Cool Mask - Television Tropes & Idioms

Ran Fan and Fuu from Full Metal Alchemist wear masks, and they're elite bodyguards of a prince. Ran Fan in particular seems to feel insecure without her mask on.
Several of the cast of Naruto (most notably Kakashi)
- Of course, he gets bonus points. What's under his mask? Another mask!
Arshes Nei in Bastard!!
Vampire Hunter D.
Pizza the Zonderian from Gao Gai Gar.
- By extension, Sixth Ranger Soldat J. When he gets purified and makes his Heel Face Turn, his mecha ends up being at least three times the size of the biggest Yuusha Robos.
Char Aznable and his imitators from the various Gundams.
- As well as that Darth Vader wannabe from the F91 movie.
- Bask Om from Zeta Gundam (and a minor role in Gundam0083) is the "tiny little glasses" version of this. Well, goggles, really. He happens to be one of the highest ranked officers in the entire Federation/Titan force, and one mean bastard in general.
Larva from Vampire Princess Miyu.
Cain from Tenchi Muyo! In Love, and Katsuhito Masaki/Youshou in Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki.
Chichiri in Fushigi Yuugi.
Zelgadis from Slayers.
- Xellos from Slayers NEXT and Slayers TRY makes his Cool Mask through habitually keeping his eyes closed or hidden behind his hair (not to be confused with Hidden Eyes).
- In the first Slayers anime season, a Mazoku named "Tiiba" looks like a cute humanoid rooster in a waistcoat at first. Then he manages to slip away and find a mask into which most of his power was sealed, transforming him into a giant humanoid hawk-thing when he melds it into his face. Also another trope, but this troper doesn't recall what.
The Zeiram's (from the Zeiram films and Iria: Zeiram the Animation) only visible face is a three-inch thing on a long prehensile neck, but it resembles a Kabuki mask, so it might count.
When Fubuki in Yu-Gi-Oh GX, suffering from Jekyll-and-Hyde Syndrome, succumbs to his powerful but evil dark side, it is symbolized by such a mask appearing on his face from nowhere except a cloud of black smoke.
The mysterious masked man in the second season of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha. He could take the full brunt of Nanoha's attack without being fazed and routinely made short work of anyone he attacked.
San from Princess Mononoke. Her mask is so badass that it let her shrug off a nearly point-blank gunshot to the face (Okay, so it shatters at that point, but it gets better.)
Racer X from Speed Racer.
Turkey in Axis Powers Hetalia, though he loses his mask during/before the Christmas Episode.
Paul Wan from Get Backers, though only in the manga. While he wears sunglasses in both the anime and manga without ever taking them off and giving people the image of a cafe owner, in the manga, it is discovered that the sunglasses are not opaque at all, and that he relies on his sixth sense instead of actually seeing. When he decides to take off the sunglasses in the last arc of the Get Backers manga, he is revealed to be VERY high on the power scale, capable of generating razor-sharp winds and cutting through his opponents just by MOVING.
Otohime Mutsumi from Love Hina appears to become a lot less ditzy, although she still affects a facade of ditziness, after she acquires a pair of these glasses (and a wardrobe change). This happens approximately in volume 12.
Sara Gallagher, one of the Five Pillars from Mai-Otome, sports a Meister Robe that gives her a decidedly Zorro-like appearance, complete with a black mask, black cape, and black form-fitting tights.
In One Piece, after Usopp leaves the crew, he comes back under the alias 'Sogeking', with a mask and cape, and a metric tonne more badassery than he had before. In the arc after that, he puts on the mask again during a battle and suddenly becomes much more competent.
The titular heroine of Kekko Kamen wears a red mask to conceal her face when she's out protecting her innocent classmates from evil. And that's about all she's concealing, seeing as the rest of the costume consists of gloves and boots... and nothing more.
Kekko Kamen: Nobody knows my face, but everyone knows my body...
Subverted to the extreme in Ultimate!! Hentai Kamen, where the main character's true fighting potential is unlocked by wearing a pair of panties over his face. It doesn't help that he takes to fighting crime in only his underwear... and somebody else's.
- Hentai Kamen gains new powers based on who's panties he is wearing: he gained amazing speed and agility when he put on a ballerina's panties... Not even going to say it... dammit.
Lelouch Lamperouge, as Zero, in Code Geass. However, he's less likely to beat you up himself than to have his minions do it for him.
