#Jason is really confused

[nelkcats]

It's not kidnapping, it's borrowing

When Jazz first decided to study psychology she didn't know what she could major in, maybe child psychology? Taking into account all her experiences. Or she could go a step further and specialize in obsessions. Even ghosts, though that would probably make her look weird.

In the end, she decided on something else, and after graduating she opened a clinic in a challenging place: Gotham. She might even give superheroes appointments in the future, considering that having Black Canary do all the Watchtower sessions didn't seem like a good idea.

Surprisingly it was a success, and she got several clients, even if some of them preferred to keep their identities a secret. She was pretty sure they were superheroes or millionaires.

Interestingly, her clinic got quite a reputation and at some point, villains started kidnapping her...To receive therapy? Jazz was about to break free and destroy whoever had kidnapped her on her way out of work (of course she knew self-defense), but Killer Croc looked contrite and…shy?

It turned out that several villains required her services but couldn't make appointments due to their lack of good reputation, there was also the fact that they didn't want to go back to prison, and wouldn't talk in an environment like Arkham (Jazz didn't like the place either, despite of considering it in advance), so she allowed the "borrowing" after work. As long as they didn't invade her apartment.

When Red Hood went to rescue the psychologist from her sixth kidnapping of the week (and damn, why did she refused to report it?) He didn't expect to find Crane crying in a chair and Dr. Fenton scowling at him as she comforted the villain.

#dpxdc #villains need a therapist too #they wanted an appointment #but couldn't ask on normal ways so #Kidnapping it is #Jazz talked to them after that #and allowed the borrowing after work #she wanted to help #Jason is really confused #he doesn't understand what is happening #dp x dc #dc x dp #Jazz is really good at her job #her clinic also work for ghost but just in special occasions #when they visit #Jazz know self-defense #she could've stopped the kidnappings if she wanted #but she wanted to know what was happening #People in Gotham love Dr. Fenton #Bruce refuses to visit her clinic #The villains protect the clinic too #and kinda stop the joker #Harley stop him with her hammer every time he is near the clinic

[haliaiii]

Juno’s champion

#uhh spoilers cough cough #had some deep Jason thoughts #rlly feel like he was missed potential tho 😔 #actually fun fact I didn’t know heroes of Olympus was a sequel #so I started it as my first book into the Percy Jackson series and was really confused the entire time lmaooo #anyway my favorite characters are the ones doomed by the narrative #pjo hoo toa #pjo #pjo fanart #jason grace #percy jackson #percy jackon and the olympians #heroes of olympus #trials of apollo #pjo spoilers #my art #art #digital art #fanart #illustration #procreate #haliai art #toa spoilers #the burning maze spoilers

[oifaaa]

I will never understand the obsession with making tims favourite robin Jason when it couldn't be more painfully obvious that tims favourite robin was Dick

Like people are so caught up in the concept, the made up angst, that tims favourite robin beat him up that they straight up misunderstand how much more significant Tim and Dicks relationship is not to mention the added layers of Tim originally being created as the ultimate self insert character which for a good number of readers meant they grew up with Dick as their favourite robin and didn't really like Jason just for not being Dick

#dc #tim drake #dc comics #dick grayson #jason todd #can you guys tell tim and dicks relationship is actually really important to me #but yeah #its not like theres no angst in tim and dicks relationship #tim and dick also just feel so much more organic #any time tim and jason have interacted as enemies or allies #it always feels so forced #i hate it #anyway gonna keep shouting about how dick will always be tims favourite robin #its important to my health that i do this #negative #negativity #i said this in my reblog but people still are getting confused so ill add it here too #this isnt a canon vs fanon canon only thing #or else id be a hypocrite #this is mainly a specific thing i dont like bc i prefer this other thing way more

[skylersprompts]

DC x DP Prompt *16*

After he got crowned, Danny started to clean up in the Ghost Zone. One thing he found was an empty lair. An elegant room full of books with a fireplace and comfy armchairs. A ghost was tied to this place, but he never saw them. But he still could feel that the lair was tied to someone, what meant that the ghost didn't end to exist.

It took some time, but Danny was able to follow the bond from the lair to the ghost. He found himself back in the mortal realm and his first thought was that the ghost got somehow stuck here.

So the plan was to find him and bring him back to the zone. Except as soon as Danny made the plan, he should have known that nothing ever goes according to plan for him.

