Origin
Raven is one of the longest-serving members of the Teen Titans, in various incarnations of the team. Raven owes her heroic role (as well as an evil role) to a darker past - she is the daughter of a human mother named Arella and an inter-dimensional demon known as Trigon. Raven's demonic lineage was hidden from her for most of her early years. She was raised in an alternate dimension called Azarath, where she learned with a greater degree of skill to control her emotions by the goddess Azar. This was intended to control the influence of Trigon on Earth as her demonic powers would facilitate his ability to conquer the planet. Due to this training, she rarely saw her mother and the two grew apart. Upon Azar's death, she discovered for the first time her demonic heritage as she met her father face-to-face for the first time. This eventually caused her to leave Azarath and take residence on Earth where, after being rejected by the Justice League of America, she helped to create an incarnation of the Teen Titans.
Creation
Raven first appeared in an issue of DC Comics Presents in 1980. The series was commonly used as a way to highlight characters or reintroduce somewhat forgotten ones by pairing them with Superman. In this particular case, a new version of the Teen Titans was shown in a bonus section, of which Raven was one of the new members.
The timing was right for the new team, as youth-oriented books were quite popular in the medium (the leader at the time was the X-Men at Marvel.) This led to these new characters becoming very popular themselves and very much established in the DC Universe.
Two of her early creators described her after her creation:
George Pérez: When I came to DC I came in strictly to do the Justice league. At the time Dick Dillin was still alive, so I just wanted to do one issue of it. Marv had asked me to do something for DC and suggested the Teen Titans. You know how hard it was to tell the people at Marvel what I was going to do at DC? "Oh, they finally got you doing work there, what are you going to be doing?" "Well, I'm doing the TEEN TITANS... (very low, embarrassed voice)" (laughter.) I did not think that book was gonna go. I loved the original, I hated the second version... and I thought it was going to die. Marv had already decided on Cyborg. Basically, he had all the things worked out on him. Same thing with Starfire. Raven ... while Marv conceived the character, it was Len's idea to put a mystical character in there. Marv didn't want Raven in.Marv Wolfman: Len didn't specify Raven, he wanted a female mystical character. I just didn't want to do that because my first thought was Dr. Strange and my second thought was the Phantom Stranger. I didn't want to do anything like that. Len said, "Come up with something different." This was before Zatanna became a member of the JLA. And there were no mystical type characters in any group book. I had to figure out a character that would be completely different. from Dr. Strange, Dr. Fate or Zatanna. The name Raven came from the comic strip that I had done with Ross Andru. There was a girl in there named Raven Winters. And the last name went on to become the Baron's last name in Night Force. Raven sort of appeared that way.The characters held no interest for me until a George did a visual. We talked about it and I was still very reluctant. While I knew about her background, I still didn't care about her because I don't like writing about mystics. He did the visual and I just went... "Wow." I knew what the face looked like, but at that point we had no intention or showing what her face looked like.
Character Evolution
Modern Age: New Earth
As is common with any character that first appeared as a teenager, Raven has matured substantially throughout her time as a hero. When first seen she was shy and withdrawn, but this was also a result of not wanting to use her powers to their full capacity (or else her father would control her body.) Keeping her distance and her secretive nature made her hard to trust. Initially, she was also a total pacifist and refused to actively engage directly in fights, but provided transportation and healing to her teammates. Although Raven began maturing as a character, unlike the rest of the characters on the Titans, this development came at the cost of potentially releasing her father upon Earth. As she accessed her emotions more often they came to affect her physical appearance and after she became completely corrupted she took on a demonic form and finally summoned her father to Earth. After his defeat, she was revived and her normal appearance returned. During this time she struggled to better relate to other people.
During the Titans Hunt story arc, Raven was corrupted by the mad spirits of Azarath that had also possessed Jericho. After fatally wounding Adrian Chase, the Phantasm, her body was destroyed by Chase and Arella, all of whom were presumed dead. However, Raven's spirit lingered on and escaped to Earth, still as mad as she had been at the time of her destruction. She found a suitable host body and destroyed the spirit replacing her within the flesh. Having turned to her father's side, Raven's goal became to recreate her lost siblings that had come before her. The means by which meant planting a seed within a host body that would eventually give birth to one of these lost siblings. But the human Raven had attempted this with first went completely insane before she exploded, unable to handle the raw power within. Instead, she settled on implanting the seeds within superhuman hosts, gathering and corrupting a group of helpers with the task. One of the first victims of this process was Beast Boy. And later on, Raven famously prevented the marriage between Nightwing and Starfire when she attacked the ceremony before the vows and implanting a seed within her old friend.
