive at times, especially after discovering her meta human powers and developing invulnerability. After some training and guidance, she's more cautious but still tends to fight instead of running away. Unlike her sister, she fully embraced her powers and claimed they were a "blessing from God" and sought to actively use them to help people like Black Lightning.she cares about her sister and seems to have a close bond with her

Powers and Abilities

Powers

• Metahuman Physiology: Anissa inherited the Metagene from her father Jefferson Pierce. Therefore granting her superhuman powers.
• Density shifting: Anissa can increase the mass in her body while preserving volume, which will increase or decrease the density in her own body without inducing any drastically noticeable physiological change in the process, other than her own bodily weight increasing when her bodily density heightens, and does not adversely affect her personal mobility and body's constitution in the slightest.
  • Superhuman Strength: When Anissa manipulates her density, she makes her body both harder and heavier without compromising her natural limberness. She can focus her density manipulation into her hands, making them stronger and heavier, which gives her abnormal strength and striking power; conversely likewise, she could do the same to her lower limbs — not only augmenting the force behind her kicks but also strengthening the foundation of her foothold, rendering herself immovable to outside forces. This was shown when she broke her bathroom sink and tossed a robber across a drug store. It was revealed in LaWanda: The Book of Burial, that Anissa can trigger her strength through inhaling deeply and holding her breath, staying peak of this physically-empowered state for as long as she is able to stall her own respiration but will gradually wane whilst Anissa breathes again or speaks, and has proven powerful enough to at least flip a car upside-down in Black Jesus. When she first discovered and used her powers, her hands glowed a luminescent orange-red, but after more usage of her powers, this glow faded away.
  • Near-Invulnerability: In the episode LaWanda: The Book of Burial, Anissa has shown to be somewhat invulnerable when she was training she punched a mountain of scrap metal and a piece fell on top of her, but she barely winced at the injury. Likewise, she did not damage her foot after stomping violently down on cemented pavement, producing upon it cracks from the point of impact. She can also withstand point blank bullets with no damage, and deflect lightning off of her chest and hands.
  • Stomp-Induced Shockwaves: At high density in lieu with maxed personal weight, Anissa can generate shockwaves by pounding or stomping hard from where she is presently positioned, taking advantage of the prodigious physical heaviness concentrated at her hand/foot (or hands/feet) together with the downwards pound or kick to deal considerable damage upon the recipient, inducing loud tremors that can be heard and felt over a large area.
  • Clap-Induced Shockwaves: Likewise, Anissa can unleash airborne-based shockwaves by clapping hard — releasing them in the form of a spherical pulse that emanates, up to mid-range, from where her palms struck together, and effectively repelling all within that way away from Anissa herself.
  • Vocal Alteration: In the episode Black Jesus, it was seen that Anissa’s deliberate augmentation of her personal density also somehow affects her own voice, causing her speak in a hoarse and slightly reverberating manner.
• Regenerative Healing Factor: Anissa has an enhanced healing factor. Like her father, she heals more than twice as fast as a regular person. The injured area glows orange red when healing occurs.

Abilities

• Expert Hand to Hand Combatant/Martial Artist: Anissa has been shown to possess impressive hand to hand combat skills, as she was able to single-handedly flip a member of the 100 gang onto the ground. Combined with the prodigious raw physical strength as afforded by her powers, Anissa was seen inflicting critical injury on average people using only basic fighting tactics and techniques while assuming the offense during a fight. She has since then received additional training from her father upon realizing each other's metahuman indentities.
• Expert Acrobat: Anissa was able to perform many acrobatic feats when engaging in fights.
• Expert Physician/Medical skills: Anissa possesses medical skills, as it has been mentioned that she is a medical school student.
• Teaching skills: Anissa possesses teaching skills, specifically on the subject of health, as she works as a health educator 3 days a week at Garfield High School.
• Peak physical human conditioning: Anissa possesses somewhat good speed for a human female of her age as she regularly jogs.
• Expert Investigator: Anissa is very intelligent and an excellent investigator, as she follows every lead and rumor to discover the truth.

Equipment

• Thunder Suit: With Lynn's request for Gambi to make her suit. According to Gambi, the suit is composed of breathable Kevlar weave, so that when Anissa is not "bulletproof, she will still be bulletproof". The suit is also fireproof, water-resistant, and state-of-the-art neural interface stitched into the lining, so Gambi is able to monitor Anissa's vitals from the tailor shop's basement.

Former Equipment

• Thunder Prototype: Anissa acquired a blonde wig and dressed similarly to the costume Thunder wears in the comics, but later began to wear an especially designed suit by Gambi.

Relationships

Chenoa - Ex-Girlfriend Grace Choi - Wife Family Alvin Pierce † - Paternal Grandfather Jefferson Pierce/Black Lightning - Father Lynn Pierce - Mother Jennifer Pierce/Lightning - Sister Allies Grace Choi - Wife David Poe † Peter Gambi

Enemies The One Hundred - Kidnappers Lala Will † - Attempted Killer Chenoa - Former Lover

Trivia

• In the comics, Anissa Pierce is the oldest daughter to Black Lightning whom discovered her powers and goes under the identity of Thunder after graduating college.
• Anissa is the first LGBT character in the show. The second being Chenoa the third being Grace Choi, the fourth being Zoe B and the fifth being Jamilah Olsen.
  • All of the women have had a romantic relationship of some sorts with Anissa; Chenoa is her ex-girlfriend, dating for 2 years. Grace is her current girlfriend. Zoe B and Jamilah casually dated her for a brief period. The latter became Anissa's friend before her death.
• She teaches 3 days a week as a health educator at Garfield High School.
• She is a medical school student.
• Her parents had her very young.

Gallery

• Promotional
• Screencap