Okay but why has Tim never been called Sparrow? Sounds intimidating, still in the kinda bird theme he likes to stick with, and it pays homage to his time as Robin without sounding derivative. You can even keep his Red Robin suit!

Sam would absolutely be going by "Captain Falcon" if Nintendo wouldn't sue Marvel's asses into next Tuesday.

By far the most cancellable take here is “you probably don’t think of Kyle Rayner”. I will not take this Kyle Rayner Slander lightly 😤

Nightwing is a great example of a legacy character done right I never felt he was forced to replace batman. He became his own character.

The thing about passing the torch is that you have to actually pass the damn torch and not pass it back

I feel the need to acknowledge this whenever I get the chance the absolute hilarity that the sole user of the name Orphan in the superhero community (which has all the orphans) has TWO living parents (David Cain and Lady Shiva) plus an adoptive family

The thing with the Flash is that Barry was dead for a while, not just your average comic death of about a year or two. Wally was the flash for like 22 years I believe. So for a generation of people, Wally was The Flash, for all of those people it would've been weird for Wally to lose his name just because the previous Flash came back. It's as if Jay Garrick went to Barry's earth and kept the name The Flash, and Barry had to find another name. So ye, it's a weird situation. I'm also not a fan of there being two different Flashes, but I don't think Wally can go by Kid Flash anyways, and I'm not sure how I feel about giving him a completely new name, but it probably would be for the better. It honestly would've been better than just deleting him form existence, looking at you New 52.

It’s crazy to me that Duke Thomas can get a name and powers that sets him apart from the other Bat-Fam in a relatively short time and Tim Drake is still struggling to find his own😭 it really feels bad

In gotham knights during Tim's story they talk about chess and how Bruce's favorite piece was the knight and how Tim needs to find his own way to win, not just copy Bruce. Tim takes a liking to the Rook which he deems an unseen threat that can set up for unexpected plays, much like he sees himself. I'd honestly love if Tim took up the mantle as Rook, a black bird with a white face or he could even keep the red too. I just think rook is a good identity for Tim that hasn't been done

One thing I like about the Spider-Men is that they usually have an adjective that can be used to refer to one of them Amazing Spider-Man = Peter Parker Superior Spider-Man = Otto Octavius Spider-Man 2099 = Miguel O'hara Spider-Man Noir = Peter Parker (1930's) But then you have Miles Morales, who's simply "Spider-Man". If he just had an adjective like "Venomous Spider-Man", it'd make him stand out a lot more. In the battlefield, they could all just call each other by the unique parts of their names (Amazing, Superior, 2099, Noir, Venomous) and it'd work like a charm.

Tim's (and his writers') refusal to move on from the role of Robin is my biggest frustration with current comics. There's so many birds out there he could pick from. A popular fandom one is Crow. Tim can't be a 17 year old forever and he can't be Robin forever and I hope DC realizes that eventually. (Also this isn't really related but it's kind of funny and speaks to why Red Robin is also a bad name so I'm sharing it. There's this one panel of a comic--I can't remember which--where Nightwing, Oracle, Red Hood, Red Robin, and Robin are all working together, and Nightwing calls Oracle "Red" over comms, to which Jason complains "why does she get to be Red?". There's certainly a lot of Red in the Batfam these days.)

I think the biggest problem facing Miles is that there just isn't a good enough name for him. And that's been true for legacy Spider-Men since the beginning. Even Ben Riley had to be referred to by first name until "Scarlet Spider" came along and even then multiple people have taken up that mantle. And that works both with alliteration but also because Scarlet is an off color of red so by costume standards it works. Miles' costume is predominantly black so you would think Black Spider could work but then DC already has a character named that and also you can't name a black superhero "Black Noun" these days because it's been done to death and feel tacky. You also don't want to go with the youth names like "Spider-Boy" "Spider-ling" because it's still too connected to the original and is famously connected to side-kicks which Miles isn't in most cases. You can't name him after a type of black spider because most spider's are named after other things and animals like wolfs and trapdoors. The most famous black spider being the Black Widow is taken by another hero and also a Widow is female so that wouldn't work regardless. Now you're left with aspects of spider's and there's nothing good there either. Kid Arachnid sounds like a bootleg and Spin is just as Nando mentioned not good. So we're left with just sticking with Miles Morales Spider-Man.

honestly i agree with your take. of course one easier solution would be to stop constantly bringing back characters who died/got depowered so that it just doesn't happen as often and let the mantle truly be passed on. but given that that's never gonna happen in the industry as it exists, then yeah, each version should get separate names.

@The Nando Cut Blue Beetle is another great example of legacy characters that work. Each one is unique, and even though they share a name, they don't get them mixed up. Dan Garret is dead and rarely mentioned. In-comics, Blue Beetle II is either just called "Ted" or "Beetle" and Blue Beetle III is either called "Jaime" or "Blue," so even when they are together, you don't get them mixed up.

