Marston's Lie Detector in Super-Mystery Comics #2, at Auction

Posted in: Comics, Heritage Sponsored, Vintage Paper | Tagged: Ace Periodicals, Harry Lucey, william moulton marston

Marston's Lie Detector in Super-Mystery Comics #2, at Auction

The year before William Moulton Marston and H. G. Peter introduced Wonder Woman in All-Star Comics #8, Super-Mystery Comics #2 featured his previous claim to fame.

Published Thu, 05 Nov 2026 08:27:09 -0600
by Mark Seifert
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Article Summary

• Before Wonder Woman, William Moulton Marston appeared in Super-Mystery Comics #2 via a feature on his lie detector test.
• The issue explains Marston's deception test, his 1917 blood pressure study, and the 1923 Frye ruling against it.
• Harry Lucey drew the cover and lead Magno story, with the Blue Spark using an electrical ray to control Ann Borden.
• A scarce early Ace Periodicals comic, Super-Mystery Comics #2 has just 17 Universal CGC copies recorded on the census.

Before William Moulton Marston and artist H. G. Peter introduced Wonder Woman in All-Star Comics #8 in 1941, readers of Ace's Super-Mystery Comics #2 could find Marston's name on the inside front cover. On a page about the history of lie detector tests, you'll see a description of what Marston was best known for at that time. This August 1940 issue calls what he's undergoing the Marston deception test, and as the description explains, a question that catches a suspect off guard may send his blood pressure sharply down before it rises even higher again.

The Marston Deception Test in Super-Mystery Comics

The inside front cover feature, "The Lie Detector and How Suspects Were Treated in Earlier Times," makes Marston's testing process the focus of the page and also includes historical attempts to determine whether a suspect was telling the truth. Marston had published his study of systolic blood pressure and deception in 1917. Whether this test belonged in a courtroom was another matter. In Frye v. United States in 1923, the appeals court upheld the exclusion of testimony about the test because the method had not gained sufficient scientific acceptance. Marston continued to publicly argue for its acceptance, as in his 1938 book The Lie Detector Test.

Elsewhere in this issue, the lead feature is a Magno adventure drawn by Harry Lucey, who also drew the cover. The villain, the Blue Spark, is able to keep Ann Borden from telling the truth here, using his electrical ray to prevent Magno and her from warning a train about a potentially fatal trap. Magno fights through it, but the Blue Spark and his minions are able to control Ann with their device. They attempt to use her to help rob a bank next, but Magno finally breaks the villain's hold on Ann.

Like most early Ace Periodicals comics, this is not an easy issue to get. Of the 17 Universal copies on the CGC census, there are only six graded higher than this CGC 5.0. For Harry Lucey's Magno and a look at the work that made Marston's name before Wonder Woman, there's a Super-Mystery Comics #2 (Ace, 1940) CGC VG/FN 5.0 with off-white pages up for auction at the November 5, 2026 Golden Age Century Comics Showcase Auction VI #40378.

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