Beneath The Mask / Anime & Manga

Times where characters were hiding their true selves Beneath the Mask in Anime and Manga series.

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• Aggretsuko has the idea of social masks as perhaps the major theme of the show. Retsuko is very much of the variety that doesn't want others to see behind her mask but is completely oblivious to the fact that all of her coworkers are wearing masks themselves. Washimi and Gori, two successful businesswomen at the company, play a major role in helping Retsuko both take off her mask around other people and stand up for herself, while at the same time noting how useful masks can be at times and how they can help you get along better with other people. Gori herself wears a mask at work that very much hides her true, much more vivacious self, while Washimi seems to be the most consistent character, without extreme personality shifts between different parts of her life due to her control over it all (though her personality is naturally very suitable for a wide variety of social situations).
• Misa in Asteroid in Love has the public face of a cool and composed Teen Genius/Student Council President. That's mostly hiding the fact that she's actually a math/physics nerd with poor communication skills.
• In Attack on Titan, quite a few characters have built up public masks to hide portions of their true personalities or characters, with some even Becoming the Mask as a result.
  • Krista hides her true insecurities by very purposefully acting as The Pollyanna, something that she's repeatedly called out on by her closest friend, Ymir. Ironically, Ymir herself has built up a very intentional facade pretending to be a jerk to keep others at arm's length and conceal her true kindness.
  • Commanding officers such as Erwin, Pixis, and Levi build up a public persona in order to function in a professional manner. For Erwin and Levi, their cold and unemotional masks keep their very human vulnerabilities hidden from public view, while Pixis often behaves like a foolish old man to hide his true cunning and ruthlessness.
  • Annie hides behind two masks. The first is her cold and aloof demeanor which keeps most people at bay, though Eren and Armin both state that she's a much kinder person than she wants people to realize. When her mask finally does slip away, it's particularly unnerving and tragic at the same time. The second mask is her apathy which conceals a Blood Knight that greatly enjoys fighting and getting to train with her martial arts. This side of Annie is known only to Eren and possibly Zeke Yaeger.
  • Reiner hides his extensive issues beneath a cheerful and reassuring mask, always playing the reliable big brother so that others will feel more confident. Bertolt, his childhood friend, keeps his emotions hidden beneath a soft-spoken and stoic demeanor. When he finally does reveal his emotions and speaks up for himself, it startles everyone — characters and audience alike. Justified, in that both are Titan spies living in deep cover. Reiner's mask hides a ruthless and deeply pessimistic person, while Bertolt's disguises his true kindness in order to cope with his actions.
• Beet the Vandel Buster has Grineed, who actually wears a literal mask (more like an extra outer skin) to keep himself calm and composed, instead of the raging beast that is underneath. Needless to say, Beet and the squad bust it out of him pretty quick.
• Bleach:
  • During the Soul Society arc, Byakuya goes to considerable lengths (like, nearly-letting-his-adopted-sister-get-executed lengths) to maintain the mask of the perfect, stoic Seireitei noble, bound by two conflicting vows that could not be resolved until Ichigo intervened. The end of the arc reveals that he really wants nothing more than to protect Rukia. And while he still puts some importance on keeping up appearances in later arcs, we also get to see a much more three-dimensional underlying personality: a Hot-Blooded Bratty Half-Pint with a Hair-Trigger Temper who learns to keep his cool and grows up to be A Father to His Men. He even discovers he enjoys a fight for the sake of a fight.
  • Ryuuken also has a stoic Proud Elite persona that obscures his gentle, protective, and intensely caring inner self. The unique aspect to Ryuuken's lifelong mask, however, is that he has completely reversed it while maintaining the masquerade. In his teens, as heir to a powerful bloodline, he was expected to behave as an example for all Quincies and tended to disguise his true intentions behind a facade of rigid adherence to tradition. At some point during the last 20 years, this flipped to a facade of completely disowning his family heritage, while still hiding the same softer intentions. Uryuu believes his father to be a hypocritical, intolerant, money-obsessed Dr. Jerk who refuses to use his power and hates his son...a conclusion Ryuuken's actively encouraging. Only Isshin seems to know Ryuuken's true intentions and considers him a trustworthy friend.
