#+ the other comics I’m thinking of like the beginning of prodigal + Tim’s earliest interactions with Dick

[heroesriseandfall]

Part of what’s so fun about the earliest Tim comics is how he is clearly an outsider with an abnormal amount of information and self-investment. He has spent about 4 years learning things by guesses and intuition and a child’s passionate detective work, all without ever actually talking to anyone directly. He thinks he knows…but he doesn’t.

He knows their identities, he’s super passionate about what those identities symbolize, he knows their addresses and a creepy amount about their schedules and associates. He knows the stories he’s found in newspapers and on tv or that he’s seen himself. He remembers meeting Dick, and seeing Batman, and he’s seen them again many times since, from a distance or in photos/videos. But he doesn’t know anything else! And most importantly, he doesn’t know them personally in the way he’ll end up knowing them over time.

He didn’t actually know where their base was until Dick showed him the Batcave! He’d never actually met Alfred despite knowing his name! He knew the places Dick lived in New York but he didn’t know the messy situation that led to Dick moving out of Kory’s apartment! He essentially studied Batman and Robin for years and yet still, he has to badger Dick for more information on the history of Robin because Tim was a child and not there during that history, no matter how much of a Robin fan he was.

His only clues as to how to navigate their emotions and personalities is based on guessing how they might react, he doesn’t have the experiential framework to actually know. He assumes Dick will be upset to hear Tim talk about his parents dying, so he avoids bringing it up and apologizes when he does. And he’s not wrong, Dick is a bit upset to talk about it, but Tim doesn’t actually know the feelings Dick has on it or how he’d handle those feelings. (He probably doesn’t know Dick has been going to therapy.)

And Tim initially assumes Dick must take on the Robin mantle and support Batman, completely unaware of exactly how complicated and unfitting and bad that is for Dick at this point. To Tim, Dick is his Robin! Of course he is the perfect person to fulfill the role of Robin. But to Dick, he has set Robin aside, he has been building independence from Bruce as he grapples with the ways Bruce treated him over the years. He has already become someone new and cannot return to what is, for him, his child self. Tim doesn’t see this! He knows the fun facts but he doesn’t know anything beyond that! (Until later.)

(Tim knows about Jason, but he does not know Jason. He had never met him. And yet he spends the next several years until Jason’s return telling Dick that he thinks about Jason and what it means to be the third Robin every day. Jason might as well be fiction to him, existing in his mind, in legends, and in the ripples he left behind.)

#thinking. thinking. the way tim is so clumsy around them at first for lack of a better word. dick was weathering it so well. #for the most part #tim drake #dick grayson #batfam #jason todd #dc meta #batman: a lonely place of dying #+ the other comics I’m thinking of like the beginning of prodigal + Tim’s earliest interactions with Dick #bonds: I knew it was you #bonds: no one could forget you #heroesriseandfall #batbros #robin mantle