However, it was later revealed that Raven's pure spirit was still active and unknown to her evil counterpart, had been the part implanted within Starfire. While inside her old friend, Raven pushed Starfire to undergo an old Tamaranian ritual gaining a slightly altered appearance and seemed to be more shaman-like before leaving for Tamaran itself. Eventually, this prompted the Evil Raven to follow her into space, striking a deal with the Citadel that leads to the destruction of both Tamaran and the Technis. Everything culminated on New Tamaran where Evil Raven was eventually reduced to ash, by Starfire, Darkstar Donna Troy, and Kyle Rayner while it was revealed that Raven would have resurrected Trigon and not his children had she succeeded in her plans. And Raven's spirit for the first time was free of her father's influence.
Raven would exist as a golden spirit for a while after the conclusion to the New Titans series, opting to remain in space with Starfire, Changeling and Cyberion. Eventually, she would return in an effort to warn her friends that Cyborg had lost touch with his humanity as Cyberion and was now returning as a massive planet-like object known as Planet Cyberion. She would stand by her friends against the Justice League when they would attempt to destroy Cyborg rather than try and save him, in the ensuring conflict he was confronting the New God Orion, one of the strongest voices for Cyborg's destruction before she quelled the everburning rage within, leading to Orion acting markedly different before returning to normal.
She would appear again during other engagements, most noticeably during the Our Worlds at War story where she played a crucial role in Wonder Woman's plan to both re-empower Darkseid and reignite the firepits of Apokolips, but also to enact Diana's own revenge against the New God of Evil for the earlier murders of her sisters by implanting within him a sliver of Diana's own soul, robbing him of the dark edge he had always had. Later it was rumored she had departed for other planes of existence.
She would later be revived again by Sebastian Blood who needed her as a bride, but as Blood was merely a 12 year old at the time, Raven was reborn with a body of a similar age despite being in her mid-twenties. After being rescued from this fate by her friends she developed more of a personality and even developed a Goth-inspired fashion sense. During the events of One Year Later she decided for the first time to lead the team alongside Beast Boy while they were in a relationship at the time (though they would break up from the strain the team placed on them). However it was revealed when Cyborg returned that Raven had broken up with Garfield and left the team, not because of the strain, but because she had become aware of a traitor in their midst. The traitor turned out to be one of the recent members called Bombshell, who was after the disk Cyborg had trapped Jericho on and tried to stop Raven from reviving him from the pool she herself had been recreated from.
After a period of turbulence, Cyborg tried to recreate a new team of Titans to run parallel with the one run by Tim Drake, while the other old New Teen Titans declined to take part originally, they were soon forced when Trigon attacked every single member the Titans had ever had, seriously injuring many of them. In order to confirm it was indeed Trigon who had struck them, being the only figure with the reach and resources to do so. Raven discovered that not only was her father alive, though a shade of himself, she had a living sibling on Earth who was aiding him. It was soon revealed she had 6 brothers, known as the Sons of Trigon, each of whom carried the powers of one of the 7 deadly sins, where Raven was revealed as the oldest and most powerful as the Sin of Pride.
Post-Flashpoint: Earth-0 (New 52)
After an absence of a year in the new 52, Raven finally appeared in the pages of Phantom Stranger as a teenager living in fear of becoming like her father. The Phantom Stranger intervenes when she comes under attack and seems to be interested in protecting her, but instead delivers her to her awaiting father despite her pleas as he was poised to invade the Earth to find her.
During the issue it is revealed Raven had escaped to Earth when her father Trigon had invaded Azarath some time ago, ending up at Stonehenge that serves as a portal between Earth and Azarath. It wasn't specified how long ago this exodus was or what Raven had been doing since then other than trying to help people with her empathic powers and avoiding the Church of Blood, Trigons earthly followers.
Later Trigon revealed more of Raven origins. He has a son from each of the Under-Realms he's conquered, though only three have so far been revealed. Raven is his only daughter and the only one Trigon doesn't hold in contempt. Trigon let Raven's mother, Arella, live because he needed Raven to be raised by humans so she could recreate the seven under realms in her own image. Something he claims would clear his path to attack even greater realms. Arella eventually fled with her daughter to Azarath where the monks taught her how to control her bad side and avoid Trigon`s influence on her before he attacked them years later.
After her capture, Raven spent time in the Under-Realms where time flows faster or was compressed. Trigon believed he just needed to liberate her by keeping her close to him, letting her suppressed heritage reemerge on its own and not directly control her to remake Raven in his own image.
Impressed after having fought many battles by his side, Trigon handed her the Throne of the Under-Realms to rule as a Queen.
