The character first appeared with the name Screaming Mimi in Marvel Two-in-One #54 (August, 1979), and was created by Mark Gruenwald, Ralph Macchio, and John Byrne.

[3] She was eventually imprisoned, where she met Poundcakes, a female wrestler who invited her to join the Grapplers under the name Screaming Mimi, alongside Titania and Letha.

[4] The Grapplers became renowned for their colorful personalities and ringside antics, but the wrestling federation denied them the opportunity to make the amount of money their male counterparts made.

Roxxon gave the Grapplers special paraphernalia to assist them in their mission, and Mimi received an apparatus that converted her voice to high-frequency sonics for various effects.

[7] When the Grapplers were finally paroled, they discovered that the women's wrestling movement had lost its momentum without them, so they continued to perform crimes to support themselves and working as professional criminals.

Her first assignment was to help bust the female Yellowjacket out of prison, but Mimi was captured in the subsequent battle with the Wasp, Black Knight, and Paladin.

Zemo allowed Mimi to be nursed back to health, and his accomplice, the Fixer, gave her new powers via a voice-augmenting harness and high-tech implants in her neck based on technology from the villain Klaw.

Melissa was a consistent part of the Thunderbolts through several different incarnations; she co-led the team with Hawkeye and eventually became sole leader when he departed.

During the superhero "Civil War" event, the Thunderbolts under her leadership were contracted by the U.S. government to capture supervillains and rehabilitate them in response to public fears of a spike in superhuman crime.

[15] Having turned up alive after his apparent death, Lemuel Dorcas developed an obsession for Songbird where he kidnapped her and repaired her vocal cords so she would be his slave.

[18] During the "Dark Reign" event, Norman Osborn orders Melissa killed by other members of the Thunderbolts team so he can usurp control, forcing her to go into hiding for a time.

Faced with Angar's death, she screamed for 43 minutes in a fit of hysteria, creating a large blast crater and literally liquefying nearby plant life.

Presumably, she animates the wings to flap or somehow generates a propulsive force with her powers, since her airborne speed and maneuverability to date extend well beyond simple gliding.

[25] Songbird has also occasionally exhibited an ability to influence others through sub-vocal (below the level of conscious human hearing) sonics, but this is more of a subtle "nudge" or subconscious suggestion rather than outright mind control.

After a roller coaster of a career as a powered individual, Mellisa Gold has become a formidable force to be reckoned with, growing from petty criminal to redeemed hero.

In some ways she exists as the ultimate Marvel superhero story: a child with no future who could have traveled a hard path of crime chose instead to redeem herself and become a hero.

[33] Songbird appears alongside the Thunderbolts in the Dead Days one-shot of the Marvel Zombies miniseries attacking Thor and later Nova.

When Hawkeye goes on a quest to kill the former Thunderbolts for their betrayal, he finds an older Melissa at the Sanctuary of the Silent Sisterhood where she has become a nun that has taken an oath of silence.

[35] When the duo are attacked by Bullseye, she saves Clint and gives him a map to where Moonstone is before the villain stabs her with Elektra's Sai.