• The entire point of Bloom Into You's Show Within a Show I Only Know You is that we don't know what's beneath the masks of the amnesiac protagonist. We see the masks she presented to her family (an aloof big sister), her friends (The Ace), and her lover but never see her real personality, except for bits and pieces, like a kind of flower she likes or what authors she likes to read. In the end she abandons all of her masks from her previous, unremembered life and decides to start anew.
• Blue Exorcist: On the surface, Yukio Okumura is calm, polite, and professional. But inside, he's really a big ball of anger, resentment, and jealousy towards his brother Rin. Beyond that, for most people, he puts up a smiling facade, but to those he is closer to such as his brother and Shura, he shows his true colors of having a rather short fuse and being generally grumpy. Even that is something of a mask, as when Yukio's collected facade falls he tends to play up his temper to match the villain he sees himself as and hide his vulnerable heart. Deep down, he's basically the same as he was when he was young - moody, sensitive, and shy - with a great deal of trauma heaped on top.
• Code Geass plays with this trope. Lelouch Lamperouge is a Brilliant, but Lazy highschool student living in Area 11, a Britannia-occupied territory formerly known as Japan. When we first see him, he's skipping class in order to do some high-stakes gambling. He seems to regard everything with indifference or disdain, and as we get to know him, it becomes clear that he has a strong sense of justice but has come to accept that there's nothing he can do to fix his government's deep-seated corruption and institutionalized racism. Then he gets superpowers. He maintains his Upper-Class Twit facade to avoid suspicion, but secretly becomes Zero, a masked freedom fighter dedicated to dismantling the most powerful government in the world. The series heavily contemplates identity and character and repeatedly addresses the irony that Lelouch needs to put on a literal mask in order to take off his metaphorical one.
  • It should also be mentioned that in his conversations with CC, Lelouch strongly implies that he was planning to overthrow Britannia since he was a child, gaining the Geass simply meant that he could start much earlier and move much quicker than he otherwise would have been able to. As such one can say that his hidden personality was already simmering in the depths of his lazy life before the story kicks in.
  • His father's ultimate plan? To remove all "masks" via an Assimilation Plot.
  • Suzaku Kururugi is the same. When first met, he gives the impression of a Fettered Knight in Shining Armor. But as he's working for The Empire and consistently is hypocritical about how "the means don't justify the ends" despite all he does, it starts becoming clear there is a lot more going on. Turns out he's a Death Seeker and The Atoner due to him having murdered his father - which was covered up as suicide - to stop the do-or-die resistance that would have destroyed Japan. He then manages to get worse. Extra materials reveal that he used to be a brat and when it comes down to it, Suzaku still has that selfish attitude of his child self. This contrasts him with Lelouch who Used to Be a Sweet Kid and deep down is still that gentle, kind person while Suzaku is more self-centred but good hearted in the end.
  • Also happens to be the case with Mao, who we first see as a Wicked Cultured Manipulative Bastard with mind-reading powers. It's only after he Mind Rapes Shirley, beats Lelouch at chess^note he and Schneizel are the only two who consistently do so, and sets up a Batman Gambit to get the two of them to kill each other (which nearly works) that we discover he's really a deeply-hurt Psychopathic Manchild with a very good Freudian Excuse.
• Death Note: An Alternative Character Interpretation for Light Yagami. The Death Note only showed his true colors. And conversely, even in full-blown Kira mode, he still realizes that he cares a lot for his little sister.
• Prince Vegeta of Dragon Ball Z was introduced as an arrogant, selfish, coldhearted man. It was later revealed as he was dying that for most of his life he lived as a slave under Frieza, despite his father having promised him he would grow up to become the legendary Super Saiyan and be the one to put an end to Frieza.
