LADY MASTERMIND & MASTERMIND II

 

LADY MASTERMIND & MASTERMIND II

Real Names: Regan Wyngarde (Lady Mastermind) & Martinique Jason (Mastermind II)

First Appearances: X-Treme X-Men (Vol. 1) #6, December 2001 (Regan); Gambit/Wolverine: Victims (Vol. 1) #1, September 1995 (Martinique)

Powers: Lady Mastermind (left) and Mastermind II (right) are both mutants and paternal half-sisters. They're the daughters of Jason Wyngarde, the mutant illusionist known as Mastermind. They both possess the same mutant power with the same area of skill: Telepathy with a specialization in illusion casting.

They're capable of probing the minds of other people and interacting with them on an astral plane. They can force various kinds of afflictions onto other minds, such as pain, unconsciousness, catatonia, nightmares, infantile regression, etc. Their ability to stimulate responses such as these combines with their illusions to make them seem more real. They can use their powers to appear invisible, disguise their physical appearance and those of other people, or the entire landscape. They can create interactive illusions which completely redefine how someone sees and interacts with their surroundings.

Their telepathy also enables them to condition people so that they don't question the sudden appearances or changes in circumstances caused by their power, even if they seem so fantastic that someone would logically recognize them as not real (especially someone aware of who they're facing). They can also sense other forms of illusion-casting and disperse them, either to their senses or to those of others. Their minds are also innately and highly resistant to hypnosis and other forms of outside suggestion.

MASTERMIND

 

MASTERMIND

Real Name: Jason Wyngarde

First Appearance: The Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 1) #4, March 1964

Powers: Mastermind possesses the mutant ability to create hypnotic illusions capable of affecting the senses of sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste. Already cunning at psychological manipulation, he can create illusory people or objects that appear completely indistinguishable from the real thing, or alter the appearance of existing reality. The illusions he creates look, sound, and even smell and feel real to others. Even if someone knows a wall is an illusion, they normally cannot pass through it because their senses refuse to accept it isn't real. Mastermind can alter his physical appearance to look like someone else, or make himself invisible by casting an illusion that he's part of the background. He can project false environments over the existing surroundings, creating the appearance of a time-shift or a Hell dimension that seems totally real. Mastermind can even seemingly alter the appearance of nearby events, altering what his victims believe someone else is saying or doing in their presence.

His projections can be experienced by everyone in their vicinity and could not affect simply one mind without the use of artificial aids. While working for the Hellfire Club, he was given a mind-tap device that enabled him to project his illusions directly into Phoenix's mind, increasing the vividness and realism of his illusions. He could also monitor and track her thought patterns from a distance using the mind-tap.