One of the most important things about being a superhero is protecting their secret identity, and heroes like Daredevil and Spider-Man have both experienced the hardships of what happens when those identities are revealed. While some heroes have managed to forgo a double life, not everyone can. Peter Parker and Matt Murdock are two of the biggest examples of heroes who need their secret identities, and when Daredevil’s identity is leaked, he’s actually shocked it happened to him and not Spider-Man.
Daredevil’s secret identity is one of the absolute tightest in comics since very few people would assume a blind man could be an acrobatic vigilante by night. But this still doesn’t stop his identity from being leaked to the press in 2002’s Daredevil #32 by Brian Michael Bendis, Alex Maleev and Matt Hollingsworth, at which point people begin to assume he has been faking being blind. While people are unable to definitively prove that Matt Murdock is Daredevil, this new attention on his secret identity throws Matt’s life into complete chaos, and it is something he is entirely unprepared for.
Daredevil Figured Spider-Man’s Identity Would Leak First
After a criminal learns Matt Murdock’s identity, he trades it to the FBI for protection from the Kingpin. A corrupt FBI agent then sells the identity to a newspaper for a quick payday, resulting in Matt’s life completely falling apart in Daredevil #33. One day, while Matt is hiding out in his office with Foggy, it’s here that Matt fully states that he believes himself to be an idiot for making absolutely no preparations in case his identity is leaked. He admits that he knew something like this would be possible, but he always thought it would first happen to Spider-Man, and then Daredevil would adjust accordingly after seeing how Peter handles it. But this entire conversation, and Peter’s own remarks later in the storyline, only foreshadow the absolute hell Peter would go through just four years later.
Spider-Man Doesn’t Want His Identity Out
During the events of Civil War, Spider-Man makes his identity public knowledge at the urging of Tony Stark. This immediately has disastrous consequences for Peter, from him being fired by The Daily Bugle, to Aunt May being shot and nearly dying. This eventually leads to the events of One More Day, where Peter is forced to make a deal with the devil in order to win his anonymity back. In the process he loses his marriage to Mary Jane and still hasn’t gotten it back to this day. Throughout the Daredevil storyline, both Matt and Spider-Man state that they thought Peter’s identity would be the first one to leak. Peter even comments that after watching what’s become of Matt’s life, he would never want his identity to get out. This is what makes this foreshadowing so much darker. This was all done four years before Peter would willingly give up his identity, which completely and immediately destroys his life far worse than anything Matt experiences.
Matt is able to eventually recover from his identity being leaked, mostly through sheer force of will. However, Spider-Man isn’t so lucky. Spider-Man‘s life is ruined far worse and has to make a deal with the devil himself to get his identity back, while Daredevil was mostly able to go on just fine.