• Seems to be a theme in Durarara!!, where everyone involved, up to and including the district of Ikebukero, has a hidden second side beneath the personalities they show to the world.
• Kobeni's older sister Benio in Engaged to the Unidentified is a model straight-A student at their school, is the Student Council President, and is famous not only for her industriousness at the campus, but for her community work outside of it as well. She has many open admirers among the male and female segments of the student body. However this is a well-constructed facade — at home or with her family, Benio's true personality surfaces: a laid back and outright teasing teenager who dotes on her younger sister a little too much, and currently fixates on her much-younger prospective sister-in-law Mashiro.
• Kurei from Flame of Recca personifies this trope, he even wears a mask! He may seem like one of the cruelest, heartless and sadistic characters in the series, but most of his actions are driven by his love for people he cares about.
• Maho Nishizumi of Girls und Panzer typically acts as an Aloof Big Sister to Miho. However, beneath that mask lies a kinder individual, who gets along well with her family maids, is willing to lend Mako her team's helicopter to help her visit her grandmother in the hospital, and strives to live up to being Nishizumi heir mainly so that Miho can live and do tankery the way she wishes.
• Gundam Build Fighters has Aila Jyrkiäinen, who appears to be an Emotionless Girl with an icy, detached view of the world. Episode 10, however, reveals her Cuteness Proximity and excitable emotions when it comes to food. In the end of Episode 21, she abandons her stoic masquerade entirely.
• Haruhi Suzumiya: Sometimes the only way to determine that Kyon has leaked a comment instead of internally snarking it is when another character responds to it. In addition, the title character does not know that he's leading a conspiracy to keep her from her true abilities and so sees the silent snarking as silent support.
  • Also, Itsuki Koizumi is implied to have much more going on under his always-smiling, friendly, easy-going exterior than meets the eye, especially in those few moments when he slips up and lets a little of his anger, stress, or loneliness show. Confirmed in Volume 11 when he goes completely ballistic at Fujiwara for trying to kill Haruhi. Also, Haruhi takes him as her ever-loyal ally without realizing he is The Chessmaster behind much of what goes on.
• Higurashi: When They Cry sort of plays around with this, where in the first and last arcs of the anime's first season the characters discuss social masks and not speaking about things they don't want to speak about, such as in the first arc, both Keiichi's and Rena's hiding their respective Dark and Troubled Pasts, and in the last arc, Keiichi hiding that he killed Rena and Mion in the first arc. However, it's played more straight with Rika in the second season, where although everyone knows about her place in the Furude family, she acts like a child usually would at her age. At least, the age everyone thinks she is. However, when she's seen alone with Hanyuu, she acts much more stoic, or even a Determined Defeatist.
• In His and Her Circumstances, Arima is insanely scared of what's beneath his.
• Is It My Fault That I Got Bullied?: A major theme within the series.
  • Shinji presents himself as a self-made man, a highly successful banker playing the part of the perfect husband and father, but in reality he is a sick sociopath who regularly abuses his wife, shamelessly cheats on her and relishes on the pain of others. The mask slips off during his Villainous Breakdown, when it turns out his success is nothing but a house of cards and all his actions catch up to him.
  • Nagumo Ai presents herself as a sweet innocent girl to both her classmates and her parents. In reality she is an Alpha Bitch who bullies Shiori because she is jealous of her father's high status and Yazaki-sensei promoting Shiori to the main team after sleeping with Shiori's father. The mask slips off after she gets exposed on social media as the bully she really is but she still pretends to be sweet and innocent to her parents, hoping they will turn things back for her and protect her from the consequences of her actions. Once it turns out they can't, the mask she wears for them also slips off, revealing the Spoiled Brat within.
  • Yumi Yoneda presents herself as a good and caring friend to Shiori. In reality, she is very jealous of her father's economic status, and is actually very happy when Shiori's bullying begins, eventually joining the Gang of Bullies and abusing Shiori herself.
