Should Mind Control & Possession Weaken Diana?

[Guy_McNichts]

Back in the Golden Age, Wonder Woman's powers were primarily as result of her Amazon training. She more or less could mentally will herself to be as strong as she needed in a given situation. Nowadays, as we know, her powers are mainly due to godly gifts or she's simply a demi-god herself.

Now, I've always thought they should reincorporate the Amazon training element, but combine it with the godly gifts. Meaning, yes, Diana has gifts from the gods that give her great strength and speed and whatnot, but it's only because of her training that she's able to harness these gifts to their full potential.
Diana without training might have some power, and a fully trained Amazon has superhuman strength and speed, but it's only together that Wonder Woman is the powerhouse that she is.

So this got me thinking: wouldn't mind control or possession therefore handicap Diana? If her mind and body aren't as one, she is only fighting at a fraction of her potential.

Benefits:
- It partially explains why, whenever we get one of the tedious "heroes get possessed or mind controlled to fight each other" stories, Diana isn't steamrolling anyone she's up against.
- It invalidates Batman's obsessive "fail-safe" plan for her, because a mind controlled Wonder Woman, due to being controlled at all, isn't fighting at full power/skill and therefore easier to subdue. In other words, she is her own fail-safe.

I also just like the idea that Diana's great power is her mastery of her mind and body.


Just thinking out loud. Thoughts?

[I'm a Fish]

Well, the mind control troupe sure weakens my ability to trust the author to come up with a good story plot, eyyyy.

All seriousness, wouldn't it depend on how she's being mind controlled? If it's illusions and not someone making her a Muppet, would it still have the same effect? (Assuming she doesn't have the lasso on hand or something, so she can't break the illusion.)

Cuz then it would be reverse roles for the Max Lord Sups vs. Wondy fiasco, where we get a fully conscious Wonder Woman thinking she's fighting a restricted Genocide or whatever the writer wants her to think she's fighting, when she's actually fighting Superman.

Edit: I'm just bringing it up because of the second benefit, than Batman would be all, "What if a villain gets the lasso away from you, and dupes you with an illusion. You could be turned into a weapon, Diana!" Or something like that.

I like Wonder Woman having to earn her powers in someway. And your version of it, would make sense to have mind control weaken her.

[Guy_McNichts]

Yeah, I guess if she was caught with an illusion she'd still fight at full strength. So meat puppet scenarios or possession would be the kinds of control that weaken her abilities.
And the Lasso should protect her from mind control, possessions and illusions in general, so I am referring to situations where it's out of her reach.

I think the big problem with my idea is it would demand a level of consistency among writers that's enforced by editors that Wonder Woman is probably never going to have. I mean some can't even be bothered to remember that Lasso should defend her from this sort of thing to begin with.

[Primal Slayer]

As long as she has the lasso on her hip, mind control shouldnt really do much to her.

[Alpha]

I think Diana should have a great resistence to mind control, and a total resistance while using the lasso.

But I also think Diana should have a vulnerability to soul de-attachment. Since she often travelled to the Astral Plane and since she is an artificial creation I think it makes sense that she has a really strong mind and will, but she can easily be taken away from her body by psychics and sorcerers.

[PopQuezy]

As long as she has the lasso on her hip, mind control shouldnt really do much to her.

Personally, I like the way it's been handled in the main series and the Sensational Wonder Woman series. If the lasso is wrapped around Diana, she's immune to mind control. If not, she's susceptible. It's easy and still allows for narrative possibilities.

Also there was the first issue of Sensational Wonder Woman where a Psycho Blast trapped Diana in some type of dream illusion. While I didn't particularly care for the execution of that story, I would hate for that type of story to be completely off limits to Diana in the future.

[Nyssane]

Depends on the source in my opinion.

Divine beings like the Duke of Deception or Deimos should be able to affect her.

But mortals like Dr. Psycho? I'm not so sure. I think his best stories are when he's creating havoc by controlling everyone else around her.

[Stanlos]

Back in the Golden Age, Wonder Woman's powers were primarily as result of her Amazon training. She more or less could mentally will herself to be as strong as she needed in a given situation. Nowadays, as we know, her powers are mainly due to godly gifts or she's simply a demi-god herself.

Now, I've always thought they should reincorporate the Amazon training element, but combine it with the godly gifts. Meaning, yes, Diana has gifts from the gods that give her great strength and speed and whatnot, but it's only because of her training that she's able to harness these gifts to their full potential.
Diana without training might have some power, and a fully trained Amazon has superhuman strength and speed, but it's only together that Wonder Woman is the powerhouse that she is.

So this got me thinking: wouldn't mind control or possession therefore handicap Diana? If her mind and body aren't as one, she is only fighting at a fraction of her potential.

Benefits:
- It partially explains why, whenever we get one of the tedious "heroes get possessed or mind controlled to fight each other" stories, Diana isn't steamrolling anyone she's up against.
- It invalidates Batman's obsessive "fail-safe" plan for her, because a mind controlled Wonder Woman, due to being controlled at all, isn't fighting at full power/skill and therefore easier to subdue. In other words, she is her own fail-safe.

