Finally, let us say hello to Dr. Edgar Cizko, also known as Doctor Psycho, one of Wonder Woman’s most notorious and eccentric foes ever. This crazy, sexist, telepathic character was created by Wonder Woman co-creator William Moulton Marston and artist Harry G. Peter. He originally appeared in Wonder Woman Volume 2 #54.
Despite having started in Wonder Woman’s early years, Doctor Psycho has remained captivating, especially to his admirers, to this day. This is due to his irrationally complicated methods for defeating Wonder Woman. If you are curious as to who it was who actually went to the trouble of making a phony superhero version of Steve Trevor, it would be Doctor Psycho!
So get ready for today’s film, in which we will examine the roots of the Wonder Woman villain, who in actual life is more of a parody of Hugo Münsterberg, Marston’s former college tutor and adversary. The German-American psychologist apparently had a staunchly conservative political stance, notably in regard to women’s rights. He held that women should only attend college in order to make their husbands more interesting. It makes sense because Marston was horrified by his opinions, and it was soon time for him to make amends. Anyhow, let us go back to today’s video!
Doctor Psycho Tragic Origin
A multitasker and a master strategist, Dr. Psycho’s first escapade was masquerading as Dr. Charles Stanton, a child psychologist at the Adams Junior High School in Boston. While he mentally strained the students to raise their grades, his sole purpose was to provoke some kind of a friction between Wonder Woman and Hermes, make them fight thereby leading to the simultaneous obliteration of everyone in Boston.
In case, you are having doubts, of course Dr. Psycho called the shots for them as he was secretly in control of both their minds. Had it not been for the guidance councilor at Adams Junior High, Helen Anderson, Dr. Psycho would have been successful. As Helen tried to probe deeper into things, she landed herself in a fix. With Dr. Psycho holding her hostage and tormenting her using his mental capabilities, Helen went completely batshit; she was literally about to kill herself along with her expecting child had Wonder Woman not intervened and knocked Dr. Psycho out.
Don’t even for once make the mistake of thinking that this is where the exploits of Dr. Psycho come to an end. Not only did he manage to flee from there but he was also seen making use of his powers again and this time to abduct and hold hostage Wonder Woman’s mentor, Julia Kapatelis. Apparently, the ancient, immortal sorceress, Circe, had directed him to do so.
Of course, the witch enlisted the help of Dr. Psycho again and made him use his powers against Vanessa Kapatelis, who happened to be a close friend of Wonder Woman. He implanted dreadful nightmares in the mind of Vanessa with the sole purpose of getting back at Wonder Woman. However, this only landed him inside the Greater Boston Institute for the Criminally Insane.
But having said that, Dr. Psycho isn’t one of them to give up so easily and he became accomplished in altering Vanessa into the new Silver Swan all in the hopes of making her a member in his team of villains that had him, Circe and the new male Cheetah. But as fate would have it, he was flattened by Donna Troy and shut away inside the metahuman prison, Slabside Penitentiary.
You’d be surprised to know that he even went to the extent of ambushing the Legion of Super-Heroes, attempting to take over the mind of Saturn Girl but sadly, things did not really work out in his favor. Back in The Slab, he was paid a visit by one of the founding partners of Cale-Anderson Pharmaceuticals, Leslie Anderson, as a result of which he was moved from there and also employed by Veronica Cale.
The goal was still the same – disgrace Wonder Woman but this time it was a joint effort; apparently, Cale wanted the same thing. Therefore, Dr. Psycho went on a killing splurge and made people commit acts of suicide. In short, he went to every extent possible and at the same time, was also clever enough to expose Cale’s real motive to Wonder Woman blaming her for everything and thereby maintaining his freedom too.
Doctor Psycho Evolution
Post escaping from The Slab, Dr. Psycho ends up emerging as the primary core member of Alex Luthor’s Secret Society of Super Villains while working simultaneously with Talia al Ghul. Right from attempting to have Catman on board to working with Deathstroke so as to seize the Marvel Family, he has come a long way and there’s no denying that. But there came a time when the Society started having their doubts on Dr. Psycho and they thought he was manipulating them to do his work. It was only after Dr. Psycho released Doomsday to lead an attack on Metropolis that the members realized his allegiance towards them.
