Doctor Psycho (Earth-Two)

As far as anyone can tell, Doctor Psycho's real name is "Psycho," and he earned at least one real doctorate. At his medical university, he was the pride of the faculty, graduating with a special commendation, but to his peers, he was the subject of ridicule. Psycho's short stature and disproportionate physical features earned him cruel nicknames such as "Pumpkinhead" and the "Pocket Napoleon". Despite all this, he managed to marry a medical school classmate, Marva Jane Gray. But Marva was secretly in love with a more attractive and athletic student named Ben Bradley. To cover their illicit affair, Ben and Marva framed Doctor Psycho for the theft of $125,000 worth of radium from the laboratory in which he worked. Psycho was indicted, and Marva testified against him, claiming to be an eye witness. Her story was bought, the charges stuck, and Doctor Psycho was sent to prison.

While serving his sentence, Psycho read a newspaper announcement in which he learned that Marva was now engaged to marry his rival Ben Bradley. He went mad. At that moment and forever afterward, Doctor Psycho developed and cultivated a lifetime hatred of all women. He spent the remainder of his sentence planning his revenge, and when released, he set up his own private laboratory. Meanwhile Mars, the God of War, sent one of his agents, the Duke of Deception, to the United States to instigate and exploit Doctor Psycho. The Duke appeared to Doctor Psycho in his lab, as a spirit of vengeance, and whispered in his ear, inspiring him to carry out a grandiose revenge plot against all women. To this end, Psycho began inventing elaborate machines, restraining tools, and torture devices.

First however, Psycho confronted Ben Bradley, who confessed that he had conspired with Marva to frame Psycho for the radium theft, which was true, but adding that Marva had planned the crime, which was false. After hearing this confession, Psycho forced Bradley to eat a radium tablet, which killed him, but not quickly. Doctor Psycho then tracked down Marva and, with his broad, deep knowledge of science and the occult, Psycho hypnotized Marva, and compelled her to marry him. Marva became Psycho's slave, and he reinforced his power over her through daily hypnosis treatments. As this practice continued, Psycho learned that Marva could bridge the conduit between the physical world and the afterlife. Using her body as a channel, Doctor Psycho extracted ectoplasm from the spirit world, and molded it to disguise his features. With this unique new gift, he could make himself look like anybody he wished!

Doctor Psycho undertook an elaborate scheme, involving real and fake seances, and an ectoplasmic replica of George Washington's Ghost, to influence the U.S. military into not recruiting women into its various branches. Three U.S. Intelligence Officers, Major Trevor, Colonel Darnell and Lieutenant Prince, uncovered and disrupted this scheme, but not before dozens of other officers were killed in a factory bombing.

Doctor Psycho then used his powers over ectoplasm to take on the shape of Colonel Darnell, and thus disguised, he removed some top secret documents from the military base's safe, and gave them out to three female staff members with instructions to hide them in a secure location. When the documents turned up missing, the three staff members were accused of espionage and questioned. Major Trevor grew suspicious and believed that Doctor Psycho was responsible for all of the recent trouble. He took it upon himself to investigate Psycho's laboratory, but was captured and caged by Psycho. Wonder Woman learned of Trevor's plight, and broke into Psycho's laboratory, where the Doctor used one of his inventions, an Electo-Atomizer, to separate Wonder Woman's spirit from her body. With no conscious mind to guide it, Wonder Woman's body fell into a state of torpor. Her mind was still active however, and she sent a mental summons to her friend Etta Candy, who brought a squad of her sorority sisters the Holliday Girls, to help. They distracted Doctor Psycho long enough for Wonder Woman to gain her strength back and merge her spirit back into her body. Wonder Woman rescued Major Trevor, who then disarmed Doctor Psycho and returned him to prison.^[1]

After some time in prison, Doctor Psycho obtained a supply of ectoplasm and used it to fake his own death, and to disguise himself as he escaped from the prison. He then took on the fake identity of a stage magician, calling himself Buenos Noches, and attempted to assassinate Major Trevor, with a planted bomb. Wonder Woman intervened, but the bomb still exploded, killing Trevor's secretary, Lila Brown. Doctor Psycho escaped again. Major Trevor now suspected the late Doctor Psycho, so strongly that he flew his plane to the prison, to inspect Psycho's grave himself. Wonder Woman and Etta Candy accompanied him. They encountered Doctor Psycho, who tried to murder them, but failed, then failed more completely as his medium, a young woman named Joan White, was awakened from her trance by Etta Candy, which disrupted Doctor Psycho's control over ectoplasm, and dissipated the ectoplasm itself. Wonder Woman captured Doctor Psycho. She ensnared him with her magic lasso and brought him back to his cell.^[1]

Powers and Abilities

Powers

Ectokinesis: Acting through a medium, Doctor Psycho can extract Ectoplasm from the spirit world and use it for a variety of effects. He can mold the ectoplasm to disguise his own physical features, and can also use it to create simulacrums of other individuals such as George Washington, Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler.^[1] His mediums have included his wife Marva, and his secretary Joan White. It is unknown if his mediums need to have a special connection to the spirit world, or if Psycho can use anyone as a medium.

Abilities

Genius Level Intellect: Doctor Psycho is a scientific genius with expertise in a wide variety of fields including mechanical engineering, electrical engineering and chemistry.
Science: Psycho built the world's first Electo-Atomizer, for separating a living person's spirit from her body.^[1]
Hypnosis: Doctor Psycho is an expert in hypnosis. His ability to hypnotize and mentally control the actions of others borders on being superhuman.
Occultism: Doctor Psycho is known to possess a dark, forbidden knowledge of the occult. Psycho has demonstrated this ability by manipulating others into serving as mediums, through which he can access the Spirit Plane.

Weaknesses

Blind Hatred: Extreme misogyny leads Psycho to underestimate female adversaries.

Paraphernalia

Weapons

Skeziatric Gas, extremely potent knock-out gas, effective against Wonder Woman.^[2]

Notes

This version of Doctor Psycho, including all history and corresponding appearances, was erased from existence following the collapse of the original Multiverse in the 1985–86 Crisis on Infinite Earths event and later restored following the rebirth of the infinite Multiverse during the Dark Crisis of 2022-2023. Even though other versions of the character may have appeared, this information does not apply to those versions.
The appearances of Doctor Psycho in Wonder Woman #160 and #168 were retconned to be of the Earth-Forty version and the Earth-Two Diana experienced similar adventures (effectively meaning they happened to the Earth-Two version of Doctor Psycho as well.)

Trivia

Doctor Psycho has a penchant for shouting "Z-Z-Zut!"
Doctor Psycho suffers from dwarfism and has disproportionate physical characteristics, notably an abnormally large head.

Doctor Psycho (Earth-Two)

Contents

History