I think Miles is the most unfortunate case of this issue. I think everybody who is a fan of him *wants* him to be Spider-Man. For many, he *is* Spider-Man. But so is Peter Parker. It works great when Miles is in his own universe, but outside of Spider-Verse that doesn't seem to be the popular way to use him nowadays. In the modern day, Miles and Peter work along side each other with Peter as Miles' mentor. And a lot of people, me included, like their dynamic and relationship. I think Miles *should* be called Spider-Man, and I also like the versions of him where Peter Parker also exists. But the "comms confusion" issue comes into play, and it's just unfortunate.

i like the idea of differentiating peter and miles as queens and brooklyn respectively while they're together

I think they handled Superman very very well. Clark is leaving earth for an extended period of time and leaves Jon behind to be earth's Superman. Superman is the name people whisper for help all over the world.

The worst part about the Flash thing is that in addition to their being multiple Flashes there are also multiple Wally Wests. Which for a long time left no real good way to refer to these different characters. They eventually settled on one goes by Wally and the other by Wallace. But for several years it was just a confusing mess.

I think Laura and Logan is clear enough. It’s clear who is who when the two are together in a panel. Plus the story telling of Logan being proud of the name to the point where is “daughter” takes on the name is great.

I think if DC adds an adjective in front of the hero's name like Marvel does, it will be easier to distinguish heroes with the same name. Just like Peter and Miles are both Spider-Man, people call them "Spider-Man" when they are apart, but when they are together, people can call them "Amazing Spider-Man" and "Ultimate Spider-Man" to distinguish them.

As a Flash super fan, I love the idea that multiple people hold the title "The Flash" at the same time. It's something unique to the Flash Family. Usually there is only one Flash in a given story so there is no confusion. And times there are multiple Flashes working together, things are so crazy that using real names is not an issue because everyone involved already knows each other and civilians aren't around to hear anyway.

I saw a reddit post depicting Tim Drake as the Gray Ghost. This is based on the Batman: The Animated Series where Bruce watched a cartoon when he was a kid about a detective superhero called Gray Ghost. I thought this was a really cool ideia for Tim, since it shows his admiration for Bruce and it makes sense for him, since he is the greatest detective of all the Robins.

The Thor one is the silliest because it's not a hero name... It's his name. But it's also the only one that makes sense why the follow-up ones have the asterix because it's the hammer that gives them the power... The power of Thor.

I'd love to see you watch My Hero Academia because they get really caught up in the minutia of things like this and how superheroes would have to operate within larger organizational structures.

I usually handle the Spider-Men in the way, that Spider-Man is Peter and Ultimate Spider-Man is Miles. In case of Gwen, Spider-Gwen obviously doesn't work in the comics, but it's kinda genius and ridiculous how they handled it in comics. Gwen realizes that she has a secret identity in the 616 universe and points out that she can't be Spider-Woman 'cause Jessica would be mad. And in the next panel, she immediately settles on the name "Ghost-Spider". Peter is confused and Gwen says "Just roll with it." I think the writers settled with that name, not because she is a ghost to Peter (just like Peter is a ghost to her, btw), but rather because she hops a lot between universes and just like a ghost, she can be there in one moment and gone in the next. Plus her costume looks quite ghosty.

I think a good compromise with Miles is to refer to him as “Ultimate Spider-Man” or maybe just “Ultimate” for short. I think that makes sense because he’s from the Ultimate universe, and he kind of is the Ultimate Spider-Man. I mean he can do a lot of things Peter can’t do like turn invisible, electrocute people, and hug his parents.

Miles Morales could just adopt the spanish version of his name given his heritage, I'd love to see the rest of the english speaking cast have to refer to him in the english version as "hombre araña".

I think something that does bother me is the assumption that's given in basically every case but Robin that it's the new guy who needs to pick something else. Like, the "Take a new identity" thing always uses Nightwing as an example, but in that case he was also bowing out to make room for Jason. I think it works a lot better in a lot of cases for the more experienced character to be the one taking a new identity, because they have more history to draw on, and also like. If Peter Parker stopped being Spider-Man, he'd still be Peter Parker, you know? The original characters have enough brand recognition they can survive not having their names.

I feel like the in-universe and real world logic for the name changes just doesn't often align, like you say with marketing. And every legacy character just lands on some sort of compromise between diagesis and sales eventually that either feels like a bad choice for the character for the sake of sales, or sacrificing sales for a character detail.

Not finished the video yet but on your suggestion that Clark Kent should change his name: I think that's probably the single most outrageous thing that they could commit to, regardless of the context it's done. Superman has been Superman for so long that it's stuck and cemented itself into the zeitgeist. You can't change that no matter what you do. But Man of Tomorrow? That's a good name, and I think it works for *Jon* as a metaphor for how the younger generation has progressed from the older one in terms of acceptance and diversity. Not to say that Superman needs to be painted as out of touch, but as part of the next generation, Jon is quite literally the Man of Tomorrow.

