From The Fury of Firestorm #60 written by John Ostrander with art by Joe Brozowski (cover date June 1987). Nine years and 65 issues later… and this is how Doreen Day discovers her boyfriend is actually Firestorm. Nice Ronnie, real nice.
Hey Ronnie, your trust in your relationship is to be commended! You’re quite the catch, Mr. Raymond! Any girl would be luck to have you… Not!
Support Firestorm (well, maybe not his romantic style)! Fan the flame!
I don’t see how Ronnie’s situation is any different than Clark hiding his identity from Lois for 50 years.
Indeed. While there is perhaps an interesting discussion on trust to be had here (Should all superheroes confide in their significant others?), I don’t think the way it was revealed is especially problematic. Ronnie acted to save a life (the life of his bitterest rival, it is noted, and although I don’t think Ronnie knew that at the time, I actually don’t see Ronnie as refusing to act if he did), knowing his secret would be exposed if he did. I cannot fault him for this.
If you’re going to fault Ron for anything, I would think carrying on with Lorraine as Firestorm (and you’ll note Martin wasn’t really into that relationship, that was all Ron driving it) while still dating Doreen as himself would be a bigger issue. Given Doreen’s frequent status as “Ms. Not Appearing In This Book” it is easy to forget they were still supposed to be together (and most readers probably weren’t really aching for her to come back).
And given that the first thing Doreen did after this was babble to what she thought was a cop (but was a Manhunter), Ron keeping his mouth shut was a good thing.
I kinda miss Doreen, I wish we could see what has become of her in Brightest Day…