The bond lead him to a young man with black hair that had a white stripe in it. And the man was very much alive, but also didn't seem to be possessed. But he also absolutely felt like the lair.

Invisible Danny followed the guy around and he found out quite a few things.

His name was Jason Peter Todd.

He lives in Gotham.

He is the vigilante/crime lord Red Hood.

He came back from the dead as a revenant.

He got dipped into some corrupted ectoplasm.

He had sever anger issues because of that.

So... Danny made another plan. Jazz had told him about emotional support dogs, because she liked to work with them. And Danny was pretty sure that it shouldn't be to hard to train a ghost dog to do all of this.

It was a nightmare to train Cujo, but after almost six month he was positive that it would work. He took Cujo with him to Gotham and waited till he had a moment where he got Red Hood alone.

The first thing that happened after he made himself visible but not tangible, was that Hood shot him. Like, rude. But because of that he was here.

"Hello. My name is High King Phantom of the Infinite Realms and I am here to give you your prescribed emotional support ghost Dog. His name is Cujo!"

#skylers prompts #dcxdp #dcxdp prompt #dpxdc #don't tag the danny phantom fandom #jason todd #dp cujo #emotional support ghost dog Cujo #Danny trained him himself #What could go wrong? #everything #Jason is so confused #why is there a floating guy with a green dog? #WHY does he need a support animal?! #what the hell is going on?! #Jazz will be so disappointed #Danny should have just asked her how to train a dog for this and she would have made a far bette job than this #Cujo is a good boy #but he is not really the best at his new job #Jason still loves him #Cujo will give Bruce so many grey hairs

[tiredofsatansbullshit]

they're best friends, actually

#jason todd #stephanie brown #red hood #spoiler #joker: the man who stopped laughing spoilers #not really #eh #dc #batfam #this is such a confusing comic but it's given us shots of jason looking good #pros and cons

[nerdpoe]

Prefacing this with I haven't read the comics I just dip in and out like the canon is a pool and I'm trying to climb onto a pool floatie.

So y'all remember that weird fucked up mind game test Bruce pulled on Tim in the beginning of their bullshit? The real fucked up mindgame that made Tim quit being robin for a bit, before coming back and being all "I know I'm not gonna get an apology." And Bruce was all "good."?

What if Tim realized it for what it was.

Tim realizes the test is a test and decides to get back at Bruce in his own game.

Bruce wants to act like he doesn't care about him in an effort to protect himself from grief if another kid ends up dying? That's fine.

Bruce resorting to psychological mind games to drive Tim away from seeking any support??

Not cool.

Tim realizes, and pulls a Hamlet.

He likes Dick, doesn't want the man to go through what Bruce is about to, and goes to Bludhaven to directly tell Dick not to believe ANYTHING Batman says for a month if it relates to Tim, that he's gonna teach the old man a lesson.

Dicks like "uhhhhhhh okay? U know we can just tell him whatever he's done is wrong, right?"

And Tim's just "nah, I'm past that point. See u in like three weeks to a month. This conversation didn't happen."

He leaves a copy of Hamlet in his locker in the bat cave, the only clue he's gonna drop until all is said and done, and gets to work.

Pretends that Bruce's mind fuck has driven him mad, pretends that he's sneaking off to chase down leads, pretends to talk to people that aren't there, visits the joker just to learn how to mimic his laugh, (side bar, joker has no idea why the new robin is visiting him and disabling the cameras, or why the kid just copies what he says and when he laughs, but after like two weeks of it he may be slightly uncomfortable around the kid no lie) uses makeup to make his eye bags look worse and trashes his own house (his parents are gonna be so pissed but he's already angrier than they could ever hope to be, so they can suck it), acts so unhinged Bruce calls it off and tries to tell him the truth, only for Tim to pretend like he doesn't believe him and steal the robin uniform and run away, and then goes and sneaks away from his own house (he knew he was being watched) to a warehouse he predetermined with a conspiracy theory board and string in his room (he needs to make sure Bruce knows where Tim wants him to go) and the conspiracy theory is just an amalgamation of the bullshit Joker spews (again, joker is really confused by this strange child hero and very slightly unsettled, what the fuck Batman where the fuck did u get this robin, maybe return him to the robin store? This one's defunct), makes sure it's abandoned, and blows it to hell with the robin uniform inside

He knows Bruce will be too jarred, to lost in the major trauma buttons Tim is pushing with the warehouse explosion, to do a proper analysis. He KNOWS Bruce will want it done as quickly as possible, and try to bury Tim as quickly as he can. He knows his parents won't get any phone calls for at least a month.