  • Yazaki-sensei presents herself as a caring teacher, in reality she has a sick obsession with the married father of one of her students, which also actively prevents her from doing anything to protect Shiori from the Gang of Bullies.
  • The school principal appears to be concerned about bullying, but at the end of the day he only cares about his school's (and consequently his own) reputation, preferring to cover-up the problem, rather than do anything to solve it.
  • Shiori's classmates appear friendly and kind but choose to actively ignore Shiori's bullying even when it's happening right in front of them. When Nagumo and her Gang of Bullies get exposed on social media, Shiori calls them out on this.
• This is a major theme in Kaguya-sama: Love Is War, with most major characters having a side that they hide from others. This is especially apparent with the two leads, who completely reinvented themselves from the ground up in order to attract each other and fear that the other would never love the "true" them (the irony being that's the part they fell in love with to begin with).
• Kashimashi: Girl Meets Girl has the protagonist who gradually feels more and more free to act more feminine.
• Komi Can't Communicate:
  • Everyone thinks of Komi as a cold, aloof beauty, but as Tadano discovers she's really a shy, socially-awkward young woman desperate to make friends.
  • Katai looks like a delinquent, but that was an image he cultivated to avoid being bullied at school, and like Komi he's really a Nice Guy who wants to have friends.
• Megumin in Konosuba likes to boast about the destructive power of her explosion magic and how it is the ultimate offensive spell. Underneath this proud facade however, she is quite insecure, being painfully aware of how useless she is in most circumstances.
• Several characters in Life (2002) are like this, typically to mask their Jerkass side.
• Love at Fourteen: A major theme of the series is the difference between how a person presents themselves to the world and how they really behave, which they can only show around certain people.
• Magical Project S: Misao Amano's normal self is that of a stereotypical Shrinking Violet friendless, blue-haired Delicate and Sickly girl. However, this persona falls away when she's transformed into Pixy Misa, the manifestation of her deeply repressed id: an egomaniacal Chaotic Evil jealous Dark Magical Girl trickster.
• In My Hero Academia, All Might puts on a facade of a totally unflappable hero dedicated solely to preserving justice. However, that's all a mask for a man who genuinely fears for his safety every time he goes out to fight and is deeply worried about passing on his powers. He shows his vulnerabilities more often when he is in his depowered form, and his true thoughts use his depowered voice. Appropriately, Christopher Sabat uses a manly and heroic voice for the mask, and his more natural-sounding voice for his true self.
• Naruto:
  • Sakura Haruno is a perfect example (as well as the current trope illustrator): her inner side shows us what she actually thinks about something but is not willing to say or do. Although Inner Sakura hasn't been seen since the time skip, and Sakura is now more willing to say what's really on her mind. A bit of a cross between Becoming the Mask and Character Development.
    • One theory is that Sakura broke out of her Stepford Smiler attitude and embraced "Inner Sakura" after it helped her break out of Ino's body switch jutsu during the Chuunin Exam.
  • Meditating at the Waterfall of Truth reveals the depths beneath Naruto Uzumaki's own Stepford Smiler habit. He had truly hated and despised the villagers who treated him poorly and questioned the sincerity of their change of heart regarding him, but he buried those feelings deep down. Due to the Nine-Tailed Fox's presence, they coalesced to form a split personality who would feel all the negative emotions Naruto refused.
    • This aspect of Naruto was hinted at early on when Karin encountered him and got a feel of his chakra. To her surprise, his chakra had three layers: Bright, warm, and comforting; dark, cold and overwhelming; and corrosive, chaotic and sinister. The last one is from the Nine-Tailed Fox's; the first two polar opposites were Naruto's.
  • Played with in Itachi Uchiha: The first time the mask "slips", he's crazily taunting his brother and showing an obsession with power. It later turns out this was him trying to goad Sasuke into killing him and doesn't resemble his real personality at all. It really turns out that he's an extremely Tragic Villain who despises himself for his Necessarily Evil actions and loves his brother more than anything else in the world, even the love for his village that forced him into destroying the Uchiha clan. The Stoic personality, however, is just who he is; apparently, he was born without the ability to express emotion.