Despariah, the Big Bad of Yes! Precure 5, wears full kabuki makeup to the point that her expressions are completely unreadable.
- Later revealed to be an actual mask that shatters to reveal her true face when it's time for her to play Final Boss.
Hakuoro of Utawarerumono, as seen above. Not even he knows what he looks like without the mask, so you know he means business. In fact, the scientists who originally recovered and studied him even found a way to improve their health and longevity by donning duplicates of his mask... until he smote them.
Mask de Smith from Killer7 is a luchadore who has the most powerful weapon (dual grenade launchers) and largest health bar of any playable character in the game. He's physically strong enough to lift a semi-trailer truck. Near the end of the game, he receives an upgrade in the form of a new mask and costume that lets him fire infinite grenades without ever having to reload.
- In fact, luchadores period.
- Also, his ultimate upgrade not only makes him damn near invincible, but almost as terrifying as the monsters he's slaughtering with said infinite grenades
Kogarashi from Kamen No Maid Guy. He's got super strength, super smarts, is a master of disguise - and wears a mask at all times.
Persona from Gakuen Alice.
- Could be argued that it's not his choice. The mask is what keeps his Alice in control. Otherwise it would eat his own skin off. Still a Cool Mask though.
Hei from Darker Than Black. His mask looks like a cross between V's and Jigsaw's and is kind of freaky.
Papillion Mask from Busou Renkin may be the only homunculus to wear a large face mask, depending on whether or not Moon Face's actual head is shaped like the moon. And Papillion Mask is probably the strongest, smartest, and most ambitious 'normal' human homunculus in the series.
Kurei from Flame Of Recca. In nearly all of his appearances he is wearing his mask, or renditions of it. Which is a very badass mask too.
The Jester from Grenadier.
Everyone in Dorohedoro, pretty much justified since mages get masks as part of their contract with daemons, and Cayman presumably does not want to scare off little children looking at his face. En is a particular bad case of this, even among a city of powermasked people.
Samurai Seven top villain Ukyou seems to be this, although it's possible that what looks like a variation of the same full-face makeup the city guards wear is actually his face. His brothers?/fellow clones? have the same look when they turn up, but they were disguised as him to serve as body doubles at the time. Their father?/original version? The Emperor has a face that resembles this and is much more mask-like; if it didn't have expressions and he weren't restricted for unexplained reasons to a life-support tank all his life you could presume it was a mask. All in all, very bizarre, but ups the badass considerably.
- Same show has the Shikimoribito, who all wear fullbody suits and bizarre masks through which they eat with straws, and who have the government and everyone else terrified of trespassing on their underground territory, where they dangle by their ankles on ropes from the ceiling in a disquieting way. The main characters can beat them up if they have to, though.
In Digimon, any 'mon who has a sufficiently humanoid appearance (I.E. could be confused for an actual human if not for a few tells) wears some sort of mask that obscures the top half of their face - for example, Angemon, Piedmon, Devimon, Myotismon, etc.
The titular character of Ergo Proxy.
In the Pokemon manga, Mask of Ice's takeover of Team Rocket leads to all the grunts wearing masks and making them naturally more badass. Not to mention said Mask of Ice himself, who is pretty much the primary driver for bad stuff happening in about half of the entire series.
Kenichi The Mightiest Disciple has "Laughing Fist" Diego, the Yami Luchadore master, who, of course, wears a Mexican Wrestling mask. ( He actually wears 3 masks, when the first comes off, it means he's serious. The second comes off after he's defeated, and the mask he wears under that one is just a joke.)
General Cross Marian of D.Gray-man is never seen without his opera style half-mask. But when he mysteriously disappears after sustaining a supposedly fatal head wound, his mask had been shot off and is left behind.
- Also General Winters Sokaro. And once he gets better-attuned to his Innocence, Allen.
How has Sailor Moon not been mentioned yet?! He's called Tuxedo Mask◊ for a reason. Sailor V also wears a half-mask.
Noein, the titular Big Bad of Noein, appears as a floating mask for most of the series. It makes it harder to tell that he's an alternate-reality version of one of the male leads.