Then he goes to ground for a week.

Walks back into the cave after that week, corners a grieving and broken Bruce, and asks him how he likes mind games now.

After all, it was just a TEST. There was no need to skip basic steps like DNA analysis, that's just SLOPPY Bruce.

Dick, who had been warned by Tim early on and kinda knew the kid was gonna pull a fast one of Bruce, had NO IDEA it was gonna be this depraved, and is very highly Shook. Nor did he realize Bruce had tried a mind game first, and is...disappointed but not surprised, really.

But holy shit Tim Bruce started at a 9 and you escalated to a goddamn 25.

Bruce, realizing that they may both be a bit fucked up, acquiesces to therapy. For all of them. Holy shit for all of them, because that was NOT a normal teenage response and he is beginning to sense some distinctly villainous red flags from this kid.

Next time the joker breaks out he flat out refuses to believe that Tim is a Robin, and joker is the one that starts the whole Cuckoo thing, and asks Batman if he's gonna send the kid to Arkham early or if this is a weird intervention program he's trying.

Then he tries to murder like fifty people cuz he's the motherfucking JOKER.

#Batman #Tim drake #Bruce Wayne #Tim drake is deranged #Tim drake is feral #fanfic prompt #story prompt #this early on Bruce has no idea just HOW feral this kid is #in this au he's about to #maybe I'll write it #actions have consequences au #Jason comes back to pull his bullshit #only for Batman to corner good and just #look man I'm trying really #really hard #to make sure robin doesn't turn supervillain #do NOT fuck this up for me #and Jason's just #really fucking confused #because this is supposed to be his replacement? #then he tries to attack titans tower #and meets feral Tim from his au #and yeah #yeah he can see why Bruce was telling him not to cross the kid

[l-just-want-to-see]

United States Junior Gymnastic Team of ‘88-‘89

Catherine Todd née Johnson & Mary Grayson née Lloyd: I hope we meet again (I’m letting you go)

@kindlespark / The Book Thief, Markus Zusak / ? / dc comics / Diary, Chuck Palahniuk / Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace / Always Gold, Radical Face / Us Against You, Fredrik Backman / @inanotherunivrse / I Wanted to Leave, SYML / ? / ? / Psychogeography, Chelsea Dingman / @leonardospoetry + me / On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, Ocean Vuong / Past Lives (2023) / A Letter to Love, Caitlyn Siehl / @archivegeo / In a Dream You Saw a Way to Survive, Clementine von Radics / Always Gold, Radical Face / Dorothea, Taylor Swift / Stand by Me (1986) / dc comics + On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, Ocean Vuong / Life After Death, Laura Gilpin / Lost Without You, Freya Ridings

#target audience: me #but come on guys. Catherine loves her people and her city and her home and her books. And Mary needs to leave. To fly. To perform. #like not only is it a fascinating relationship between two characters regardless it’s also really interesting through the lens of Jason and #Dick as brothers. #Because yeah Dick can’t stay in Gotham and Jason will always be coming back #But at least they found each other again I suppose #At least they have that #Jason Todd #dick grayson #mary grayson #catherine todd #dc comics #batfamily #web weaving #anyways I hope this isn’t too confusing and feels like a dialogue. Also I tried to incorporate writing/books/stories on Catherine’s end #And flying/weather/space on Mary’s

[tinybro]

jasico server was chatting about the cupid scene and jason getting nico's memories blasted straight into his brain and how jason being shot with one of cupid's arrows while with nico and this was just never brought up in canon again and now i'm thinking like...what if that's just how cupid's arrows work? not by magically manifesting love for someone out of nothing, but by giving someone the perspective that'd make them fall in love naturally? jason gets a front row seat to nico's memories and instantly understands him intimately and can trust him completely without any doubt or suspicion

so what if jason, after slowly realizing he's totally in love with nico, just thought back to the arrow incident and it made him second-guess everything? because maybe he's only feeling this way because cupid hit him with an arrow with only nico was around and it's no different than any other god messing with his love life

