Lady Deathstrike
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Lady Deathstrike (Yuriko Oyama) is a fictional character, a comic book supervillainess in Marvel Comics and an occasional foe of the X-Men. Her first appearance was in Daredevil #197.
Character history
Yuriko Oyama's father was Lord Dark Wind (Kenji Oyama), a Japanese crime lord and criminal scientist who created the adamantium-to-bone bonding process. She teamed up with Daredevil to free her lover, Kiro, from her father's servitude; when Darkwind was slain the devoted Kiro chose suicide to honor his master. Distraught, Yuriko belatedly embraced her father's ideals and sought to track down whoever dishonored him. Her trail led to Wolverine, whose skeleton had been bonded with adamantium. Deathstrike sought to kill him to right the wrong of the theft and thus restore her family's honor, but she was defeated by Vindicator of Alpha Flight. Yuriko then went to the Mojoverse and Spiral's "body shoppe" where she received extensive cybernetic enhancements including adamantium bones and talons.
Lady Deathstrike was once a member of the team of criminal cyborgs called the Reavers, led by Donald Pierce, who once managed to successfully defeat the X-Men. The Reavers have since been annihilated by the Sentinels, and Yuriko has been operating independently.
At times she has resigned her quest to kill Logan and has even worked with them cooperatively toward a common goal as she did in X-Men Annual 2000. (In this case the goal was to defeat Stryfe). However she still remains a mercenary and assassin. Despite all this, Yuriko is set apart from many of the X-Men's foes in that she adheres to a code of honor. Yuriko is emotionally disturbed.
Powers and abilities
Lady Deathstrike is a cyborg with superhuman strength, speed and agility. She still has some biological parts that do not seem to be affected by the adamantium bonding process which would be lethal to any ordinary human, it has been speculated that she may be a mutant with similar powers to Wolverine; she has demonstrated the ability to regenerate her organic tissue in the past, though whether this is an attribute of her cybernetics or not is unknown. Although her normal form is obviously that of a cyborg, she uses disguises when necessary. She is an expertly trained assassin and warrior, and while she prefers stealth and subtlety in her killings, she is emotionally disturbed and this interferes with effectiveness. This is especially obvious when dealing with Wolverine whom she has ambivalent feelings toward (several times she has been able to kill Wolverine and could not bring herself to do it, indicating she may have a confused romantic attraction to him).
Appearances in other media
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Lady Deathstrike has a part in the X-Men animated series that ran from 1992-1997. She first appeared in the Season 3 episode "Out of the Past", and was voiced by Tasha Simms.
Lady Deathstrike was portrayed by the actress Kelly Hu in the X-Men 2 motion picture released in 2003. In her film incarnation, she is not portrayed as a cyborg, but as a mutant with abilities similar to those of Wolverine. Although she is portrayed as a villain in the film, her actual orientation is unclear because she is under the effects of mind control.