Explain SMBC — the wiki for Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

secret-identity

2022-05-12 View on smbc-comics.com → 1 revision
secret-identity
Votey panel for secret-identity
This explanation is incomplete or may contain errors. It was generated by AI and has not yet been reviewed by a human editor.

Explanation

This comic features a Superman-like superhero complaining about the pressures of his double life. In the first panel, the hero flies through the air saying "It's so much pressure being Superman! You know what? I'm gonna start telling everyone at my workplace my identity. I'll bring baked goods to share around my workplace — just be a normal human being."

In the next panel, we see the result: the hero, now in his Clark Kent-style civilian identity, is at the office offering coffee. A coworker responds: "With you, oh Clark, you're always trying to get people to see you as a regular person. It's a little much." Another says "See, look."

The joke is that the superhero's attempt to seem "normal" by being overly friendly and bringing treats to the office backfires — because in any workplace, the person who tries too hard to be liked and constantly brings in baked goods is seen as transparently performing normalcy rather than actually being normal. The comic points out that the "secret identity" problem is not really about superpowers — it is about the universal social awkwardness of trying too hard to fit in. The hero's coworkers see right through his efforts not because they suspect he is Superman, but because overcompensating friendliness is its own kind of tell.

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