#i live for anything that drags out the pining/pre-relationship period as long as possible okay #give me the drama of jason frustrated about constantly being manipulated by gods #in love with nico but convinced it's just cupid fucking with him and not wanting nico to get dragged into it #maybe telling nico eventually because he's having trouble hiding his feelings and he doesn't wanna hurt nico by confusing him #which is of course an emotional rollercoaster for nico #hearing jason say he's in love with him only to then immediately hear that it's just godly fuckery #nico agreeing to help jason find cupid to get it reversed because he knows how much it sucks having feelings for someone unwillingly #and he doesn't want jason stuck mooning over someone like him just because he was unkucky enough to be with nico for the cupid incident #whole quest in which nico develops feelings in return and angsts because he's sure jason only feels that way because of the arrow #maybe a slip-up in the middle somewhere with nico accidentally revealing he likes jason back before backpedaling wildly #so now jason has hope despite himself because he'd never really thought it was possible anyway given nico's feelings for percy #and he doesn't like being manipulated by gods but he doesn't mind the idea of being in love with nico #and what if he just gave up on the hunt for cupid entirely and let it happen #while nico feels guilty since clearly it's just cupid arrow magic fucking with jason and he's enabling it #and then of course when they finally find cupid he explains how his arrows work and that he can't just FORCE someone to be in love #no more than hera could with jason and piper by fucking with their memories to push them together #cupid's methods are just way more effective #my tag babble ended up longer than the actual post oh my god #pjo #jasico #my dumb headcanons

[voiider]

fake psychic Tim but its just. its just psych. Jason dies and batman goes off the deep end so Tim (instead of becoming robin) starts going ham on the 'tips to the police' bc if the police can deal with the smaller crimes then Tim doesn't have to worry about batman killing a petty thief.

Except he's running himself into the ground and he starts getting sloppy bc he's giving the local police info, and bludhaven info (bc dick) AND probably giving Nightwing info when he can and someone catches him or he leaves a paper trail and then Officer Dick Grayson apprehends him and takes him in for questioning and Tim is like "you can't talk to me without my parents or a lawyer present, I'm a minor. And my parents are in Guatemala, so you better call my lawyer."

and Dick is like "kid you're not in trouble i just need to know who's giving you this information." Because there is NO WAY this kid isn't working with someone. Someone who is using a child to drop off information, which while noble to help the police, is putting this child in danger and tim is like, pretty offended actually. That it's being implied that he COULDN'T do this himself.

So he's like "im not working for anyone."

and Dick is like "you have to be getting the info from somewhere. I just wanna help."

and Tim is like AUGH ADULTS "I just- i figured it out on my own" and its CLEAR that Dick doesn't believe him which is, first off, super insulting, never meet your heroes, and second he shouldn't be talking anyway or admit that he goes out at night or Dick will do something stupid like try to make him stop. So he's like (rolling eyes) "I'm psychic. Are you happy? Can I have my phone call now?"

#batman #tim drake #Cue Dick ALMOST not buying it but he's like 'okay kid' #if you're psychic prove it. #And Tim is like oh he thought i was serious??? Uh #“you're favorite animal is a bat.“ And Dick looks at him confused but then sorta pales a little and is like ”... what.” #and tim is like “and you really like nighttime... walks.” #And Dick like turns off the recording and is like “kid what are you saying to me” #and Tim is like “I know you're Nightwing. The ... spirits told me.” #and honestly it's more believable that a 12 year old kid is psychic than that he figured out who Nightwing was on his own #ted talks #anyways lots of fun hijinks can ensue. Tim is technically a security rick and even though dick REALLY doesn't wanna talk to bruce #he should tell him about this... psychic child #Which can just be more questions and Tim answering them and is like #if i wasn't psychic how would i know this. #and Bruce.... doesn't know. So they have no choice but to believe him #psych tim au #also including: bruce being like “.... can you tell my son (jason) i love him?” #tim would actually be pretty good on the field with moments notice observations #he's been trained his whole life to read people at parties and know what they want from him and what they mean #regular people are MUCH easier to read than the elite who say everything backhanded and all have like poised masks of perfection #raye was telling me their psychic tim au and i was like 'ok but what if just psych' #catch us out here both writing separate fake psychic tim aus

[nelkcats]

Ice tears

When the pit rage got worse and Jason was barely able to think he decided to ask Constantine for help. Mainly because B hated when he asked Constantine for help and the wizard was nicer than he seemed at first glance.

