#(well yj and also the batman 2004 animated series) | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

johnvenus · 2 years

Text

On Why I Prefer Bruce/Zee over Dick/Zee (Chalant)

With Batman: Urban Legends currently doing a story arc that focuses on Batman and Zatanna which promises to ‘change their relationship forever’ and YJ S4 resuming from March 31st on wards with YJ fans eager to see whether Dick and Zatanna will interact this season, I thought it would be interesting to do a post comparing both pairings.

There are strong arguments to be made for both pairings.

Dick and Zatanna are both performers, they’re both legacies and knows what it’s like to be in someone else’s shadow, they’ve both had their respective coming on age arcs (Dick in Titans and Zatanna in JLA) and they’ve both worn Perez designed costumes that are meant to represent them coming to their own.

Batman, on the other hand has been there since Zatanna was introduced. He was one of the heroes who teamed up with her in her introductory arc, Zatanna’s Search (albeit in a partial retcon), he was there when she joined the League and even back then it was established that the Zatara’s had a mansion in Gotham thus there was a Gotham connection early on He also had strong feelings about how the fight to rescue Zatanna’s mother Sindella went down and they were teammates for years in canon leading to moments like these:

Source: JLA #206

However, back then, there were no romantic sparks between the two. Zatanna was much closer to Ray, Barry and Ralph as friends and teammates. There was also 2004′s Identity Crisis in which the reveal that Zatanna mindwiped Batman at the behest of other Leaguers which drove a huge wedge into their friendship.

The idea of them being romantic with each other started with Paul Dini who wrote them together in 1993′s Batman: The Animated Series episode titled ‘Zatanna’ and later he incorporated that into DC canon when he was hired to write ‘Detective Comics’. However, the reason why I like the pairing is because it didn’t come to fruition.

Now, let me explain; what I like about romance in fiction is seeing how characters change and what we learn about them through their romantic relationships. Bruce may have turned down Zatanna’s offer of a relationship, but during the arc we learned that:

-Bruce trained with John Zatara thus revealing that the Zataras have skills that even a normal human can learn. Zatanna’s stage magic skills would be an important part of her 2010 ongoing.

-the childhood friendship was the reason why Bruce was extra dickish towards her over the events of Identity Crisis.

-Zatanna doesn’t pine or whine, she moves on if a relationship doesn’t work out.

Source; Detective Comics #847

The reveal that they were childhood friends doesn’t detract from any of her existing canon of stories, it adds to it and reaffirms them. And even if Bruce and Zee aren’t raising babies together and even if we all kind of knew the pairing wouldn’t work out well in advance, we are still rewarded with getting to know the characters more. That said, I’m not opposed to alternate universe’s that explores what could have happened if their relationship did happen.

Plus her appearances in ‘Tec by Dini is what paved the way for her first ongoing and we also learned more about Thomas Wayne and John Zatara’s friendship in the past in Dini’s Streets of Gotham series.

I also like that she became attracted to him because he sat by her bedside while she recovered from an injury.

Moreover, Bruce training with John Zatara, meeting Zatanna, their childhood friendship and attraction towards each other, becoming teammates on the JLA, the wedge driven between them by Identity Crisis and their eventual reconciliation and resumption of their friendship are all stuff that happened on screen (err..rather on panel). I covered the relationship in more detail here, here and here

Whereas on YJ, too many things happen off screen:

Zatanna and Dick’s relationship after they kissed at the end of S1? Off screen.

Zatanna and Dick’s break up? Off screen.

Zatanna joining the League and becoming a full fledged League member? Off screen.

I also feel that deaging her also takes away too much from her character.. It is jarring to see Hal Jordan, Oliver Queen, Dinah Lance, Red Tornado all resembling their comic book selves and their relationships and story arcs acknowledged, referenced and even partially adapted in the shows own style but Zatanna’s isn’t. Plus you know, Zatanna has her own side kick, Zachary Zatara who was a member of Teen Titans thus making her one of the rare female heroes to have a male side kick. Said side kick also had chemistry with Robin (in this case Tim Drake):

Source: Robin #166

It doesn’t feel right to just give her Dad what is supposed to be her spot on the JL when he was never a JL member in the comics. I could have rolled with it if the writers had given her a great coming of age arc like in the comics but unfortunately we all know how underwhelming Zatanna’s ‘arc’ was. Overall, I don’t have a problem with the pairing itself but how the characters are utilized. The show doesn’t really use any elements from the comics that are unique to Zatanna (enemies, story arcs, supporting characters). Instead she and her father are basically the Dr Fate of this universe. Hence why I get annoyed rather than gratified by scenes like this:

Source: Young Justice #20

While it’s in character for her to kiss someone like that, the fact that she is underutilized on the show and was then used to prop up Dick Grayson’s masculinity like that, to show how much of a stud he was, didn’t really sit well with me. Maybe if she got better storylines on the show, I would have been less annoyed with it.

