Secret Identities: My Thoughts

I've seen a number of interviews about plans for the DCU after the OYL gap. (Lots of acronyms there. :-)) And one thing keeps coming back into my mind, from what is said, apparently secret identities are going to become much more important.

I'm not sure what I think about this, to be honest. On one level, I'm happy because Secret Identities allow for a lot of interesting stories centering around the characters in non combat, non heroic settings. And if nothing else, many of the recent DCU plotlines elaborate the downsides of having public, or at least not as private as one would hope, identities.

However, there are certain characters that work very well having no secret identity. Diana for one. She should never, I think, have to hide who she is behind some fake identity. She's the embodiment of truth, she's royalty, she's an ambassador, and even without Themiscyra around, I want to see her remain in that sort of role.

The Green Lanterns, I've always been fine with as they are. Guy and John are publically known (which may be problematic OYL for John...Guy's in space.) Pretty much everyone who knows Kyle Rayner has figured out that he's also a Green Lantern, (dating the green superhero chick that the GL is romantic with in public, answering to the wrong name, and transforming in semi-public places...I love the boy, but honestly, he's a little dim. :-P) I think Hal's secret is causing possibly more potential problems now than if his identity were public. But I can see why he and Kyle, who have stronger surviving family ties, try to keep their identities secret, and why Guy and John don't. "Green Lantern" isn't really a code name after all, it's a job title, and thus it's not necessarily bad to know the man in uniform.

The Bat-clan *need* their identities kept mum. With all those psychotics running around with grudges, no one's safe. In fact, that was the one thing that bothered me about Identity Crisis. Considering how paranoid the Batclan are about their identities, how the hell did everyone and their dog know that Tim Drake was Robin? I mean, the Titans know of course. And the current JLA probably knew...at least the guys who knew Bruce was Batman. But how did Jean Loring find out? I mean DC comics are hard, timeline wise, but I could swear Ray's JL didn't know Batman's identity, and Jean divorced him before Tim Drake ever wore the tights. It was just a little weird.

I always loved the bit in Divided We Fall (thanks Mallet for catching that mistake) when Wally, Kyle and Eel are shocked that Superman *has* a secret identity. As he never wears a mask. It perfectly articulated why I was never bothered by no one connecting Kal-El to Clark Kent. People see what they expect to see. Superman's lack of mask means that no one's really looking too closely to try to figure out who he is. His costume is more eye catching than he is, so it's easy to see why so many probably never got a look at his face. The common person has heard at least of the Fortress of Solitude, and it's only a mild leap to think that Superman actually lives there. Why would Superman pretend to be human?

(Of course we all know that Clark Kent came first and Superman came second, but the average populace just knows he's an alien. It's easy to assume that he just came one day, settled in, and went with the helping people shtick.)

Superman's got a reason to be cautious. He might be nigh-invulnerable, but his parents are not. Other characters though have less to lose.

I don't know. I love seeing heroes in mundane situations, but I'm a little worried that it'll all become a bit cookie cutter again: "Oh no! Character B has almost found out that I'm Superman/Batman/Green Lantern/Wonder Woman/whatever". I don't like Secret Identities for the sake of Secret Identities themselves. And variety always makes things better... Guess I'll just have to wait and see.