  • Later, in the Ten-Tails Revival Arc, Naruto calls Obito out on this after their chakras link and Naruto learns of Obito's entire past and his true emotions. Obito never truly let go of the Will of Fire he always cherished as a child, but to go forth with the Moon's Eye Plan, Obito convinced himself that he doesn't care about anything anymore, even his Team Minato, when in reality, they meant the world to him.
• Neon Genesis Evangelion:
  • Asuka Langley Soryu constantly puts up a mask of bold confidence and arrogance to hide she is a very insecure, frightened child. It is visible in some scenes where she is alone (in Episode 8, when she is putting her plug suit on, she is hesitant and worried) or when she is hanging around someone she trusts (like Misato in the hot spring scene in Episode 10). After Episode 22 and her Mind Rape, though, her mask falls apart.
  • Gendō Ikari is portrayed as a cold, calculating, and ruthless chessmaster. But as the series goes on and the audience gets several glimpses behind his exterior, it becomes increasingly clear that he is actually a very lonely and socially awkward man, who struggles with feelings of extreme self-loathing and believes that he is unworthy of being loved. In other words, not that different from his son, Shinji.
• One Piece: During the Syrup Village arc, we meet Klahadore, the butler and caretaker of the Delicate and Sickly Kaya. He initially seems to care for Kaya and her well-being... but is soon revealed to be Kuro, former leader of the Black Cat Pirates, who had been planning for three years to kill her and take her inheritance for himself so he could comfortably retire. When Kaya discovers the truth, Kuro outright spells out to her that he absolutely hated every second of his servitude to her and "endured" it.
  Kuro: I, who was once the dreaded Captain Kuro, bowed and scraped to a spoiled little girl, and catered to her every whim... Can you fathom my humiliation?
• Grings Kodai from Pokémon: Zoroark: Master of Illusions seems at first to be a friendly businessman who cares for his own city...it turns out he's actually trying to destroy said city's ecosystem so that he can renew his ability to see the future and is also horribly abusive towards Pokémon.
• Sasame from Prétear is outwardly flirty, cheerful and quick to offer up a listening ear, but is secretly struggling with bitterness and depression due to unrequited love. In the anime, his mask eventually comes off after he more or less has an emotional breakdown, while in the manga his mask slips off occasionally, but he continues to try to keep up the act until the end.
• Essentially everyone in Princess Tutu, but particularly:
  • Fakir, initially portrayed as a selfish, manipulative Jerkass, accidentally reveals himself to be a Jerk with a Heart of Gold when Duck is briefly stuck as a duck and he falls under the influence of Cuteness Proximity.
  • Kraehe is initially portrayed as doing things just For the Evulz, but by the end, it's revealed that she only wanted to be loved.
• Rebuild World:
  • Akira has two different masks he uses while Living a Double Life:
    • When Akira’s with Elena and Sara, he hides the darker part of his personality and looks like a awkward and easily embarrassed kid who is looking up to them like theyre his Big Sister Mentor and Cool Big Sis. Occasionally they see glimpses of his Tranquil Fury and ruthless side, and it leaves them horrified or gritting their teeth.
    • When Akira’s not with those two, but especially while he’s with Sheryl, he shows a cold, ruthless side emphasizing that Akira is actually The Paranoiac. He plays this up partially as a Jerkass Façade to keep Sheryl’s slum gang scared of him to prevent insurrections, and partly because he’s deathly afraid of falling into a Honey Trap laid by Sheryl, since he’s had traumatic experiences with those. But despite all this, he’s an extremely generous Uncle Penny Bags to Sheryl and her gang, occasionally shows great respect and deference to her, and risks his life to save her repeatedly, making him look like a massive Tsundere.