Raven appeared to be allied with her father to defeat the Teen Titans, but Trigon is wary of her as he knows she is making her own plans without his blessings.
It was not determined exactly which side she was on as she remained vague about her intentions. Though she appeared to be friendly with the Teen Titans, fighting alongside them against both her father and her brothers. Her allegiance seemed to be a ruse, as she had taken control of Beast Boy before meeting with the Titans. And was seen speaking with Trigon after joining the team. Her allegiances could come under further questioning when she ambushed Wonder Girl and wiped her memory of certain historical events she had witnessed when they were traveling through time. Even more so when she later confronted Jon Kent, a violent future Superboy who had killed many of the Earth's metahumans, being the only one to know Jon had replaced Kon after Kon had vanished and the Justice League of that era had dressed Jon in Kon's outfit. Though Jon tried to kill her, Raven brushed him off and cautioned he grow patience if he wanted to achieve his goals, but otherwise let him continue his charade as it served her own purpose and that of Trigon.
However, Raven's allegiances changed rather drastically, once the team finally returned to their own timeline where the trip back seemingly broke Trigons influence over Raven.
Along with the rest of the team, Raven gained a social media presence to some degree as they stopped a school bus that had been hijacked by suicide bombers heading for STAR Labs. In Raven's case, the popularity boost resulted in a band called Dark Mistress that wrote their music based on their experiences with Raven, even using some of her spellcraft in their lyrics.
DC Rebirth
After the death of Tim Drake and the dissolution of the Teen Titans, Raven discovers that her mother has a sister that lives in San Francisco with her dedicated Christian family. Feeling out of place, Raven tries her best to fit in. At the same time, a mysterious white orb has been luring the young generation into its world in order to use their youth as its power source. Raven is able to stop the creature with the help of her Aunt and the people of the city. The creature escapes and Raven wipes everyone's memories of the entire event.
While exploring a museum in the dead of night, Raven comes under attack by Damian Wayne, who has recruited her, along with Starfire, Beast Boy, and Kid Flash in becoming the new Teen Titans. He informs them that his grandfather Ra's al Ghul has formed his own special team called the Demon's Fist. Each member of the team has been specifically trained to target a certain member of the Titans. Raven's enemy is Plague. After defeating the Fist, the team decides to accept Damian's offer in becoming the Titans group of the West Coast. Raven begins to form a close bond with Kid Flash.
During the events of Metal where the Dark Multiverse invades, Raven is taken captive alongside most of the Teen Titans and Suicide Squad by the Batman Who Laughs. While the other members of the Titans and the Squad are all transformed into 'goblin-like' versions of themselves in service of the Batman Who Laughs, Raven remains unchanged. Later she is witness to the League being brought in, having been defeated by the various Batmen. Close by Cyborg is battling the Murder Machine's influence that overriding his systems before being tempted by the Mother Box inside of him to fully embrace it. Raven reaches out and begs him to reject the Motherbox, as the process of embracing it would ultimately kill him. Cyborg makes a partial sacrifice instead and breaks free, taking the League, their allies and Raven with them before heading out to seek the Nth metal that they believe could be used against the invading Batmen. Though it is revealed their escape had been anticipated by the Batman Who Laughs. Raven, Cyborg, and Flash attempt to reach the House of Heroes using the Monitor ship Ultima Thule, a ship last seen in Final Crisis, to reach it. Between them Cyborg and Raven try to steer the hyper-advanced and semi-sentient vessel while being pursued by the Dark Knights, ultimately proving their escape was planned and their ship meant to destroy the House. Only to be rescued at the last moment by the inhabitants of the 53rd universe, where everyone is an ape.
Post-Metal the Teen Titans remain together for a while before they are abducted by Brainiac for the events of No Justice. Brainiac assigned Raven to Team Wonder, a team headed by Wonder Woman and also included Dr. Fate, Etrigan the Demon and Zatanna. While the heroes fail to save Colu, their experiences there with the trees and their connection to the Omega Titans allow them to save Earth. Afterward, the Teen Titans disband, with both Raven and Beast Boy feeling adverse effects of the broken Source Wall. Raven is recruited by Nightwing not long after for a special Titans team meant to help and contain a new breed of metahumans that has begun appearing after the Source Wall broke, with Raven being imagined as the co-leader by Nightwing and essential due to her empathic powers being able to calm those who were scared and be able to tell who was being a real threat. Currently, Raven has however been marooned on a different world called Unaearth due to the machinations of an otherwise fictional character called Prince Travesty, a product of a fantasy writer who had his meta powers triggered by the Source Wall.
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