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Boy Blue from Fables when he's infiltrating the Homelands, in a clear The Princess Bride homage down to the near-identical bandana-mask. Admittedly, he doesn't wear it for most of the series, but the magical artifacts he carries at the time and from that point onward make him pretty damn powerful.
The Anti Hero in V for Vendetta wears a Guy Fawkes mask. In the movie, the mask is such a powerful symbol, it overshadows the hero himself up to a point where it's hard to tell who's wearing whom.
Pretty much most (if not all) superheroes, but the current Batgirl takes this to the logical extreme; her mask is skin-tight, designed to cover her entire skull, and really about the last thing you'd want to meet in a dark alley◊. (Let's not even get into the pointy ears.)
- On the other hand, it's exactly the kind of thing you want to see in certain nightclubs.
The Corinthian from Sandman has these as well, although it's justified in that he needs to hide his eyes because he has little mouths instead, complete with Nightmare Fuel teeth. (Although he still manages to see...)
- He's a genuine nightmare. He is not bound by logic.
Judge Dredd (and the other judges).
The graphic novel Fall Of Cthulhu features a being called the Masked Mute, who is somehow related to Nyarlathotep (often referred as the god with a thousand masks) and takes the form of a little girl wearing a mask. You don't want to know what's behind that mask...
Rorschach from Watchmen only feels like himself when he's wearing his mask, even referring to it as his face. This sort of overlaps with Becoming The Mask, though.
In Kabuki, all eight Noh agents wear painted porcelain masks when "in character".
In Jon Sable Freelance, Sable wears a black makeup design on his face because "it scares the hell out of the bad guys".

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The Man in Black from The Princess Bride (see page quote). He never actually wins a fight on his own without his mask.
- Except for his "To The Pain" moment at the end of the movie.
  - He was bluffing there, though.
  - He never actually fights after losing his mask, given that he's taken prisoner without a fight, then dies, and then spends the rest of the movie barely able to stand at best. So Yeah.
Darth Vader.
- Dies when he takes it off...
- Don't forget Darth Revan of Knights Of The Old Republic, who is stated to be one of if not the most powerful Force user in history, masterminds elaborate Xanatos Gambits for dealing with events centuries if not millennia in advance, and of course who also happens to be you.
  - And then there's Darth Nihilus from the sequel, whose mask can be obtained to get you more Force Points, and who is coincidentally extremely close to being an Eldritch Abomination. Quite a few Sith from those games have part or all of their faces obscured, actually.
- Subverted in that Vader is actually proven to be weakened after his transition into the mask as he can no longer cast Force Lightning because of his mechanical limbs. He is, however, much more intimidating and serious in a mask.
  - Then played straight in that he's possibly the only Jedi ever to wield their lightsaber so effectively with just one hand (outside of Episodes 4-6). He's also insanely good with his little Force Grip trick. He's a half-robotic horror that can choke-hold you from 50 feet, then slowly walk up to you with that horrible breathing he has...
What, no Predator? After all, his mask features (at least) IR vision, EM vision, "preda-tech" vision, optic zoom, breathing mask and a targeting module for the Plasma Caster. I'd buy that for a dollar!
No love for Optimus Prime? A metal plate folds out over his mouth when he preps for combat.
As a part of his Historical Hero Upgrade, King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem (Edward Norton) got a pretty spiffy metal mask in the Kingdom of Heaven movie to cover his leposy-stricken face.
How have we not mentioned Robo Cop yet? He's the future of law enforcement!