I think the only real problem I have with heroes sharing names at the same time is that the public would absolutely not allow it and immediately come up with different names to identify each of them. Stuff like calling miles “Brooklyn Spider-Man” because he patrols there more often would only stick for like a week before the streets came up with a way better nickname for him that wether he liked it or not they’d all start calling him by both in person and online. This is how most heroes usually get their original hero names by the public picking one for them. Like you said in this video I think writers get a lot of wiggle room having characters with the same hero name just openly calling eachother by their real names like Wally, Barry, Hal, Jon, etc in comms since they never HAVE to show us regular civilians perspective during battle overhearing these heroes talking to eachother.

My take is that if the passing of the mantle is temporary then the name should be temporary. There are exceptions, when Miles Morales was created I doubt they ever intended to bring Peter back (this was just an alternate universe after all), and when he finally returned, it would have been weird to make Miles change his name after so many stories focused on him being worthy of the mantle. It's just been so long that Miles being Spider-Man is kinda set in stone. No other name will feed good enough, and changing it might contradict the whole point of the character.

I kind of liked Tim going by "Drake" because it highlighted his slight inability to understand that figuring out secret identities with ease is a talent that not everybody has. In Tim's mind, secret IDs are so easy to figure out that you might as well not even try. Also, the fact that Damien always referred to him as "Drake" in the field makes it almost a necessity.

To be honest I'd say Barry and Wally both being Flash works. Mostly because they rarely ever overlap with eachother. Wally usually takes on the "Protector of central city" role only when Barry isn't around. There's also the fact that Barry is considered the "Justice League" Flash while Wally is the "Titans" Flash.

I think that just having a unique name for a character can give them so much more individuality from the start rather than them having to prove themselves with loads of slow building. Me personally I'd be more intrigued by a new name than a "oh they have a series for that [insert superhero name] reskin?" on a comic cover.

with the superman name, you could keep both of them as superman, and distinct them by using their krypton names. in the field if you want Clark you call out to Kal-El, because while their human identities is secret, their alien ones are not

Orphan as a name never made sense to me for Cass because not only was she adopted (no longer an orphan) but she is also one of the only Batkids with two living biological parents? And both her parents are significant characters so it’s not like you can just ignore them. I think Cass works as a character who can embody the mantle of Batgirl while the other former Batgirls have new code names

I saw Nightwing I click. Pretty simple.

I think there clear solution is to keep character deaths permanent to prevent this confusion. But seeing as that’s extremely unlikely, the best thing IS to come up with new names for these characters. I think it’s easier for characters named after animals since you can find other creatures related to the main one. For example Kane could be named wolf spider, Laura could be badger, miles could be golden weaver (or ghost spider), Damian could be crow, etc.

I liked how they handle it in Young Justice. The league just has multiple characters with similar mantles and roll with it because they send them on different missions. Both Barry and Jay are Flash, the GL Corps is a peacekeeping force and Arthur and Kaldur are both Aquaman. I think it’s just cool to have multiple people in the roles.

The thing is that once a character takes up that role you can’t exactly demote them back down to their previous codename in a clear way. Doing so undercuts them in a major way.

The Green Lantern mix-up confusion is only done well in a fanmade project called Earth-27 where all human Green Lanterns gets different designation (like John as GL Alpha, Hal as GL Beta, Guy as GL Charlie, Kyle as GL Delta, Simon as GL Echo and Jessica as GL Foxtrot.) It's just a better way to differentiate the GLs, ya know.

Iron heart has a nice moment like that, where she chose her own name. She is kind of Ironman “heir”, but still her own person

I think for characters who happen to frequently crossover with variants of themselves should take some influence from tokusatsu and have themed subtitles to distinguish. Even if it's as simple as characters take the name of the color their suit most uses

You’ve literally put all my thoughts in this video. Acknowledging legacy characters are cool in concept but messy in practice unless you really lean into it

It may not completely fix the issue, but I like canonizing the idea that Peter is the "Amazing" Spider-Man while Miles is the "Ultimate" Spider-Man. I kinda like the idea of them calling each other Amazing and Ultimate in the field. And I also agree that there being two Hawkeyes that refuse to rename is a great bit.

