For Halloween I Am Going As Myself / Comic Books

• In one Archie Comics, Archie and Jughead are dressed as vampires and accidentally get invited to a party full of real monsters, who are celebrating because this is the one day of the year they can walk around normally.
• Batgirl: In both of her origins -Detective Comics #359 and Batgirl: Year One-, Barbara Gordon created the Batgirl costume for a Halloween party and didn't tell anyone about it so that when she went to the party no one knew it was her, however when a group of criminals crash the party she defeats them as Batgirl and has used the costume since.
• Batman:
  • An arc of Legends of the Dark Knight entitled Idols features a craze among Gothamites for dressing as Batman. Bruce Wayne attends a party wearing a bat pendant, then has to steal someone else's bat mask in order to save the day as Batman when there's a riot.
  • During the "Midnight" story arc, Batman says that he likes Halloween because he can walk around downtown in his costume and nobody cares. He even talks to a little kid, also in a Batman costume, who compliments his utility belt.
  • Subverted in a Batman short story. During Mardi Gras, a guy dresses in a Batman costume, actually gets involved with criminals, and is rescued by the real Batman — in a Zorro costume.
    Batman: Even I have heroes.
  • In the Li'l Gotham Halloween issue, Batman and Robin are tracking down some criminals. Unfortunately, everyone is dressed up like a rogue or vigilante. Cut to the villains eating dinner and celebrating how they can go out in public without being arrested.
  • One story opens with what appears to be The Riddler unmasking Batman as Bruce Wayne to the entirety of his Rogues Gallery, only to reveal that Bruce was dressed as Zorro at a costume party he was holding and the Riddler who went as himself (during a stint as a private detective) just figured out who he was and the supervillains are really just costumed partygoers.
• In The Books of Magic, Zatanna takes Tim Hunter to a Halloween Ball. Halfway through, Tim looks at the wolfmen, vampires, and black magicians around him and says, "It's just occurred to me, these people, they're not wearing masks, are they?"
• The second Confessions Of A Teenage Vampire graphic novel had the eponymous teenage vampire, Lily Jordan, throw a Halloween costume party. Not surprisingly, she attends as a vampire. This volume also introduces us to the werewolf Talbot who attends the party as a werewolf.
• One storyline in the 80s Eagle strip "Doomlord" has Doomlord going to a costume party as...Doomlord. There are actually five Doomlords there and the organisers decide to have an impromptu Best Doomlord contest. He comes second.
• In several volumes of Empowered, Emp dresses up as herself as part of a group of superhero team lookalikes for store promotions and such as her day job as being an actual associate member of the team doesn't pay. It is lampshaded how the costume she is wearing for the gig is much less revealing than her regular one.
• The Flash:
  • Iris Allen was murdered at a costume party where all the guests were dressed as superheroes and supervillains. Not only did Barry Allen go as the Flash, but many of his Rogues Gallery were there in their own costumes. Hal Jordan was there as well as Green Lantern, as noted by the Reverse Flash, might have been some other heroes as well.
  • An issue of Impulse has him going to a school Halloween party in his costume. He is, of course, not the only Impulse there.
• In one Hack/Slash story, an investigation takes Cassie and Vlad to a comic convention, where Vlad's monstrous appearance and creepy gas mask causes people to mistake him for a cosplayer. This wasn't intentional on his part, and he doesn't seem to get that everyone thinks he's wearing a costume.
• In an issue of Harley Quinn, Harley shows up at one of Bruce Wayne's masquerade balls in her own costume. She even introduces herself as Harley Quinn. He is actually suspicious — but then, he is Batman. He'd have every right to be suspicious regardless. As Tom Katers points out, thieves and supervillains in the DCU have a habit of breaking into high-class costume parties by pretending to be someone pretending to be them.
• Unintentional example: In Hawkeye vs. Deadpool Kate Bishop meets◊ the latter for the first time on Halloween and compliments him on "The best Freddy Krueger make up I've ever seen" only to be flatly told by Clint that it's Deadpool's actual face. Kate merely smiles, shoots Deadpool a thumbs up and a happy Halloween, then turns around and silently screams at Clint.
• In the first Justice Society of America story, Hour-Man told a story of how he went to a costume party dressed as Hour-Man and ran into a gang of thieves planning to rob the party, all of them dressed as Hour-Man.
• The Spirit Holiday Special had a similar story, where-in a group of five criminals perform a late-night robbery disguised as the Spirit, and go unnoticed because it's Halloween. The Spirit manages to infiltrate and take down the group because none of them noticed a sixth man in the same costume.
• In Masks 2 #1, The Shadow and The Green Hornet infiltrate a masquerade party wearing their usual costumes. Green Hornet notes that he has seen at least three other party-goers dressed as him.
• While Morbius is hiding on a ship, the ship's costume ball is the only time when he can go out and get some fresh air.
• In Vertigo's Proposition Player, Moloch and Anubis (of Hebrew and Egyptian theology) are looking for the protagonist in Las Vegas, the latter not bothering to hide his animal head.
  Anubis: This is Las Vegas. We just saw thirteen Elvises play blackjack. They'll assume I'm part of some Egyptian attraction.
• PS238: During the "Crisis In Alternate-Omaha" arc, when the kids find themselves in a universe that has no superhumans, they pretend that their superhero outfits are for a costume party when they're stopped by police (while Julie 84 pretends to be an incredibly realistic helium balloon by tieing a string to her belt).
