History: Alison Blaire's life has been centered around art and performing since she was born. Her family has a long history of being artists and performers of varying success. Whether by luck or coincidence, she came of age at a time when her family had more faliure to speak of than triumph. Both her parents had been artists at one point. Her father was a struggling screenwriter and her mother was a former lounge singer who never grew beyond her local music scene. They met at a talent agency where they were hoping to further their careers. For a while it looked like they would have a chance, but then the agency went bankrupt as a result of a major scandal. The couple ended up moving to Philadelphia where her father got a job at a small record company and her mother got a job as a waitress. Shortly after they arrived, Alison was born and she started following her family path.

Early on, Alison showed a talent for music. Almost from the time she learned to speak, she was singing. Her mother, being a former singer herself, was very encouraging. However, the lack of money and opportunity for their family, who were still deeply in debt, limited her ability to nurture Alison's gift. For much of her childhood Alison's family endured varying degrees of hardship. Yet Alison's desire to perform did not wane. She developed her talent wherever and whenever she could. Growing up, she sang mostly at church and in school choirs. By the time she was a teenager she desired more and looked for any means of making music her career. This wasn't without controversy though. Alison routinely skipped school and negated class, which caused plenty of conflict with her parents. For a while her desire to sing was so strong she became the target of fraudsters and phoney agents. She even got in trouble with the law for trying to drop out of school without her parents' consent.

Despite these various mishaps, Alison did show genuine talent. By the time she was in her late teens, she was doing local music gigs and singing in cover bands throughout the city. Her father even managed to record some of her vocals and get it circulating throughout the music community. For a while it looked as though she would break into the industry as she always dreamed. Then one night at a concert, everything went wrong. She was singing lead vocals in a battle of the bands style contest and during the show, one of the amplifiers malfunctioned. This caused a huge outburst of noise that overwhelmed Alison. Coupled with the pressure of making a name for herself, her latent mutant power was activated. From her hand and body, the sound was turned into a fury of dazzling sparks that destroyed much of the set and sparked several fires. The damage wasn't too severe, but Alison's career was deeply affected.

Upon finding out she was a mutant, every potential suitor in the music industry abandoned her. Nobody was willing to employ a mutant, some out of sheer prejudice and others out of concern for the public backlash. This was a time when mutants were a growing controversy and while Alison was devastated, she did not let it get her down. Knowing she would have to make it the hard way, she went on the road as soon as she graduated high school. Her parents went into more debt to get her a car she could use to go on her own tour. For months she traveled, taking gigs and odd jobs wherever she could. Being a mutant made it very difficult to further her career and for a while she was on the brink of losing everything and moving back home. Then a new opportunity came along.

Her travels eventually landed her in Las Vegas where during a gig, she was heckled by a rowdy fan. In response she used her powers to fight him off. At first the situation was volatile, but when she saw how some of the people reacted she took it further. She began using her powers along with her vocals to put on a light show and a spectacle. It went over very well and at the end of the show, someone called her a real dazzler. The name eventually stuck and she began a new phase of her career. Armed with this talent, she was quickly enlisted by a Las Vegas talent company and sent to various stages to show off her talent. Her singing along with her powers generated a lot of positive buzz and for once she was making a good living off of her talent. She became such a draw that some of the biggest hotels and resorts in Las Vegas were offering her well-paying gigs.

As the money poured in she refined her act. Along the way she used her developing sex appeal to generate more buzz. By the time she was 21 she was a full fledged Las Vegas showgirl. There were times when her act required that she be topless or scantily clad, but she did it for the sake of getting her music out there. It was also around this time she had an on-again/off-again relationship with a fellow mutant she met in Detroit named Lance Alvers. He had been a struggling musician as well and for a while they shared a heated romance, but Lance had a violent past as well as an uncanny talent for getting in trouble with the law. When she struck it big in Vegas he tried to stay with her act, but eventually she had to sever ties with him when the deal she had been waiting for finally came along.

At 22, she was signed by a major record label and her act was set to go beyond Las Vegas and into the mainstream. Leaving Lance and her former act behind, she began touring the country in hopes of becoming a major act. She kept her stage name, Dazzler, and her talent for providing spectacles with her mutant abilities. However, her act has led her into a direct confrontation of the growing mutant issue. Even as her fanbase grows, her mutant talents often get in the way of her vocal talents. As her popularity grew, so too did the target on her back and this has become her greatest struggle as a singer and a mutant.

Character Breakdown: Alison Blaire is ambitious. Her whole life has revolved around ambition. She has a powerful desire to be a star and all the natural talent necessary to become one. In some ways her family plays a role in shaping this desire. Her mother and father were performers as well who failed to get a big break because of bad luck and circumstances. To her it appears her parents gave up or outgrew their ambition. This helps serve as extra motivation for her because she clearly wants to succeed where her parents could not. All her efforts are focused on attaining that success and she's willing to take whatever chances she has to in order to get it.

In terms of personality, her aspiration is the guiding force between her thought processes and her behavior. In some cases her despire for success boarders on obsession. However, it falls short of being the pathological variety because she does not resort to the extremes that others may. She's willing to cut class, drop out of school, and negate any sort of fall back plan, but not through fraud or deception. In some cases her aspirations can make her a victim to fraud as she was courted by various fake-talent agents in her teen years. She managed to avoid getting in too deep, but the mere fact she's willing to give them a chance speaks volumes for how strong her ambition is.

This ambitious aspect of her personality also makes her more willing to take risks. Nowhere is this more apparant then how she uses her powers. When they first manifested, it was by accident. For a time these powers were a hinderence to her success and threatened to undermine a very central goal in her life. But rather than lash out in anger, she turned this anomoly into a tool for success. It was these powers that allowed her to become Dazzler. It was these powers that gave her a window into stardom. In a sense she's more in tuned with her powers than most mutants because she sees it as part of her act. It's an act she often has to balance though because her powers can and often do garner more attention than her vocals. Like other muscians who use their sex appeal or family name to seek success, Alison uses her powers and that can come at a price. But for stardom and success, it's a price she's willing to pay.