I feel like this channel should be called "Nando v Twitter," 🤣. Love the channel I just think it's funny how often these vids start with something along the lines of "I was on Twitter"

I think if it's holding the name and keeping the mantle alive until the original hero comes back (Logan to Laura over Wolverine and Kate Bishop to Clint Barton over Hawkeye) then I can see that as a small arc for the newer person. Then the new hero should have their own name after that. Like call Laura Hyper Claw, call Kate Trickshot or give her the Ronin mantle, call Miles Arach-Knight, call Riri Williams Mecha-Maiden after their stint as a place holder. This way their comics don't need to rely on the original hero's name to sell the new ones. Gwen Stacy did it when she was Spider-Gwen and is now called Ghost Spider. Marvel made some new Asian heroes that have their own names. Aero, Swordmaster, look up the Agents of Atlas comics. They did that right. With DC, they seem to be afraid of letting some characters be themselves. Why is Stephanie Brown not Spoiler full time? Why is Cassandra Cain not Orphan full time? I like Black Bat though. Keep Barbara Oracle. They have new characters like Ghost Maker, Clown Maker, Signal, Batwing (should have had him for Future State instead of Jace Fox) As for Sam Wilson as Cap, I don't mind it. If Nintendo didn't have Captain Falcon, I'm absolutely sure they would have called Sam Captain Falcon. That's probably the only reason Marvel didn't call Sam this. Same with Jane. It's annoying that she's called Thor but male Thor is still Thor. It's his name, not a costume name. Why not call Jane Thunderstorm? Problem solved with her. If she was called that, nobody would have been complaining about her having Mjolnir. Avengers Assemble cartoon gave her the name Thunderstrike and Odin made her a copy of Mjolnir and it worked. Brand recognition is the name of the game is what the huge problem is.

I think there’s a couple of things with the Flashes, and an important concept that comes into play with characters like Sam Cap: when the original died/retired/disappeared, the character who took up the mantle was absolutely the right person for the job, had earned that title, and made it their own in a very important and personal way. Then, when the original comes back, it’s not as simple as changing the name or reverting to their previous title because they earned this role, it’s as much theirs as it is the original’s, and it would be wrong to make them change back. Honestly the best answer would probably have been to leave the originals retired/dead, but what the Flashes did recently that I like is that Wally is the Flash for the main DC continuity, while Barry goes off to be the Flash of the multiverse

the Bat-family and the Robins in particular feel so cohesive as a unit with their common experience of operating as a Robin but also so unique and individual as they grow up as characters and graduate into their own identities its part of what makes the Batfamily/Gotham side of things work so well and build such deep and interesting stories. the Flashes on the other hand are mostly the same character. legacy characters should spend some time using the legacy mantle and then graduate into their own identity, or have the previous mantle-holder retire

I liked how in Young Justice the animated show, the way they shorten their names to Rob, SB, KF, etc. It’s neat. Also I do love that there’s a clone of Laura Kinney called Honey Badger, that’s wonderful.

I definitely think it's crazy how upset people get when Laura goes by Wolverine. I personally just call her X-23 tho, sometimes I lowkey feel bad since that's tied to her terrible childhood.

I honestly agree with this because some these characters are never able to escape the originals shadow. Like for me I didn't mind Miles being called Kid Arachnid in the cartoon and Tim Drake I always thought that Cardinal would be a cool name for him given his all red costume

Dude, the Spiders just remind me of Kamen Rider. Peter=Ichigo, Miles=Niigo, Miguel=V3. Laura taking over the Wolverine name, perfect. Plus, it's a family thing, going from father to daughter. Even the Batman legacy, Bruce to his adopted son, Dick, then eventually Damien or Terry. Yes, it's a legacy, if you inherit the name, take it, and live up to it. I was looking forward to seeing what name Miles would have taken during Dan Slot's run, especially with Peter training him. Miles even questioned if he even WANTED to keep using Spider-Man while Peter was still active.

Thank you! I'm so glad that someone has finally addressed this. This has always been a major pet peeve of mine in the comics.

This video gave me the best headache I’ve had in quite a long time. I love this level of passion.

Tldr: Once the mantle passes on the original character should have a completely different name, despite death/de powering and then resurrection/gaining their powers back. Totally agree, would make the mantle being passed have much more meaning and depth, and give a new direction to an otherwise stale and old character. Spider-Man (as Nando pointed out) is a very tricky situation, as miles did pick up the Spider-Man mantle through his universes character dying. He has the rights to the mantle just as much as Peter Parker. I think when they’re in the same comic, giving them specific code names would be cool (including Peter Parker) to make comms easier and hide their identity. Doesn’t make the real world confusion any easier though. Very tricky.