Speaking of Dr. Psycho’s new appearance, he is short, he is bald and has a lot of marks and bandages on his head. He is particularly seen donning a neck brace, one that aids him in his movement. Now, we all know that he is a telepath so it should not come as a surprise when we tell you that making use of his telepathic skills, he once pretended to be a psychic in New York.
And, because he had the power to not only enter people’s dreams but also warp them, being a psychic was way too easy and profitable for him. He would make use of his customer’s memories primarily for their bank account details and then later swindle them. But because he was afraid of the H.I.V.E. locating him, he would always be in disguise, wearing a cloak, one that literally concealed his whole face.
So, there was a time when he discovered Superboy engaged in some kind of a battle with Plasmus. Call it a telekinetic fallout but his astral form was somehow absorbed into Superboy’s body. No wonder, he reached out to Superboy and proposed the idea of the two of them crushing H.I.V.E.
With Dr. Psycho further helping Superboy fight against the Dreadnought, the duo became partners. However post getting ambushed by Psycho-Pirate, Dr. Psycho’s true origin was exposed and Superboy realized how he was being exploited the whole time.
It is then that Dr. Psycho discloses that he has been in possession of every psionic power formulated by H.I.V.E but he was debilitated so he could not make use of the powers. But with him spending enough time with Superboy, Dr. Psycho now had the power to do so. However, unbeknownst to Dr. Psycho, Psycho-Pirate had managed to disconnect his memories of Superboy’s origins, thereby making him unfocused and eventually Superboy is able to defeat him.
Interesting Story Of Doctor Psycho From His First Appearance In Comic
With the god of war, Mars, receiving reports from his slave secretary of how active American women are becoming with their roles especially in the war activities, he summons his lieutenants, the Earl of Greed and Duke of Deception and holds a meeting. By the looks of his conversation, he certainly wants to put these upstart women back in their place.
No wonder, he ends up sending the Duke of Deception to earth to do his bidding. As for the Duke, he is aware of a certain man of earth, one who loathes women. We are talking about the devious Dr. Psycho, who is chosen by the Duke and put to work. Well, speaking of Dr. Psycho, he wasn’t always like this. In fact, he was a brilliant student in medical school, a recipient of the highest award.
However, blame it on his short stature and an abnormally huge head, he was always picked on by his peers. The readers learn about his fiancée, Marva, one who doesn’t really fancy him, forget love. In fact, she is seen to have an affair with the athletic idol of the college, Ben Bradley, something that’s eventually discovered by Dr. Psycho. Later, with a theft of $125,000 worth of radium missing from the laboratory where Dr. Psycho has been working, he is held as a primary suspect. Even Marva testifies against him as she herself had seen him entering the lab the previous night.
Not having anything to prove his innocence and on the basis of Marva’s testimony, he is sent behind the bars. It is while serving his prison time that he learns about Marva and Ben’s wedding – the very incident that crushed his faith in humanity and made him develop a strong feeling of hatred towards all women. As he serves his sentence, he becomes even more bitter and resentful towards the duo and makes up his mind to take his revenge on them.
Soon, the day arrives when Dr. Psycho is finally released from prison and just like the saying, ‘revenge is a dish best served cold’, he gets his vengeance on both of them. Things turn out horrible and ironical for Ben who is forced to swallow a lump of radium but only after he admits to stealing the radium to frame him and that it was Marva who planned the whole thing. Of course, Ben dies and Dr. Psycho makes his way towards Marva.
Using his skills of hypnotism, he makes her do things his way. Marry her, check that! Make her his slave, check that too. In fact, he starts hypnotizing her every day, making her participate in various occult experiments. He even goes to the extent of using her as a conduit to tap into the other world and in the process, becomes successful in extracting samples of ectoplasm. Imagine him altering his own physical features and addressing himself as Mussolini and John L. Sullivan amongst others.
Later, with Dr. Psycho publicly announcing that the spirit of George Washington will be channeled via his wife at the Lafayette Hall, Steve Trevor and Diana Prince decide to see it for themselves. Of course, they along with the entire audience are shocked to see George Washington appear right before them.