• In Robin (1993), Tim and Stephanie go to a costumed Sci-fi movie viewing on a date in full uniform as Robin and Spoiler where they are complemented on their original designs (at this point Batman and the Batclan are widely considered to be urban legends).
• A one-shot special of Shi telling Japanese ghost stories has the namesake heroine remarking Halloween is the only time she can wear her assassin outfit without impunity or being mistakenly attacked by her enemies. Lampshaded a bit when a trick-or-treater praises Shi for her costume but misidentifies it as a costume worn by Zealot of the Wild C.A.T.s (WildStorm).
• Played with in The Simping Detective. Jack attends a "hate party" where all the local mob dress as various characters from Judge Dredd canon as himself. Nobody recognizes who he is supposed to be until someone else turns up as Jack. Galen Demarco attends as herself, but in a manner that she appears to be her intelligent gorilla partner dressed as her.
• In a one-page gag from The Smurfs, all the Smurfs attend a costume party dressed as Papa Smurf, except for one Smurf, who seems to be dressed as himself. The catch? The ordinary Smurf is actually Papa Smurf wearing a costume.
• Spider-Man:
  • In The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #226, the Black Cat meets Spider-Man at a costume party. She wears her own costume but mistakes a random party-goer dressed as Spider-Man for the real thing. Turns out Spidey is In the Hood.
  • During The Amazing Spider-Man (J. Michael Straczynski), Peter takes a tailor who designs costumes for supervillains to a safe place. The safe place? A Coffee House where he often goes in full attire, because no way would the real Spidey just hang out at a coffee shop.
    Spider-Man: Hey! I'm Spider-Man, right? Tell the guy I'm Spider-Man!
    Waiter: (calling back) Yeah, yeah, you're Spider-Man. And I'm Dorothy. Just a minute, while I get my red freaking shoes on...
  • In one issue of Spidey Super Stories, Peter goes to a Halloween party in his actual costume, except with a Domino Mask instead of the real deal.
• Superman:
  • In Adventure Comics #392◊, It's Supergirl Day at Stanhope Women's College, so everybody's supposed to wear a Supergirl dress. Unfortunately, Kara flew through something radioactive and now her dress is being decontaminated. As Linda, she gets a replica dress at school but has to wear it for some actual super-deed that leaves it badly ripped. She simply tells everyone she took it off because it was a bad fit and didn't look right.
  • In Starfire's Revenge, villain Starfire's gang is pulling bank robberies in the neighboring town of Carvale, where a Mardi Gras celebration is going on. So Kara goes to the party dressed as Supergirl in order to blend into the crowd and capture the robbers.
  • A comic has Supes going to the Daily Planet's Halloween costume party... as Superman! So he buys a cheaper Superman costume (the spandex part is OK but the cape is a solid plastic piece which he has to throw away halfway through the party), and goes with his glasses on, so that he's obviously just Clark Kent disguised as Superman. It helps that every other guy at the party and one girl decided to go as Superman too, and many of their disguises were better. All this leads to one of the most amusing scenes in Superman ever, when the obligatory supervillains crash the party and he tears down his Superman costume to reveal his Superman costume.
  • Something similar happened when Clark Kent was on a talk show. He and the other guests had been invited because they (and the host) had all been publicly suspected of being Superman's secret identity, so all of them wore the costume on stage.
  • Averted in a Halloween issue of the DC Comics Presents. Clark attends a costume party as Green Lantern.
  • In a subversion, there's an issue where Clark and Lois go to a costume party dressed as Batman and Robin.◊ And then they stand around in their costumes sticking their tongues down each other's throats and...well, it's really hard to believe that the writers weren't poking fun at the "Ambiguously Gay Duo!" meme that sprung up around the rich single guy who dresses little boys in pixie boots and tiny shorts a long time ago. Also, Superman flatly states that Batman's going to kill him if when he finds out.
  • Also subverted in a Mxyzptlk story, when Clark went to a party as Green Lantern. When the crazy stuff starts and Jimmy Olsen, dressed as Thor, turns into a REAL thunder Tiamat and flies off, Clark surreptitiously uses his heat vision to heat up his fake power ring. "Look, Lois — my ring is glowing!" "Maybe the magic is giving it real powers too! Can you fly after Jimmy?" "Well, I'll try..."
  • Played with in The Girl with the X-Ray Mind. Linda Danvers wants to attend a fancy-dress ball, but her mother hints that she should NOT go as Supergirl because she would be foolishly drawing attention to herself. Her friend Lena Thorul goes as Supergirl, though, and when she is mistakenly credited with subduing a gang of bank robbers crashing the party, Linda's boyfriend Dick Malverne believes Lena is Supergirl and was hiding in plain sight.
    Dick Malverne: Clever of her to pretend her Supergirl outfit is only a hired costume!
• One issue of Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is set during Halloween; when the cops show up after the big fight is over, they tell the turtles to go on their way, thinking they're just kids in costume.
  • Similar in the non-canon (but Eastman-and-Laird illustrated) short story in the TMNT Role-Playing Game, where the Turtles go to a Hallowe'en party as themselves (and no one has any idea what they're supposed to be). The irony is they DID have costumes, but they got shredded in a fight early on in the story.
• At the start of W.I.T.C.H. Cedric and Vathek infiltrate a Halloween party. Cedric, being a Shapeshifter, goes out in his human form, modified to make it look like he's wearing a costume, but Vathek is openly showing his ogre-like looks and wearing his normal outfit... And wins the prize for the best costume.
  • Later in the series, the girls go to a Halloween party in their Guardian forms.

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