The good things about YJ Zatanna though is that they at least get her personality right, her character design is great and I love Lacey Chabert as her voice. Plus I love her friendship with Artemis.

There is also the matter of how characters other romantic partners are handled.

Prior, to Dini, as part of the terrible Identity Crisis event, Geoff Johns and Will Pfieffer did a story arc where they “revealed” that Zatanna mind wiped Catwoman and that was the reason for her redemption. It was an insult to Catwoman whose redemption was clearly laid out by Brubaker in his run and to Zatanna who had been one of the most straight laced heroes up until that point. Anyway, writers eventually backtracked and revealed that Zatanna only gave Selina a nudge and didn’t rewrite her mind entirely.

Under Dini’s pen, Catwoman was initially apprehensive about Zatanna but the latter assured her that she wasn’t pursuing Bruce anymore after he turned her down. They were amicable friends and I still get a chuckle out of Selina calling Zatanna’s fishnets tacky and thinking she was the angel of death:

Source: Detective Comics #850

Even after Dini fixed the mess that IC created, there was a writer on Gotham City Sirens who did a story arc where Talia tries to convince Zatanna to wipe the knowledge of Batman’s secret identity. Whilst initially tempted to go through with it, Zatanna ends up restoring Selina’s mind and calling out Talia for her deception.

I don’t acknowledge the two mind wipe stories considering how grossly out of character it was for Zatanna to commit magic lobotomy on Catwoman whereas the stuff written by Dini actually feels in character and true to how Catwoman, Zatanna and Batman have been portrayed in the comics.

Besides Catwoman and Zatanna being friends and bantering with each other is way more fun than watching them being rivals with each other:

Source: Catwoman #18

If Bruce is to have an endgame pairing, it’s Catwoman/Selina Kyle. Talia is the runner up and Zatanna is the childhood friend-almost-lover-but-now-friend. It all fits and every character has their spot.

With Dick Grayson, it always comes down to Dick/Babs and Dick/Kory. I like both but I lean more towards Dick’s relationship with Kory. Again, it’s about how characters change due to their relationships. In Marv Wolfman and George Perez’s New Teen Titans, Kory is the one who helped Dick realize that he didn’t need to shut down his emotions and act like Batman all the time and in turn Dick helped her deal with her trauma and gave her companionship while on earth.

I could have rolled with Dick/Babs if writers had treated it like something that the characters developed later on in life. Like, Dick’s romance with Kory was important but now he is moving on to a new phase of his life with Babs. Unfortunately, Bat writers have often minimized Kory’s importance in Dick’s life, wrote off the relationship as Dick just being horny and worst, even had characters espouse denigrating comments about Kory’s body. As detailed here by another poster. All the while they twist Babs character into this aggrieved nerdy Girls Next Door type who couldn’t compete with the hot alien super model and instead of organically developing the Dick/Babs relationship, prefer to retcon in moments in their history, making it seem as if the characters have always been in love and thus invalidating any other love interest the characters have or could have had. .

To YJ’s credit, they didn’t go down this road when they paired Dick and Babs but I shudder at the thought of what would happen if Dick/Zee was ever exported over to main canon and a writer who ships Dick/Babs tries to reaffirm their OTP. Would we be seeing flashbacks of Zatanna wearing Dick’s jacket greeting Babs at the door? Would we be seeing more mind wipe shenanigans? Writers giving Babs dialogue where she is jealous of Zatanna and makes denigrating comments about her and her appearance?

I also have no idea how they’re going to do Kory justice if she ever shows up on the show. Dick’s already gone through his transformation into Nightwing without her influence, Zatanna is treated as his first serious love and he has already moved on to Babs. Deaging Zatanna and pairing her with Dick has resulted in Kory being displaced from Dicks life and it’s also displaced Raven who is supposed to be the magical hero of Dick Grayson’s generation. It’s also created this confusion on how old Zatanna is supposed to be and which generation she belongs to. All this because writers wanted to be clever and reference Superman and John Zatara debuting in the same comic in 1938 (even though he wasn’t confirmed to be in the same universe as Superman until well after Zatanna debuted).

And that’s why I don’t ship Chalant.

#zatanna #batman #bruce wayne #dick grayson #nightwing #catwoman #selina kyle #starfire #koriand'r #batgirl #oracle #barbara gordon #dc #dc comics #young justice #dcau #batman: tas #batman the animated series #zatanna zatara

26 notes · View notes

aboutzatanna · 2 years