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How about some actual HP Lovecraft examples? Some I can think of:
- The High Priest Who Is Not To Be Described in Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath wears a mask.
- The horrible worm-monster-horrors masquerading as people in "The Festival" wear waxen masks.
- The entity masquerading as Henry Akeley in The Whisperer in Darkness is a powerful being and may even be Nyarlathotep manifest.
  - Apparently the way its way of speech was described pretty much gave away it was just an ordinary Mi-Go. With prosthetic hands, mask, blanket and the place being pitch-ass dark, it could pass for a sick old man, though.
In Terry Pratchett's Maskerade, a takeoff of The Phantom Of The Opera, the Opera Ghost is actually a pitiably clumsy, shy, and just plain weird janitor who becomes ultra-coordinated and suave when he wears a mask, through the magic of Magic Feather.
- Let's not forget The Phantom Of The Opera himself.
Zorro, who seems to have been one of the earliest practitioners, if not the Trope Maker himself.
In Vampirates, the captain of the title creatures' ship wears a mask, as the Expository Theme Tune says, "to curtail your fright".

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Comes up on occasion, especially Mexican lucha libre - major lucha libre feuds can culminate in a "mask vs mask" match, where the loser is required to publicly unmask themselves and have their real name revealed.
Subverted/Played Straight with Kane. In a 2003 angle, Kane was forced to unmask, leading to some major Character Derailment and Badass Decay. When he first unmasked, he went back to being the Monster Heel he was at his debut; however, after a sucktacular match with the Undertaker, he quickly became involved in some pretty idiotic storylines.

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Ethergaunts from Dungeons And Dragons. They are a race of (evil) alien supergeniuses dwelling on the ethereal plane whose faces are entirely covered by bsected masks, with the color of said masks indicating their rank. Of special note are the black ethergaunts, which are some of the most intelligent monsters out there, and cast spells as a 17th-level wizard.

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At least half of the appeal in Bionicle. Despite years of similar builds in the toys, there is always a new set of masks with each set of toys. In Universe they grant a ton of powers, to name a few: shielding, flight, x-ray vision, accuracy, invisibility, teleportation, even altering probablity. (But note that the series has been ReTooled a bit away from this, now including other headgear without powers.)

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Mr. Karate from Art Of Fighting. He acts goofy and jovial and frequently plugs his dojo when talking to others, and his kids treat him as something of an embarassment. He still is quite dangerous in a fight despite his age and mannerisms.
El Blaze from Virtua Fighter.
King Dedede in the Kirby Super Star Ultra game "Revenge of the King". Fed up with being defeated by Kirby so many times, he comes back wearing a steel mask and a badass new hammer three times the size and weight of his old one.
- Metaknight wears a mask almost all the time. The only times his face is revealed is when he's defeated and his mask breaks.
Wodan Ymir of Super Robot Wars, what with his "BFS" which can become a giant "Laser Blade".
Godot from the Ace Attorney games.
- Also Masque*De Masque, who is a charismatic Gentleman Thief compared to his alter ego, the nervous Ron De Lite
Proto Man from both Mega Man Classic and Mega Man Battle Network.
All four of the Testaments from Xenosaga.
Sturm from the Advance Wars series.
Prinny Mask and the whole Masked Hero class in general from Disgaea 3.
Salem and Rios of Army Of Two both wear metal metal painted facemasks, which actually have some practical applications in the game; one of their melee attacks is a simple, brutally effective headbutt, and if an opponent punches one of them in the face, he recoils, shaking his hand in agony, letting them set up to finish them off.
Labtech X has always been one of The Faceless, but when he traded in his old Scarf Of Ass Kicking to one with a full mask... well there's a reason his scarf is one of the most valuable prizes you can win from playing zOMG. (By the way, X actually has a reason for hiding his face, since he's a clone, and hates the man who created him.
A whole folder for video game characters and no love for Psycho Mantis from the MGS games? Even if he's a villain, you can't top that gas mask.
Aoi "Zaki" Himezaki of Project Justice is almost always seen wearing a mask covering the lower half of her face. The supplemental board game reveals that she even refuses to eat in the presence of others since it'd require taking off her mask. A number of members in the Ladies Team, the delinquent gang she leads, also wear similar◊ masks◊, though whether they're following Zaki's example or just doing it for some other reason isn't clear.

