According to the statistics of trusty Sitemeter, one of the recurring sets of search keywords that make people reach this blog these days is "Lady Bullseye". More than once, the search tags also include "powers and abilities" and the like.
Here's a list of the skills this new character has been shown to have so far:
- Peak physical condition -From the very first panels in which she appeared - featuring her leaping across the rooftops of New York City with seemingly effortless grace - it was evident that Lady Bullseye is extremely agile and acrobatic.
- Hand-to-hand combat expert -The above sequence shows the first encounter between Daredevil and the new villainess. She is clearly more than a match for our hero, in close combat. Her fighting style appears to be mostly agility-based.
An interesting note is that she's capable of going toe to toe with a fighter like Daredevil while maintaining a completely relaxed state, with her pulse rate remaining constant. Our hero even comments on how, rather than fighting, it seemed like she was performing a Yoga routine.
- Uncanny aim -Seeing as how she took the name and insignia of Bullseye - the bad guy who never misses - it doesn't come as a surprise that Lady Bullseye would have been good at throwing weapons.
Truth to be told, she hasn't been seen using this ability that much, so far, and so it is unclear if she's as good as Bullseye at it. Certainly, if one is capable of nailing a human torso from yards of distance using a weapon not normally used for throwing (as shown in the above panel, in which a ninja is killed by a kodachi thrown by Lady Bullseye, in order to prevent him from spilling too much on the Hand's plans), then his/her aim must be quite good.
- Master of disguise - As part of Lord Hirochi's plan, Lady Bullseye faced Matt Murdock under the guise of legal representative of his parents-in-law (who, behind the scenes, had been instigated to claim the custody of their daughter for themselves).
When they met in their civilian clothes for the first time, even with his heightened senses, Matt wasn't certain to be in front of his new adversary. Lady Bullseye's acting capabilities were so good that she was even able to alter her pulse rate.
Disguising oneself is in itself a pretty good ability in a ninja's arsenal. But being able to also fool Daredevil's heightened senses with a disguise is something truly remarkable.
- Proficient with eastern weapons -Lady Bullseye favors particularly weapons such as
kodachi (in the splendid image above she's shown removing - in a brutal yet coreographical way - two of those from Wilson's Fisk brawny figure),
katana...
... and the traditional throwing stars (
shuriken).
- Trained assassin -The sequence above is taken from a flashback telling Lady Bullseye's origins. At that time, she was one of many teenage sex slaves, by chance freed by Bullseye in a raid against some Yakuzas. While escaping, she kills a wounded gangster by slashing his throat with a key.
The ease with which she killed the unlucky dude with such an ordinary object makes me wonder if her ninja training predates her decision to become Lady Bullseye, or if it's all just natural talent.
What is certain is that...
... her ability to slay unlucky dudes as if they were an afterthought didn't diminish with time.
- Professional Lawyer -As was anticipated by Ed Brubaker (one of her creators), Lady Bullseye has a civilian identity. In it, she's Maki Matsumoto, lawyer for the Werner and Brock law firm. The fact that she's associate to a legitimate law firm is proof enough to say that she has the curriculum needed to be a professional lawyer.