The most convoluted Marvel example I can think of is Spider-Woman. A vast majority of the time, we think of Jessica Drew, and that's fine. Then you have Julia Carpenter who like no one knows, but then she passed HER mantle on to Anya Corazon (Arana) when Julia became the new Madame Webb. But that still leaves two Spider Womans thwipping around town. Gwen Stacy from Earth-65 was in a rough spot. Her comic book was called Spider-Gwen and obviously she can't go by that. In HER universe she was Spider-Woman and when she started coming over to 616 and met all the others, she started to grow less and less attached to her name. Then in a Spiderverse event, everyone thought she died so when she comes back, Miles says he thought he saw a ghost when he saw her, and since she was going through this personal slump/character growth arc, she decided to go by Ghost Spider because of that comment. Kind of like when Bumblebee got a paint job in G1 Transformers and he said he looked like a Gold Bug and Optimus was like "COOL You're Gold Bug now!" I'm sure I'm forgetting another Spider-Woman somewhere but that's what I can think of for now. But I agree, I feel like giving mantles BACK to originals should be an opportunity for the character to grow and make their own new name. Arguably, Sam couldn't go back to Falcon because he trained a NEW Falcon in Joaquin Torres while he was Captain America. lol so.... rock and a hard place

Since we’re talking about Legacy/Unique names for Protégé sidekick characters. I specifically remember one time were one Comic could Use Robin’s name for a Teen Titans comic. So they came up with “The Protector”. The Costume and character were different and unique. I think abit more fixing and modifying the suit design he could’ve been another Identity for the Batman crew.

I get his confusion with the Flashes, he didn't even mention the fact that there are in fact two Wally West's, and BOTH are the Flash.

The Flash group has an even funnier version of this problem. Not only do multiple characters have the same Superhero name, two of them have THE SAME SECRET IDENTITY. New 52 erased the original Wally West and created a new biracial Wally. He was functionally the same character, except this version never grew up past being Kid Flash i.e. he never got married, never became the Flash. People started to call him Wally West II. THEN in Rebirth they decided to bring OG Wally back along with keeping Wally II, retconing them to being cousins, both named after the same Grandfather. Because DC doesn't hate us that much, they decided to have Wally II go by "Wallace West" to make things easier.

Unlike Spider-Man or Captain Marvel or Wonder Woman I feel 'Wolverine' is very specific to Logan because he earned that nickname/moniker throughout his long lifetime. I think that's true of a lot of X-Men so I don't see those names as particularly transferable. While watching the video though, I thought about legacy character names in Watchmen, which is a plot point of that novel (both with Night Owl and Silk Spectre) and leads to 'a deadly mistake'.

Honestly the Wolverine mantle to me is fine being shared between Laura and Logan mostly because 1) they're really never on the same team at the same time so you know which one is being talked about and 2) they don't have secret identities at this point really so it is fine for them to just call each other Logan or Laura if need be.

I'm pretty sure Wally West and Barry Allen dont ever work in the same city at the same time unless it's a big event, for example right now Wally is the main Flash for Central City while Barry is off on universal shenanigans, and before that happened Barry was the main Flash and Wally was off with the Titans so that was always a non issue Also I think Green Lantern having a secret identity is their choice and usually there is only one per team, for example John chose to not have a secret identity so if both Hal and John are on the same team (even if it's somewhat rare) the team would call Hal "Green Lantern" and John by his name, he really only needs the Green Lantern name because it's kinda like a job like when you have a police officer on the scene, most of the time you're just going to be called Officer, but if they want they could call you by your name (if they take time to read it)

20:26 I've always called Miles the Ultimate Spider-Man, its not exactly the best in universe code name, but that's what I've always done and I will continue to do it

I never heard of Miles called “Spin” in the cartoons (I don’t watch the present shows), but I remember being super surprised years ago, I came across Disney XD one night and they referred to Miles as “Kid Arachnid” and my mind was blown. I couldn’t help but think, why didn’t they use that in the comics when Miles merged into our universe? It only makes sense and it would appease the comic purists’ hatred of miles “being” Spider-Man. It also leaves room for him to grow up and be plain old Arachnid ( I know there was a villain arachnid but … in some continuity I’m pretty certain he’s dead). So I think that was the perfect solution to giving that character his own “identity” and I really believe there was a lack of communication between Disney XD’s animation team and Marvel comics editorial… because I just can’t see how anyone in a leadership position didn’t realize that was the way to possibly get the purist fans to accept the character.

This conversation is one that’s basically impossible to have because you have people who want to just get rid of all diversity and will make the point that characters should have their own names entirely put of bad faith (thus muddy the overall opinion of that take) and those who push back against the notion that characters should be allow to have their own identities purely because “then the incel neckbeards win.” What you said is true, when talking about Spider-man, you don’t immediately think of Miles, you think of Peter, same with Wolverine and Captain America. While conceptually the idea of passing the torch is a great idea, it doesn’t work in comics where things will always need to revert back to what they were to some extent. Steve, Logan and Peter will always have their respective mantles because they are THE quintessential carries of those mantles. Unfortunately not everyone can get a Kamala Khan-esque passing of the torch, and in her case it required the death of someone no one really cared all that much about. I understand the symbolism behind it, but not only does sharing a mantle basically only serve to confuse people in the worst case and serve no real purpose in the best, it also kinda just robs the character of being able to strike out on their own make a name for themselves. Its a moment of growth where a character who has spent much of their existence in the Shadow of at the side of another character come into their own. Sure, characters can always move and be the specific hero of X locations, but at that point its like opening a new fast food chain. There’s no real sense of independence that doesn’t feel superficial.

