A Labor Day Tribute: 10 Cool Jobs Held By Super Heroes
By Nick Tylwalk
It’s not too difficult to write about super heroes in the context of American holidays. July 4th? No problem. We whipped up a list of 10 underrated American patriotic super heroes and that was that.
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For Labor Day, I had a little more trouble, because while it’s awesome that super heroes are constantly saving humanity from being robbed, enslaved or destroyed, they generally aren’t your average working folks. There’s a reason the billionaire businessman is such a stereotypical set-up for super hero origins.
Except that’s not true for all of them. Plenty of super heroes hold down other jobs to pay the bills, and together, they’ve tackled a wide variety of careers over the first 75 years or so of comic book history. So as a Labor Day tribute, it seems only right to shine the spotlight on what these men and women do when they’re not suited up to fight crime.
First, some ground rules. We already discussed how we ruled out businessman as one of our jobs due to its ubiquity, and despite our love for science here at Bam Smack Pow, the scientist/inventor trope is also a little too common to make it here.
Similarly, while we have incredible respect for the men and women who serve in the military, that’s a frequently traveled road in comic book origins. We’ll make sure they get their due at other times. Spies or secret agents? Sorry, but your super hero time is usually indistinguishable from your day job. Nick Fury and Black Widow, you know what I’m talking about.
Being a king or queen would be very cool, but that’s not so much a job as a birthright. And of course, some super heroes are simply full time adventurers, so they’re disqualified from consideration too.
Even with all those exclusions, there’s still a world of diversity when it comes to how our favorite super-powered protectors put in an honest day’s work. In no particular order, here are 10 cool jobs super heroes hold in their secret identities.
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