Well, I have to go back to my origins on this board and cite the example of Manhunter. Paul Kirk was a detective chaarcter, who appeared in Adventure Comics, starting with issue #58. The title of the strip was Paul Kirk, Manhunter, and he specialized in missing persons. When Simon & Kirby came over from Timely, they revamped Paul Kirk into a superhero Manhunter; though, at first, it was a totally new character, named Rick Nelson. However, Ozzie & Harriet objected to his superhero activities and he was sent off to a garden party and the Paul Kirk name was used with the second appearance.
On the cover of issue #73, the debut of the Manhunter mystery man, the character as a red bodysuit, blue buccaneer boots, gloves and trunks, and a red hood mask, with cutouts for the eyes, nose and mouth.
The cover was done separately from the interior story, because there is a very obvious difference...
Note that there are no line indicating the facial cutouts. The colorist has painted that area red. However, look at the forehead and down the side of the head. There is a line, indicating a face mask or cutout of the hood. It is actually supposed to be a facemask, like a theatrical mask. Somewhere along the lines, Simon and Kirby decided they needed to do something about the mask to make the character standout more. However, someone (possibly Joe Simon, as he edited their material) decided to match the cover, for this issue. In the next issue, we see the pale blue facemask that became the standard for the character.
My guess would be a miscommunication between Simon & Kirby, between doing the cover and the interior. It's even possible that Jack forgot the mask design from the cover and improvised the theatrical facemask, as he was known to forget design elements when churning out pages. My guess is he had a better idea, by the time he was drawing the interior and it was easier to have the colorist fix the interior pages than redraw the cover.
So, the blue face mask continued for the original lifespan of the character.
Archie Goodwin and Walt Simonson revived the character for a back-up strip in Detective Comics, starting with issue #437, complete with new costume. The story is told from the POV of Interpol agent Christine St Clair. When she eventually meets Manhunter, he relates his past and Walt shows a panel with his original costume.
Note that Walt has indicated cutouts for the eyes, nose and mouth, lile the cloth hood on the original Adventure Comics cover, but, everything is painted blue. He also has the outline of the facemask indicated, combining the two elements. Something is screwy here. I suspect he was given reference to that very first Manhunter story and saw the color correction for the mask, as well as Kirby's line for the facemask and thought that was the intended design, but had been told that Manhunter had a blue mask and red hood. The reason I think this is because of the Manhunter Baxter reprint, which had the mask looking like this...
Note that the area inside the facemask line is colored blue, to match the gloves, boots and trunks, except for the skin showing through the cutouts.
So, mistake compounded mistake, leading the design back and forth.
The new design for Manhunter was this....
The original costume was great and relatively unique (the Destroyer, at Timely, also had a facemask like that); but, the whole updated costume was really unique, mixing the surcoat of a samurai with a superhero. The open top set it apart from the average and made a nice departure from traditional styles. It also suited the samurai look more.
Meanwhile, after Archie and Walt killed off Paul Kirk, Jack Kirby introduced a new Manhunter, in First Issue Special #5
Kirby update the design elements of the costume a bit, matching more what he had been doing with the 4th World. The blue facemask was relatively the same. It was picked up by Steve Englehart in JLA, where he revealed that the Manhunter cult that gave Shaw his uniform were actually alien androids, created by the Guardians of the Universe, before the Green Lantern Corps, who had broken programming and rebelled against their masters. After that, Mark Shaw took on the identity of the Privateer, wearing a pirate costume, right down to an unnecessary eyepatch. He was so badass he didn't need depth perception! He is unmasked as a criminal, while masquerading as the Star-Tsar (dumb name, I know) and is exposed by Red Tornado. He goes to jail for his crimes and is paroled for the Suicide Squad, during the Millennium Event. He earns his release and starts up a new series, as a supervillain bountyhunter, with a new mask and costume, retaking the Manhunter name...
The costume and somewhat robotic mask were both a nod to the past and an inspiration taken from Japanese superhero shows, like the Power Rangers; or, more specifically, Kamen Rider...
(The third Kamen Rider series, Kamen Rider X, though it featured the 5th version of the hero, as the first series introduced a second Rider, when the original actor was injured shooting a scene and the second series, Kamen Rider V3, featured another Rider, Riderman.)
That lasted 2 years and the character was killed off in the Eclipso comic, along with several other 80s heroes, like the female Dr Mid-Nite and female Wildcat, from Infinity,Inc; and, the Will Payton Starman. However, both Mark Shaw and Will Payton "got better." During the Zero Hour Event, a new Manhunter, Chase Lawler, was introduced, with a very Image-styled costume...
The white full hood was not terrible, in and of itself, but the whole design just screamed Image and violence, as was the trend. Unlike his cousin Jerry "The King" Lawler, Chase bombed at the box office and his series lasted only one year. However, mark Shaw was brought back, alive, at the very end, which allowed him to carryover into the much better 2004 Kate Spencer manhunter series. Shaw retained the Doug Rice desinged costume. while Spencer mixed a Darkstar uniform with other things, including Shaw's baton weapon.
So, to sum up, Simon & Kirby blue facemask, Goodwin & Simonson half mask, and Doug Rice Kamen Rider-inspired facemask good; color-corrected facemask and Simonson mixed up mask and Chase Lawler mask bad. Chase Lawler just plain bad, full stop.
