Being a superhero is pretty much a full-time job, but not everyone has the luxury of having a massive fortune to fall back on to pay their rent and the salary of their live-in butlers. Even if money isn't a huge concern, some heroes have to maintain a seemingly ordinary public persona to keep people from guessing that they're actually a super-powered alien when they take off their glasses and unbutton their work shirt.
Here, we celebrate ten of them—superheroes from all corners of the DC Universe who have, at one point or another, held down a day job. Whether they were a good coworker or the kind of person who takes the last cup of coffee without brewing a new pot, we’ll leave up to you.
1) Superman: Reporter
Of course we have to kick things off here, with what is easily the most famous case of an alter-ego day job of all time. Mild mannered Clark Kent is a reporter at the Daily Planet, where he does his best to hit his deadlines, work under his demanding boss, and find little windows of time throughout the day to save the world.
2) Hal Jordan: Test Pilot and Mechanic
Sometimes, you've got to give up your career in exchange for superpowers. This is what happened with Hal Jordan, whose job as a test pilot for the military wound up landing him his current gig as a Green Lantern. It's unsurprisingly pretty difficult to continue to maintain a rigorous schedule of flying experimental jets while you're also busy trying to keep the peace in the galaxy, though (to absolutely no one's surprise).
3) Barry Allen: Forensic Scientist
On the opposite end of the spectrum, Barry Allen has stalwartly continued his day job as a forensic scientist even after getting in good with the Speed Force. It turns out having super speed (and the ability to literally zip through time if the situation is dire enough) is actually pretty advantageous to solving mysteries. That is, unless the use of those powers also causes the complete collapse of the multiverse.
4) Deadman and Nightwing: Circus Performers
Not everyone had the sort of job you'd go to school or get a degree for. Boston Brand and Dick Grayson were both members of traveling circuses where they'd perform trapeze skills. For Boston, this meant certain death for him. (Don't worry, he got better. Kind of.) For Dick, this meant the certain death of his family. The moral of the story is that maybe the circus isn't a great career path if you happen to exist within a comic book.
5) Blue Devil: Stuntman
Daniel Cassidy has had a few complicated twists and turns in his story, but we can't lose sight of the way he got his start—as a stunt man and special effects make-up specialist in Hollywood. In his original origin story, the Blue Devil persona was a complicated and super advanced prosthetic suit he created for a movie called…well, Blue Devil. But during filming he got cursed by a literal devil and transformed into a monster as the suit permanently bonded to him. Don't you just hate it when that happens?
6) Mister Miracle: Escape Artist
Continuing the theme of performance artists, we also can't forget Mister Miracle. Scott Free may have been raised in the alternate world of Apokolips where he was tortured relentlessly by Darkseid, but upon finally escaping to freedom, Scott decided to capitalize on this extraordinarily specialized skill and become a professional escape artist. Think Houdini, but in a much more vibrant costume.
7) Booster Gold: "Pro" Athlete, Actor
Okay, so Booster never technically went pro in his football career, but he could have, probably, had he not been busted for cheating. But that all worked out in the end because losing his football aspirations actually helped inspire him into his other day job: Being an actor/celebrity. Ironically, this particular idea actually came after he decided to try his hand at being a superhero. Booster used his public exploits as a hero to leverage some brand deals and kickstart his ascent to fame. Listen, we never said he was a role model, just that he held down a job.
8) Martian Manhunter and Nightwing (Again): Police
Both J'onn J'onzz and Dick Grayson spent time working as police on their respective planets. J'onn was a hardboiled detective back on Mars before its destruction and Dick spent time working his way up through the ranks on the Blüdhaven police force. Things did not exactly pan out for either of them, however. J'onn didn’t so much quit as the civilizations of Mars were wiped out. Dick, meanwhile, was unable to keep up the world/life balance of fighting crime both during the day and overnight.
9) Wonder Woman: Nurse, Astronaut, Politician, Museum Employee…and Fast Food Worker?
Wonder Woman's alter-ego Diana Prince is an odd case study in having multiple careers—most of which have little, if anything, to do with one another. We really can't imagine what her resume must look like to make sense of all these skills, but she's gone from being a nurse in the army, to being a politician, a museum docent, a fast food worker (no, we’re not kidding) and even an astronaut. Oh, she was also a spy for some time, but we'd hardly count that as a day job.
10) Kyle Rayner: Freelance Artist
Don't worry, we've got plenty of love for the self-employed here, too. Take Kyle Rayner, for example. Before replacing Hal Jordan as the Green Lantern of sector 2814, Kyle worked as a freelance artist and graphic designer. And even after he gave up the freelancing life to become a Green Lantern full-time, he still kept his creativity flowing—only his ring became his pencils and paints while his constructs blossomed into his art.
Mason Downey writes about comics, movies and superhero history for DC.com. Look for more of his work on GameSpot, IGN and Polygon.
NOTE: The views and opinions expressed in this feature are solely those of Mason Downey and do not necessarily reflect those of DC Entertainment or Warner Bros., nor should they be read as confirmation or denial of future DC plans.