  • Sheryl displays a Tough Leader Façade her slum gang and in negotiations, at one point even displaying Dissonant Serenity smiling even while being shot at, which is actually due to having resigned herself to die if Akira dies. While deep down, she’s terrified and relies on Akira as her Living Emotional Crutch who she holds onto for hours on end in private. The mask breaks if she’s worried about losing Akira’s support and comfort.
  • Reina's bodyguard Kanae is a bubbly and teasing Genki Girl most of the time. But, when she's fighting a human opponent, she lifts that mask to reveal the cold and disdainful face of a Blood Knight.
• Idola from The Red Ranger Becomes an Adventurer in Another World tries to act cool and poised at all times, but Tougo's antics quickly shatter her composure and make her act a lot more coarse than she would normally. She also tends to keep her more opportunistic side hidden behind a sweet smile when dealing with people like Princess Teltina, who can give Idola a leg up in reclaiming her father's title as the Royal Family's Wand.
• Rurouni Kenshin:
  • Kenshin's Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass and Obfuscating Stupidity masks hide deep depression and feelings of unworthiness.
  • Saitou's almost literally a "wolf in sheep's clothing".
  • Aoshi's Jerkass stoicism hid how much he cared for his people, and later his rage and violence hid depression and feelings of failure.
• Sailor Moon has Minako Aino. She's always nice and ditzy, a boy-crazy prankster apparently harmless... And yet it's made clear that a large part of this is a well-constructed act: if circumstances require her to act mature she'll show a surprising wisdom and empathy, if you manage to see through the mask and tell her she's more than willing to admit it (and if she doesn't trust you, you'd better start begging before she kills you), and if you piss her off, you're dead-you and everything around you. What she'll never do is show her chronic depression (and boy, she has good reasons to be depressed...).
• The Animated Adaptation of Tantei Team KZ Jiken Note shows how Aya feels beneath the socially required Japanese Politeness and stoicism through the heavy use of hexagonal speech balloons. On the other hand, she also hides the fact she's actually a social misfit by playing the role of the local wallflower. She later wondered this latter point is why she doesn't have any friends—she could get along with the other kids, but by oppressing her personality she has too little to be likable.
• Barnaby Brooks Jr. from Tiger & Bunny has two masks superimposed on one another. The first is the guise of a charming, skilled ace that hides a rude, untrusting Ice King beneath it. The rude, untrusting Ice King mask, in turn, hides a traumatized, lonely man who doesn't know what to do with his life beyond getting revenge on the organization that assassinated his family.
  • The second cour, as well as Word of God, proves that Kotetsu also wears a mask. Thanks to an almost pathological fear of sharing his burdens with others and a reluctance to make himself vulnerable, quite a bit of his doofy, Idiot Hero behavior is something he exaggerates to lower peoples' opinions of him so they won't bother with (and therefore worry about) him.
  • Ivan Karelin is another example. As the hero Origami Cyclone, he's loud, brash, and over-the-top. As Ivan, he's an awkward, insecure Shrinking Violet.
• In Toradora! Ami is, to her classmates, a cute, sweet, fresh-faced model that's a bit of an idiot. But to the people that know her well, she's stubborn, sometimes bitchy and actually quite manipulative. It's mentioned several times that she genuinely wishes people would accept her "true" self but is afraid of how people would react.
• In A Town Where You Live when Haruto first meets Eba Rin he wonders how such a level headed person could be related to Yuzuki, even if only as step-sisters. Eventually Rin gets tired enough of the mask that she completely discards it with Haruto, in fact, she is more honest with herself around Haruto and eventually Yuzuki that she doesn't put it back on around them, leading her to change just a little bit.
• In Tsubasa -RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE-, Fai's personality change following the events of Acid Tokyo is a powerful example of this trope.
• ViVid Strike!: Rinne may present herself in the public as a stoic, no-nonsense fighter intent on becoming the strongest there is, but underneath this facade lies a sad, lonely girl with a fear of losing everything because of her weakness. When alone in the bathroom after losing to Vivio for the second time, we quickly see that deep down Rinne the "weakling" is still present as she breaks down crying.

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