Constantine strangely had the answer. It turns out that the Lazarus Pits had an history with something called "The Infinite Realms", and the water was the remains of one of the "Ancients" (Jason had no idea what that title meant) who died trying to stop the first King and bled in the confines of the world of the living.

As interesting as the story was, Jason had no idea how it helped with his problem, and he told the hellbazer so. John just rolled his eyes and gave a summary "You are possessed by the rage of that ghost, the only way to calm it down is to get the king's tears, the only thing he wanted, although that's a bit suicidal mate"

And well, now that he had forced Constantine to take him to the King (after making the portal, the British fled, coward) standing in front of the castle, Jason prepared his weapons, he probably should have thought it better since the king could be a powerful, interdimensional entity that could kill him with a snap of his fingers. But it was too late for that.

With a sigh he entered the throne room and saw a rather cute boy, with a crown and a dazzling smile, waving at him excitedly and asking a thousand questions a minute. Damn, was that the king? He was so friendly and— fuck, Jason had to make him cry, he was screwed.

#dpxdc #ghost king danny #Danny was alone #he love visitors #but no one visit because they are scared of his power #Danny is really powerful but doesn't care about it #Seeing Jason made him excited and he decided to gain a new friend #Jason is confused #the boy is cute and apparently no messing with him #he kinda fall in love #the problem is that he needs to make the boy cry no matter what #dp x dc #dc x dp #deadonmain #dead on main #Constantine still thinks that Jason is suicidal #Even more when he told him about his plan of giving the King a heartbreak #Of course Jason will chose to fight the interdimensional entity for a possibility without telling his family lol #Pit madness cure is the king tears #no matter what king

[atruesweetheart]

okay, so nobody laugh but i recently learned that there was more than one robin??? like, as in batman’s sidekick??? looks a bit like a traffic light, THAT lil guy??? apparently there are many and i’ve just been living under a rock up until a couple of months ago and honestly idk what to do with this information because the deeper i dig the more i find. nothing is as it seems, and most pressingly of all none of them appear to be okay. one seems like he’s holding on by a thinning thread, another one apparently became a crime lord for a time, another one just gives off the same energy as that one kid at the back of the class who chugs energy drinks and never knows peace, and another knows how to use a sword. a SWORD, people. he’s, like, ten. he is an infant with a murder weapon. oh, and apparently there was a blond girl one for a second???? guys please i’m spiraling GUYS—

#this was my initial reaction verbatim guys #my mind was blown i was confused i was puzzled #i was confuzzled #gobsmacked really #batman #dick grayson #jason todd #tim drake #damian wayne

[basicpotathoe]

trying to figure out if fan art is show percy, book luke, will, jason, apollo, or octavian is so humbling for me

your art is so good but why did rick make them all blonde

#I should really pay attention to how they’re described in the books but I just picture them how I want and then get confused #pjo #riordanverse #percy jackson #luke castellan #jason grace #apollo #octavian #will solace #pjo hoo toa

[maybesomemilo]

After the tower incident once Jason finally gains some semblance of his mind back he implements a city wide hands off rule for Robin. Anyone even thinks about touching Robin and and Hood puts a bullet between their eyes.

#It extends to RR when Tim upgrades #and only Tim #I’m talking no one touches Tim #everyone’s confused #the bats mostly don’t really notice #Tim does #it takes approx ten deaths for people to get the point #batfam #jason todd #tim drake #headcanon #Batman #batfamily #protective Jason Todd #Harley LOVES it when she finds out #harley quinn #i’m telling you #it takes the bats a literal eternity to figure out that the rogues are scared #dick grayson #bruce wayne #damian al ghul #damian wayne #cassandra wayne #this tickles my brain just right

[lokiiied]

WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH THIS???

#i really don’t think they’re gonna do roy x keeley x jamie atp but then they do shit like this? #idk was this just like…her admiring how he’s changed ? #without romantic feelings? #TEDBECCA #KEELEY DIPPING HER TOES BACK IN THE LADY POOL? #keeley x jack #jason you are confusing me #keeley jones #jamie tartt #rebecca welton #ted lasso #jack danvers #ted lasso season 3 #ted lasso spoilers

[boyfridged]

the brilliance of jay's progression in countdown is that it gives you a promise of positive character development, and then it breaks it. and it does so intentionally, in the most diverting way, to emphasize jason's inability to escape the cycle.

or, another post breaking down the series, where i repeat myself a lot but also make a clearer argument.