I also just like the idea that Diana's great power is her mastery of her mind and body.


Just thinking out loud. Thoughts?

Previously trying to mind control WW actually handicapped the mentat, if they could get a foothold at all.

[Agent Z]

I guess it would depend on the mind control's nature.

If the enemy has to concentrate on keeping Diana under their control, her ability to properly use her powers would be diminished because technically it isn't her, it's someone else using her powers.

I suppose you could make it that she can't use the Lasso if she is possessed or controlled by an evil party since the lasso cannot be used for evil means.

[HestiasHearth]

Back in the Golden Age, Wonder Woman's powers were primarily as result of her Amazon training. She more or less could mentally will herself to be as strong as she needed in a given situation. Nowadays, as we know, her powers are mainly due to godly gifts or she's simply a demi-god herself.

Now, I've always thought they should reincorporate the Amazon training element, but combine it with the godly gifts. Meaning, yes, Diana has gifts from the gods that give her great strength and speed and whatnot, but it's only because of her training that she's able to harness these gifts to their full potential.
Diana without training might have some power, and a fully trained Amazon has superhuman strength and speed, but it's only together that Wonder Woman is the powerhouse that she is.

So this got me thinking: wouldn't mind control or possession therefore handicap Diana? If her mind and body aren't as one, she is only fighting at a fraction of her potential.

Benefits:
- It partially explains why, whenever we get one of the tedious "heroes get possessed or mind controlled to fight each other" stories, Diana isn't steamrolling anyone she's up against.
- It invalidates Batman's obsessive "fail-safe" plan for her, because a mind controlled Wonder Woman, due to being controlled at all, isn't fighting at full power/skill and therefore easier to subdue. In other words, she is her own fail-safe.

I also just like the idea that Diana's great power is her mastery of her mind and body.


Just thinking out loud. Thoughts?

You answered your own question: One hit from Dr. Psycho or Phobia or Brainiac, or any powerful mentalist and the Amazing Amazon is out...

[marhawkman]

I kinda like the idea that she's not naturally immune, but has artificial defenses against it. Like in Luke's Devastation story... Deva had to connect with Diana using the magic lasso before she could use illusion powers on her.

[WonderScott]

I think Diana’s innate willpower and intelligence helps her fight back against mind control, telepathic commands, deception and illusion, and possession, and the lasso, when in use certainly helps, but I’d hate to see her immune to it altogether.

Diana already has such a vast array of powers that it’s good to have some weaknesses and blind spots - especially with adversaries that include the gods, a couple sorceresses (at least), and the Duke of Deception and Doctor Psycho and Hypnota.

[hareluyafan1]

Back in the Golden Age, Wonder Woman's powers were primarily as result of her Amazon training. She more or less could mentally will herself to be as strong as she needed in a given situation. Nowadays, as we know, her powers are mainly due to godly gifts or she's simply a demi-god herself.

Now, I've always thought they should reincorporate the Amazon training element, but combine it with the godly gifts. Meaning, yes, Diana has gifts from the gods that give her great strength and speed and whatnot, but it's only because of her training that she's able to harness these gifts to their full potential.
Diana without training might have some power, and a fully trained Amazon has superhuman strength and speed, but it's only together that Wonder Woman is the powerhouse that she is.

So this got me thinking: wouldn't mind control or possession therefore handicap Diana? If her mind and body aren't as one, she is only fighting at a fraction of her potential.

Benefits:
- It partially explains why, whenever we get one of the tedious "heroes get possessed or mind controlled to fight each other" stories, Diana isn't steamrolling anyone she's up against.
- It invalidates Batman's obsessive "fail-safe" plan for her, because a mind controlled Wonder Woman, due to being controlled at all, isn't fighting at full power/skill and therefore easier to subdue. In other words, she is her own fail-safe.

I also just like the idea that Diana's great power is her mastery of her mind and body.


Just thinking out loud. Thoughts?

Good question. Let's look at some different types of mind-control:

1) Perception-altering/illusions like Aizen from Bleach. For example making WW 'think' she's fighting Darkseid while she's actually trouncing Batman. In that case no she wouldn't be weakened/handicapped at all since her free will isn't effected.

2) Possession, like say Marvel's Shadow King or direct control like Skeletor using the Mind Lens (The New Adventures of He-Man). In either of those cases yes, WW would be weakened because someone else is in the driver's seat.

3) Indirect control/mesmerism, like many versions of Dracula. Basically he makes the target obey his commands but they have enough autonomy that they don't need him to dictate their every action. He can say for example "go to the museum, steal this amulet and bring it to me" then let the target get on with it while he's off dong something else. In that case WW would still be weakened, since mind and body aren't fully in-sync, but not as seriously as with type 2.

Personally though I'm of the belief that possessed/mind-controlled heroes are always handicapped to some degree because they're going to be resisting the possession/mind-control, even on a purely subconscious level.