Steering the ectoplasm from behind a large screen, Psycho has Washington tell the audience that women will lose the war for their country and that they should be discharged off their responsibilities immediately. The apparition further tells the audience how the carelessness of women will wreck a billion dollar munitions plant. The next day, sharply at noon, there happens to be a huge explosion at the Supreme Shell Plant despite every precaution being taken. Of course, this causes panic amongst the people.
Next, Dr. Psycho is seen sending an invitation to Colonel Darnell, the head of United States military intelligence asking him to attend a private séance with the spirit of George Washington so as to receive further significant information. Darnell decides to take along Steve with him and they are also joined by Wonder Woman. Having had enough, Wonder Woman interrupts the séance with the Lasso of Truth but like Steve said, her lasso did not have any effect on the spirit.
As part of his plan, Dr. Psycho further creates an ectoplasmic form of the Colonel. As Col. Darnell, he removes classified documents from the shelf and then hands them to three female staff members. Telling each of them that he removed them from the vault as a special precaution, he instructs them to conceal them in places that only they know. Of course, with the documents gone missing, the three women are accused and found guilty.
With the trio stating that it was the Colonel who instructed them to hide the documents in the first place, Steve starts having his doubts on Dr. Psycho. Deciding to probe thing a little deeper and all by himself, he lands himself in an electrified cage inside the doctor’s laboratory.
Diana is able to learn about Steve making use of her mental radio. She quickly changes into her Wonder Woman costume and goes to help out Steve. Post locating Dr. Psycho’s lab and examining the high fence encompassing it, she makes a slingshot out of two trees and makes her way flying onto the laboratory grounds.
Inside, she frantically starts looking for Steve only to get fooled by Dr. Psycho, who performs an electrical operation on her using his own invention, an electro-atomizer. This device separates her spirit from her body. With Wonder Woman’s spirit entirely detached, Dr. Psycho fastens it to the wall with bands of psycho-electric magnetism and as for her body, it appears lifeless.
However, her mind is still active and she tries sending a mental radio message to her friend Etta Candy. Well, it so happens that Etta and her sorority sisters, the Holiday Girls, are able to receive a mental radio message from Steve and they head towards the lab straightaway. The girls’ confrontation with Dr. Psycho’s assistant, Carlo Montez weakens the bonds of Wonder Woman’s spirit and eventually, she is able to bring her spirit to her body.
She rescues Steve first and upon finding Marva, awakens her from her state of trance. However with Marva waking up, Carlo starts melting and it appears that it was Dr. Psycho the whole time. An enraged Dr. Psycho points his gun towards the girls only to have his weapon disarmed by Steve. As Steve takes him away, Wonder Woman urges a dispirited Marva to join the Women Army Corps and fight for the country.
What Makes Doctor Psycho So Deadly?
Well, he is a powerful telepath which means that he has the power to bend the realities of those around him, make them see what he wants them to see, create illusions, implant terrifying nightmares in people’s minds, in short, mentally torment them. Well, Wonder Woman has ranked him as one of the most powerful telepaths of the planet so now you know, he cannot be treated lightly. So, there is mind control and the fact that he is capable of drawing ectoplasm into the physical world and form various disguises. In case, you did not know, he had once shaped a very powerful disguise of Wonder Woman just to defeat Donna Troy.
Besides all these, he is trained in both in psychiatry as well as psychotherapy. He has this rather special talent of utilizing his enemy’s fears and inhibitions and use them against them. We already know about his hypnotism skills so you know exactly who we are dealing with and why he is addressed as being deadly.
It is fascinating to see how his character keeps appearing as a wild card especially in the life of Wonder Woman. Over the years, he has only grown more and more powerful having in possession skills that make him such an infamous villain. Well, if you remember the ninth episode of the first season of Powerless, titled, Emergency Punch-Up, you will know that he appears as a subject of a documentary about super villains. Later on, it is a reporter who tells the story that Doctor Psycho has released a dangerous gas which causes Wayne Security to go on lockdown until the all-clear can be given. Said it before, saying it again, he is certainly not the one to be taken lightly.