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"Doctor Horrible is here/To make you quake with fear/To make the whole world kneel/And I won't feel....a thing."

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Tarvek Sturmvoraus from Girl Genius, in the Chessmaster Mad Scientist sense; a Bad Ass he is not. They keep falling off when he gets hit, possibly because they don't have earpieces.
Dave of Narbonic fame, begins with apparently opaque round glasses. But, as he realizes his mad science abilities, his glasses turn transparent.
Eternion and the rest of the Eternals in Adventurers!

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Robin in Teen Titans. Even if this is potentially an artifact of the comics, it was acknowledged in-show as looking cool. (Beast Boy's Doom Patrol mask, sadly, was not.) Similarly, archnemesis Slade wears a mask, and for most of the first season concealed even that in shadow. Slade's mask is also an Eyepatch Of Power.
- Red X wears a full-face mask, and he can fight Robin blow-for-blow.
80's cartoon MASK also had (almost) everyone in masks, which produced a variety of powers and effects, including Gliding, Holograms and Flamethrowers.
- And throwing daggers.
The Blue Spirit in Avatar The Last Airbender, even without being able to bend the elements. When Zuko takes the mask off, he seems to become noticeably less successful.
- In his defense with his mask off, he's only firebending, something he knows, but never came easy to him. However, in the fight against Jet in Ba Sing Se, he's still being a badass swordsman, and did anyone else see his little bit of firebending WITH the swordfight? Also, Zuko's firebending skills are much greater after his visit with the dragons.
- Also it was probably psychological. The Blue Spirit didn't have Zuko's emotional baggage.
- This may also apply to Avatar's Kyoshi Warriors. While their facepaint doesn't give them any special powers (Suki and the others are just about as deadly without it), they use it to remind themselves of their connection to Avatar Kyoshi, and it is definitely a symbol of being at the top end of their power scale.
What of Optimus Prime's Mouthplate?
How about Dirge from The Clone Wars?

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In real life, trained Gold eagles wear masks when they aren't being used. Their wing span can easily reach 8 to 9 feet at age and their claws can rip through falconers gloves and keep going to crush bones.
Shamans of various traditions and cultures the world over wear masks of animals or spirits in ceremonies in order to assume the aspects, powers and identities associated with the animal or spirit.
Hip hop dance crew Jabbawockeez wear creepy, blank masks to give the illusion that they are a bunch of puppets moving to the music. They're masked heroes! Like Rorschach.
Since Jacques Plante introduced the goaltender mask to ice hockey, wearers of such equipment have taken to personalizing their masks, giving each golatender in the National Hockey League their own Cool Mask. Starting with Gerry Cheever's scars◊ for every time he was hit in the mask with a puck, art has evolved with motifs such as Evgeni Nabokov's◊ skeletons, Curtis Joseph's◊ painting of Cujo from the novel of the same name, and Kari Lehtonen's paintings of Yuna and Rikku from Final Fantasy X 2.

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Vash the Stampede from Trigun
Kagato from Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki
Lobelia Carlini from Sakura Taisen III
Negi Springfield from Mahou Sensei Negima!
- It should be noted that whenever he activates his Black Magic, his glasses get blown off his face.
Captain Kuro from One Piece
Hellsing subverts this. Alucard is usually at his least powerful while dandied up in his signature hat, suit, and little round glasses. As a combat progresses and Alucard unleashes higher levels of powers, his appearance becomes more feral and otherwordly. This is somewhat justified in the fact that opponents have to knock him around first before he increases his power level.
Gendo Ikari from Neon Genesis Evangelion wears little round scary shiny glasses, and while he may or may not be physically formidable, he's a megalomaniacal mad genius and absolutely ruthless, as well as having large numbers of security goons and assassins at his beck and call, not to mention that he commands a force of Humongous Mecha; he is definitely not a man to be trifled with.