Great long form discussion from the channel...... I would have loved to see this as a multi channel crossover discussion...

I hate how they aged Jonathan. He and damian had such a great dynamic

Honestly, either ways fine for me. Whatever fits the character

Further to your point, they brough back an older and thought dead Laura Kinney in the new X-Men run and she talked to the one that is Wolverine right now and they decided that the younger one would still keep Wolverine as a mantle and the other one goes by Talon. They also finally changed Logan's son's code name and it's Fang now which I am glad they changed it from the weird slur it was :)

I've said for *years* that Tim should go by "Red Bird". It was the name of his car in the 90's. It's been his online screen name a few times over the years. I just think it fits.

One thing you forgot to mention is Kong Kenan, the Superman of China. His Justice League has a Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash (who I believe is Chinese-American) and Aquaman (who’s North Korean), but to me that works because they are those versions in a different country and mainly operate in Asia in general while the original characters rarely leave the American continent. Therefore it’s unlikely for them to just casually team up with their American counterparts outside of world threatening events, and the main issue of them sharing the same name is avoided.

On the Peter and Miles front, I think the best way to differenciate them, marketing wise and fan discussion wise is to use something like "Amazing Spider-Man" for Peter and "Ultimate Spider-Man" for Miles. Even then it's not perfect, ultimate sounds like it's better than amazing, but it's what fits the most for him, as that's the run he comes from. You could use something like "Spectacular Spider-Man" for Miles but it's something Peter has used before that Miles hasn't so I'm not so sure. In universe there's no way people would call them both Spider-Man I think, sure their official names could both be Spider-Man, but it would get too confusing in conversation, the people in the Marvel world would probably call them something unique for each one just to differenciate them, as a nickname.

Another good example of this is James Rhodes, who became Iron Man then he became War Machine.

I completely agree with youre “the other one” take, as a captain america fan, when i talk about it people always mean steve until we then say Sam Wilson captain america, wich is also so strange because he had his own name before being cap, why not just have like falcon become some us bird name

If Miles is gonna get shoehorned into every universe that already has Peter, he has to change his shtick. If he's staying in his own universe, he is Spider-Man. If he's with Peter, he will always be Spider-Man (MILES MORALES) and Peter will be Spider-Man.

Yeah I agree. Like Miles Morales has been my favorite marvel character since his comic introduction, but when Peter came back and they started working together, it just feels weird to me. If they're swinging around with the Avengers, for example, then how can they coordinate without people using their names? Especially when Peter is famous for being one of THE big superheroes who's extremely protective of their secret identities.

In regards to the Green Lanterns, I’ve always heard it as being Green Lantern Hal Jordan or Green Lantern John Stewart (it’s funny cause the one that came to mind first was Green Lantern Kyle Rayner). It’s definitely always seemed to me that Green Lantern was just a title, especially since they’ve always been the cops of the galaxy. Like they even have designations based on their sectors, very much like the mayor idea you brought up. But yeah, their distinction comes from the name, or at least that’s always been my understanding.

I never put the ghost spider thing together till you mentioned it, I figured she was called ghost spider cause her costume is white like a bedsheet ghost lol

I absolutely agree with this take and most of the nuanced examples I'm fully on board with. My most controversial thing on this topic is probably that I really thought Kid Arachnid was a cool ass name

What if Jon Kent is “Powerman” or something, like how Powergirl is an older alternate version of Supergirl.

5:50, they ought to name Wally Professor Flash. He discovered the speed force during his run, and for a bit was going to be a physics professor- until they decided to make him more of a pastiche of Barry and be a forensic scientist.

It's crazy how good the video got when you started talking about marvel. I'm definitely not into DC comics apparently lol

Curently, choosing a superhero name is a Mutant Cultural Practice more than anything else

Thor was weird to me as that's his actual name lol. Anyone else taking up the mantle should have another name or their actual name.

Unless there is a story/context specific reason that adequately justifies it, like the predecessor dying (provided it's done well) or it being an actual title like Green Lantern, then fine, but as a general rule, so long as the predecessor still exists like in the case of Spider-Man or whatever else or if the title is being used by another, newer character like the Robin situation, then yes, characters should have their own names or have some other means of distinguishing them as is the case for people like Miguel O'Hara being called Spider-Man 2099 or Terry McGuinnis being called Batman Beyond. As a general rule, it's one thing for one character to pay homage to another, but characters generally need their own, distinct identities. Otherwise it just creates unnecessary confusion and frustration and sometimes strays into tokenism. Characters need to exist in their own right, not ride the coat tails of others.

