Maxine "Max" Gibson
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Maxine "Max" Gibson was a supporting character in the Kids' WB animated series Batman Beyond, in which she is a best friend of the title character, Batman (Terry McGinnis). She was voiced by American actress Cree Summer.
Max is an attractive African American girl with short dyed pink hair, who attended Hamilton Hill High School with Terry. She became a fan of Batman after his "return" to Gotham, like most people not realizing that this new Batman was a different person. Her parents are separated and she has one older sister, who often works late hours. Max is exceptionally talented with computers and computer programming, even among her peers, and became a part of Batman's life when she wrote a computer program to try and figure out if any of her fellow students were members of the Jokerz gang. When this program identified her friend Terry McGinnis as one of the potential Jokerz and she confronted him, he angrily denied it. When Carter Wilson, a classmate who actually was a member of the Jokerz, attacked her at the school in his Jokerz identity of "Terminal", Batman rescued her. After this, Max used a reconfigured version of the program to identify Terry as Batman, and he eventually confided in her.
Max attemps to join Terry on patrol as his partner, even though both he and his mentor Bruce Wayne, the original Batman, do not approve. However, she proves herself valuable in other ways, helping him with everything from computer hacking, to babysitting, to coming up with excuses for Terry's girlfriend Dana Tan. Trying to prove her worth to Terry, she became addicted to Spellbinder's illegal VR technology, but fought off its influence and knocked Spellbinder out before he could injure Terry. Although Terry remains unwilling to allow her to physically assist him, he accepts her as his partner.
When Terry went missing in Gotham's maze of subway tunnals, Bruce and Max looked for him together and managed to come to an understanding about each of them's importance to Terry. Bruce however, steadfastly refused to allow her to become more involved than was absolutely necessary, due to his not wanting her to take the risks that Robin and Batgirl had. Max and Bruce also found themselves at odds due to their attiudes about Terry's work and personal lives. Eventually, Bruce grudgingly accepted Max and she came to befriend him in return, though they never appeared as close as Terry and Bruce were.