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Ozzy Osbourne.
- who was just imitating John Lennon.
- also Deep Purple drummer Ian Paice.

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~~Elzam von Branstein~~ Ratsel Feinschmeker of Super Robot Wars.

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Jeremy of Petopeto-san also wears one, with a heart on it, and is fairly pathetic.
Arguably, Tuxedo Mask from Sailor Moon. In the manga, at least, he has some pretty hefty informed abilities and some extra powers. Still gets pwned.
Wannabe Super Hero Strike Man, from Youre Under Arrest
Done in Hayate The Combat Butler (in a Shout Out to Sailor Moon), where Nagi dons a small face-mask and takes on the name "Mask the Money" when she rescues Hayate from the ~~Yakuza~~ very nice people looking to collect on his debt. She takes Crimefighting With Cash very literally.

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WWE Wrestler Charlie Haas tries to gain a Cool Mask through putting on a Luchadore Mask during his matches. Most of the times it doesn't work.

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Inversion : In the Legend of the Five Rings universe, the whole of the Scorpion Clan (one of the 7 major factions) wear masks of one sort of the other. It doesn't give them any kind of power whatsoever, though. In fact, all it does is make them look shifty. Which is the whole point, as the basis for the Clan is that they are good guys pretending to be bad guys to ferret out the bad guys within the ranks of the other good guys. Or are they ? Of course, only they know that, all the other Clans think they're just Manipulative Bastards being really obvious about it. Obviously, it's all Xanatos Roulettes from that point on, sometimes bordering on downright Xanatos Wank.

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Johnny Sasaki (who wears a mask, of course) spends most of the Metal Gear Solid series as a diarrhea-plagued Butt Monkey who can't go 5 seconds without making a fool of himself. Once that mask comes off in the later part of the 4th game, however, he evolves into a Bad Ass of such magnitude that one can't help but wonder if that mask was some kind of Power Limiter.
The narcissistic Vega of Street Fighter wears a mask to protect his face. Considering how easily it's broken in his loss images, his face must be made of solid steel to hold up that well.
Before the director of GEAR Fighter Dendoh went on to direct Gundam SEED, he was already referencing that franchises masked characters with a masked mentor (Vega) and masked rival (Altair).

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Strong Bad, of the website Homestar Runner, who has a Mexican masked wrestler's mask for a face. He's more a wannabe supervillain than anything.
- When he finally takes it off, it's apparently very painful.
Joachim in Shadow Hearts: Covenant actually actively parodies this with his Grand Papillion identity—in which he wears a large butterfly mask, but rather than magnifying his powers, it magnifies his tendency towards over-the-top posing and silly heroic pronouncements.
Every member of the Chess Pieces in MÄR wears a unique mask. In fact, masks are quite telling of a Chess Piece's power, as the lowest ranked Mooks, "pawns" are only allowed identical masks, the same as every other pawn. If a Chess Piece has a unique mask, you're dealing with something a bit more worrisome.
- Their rank is also identified by their earrings, which ARE chess pieces.
Blood Boy from Survival Of The Fittest both uses and subverts the trope. Due to hideous facial disfigurations (and REMOVING the skin of his face in one of the game's first posts) he almost always wears a smiley face mask, and was until recently the biggest killer on the island, and is still the most psychotic and sadistic. While lacking physical strength, his surprising agility and knowledge of the body's weak points make him a very capable hand to hand combatant, and his sharp mind makes him even more dangerous. However, this ability doesn't actually come from the mask itself, and he can't see nearly as well with it on. This hinders his combat abilities and actually makes him a worse shot than normal, which inspires his normal gunfighting style of just trying to put as much lead in the air as possible because it means he can really only hope to hit someone at greater than point blank range by firing an insane number of bullets.
Utterly subverted in Adventurers!.
Shows up many, many times in The Fall (and even on the cover of the DVD!).

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