I agree with you Nando. At this point it's been confusing to keep up with a lot of these characters. Coming up with a different name, similar to Nightwing, can help these alternate/separate characters stand out more. When Thor was dead for a while, a guy took the mantle and became Thunderstrike after a while.

Unfortunately most of the new identities really suck, looking at you Drake. Nightwing is probably the only exception which is why it's the example everyone comes back to.

I was thinking Miles was Spin because of like, spinning records and spinning silk. but honestly, I hate Spin. I love Miles, but he needs something better than that.

It reminds me of the old comics where the characters actually aged and grew families. Like the SpiderGirl comics. Is a legacy character yes, but makes sorta sense since in that universe or timeline, Peter Parker gave up his role as Spiderman due to a leg injury and that he wanted a normal life. And that's fine given there are other heroes around. Then his daughter takes his mantle once she discovers she has her father's powers. It was ok to do that since back then there wasn't a return of the old Spiderman. Until they did and now her comics feel like they fell into obscurity.

I generally agree with this, but like with the Hawkeye example, I'm fond of having two Questions. Being a pain in the ass is the right energy for them, it's already not always clear that Question is even a name, and it's not like they care about branding. If one of them gets a new codename I hope it makes the "Who's on First" potential that we already have with Question and Nobody even worse.

I figure that the first class of X-Men had secret identities especially someone like Angel who is from a prominent family and given the team was basically all young people Given they wear masks and it makes sense given mutants wouldn’t be as common as what they would become going forward and the masks mean the X-Men won’t be attacked in their personal lives be people who hate and fear them and part of the fear could come from them wearing masks just how J Jonah Jameson views Spider-Man I also see the X-Men moving away from having masks as embracing themselves like how they move towards individual costumes rather than set uniforms Also with the ensuing fight against inequality the X-Men need to be upfront with who they are and what they can do in the hopes that people can accept them as well as also just being the faces for other mutants

The only time I have an issue with Spider-Man is with the Playstation game. Peter never died, Miles just also got powers but then both of them are simultaneously Spider-Man? It's confusing. And it results in Miles swinging around yelling Pete's name straight up. That bothers me a lot Comics or spider-verse or whatever, no issues whatsoever though

I think the issue deep down is really the way Marvel and DC can never truly let anything go, especially as time goes on with reboots and amalgamations of timelines etc... The idea of any character who is significant enough to have a mantle worth passing on actually dying or getting permanently depowered just doesn't exist anymore. Back when Barry originally died, he was gone for so long that for a generation of fans, Wally was the Flash, now? Logan dying and Laura taking up the name Wolverine just left people pessimistically wondering how long it would actually stick.

So about the Flash thing; Barry Allen died in Crisis on Infinite Earths (1985), in one of the coolest and most iconic superhero deaths of all time (so did Supergirl later in that very same comic). He stayed dead up until 2008 (I think he did some appearances but he wasn't properly brought back until 08), during that time Wally West took over the mantle and was the main character in the most iconic run of the character. So for many people Wally IS The Flash. I get it may be confusing for some people but I think not making him the Flash is a mistake.

Wait, so Red Robin is just called Robin now? That's super weird. Why not call him Cardinal and give him a strong red costume?

I think they need to let go of the older characters and let the new ones take the mantle for a little while. It worked well with the Flash but then they brought back Barry and forced Wally into obscurity. Marvel is in a different boat because they never really had legacy characters until recently and with their sliding timeline/lack of reboots, it'll be way harder to justify older characters retiring.

Gwen is called Ghost Spider in the comics too! And she came up with the name because since her identity was outed and she went to prison in her universe, she is going to college in 616 and needed a codename while she was there and couldn't use Spider-Woman because that's Jessica's name. And I think Ghost Spider works really well both because the Gwen of 616 is a ghost and because she just shows up in 616 and just disappears like a ghost. As for Miles, while I do think the best solution would be for Peter to get a new name, I don't think that will happen. So I think the second best is that Miles is called Ultimate Spider-Man since that's what his run was originally called and it wouldn't feel like we're shoving him aside for Peter's sake. And you didn't mention them, but I think Oliver and Connor both being Green Arrow works really well because Oliver's identity has been public knowledge for ages and Connor never seemed invested in having a secret identity in the first place. So calling out their names in the field works just fine