there are three notable events that happen at the beginning: the subtle showcase of jay's internal conflict considering his approach toward killing (the very first encounter with duela and the monitor), jay reaching out to donna in crisis ("i guess I just wanted to be around someone else who might know how it feels…"), and finally – his helmet shattering. these scenes tell you: jason's direction as a character is changing, and it seems, for the better. he's about to abandon his trauma-based (no matter how ironic, it does remain tied to his trauma) identity, he is connecting with people, and he seems to be on a brink of understanding that his moral standing does not provide easy answers or solutions either.

and for the most part of the series, we see that narrative unfolding (even if a bit non-linear, still innocently convincing way). it is, in many ways, supported by bringing up features of his characterisation from the 80s. jason remains, of course, still unpleasant in ways typical for this era of writing, and is conflicted and disagreeable, which makes sense for his utrh/post-utrh personality. however, there are also details that bring us back to his original robin run and his cameos on ntt – we see him being responsible (e.g. #43 – suggesting to bring in other superheroes in crisis, even though he clearly is not keen on the idea of working with them), determined (#16: “isn’t that your super-power, stupid boy? too stupid to ever give up?” “maybe it is”), sensitive (half of the whole storyline, really), caring for gotham (gotham by gaslight) and people-oriented (as early as #51).

the issue that particularly signals that jason is an inherently good person and externalizes his internal conflicts regarding classic heroic vigilantism vs his cynical approach is #30, where we meet batman of earth-15 –  alt jason, whom our jason attempts to punch in the face.

and on topic of batman – jason is always gravitating towards batman. in gotham by gaslight jay looks delighted to see (the foreign) bruce and suggests checking with the local bat. then, earth-51 arc arrives.

earth-51 arc (#16 - #13) is a culmination of a promise of catharsis for jason. we have already seen him as batman, as a confirmation that a different life for him is possible. and here he has a chance to come to terms with his past and overcome it. he meets a version of bruce who has done exactly what he wanted him to do in utrh: killed the joker and the rest of the rogue gallery. what is most important – he is disappointed with this version of his father. we realise that jason, deep down, has an intimate and intuitive understanding of what batman stands for; and that he shares most of his values. this is a truth that you can't ignore especially since jay is the one to inspire this hollow, cynical version of batman to go out and fight in a seemingly lost battle.

and then batman dies. right in front of him.

this is a central moment of the narrative, for many reasons, most strikingly:

the symmetry:, a premise known from the lost days, becomes literal. this "the father had lost a son, and now the son had lost the father" is a cruel parallel to a death in the family and bruce's grief. jason's death created a gap between them that jay has been desperately trying to close, with no avail – because in bruce's mind, jason remains dead. now that jason is grieving bruce, the connection closes on both sides, and there's no way for either of them to reconcile the mourning with the reality of the other being truly alive. in this sense, the arc solidifies that jason can never come home.

no good deed goes unpunished. as i have mentioned before, so far jason is established as someone good at heart, but confused; and the reader intuitively assumes that his better, honest side will win. yet, the moment jason gives in to hope, it victimises and retraumatizes him. this event, again, brings to mind his own death, when he tried his best to save sheila and ended up paying the highest price for it. so, narrative-wise, jason is always punished for his kindness.

perhaps because of the nonchalant act that jason pulls off, many readers seem to miss that everything that happens after that arc is an upshot that follows logically from it.

jason's immediate determination to leave – and later a short period of indecision that ends up with his dramatic exit, pushing his team away, makes perfect sense when you consider what intense trauma he has just gone through. admittedly, i'm not a fan of the notion that he would give up at all (i think he's always ready to give up on himself, but not on the world), but then on the other hand, if there's anything that would cause it, narrative-wise, witnessing batman dying does sound like a good incentive for that. (it also has to be pointed out that jason seems to be confident that the rest of the team can go into the final battle without him anyway; it's not like he would go back to his earth not even knowing if said earth will exist tomorrow).

