Who the Clix? Dr. Psycho

Who the Clix? is a series of articles featuring information on comic book characters that have been made into figures for the popular tabletop game Heroclix. These articles are meant to help Heroclix players learn more about the characters behind their favorite pieces.

Today we look at the diminutive misogynistic telepath: Dr. Psycho

Appearances in Heroclix: Wonder Woman 80th, Superman/Wonder Woman, Collateral Damage
First Appearance: Wonder Woman #5
Team Affiliations: Secret Society of Super Villains
Created By: William Moulton Marston and Harry G. Peter

Artwork and character is copyright/trademark DC; used under Fair Use
Artwork and character is copyright/trademark DC; used under Fair Use

Pre-Crisis

Doctor Psycho was a normal medical student who is continually humiliated by his peers. He soon learns that his fiancee, Marva Jane Gray, is in love with college athletic champion Ben Bradley. Bradley steals $125,000 worth of radium from the college lab. As if this were not enough, he also hunches over and frames Doctor Psycho when Marva witnesses the culprit in action.

Psycho is convicted based on Marva’s testimony and spends years seething behind bars, nurturing a twisted hatred directed at women. Upon release, he enacts his revenge by torturing and kidnapping Bradley who falsely confesses that Marva was his willing accomplice. Psycho then kidnaps and tortures Marva, while placing her under his hypnotic control. He then compels her to marry him and subjects her to daily occult experiments. He discovers the means to summon ectoplasm through Marva and can manipulate it to fashion and animate forms around his body. With this new found ability, he creates a career as an occultist and psychic developing a following of millions.

The God of War becomes enraged that women are gaining power in societies across the Earth which he believes will make it harder to cause wars. So, he enlists the Duke of Deception in discrediting women. To that end, the Duke of Deception uses Doctor Psycho to set about eliminating women from the war effort. Psycho uses his fame to fashion ectoplasm into the form of George Washington and has this ethereal puppet claim that women are hindering the war effort. He also disguises himself as a ranking military agent in order to frame female staff for espionage.

Wonder Woman, with the help of the Holliday College girls and Steve Trevor, disrupt Psycho’s plans but are forced to let him go without any proof. This causes Wonder Woman to become an object of obsession to Doctor Psycho. Marva is temporarily freed and aids Wonder Woman, who eventually imprisons Psycho. However, Psycho is able to fake his own death and escapes, kidnapping Marva as well as his former secretary to increase his ectoplasmic power. It is when he attempts to court Etta Candy that he is exposed and returned to prison.

Psycho eventually kidnaps Steve Trevor and uses him as a medium, able to forge the powerful Captain Wonder from Trevor’s dreams. Alongside Silver Swan, he battles Wonder Woman but is defeated when Trevor awakens.

Psycho is tested by the Monitor before the Crisis but ultimately fails and is once again defeated by Wonder Woman.

Post-Crisis

Psycho is a telepath that specializes in entering and manipulating dreams. Circe enlists him to torture Vanessa Kapatelis, a close friend of Wonder Woman, hoping to isolate Wonder Woman and ferment fear of the Amazons. Psycho is later able to use this manipulation to transform Kapatelis into the new Silver Swan.

Psycho is committed to a mental facility and goes partially catatonic for some time. Until, that is, several members of the Legion of Super-Heroes are stranded in the present and are within telepathic range. Saturn Girl mentally calls out for a lost member which awakens Psycho and sets him lose on a rampage leading to the Legion.

Psycho later surfaces as a core member of Lex Luthor’s Secret Society of Super Villains. He serves as a recruiter for the Secret Society and is greatly angered when Catman rejects him. He also helps Deathstroke capture a member of the Marvel Family. Psycho and Warp travel to near the center of the Earth and free Doomsday. Psycho takes control of Doomsday and leads an assault on Metropolis which ultimately fails.

Psycho is later put on trial with Kate Spencer, the current Manhunter, as his defense attorney. The Society disavows him and builds a machine that weakens his telepathic power greatly. Just as the verdict is about to be read, members of the Secret Society turn off the machine blocking his powers which allows him to take the courtroom hostage. This forces Spencer to try to change into her Manhunter uniform which reveals her dual identity to Psycho. He forces her to change and come to him, sneaking a kiss from her. In this moment, his powers weaken enough for her to stab him in the stomach and head which luckily denies him his powers as well as causing him to forget Kate’s dual identity.

Psycho continues to work with the Society against the Secret Six. Eventually the Mad Hatter attacks and repeatedly stabs him. He resurfaces with the full might of his powers and aids Circe, Cheetah and Giganta.

New 52

Doctor Psycho is a telepath who poses as a conman psychic and uses his powers to steal identities of customers. He does not openly use his powers in hopes that he can hide from HIVE who are hunting those with telepathic abilities. He meets Superboy when his astral form is accidentally pulled into Superboy’s mind.

Psycho learns of Superboy’s origin, which is unknown to Superboy, and Psycho befriends the hero. They join together to oppose HIVE and meet another young meta named Sarah whose powers manifest into a being called Decay. They learn that Sarah had been experimented on by HIVE.

He later speaks with Psimon and then attempts to help get Raven powers. He accidentally peers into Raven’s mind and sees a vision of her killing him. Doctor Psycho is in Khandaq when Dr. Light is killed but after investigation is found to not have been connected to the event at all. Doctor Psycho is among the villains recruited by the Crime Syndicate. He is sent out with the Fearsome Five and Hector Hammond to battle Cyborg and the Metal Men. He is defeated by Gold.

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