Pre-Crisis The lasso was formed from
Aphrodite's
girdle, which made it indestructible, and its magical properties were granted by the Goddess herself. The powers forced whoever was bound within it to obey the commands of whoever held the other end. This effect could be used on larger groups of people, although this reduced its efficiency. In addition to being unbreakable, the lasso was also infinitely elastic. Diana coated it in special Amazon chemicals that allowed it to transform her civilian clothes into Wonder Woman's garb. Diana demonstrated a remarkable level of skill with the lasso, performing such feats as twirling it to create air currents (upon which she could float) and spinning it to emit magic-disrupting frequencies. It is so strong that not even Hercules can break it. It is given to Diana after Hippolyta consults the Goddesses. Originally the lasso was given to Wonder Woman when she returned to Paradise Island. William Moulton Marston later
retconned the origin story in
Wonder Woman #1 (June 1942), in which it is shown that her mother gave it to her after Diana won a tournament on Paradise Island, before she left the island for the United States. Empowered by the fires of
Hestia, the lasso forces anyone held by it to tell the absolute truth. It has easily held beings with tremendous superhuman strength such as
Superman,
Captain Marvel, who has the strength of
Hercules and the Power of
Zeus, and
Power Girl, as well as gods such as Ares and Heracles. In several Pre-Crisis stories, it was even capable of binding Wonder Woman herself on the occasions she was caught, sometimes by Gunther. It is shown that Wonder Woman still has her powers even if bound by the lasso. The only times it has ever been shown to break was when truth itself was challenged. For example, in
JLA the lasso broke when she refused to believe the confession it wrought from
Rama Khan. The fairy tale villainess,
Queen of Fables, who has the power to bring any fictional or non-true character to life, and is herself "fictional", had power over the lasso by bringing fictional characters to life and having her minions break it. The magic lasso has subsequently been shown to produce a wide array of effects. When battling the entity
Decay, Wonder Woman used the lasso's link to
Gaia, the goddess of the earth, as a circuit between the earth and the monster, pumping the entity of death with life-giving energies that destroyed the creature. Diana herself stated that the lasso's connection to Gaea also constantly renews its user with these energies. Wonder Woman has also used it to create a ring of protective fire around people to protect them from
Circe's bestiamorphs. The lasso's energies are also shown to be capable of destroying beings forcibly resurrected by the rings of the
Black Lantern Corps. As the goddess of truth, Diana also used it to take memories of
Donna Troy and restore her to life. In Pre-Crisis comics, the lasso also had the power to effectively control those who were bound within it. In the mini-comic enclosed with the release of the Kenner Super Powers figure of Wonder Woman, the Amazing Amazon ensnares a mind-controlled Superman with her lasso, preventing him from destroying the Washington Monument. Superman is unable to resist the powers of the lasso as Wonder Woman renders him unconscious. Later, Wonder Woman uses her lasso on Brainiac and commands the villain to release Superman from his mind control. In later post-
Crisis comics, the power of truth was written as innate to Wonder Woman herself, with the lasso merely a focus of that power. A storyline in the
Morrison-era JLA comics by
Joe Kelly depicted the lasso as an
archetypal manifestation of universal truth, and, once broken (like when Wonder Woman doubted the truth that it was revealing to her because she did not like it), disrupted the underlying truth of reality itself. With the lasso broken, reality came to be dictated by whatever people believed to be the case, starting with older beliefs and extending to beliefs that were held by various individuals in the present. This resulted in Earth becoming the center of the universe for two weeks, Earth becoming flat for several hours, the moon turning into cheese for a time,
Kyle Rayner assuming a
Hal Jordan-like appearance (many people still saw Hal as 'the' Green Lantern), and
Batman fading in and out of existence due to his 'urban legend' status (meaning that people were not sure if he even existed). This allegorical interpretation is often ignored in later stories and by much of
fandom, as the lasso was long established as magically unable to break, and was never before stated to be the ultimate representation of truth. During her adventures with the
Justice League team of superheroes, Diana battled a villain named
Amazo who was able to duplicate aspects of the lasso for his own use. During her tenure as writer for Wonder Woman,
Gail Simone has further explored the nature of the Lasso of Truth, describing it as "a deadly weapon, that not only binds you, and follows its mistress' commands, the damned thing can see into your soul". This lasso is not to be confused with the lasso of the current Wonder Girl,
Cassie Sandsmark. This lasso, given to her by Ares, has the power to shock a target with
Zeus' lightning if Cassandra ropes her target. Despite Wonder Woman's lasso being mystical in origin, in
Bruce Wayne: The Road Home, Batman apparently has reverse-engineered the Amazo technology, which aids duplicating the lasso's capabilities artificially. During
Endgame, when the
Joker uses a toxin to turn the Justice League against Batman, Batman is able to immobilise Diana using the 'bind of veils', essentially a Lasso of Lies that was woven by
Hephaestus after he created the original Lasso by inverting the original weave. Allegedly created using the wool from the sheep used by
Odysseus and his men to escape the blind cyclops, it took Batman two years to acquire on the supernatural black market, incorporating it into a suit of armor specifically designed to stand up to the Justice League, with the bind of veils trapping Diana in an illusion where she has killed Batman. In the
Elseworlds tale
Superman: Red Son, Wonder Woman was subdued and restrained in her own lasso by the Soviet terrorist incarnation of Batman. In order to free herself and rescue Superman from
Lex Luthor's deadly red sun lamps, Wonder Woman snapped the cords of her "indestructible" lasso. The shock of the incident appeared to age Diana, leaving her grey-haired, frail, and unable to speak. In the series
Absolute Wonder Woman, set in the alternate
Alpha-World, Diana has three magic lassos, made and enchanted by her adoptive mother
Circe. These lassos have very different attributes and functions than the mainline counterpart: the first, named "
Nemesis", is a red lasso that burns its target in proportion to their sins. The second, "
Θυσία" or "Sacrifice", is green, and transforms the mind and body of its target, such as when Diana used it on herself to transform into Medusa. The third, named "Troika", is blue. It's capabilities have not yet been revealed. == In other media ==