it's crucial to notice that following that crisis of faith (faith in fighting for the world) is followed by him raising up for the challenge again, but now... worse and even more confused. in the final confrontation with donna, jason antagonizes the superhero community, and when we see him at the end of the series (#1) his monologue indicates that he believes the capes to be naive. (significantly, he also focuses on bruce and offends the memory of 51 earth-bruce by calling him crazy; an action that can be seen as suppression of his own guilt and invoking, once again, a cruel symmetry considering bruce's engagement in victim-blaming after jason's death). this, once again, is consistent with the "no good deed" reading – jason diminishes superhero values because he has been continuously punished for living by them. (and unlike other superheroes, he doesn't have a support system nor skills in compartmentalization that would help him deal with this trauma) every leap of hope re-traumatised him. hence, it seems to be no surprise that jason decides to abandon the mask, and in the closing scene we see him without it. the promise of the shattered helmet is pushed to an extreme – jason does not get a new alt identity. he denounces the idea of superheroism completely.

and yet, what is ultimately subversive about the ending, is that jay is not truly a civilian and he does not abandon vigilante ways. he does the same thing. we see him without a mask, but he is clearly working a case. he might have rejected the symbolic dimension of the vigilante work, but he still carries the same delusional hope for bettering the world and protecting people that the superhero community does. only now, he is even more isolated and doesn't have any identity to go by (as he is still legally dead).

as such, the ending opens a new question regarding jason's understanding of himself and vigilantism, or rather the lack thereof. is it possible that vigilantism is really at the core of jay's trauma? and why, potentially, is it something that is so destructive for him as a character specifically? (and i have some answers for that, but i'm not going to get into it here, as it's already a very long post)

so, tldr; the genius of countdown is that it establishes jay as sensitive, determined, and fundamentally good (this is what the purpose of seeing him as batman is!), and then it brutally reminds the reader that jason’s tragedy is that on this specific earth, in this specific timeline, his love doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. the story goes on as it did; one way or another, jay is trapped in the cycle of his care ironically creating rifts between him and the others, and bringing him to his own downfall.

#okay i know i said a lot of it already but it's been some time since i finished the reread and i feel like my take on it has shifted a bit #and i wanted to emphasise the 'no good deed' interpretation!! #also it's just that i've seen a lot of people saying that countdown ends with jason being a civilian. #while i think the whole genius of it is that he is not really a civilian?? #have you seen civilians doing whatever the hell he is doing in the final scene? #this is arguably the element of the narrative that is by most readers missed – and i understand why #it's easy to get confused when navigating an event that spans across pretty much all of dc #fortunately for you i have worms for brain. and i have hyperanalysed it #i'm not saying overanalysed btw because i genuinely believe that this is not a case of accidental narrative brilliance #this is a pretty clear and straightforward progression once you dissect it from the rest of the series #and there are a lot of details that further cement my belief that it had to be intentional #i mean. even the recognition that donna and jason know each other is already... a lot for dc writers? #the fatal flaw #51 #no good deed #jay.zip #jay.txt #jason todd #core texts

[batfamhyperfixation]

Jason, looking at Roy: aren't we all at least a bit homo

Interviewer: ah yes because we are all homo sapiens, I get what you did there

Jason, confused: no I meant when I look at dudes I have gay thoughts

#jason: I have gay thoughts #the gay thoughts: *hold his hand* *snuggle* *run your hand through his hair* *put your arm around him* *hug* *kiss his cheek* #jason: *is an absolute blushing mess* #interviewer: oh god they must be really dirty #Ok look I feel like jason is the type to be a blushing mess when thinking about doing little intimate things with people #Roy would think its hilarious so he would be all flirty in a domestic way like Im going to intertwine our fingers and lay my head on you #until their hands are intertwined and jason kisses their hands and roy becomes a blushing mess cause jason has never instigated it before #like I just want their intimacy to be friends messing with each other but then they both realize they actually like the intimacy so #it just becomes a thing they do and other people around them are confused cause these emotionally constipated buff dudes are able to #unironically be this intimate. the batfamily meets angry jason who was resurrected and then they meet Jason With Roy™ they are blindsighted #cause murderous jason was laying his head on Roy's lap as Roy ran his fingers through Jason's hair (no one else should even attempt this) #as they were talking in front of everyone and using pet names as calling each other partner and everyone is like 'what???' #dick is most suprised though cause he is friends with roy so its a classic case of 'when did my brother and my friend become so intimate??' #he calls the entire rest of the og teen titans over just to make sure his eyes arent deceiving him #like 'no fr donna wally garth you guys gotta get over here and see this' and that was how they started an inpromptu teen titan reunion #jayroy #jason todd #roy harper #incorrect outlaws quotes #rhato #red hood and arsenal