Stan Lee said the beauty of Spiderman is that you can imagine anyone under the mask but he also said he doesn’t like changing established characters and would prefer to just make new ones. Now for me legacy mantles aren’t bad I mean look at Batman Beyond It’s mainly how you handle them and the problem with Miles’s introduction in the comics was that he was only made and given the mantle because of current day social politics, this was popular at first but eventually people just wanted Peter Parker again. back in those days if there was more to the character that made him unique and interesting most people would’ve liked Miles but due to the fact that most readers saw him as a Peter Parker clone with nothing to stand out interest dropped until Into The Spiderverse. Into The Spiderverse took Miles’s character and made him unique and interesting in ways that even some of his critics began to actually like his character. He was focused on as an individual not a current check box & more people began to like Miles in that movie because that version of the character was made and handled for more interesting and well written reasons then just being a Peter Parker Clone or current day social politics. But despite the fact that legacy mantle characters can be handled well and successful or badly and horrible at the end of the day the original or iconic version of the character is what most people identify with. Terry became Batman in universe of The DCAU but we call him Batman Beyond for a reason. He’s a great character but he isn’t Bruce Wayne. The same thing happened when all many of The Robins got the mantle of Batman, even if the story was good eventually people wanted Bruce Wayne as Batman again and The Robins as The Robins. The beauty of legacy characters is that passing down the mantle/torch is inspiring when written well and can be entertaining based on how you handle the story & characters like how Batman Beyond & Into The Spiderverse did but the downside is that legacy characters aren’t they’re own characters. They are tied to the original or iconic versions and since those characters are number 1 for many, they’ll always be seen as secondary to them. This is why original characters usually have more potential then legacy characters. So when people say Miles Morales is Miles Morales & Peter Parker is Spider-Man , it isn’t racism, or bigotry it’s usually due to the fact that for many are fans of the original character before the legacy character. I personally have no issue with saying Miles Morales is Spiderman because like I said legacy characters aren’t inherently an issue for me I love legacy stories when done well, but in my mind I’m saying Miles Morales is a Spider-Man, not The Spider-Man, Just like I’d think Bucky Barnes & Sam Wilson become versions of Captain America, not that they are The Captain America, because Captain America in mind will always truly be Steve Rogers. The lesson we can learn here is that legacy stories can be well made and legacy characters can be interesting with hard work and good writing put in but eventually they’ll have to be sidekicks, partners basically secondary characters to the original or iconic versions that came before because they can never truly replace them for people. For a new character that you want to have their own status has to always be original because while legacy characters can be well made they’ll always just be legacy characters to people which is just another version. T’Challa was replaced by his sister as Black Panther people didn’t like that either and The Black Panther comics were going downhill at that point anyway. Legacy characters can be made and I’m behind them being made because I always loved legacy stories as a matter of fact I’m one of the few old comic book fans that believes you can make these new legacy characters in DC & Marvel good if you strip out all the modern wokeness and actually put great writing quality behind them but they can never fully replace the original or iconic characters and they have to be mainly side characters in that original or iconic Mythos they can still have solo stories but they have to tie back into that particular Mythos so while fans can enjoy these new characters and other new characters with better creative writing put in they can still enjoy the original and /or iconic characters that mean so much to them with better interesting creative writing. The only new characters that should fully have their own status like the originals and or Iconic ones should be the new original characters that have their own identity. If legacy characters transition from mantle sidekicks & secondary characters to their own full identities then the same applies and if they’re are characters that start off as new original characters and go to a mantle of an older original and or iconic character the same rule of side character/secondary/sidekicks applies. I believe that will solve the problem for many older and newer audiences not all but many. No more replacing, and no more changing or downgrading characters to replace them either. If you’re making a legacy character they need to be well written & interesting to be liked but sadly they’ll usually always be secondary to what came before. That’s the most likely scenario Now if your making a new character with they’re own legacy & mantle or taking a legacy character and giving them they’re own identity, legacy and mantle then the potential goes up especially with good writing and storytelling. There’s a reason Dick Grayson got more popular when as the first Robin he became Nightwing, or Jason Todd The Second Robin became The Redhood, even Tim Drake The Third Robin becoming Red Robin, or Barbara as Batgirl becoming Oracle. You could most likely have the potential to tell great stories with them in The Batman mantle with a legacy theme but if you try to write that they stay there forever people will loose interest & eventually they’ll just want Bruce Wayne back as Batman. Because he is The Batman. “As the indefatigable 92-year-old superhero conjurer and Marvel Comics chairman emeritus sees it, fan backlash up until this point hasn't so much been spurred on by racism as much as unyielding fealty to the source material.” "They're outraged not because of any personal prejudice, Lee says. "They're outraged because they hate to see any change made on a series and characters they had gotten familiar with. In Spider-Man, when they got a new actor, that bothered them, even though it was a white actor. I don't think it had to do with racial prejudice as much as they don't like things changed.” “I wouldn't mind. if Peter Parker had originally been black. a Latino, an lndian or anything else that he stay that way. But we originally made him white. I dont see any reason to change that. It has nothing to do with being anti-gay, or anti-black, or anti-Latino, or anything like that. Latino characters should stay Latino. The Black Panther should certainly not be Swiss. I just see no reason to change that which has already been established when it's so easy to add new characters.” - Stan Lee