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screentime-princess · 1 year

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Some thoughts on Titans (hbo max) now that show ended.

(In my head it's not over, bc I'm big on rewatching things so... anyways)

Okay. So first thing I want to make clear is that I'm super new to DC and stuff. I've seen arrowverse, most of it, and some movies, also I really like and care about these characters even though show isn't the best, as I hear everyone say and I kinda agree. But still I like the show!!!

Another thing is that I've seen a lot of people hate on this show and I get that it's not the best show, like writing is sometimes very iffy but I think that it's a good introduction to these characters for someone who has never seen anything or read the comics or stuff like that.

Next one is that I am one season short of finishing Gotham and then I plan on watching DC Animated Universe. So I guess my opinions from this post, might change in the future.

So yeah. Here it goes.

I liked the way first season focused on characters and not so much story even though the bigger story was always it like in the back of the episode(s). But I really enjoyed the fact that it was focused mainly on characters of Dick, Hank. Dawn etc. Who they are as people and how what happened to them is influencing their actions. I really liked every character introduction fr.

Even though I watched the show in like few weeks and then waited for last few episodes to come out week by week, I feel like they should have made Dick and Kory cannon or whatever way sooner. They did, kinda, in those dreams/hallucinations, but still, as much as I like this little kind of open ending, I feel like they have so much chemistry, and it just should've happened sooner. When they were in Gotham that Barbara again storyline, I don't know. That wasn't my cup of tea. Also, the flashback episode with Aqualad in season 2, why introduce a character to be killed?! Give us something else than a cute little love story between Donna and Garth and then pain. I don't know. It was so sudden and I don't like character deaths just for the sake of story line.

One thing I did really like was Gar and Rachel, from the beginning from their first meet-cute in the arcade. It was so freaking cute. The fact that they are different, special, that mutual understanding and acceptance ugh. I don't know why we didn't get that like cannon confirmation that they are a thing. We got all those like little cute scenes of them sitting together and stuff but I don't know, I just needed something real just as for Dick and Kory.

As for other characters, I really liked everyone. Conner's little split good and evil personas. Dawn is the most gentle soul I love her so much. Hank was annoying at moments but he was fine. Donna is the beauty, she is grace. <Tim3 (that's how I feel about him). (And I rant about Jason later, wait for it). I don't know what to say like, I really really liked everyone.

Now, maybe I do a separate post about season 4 because it's the, you know, the freshest one in my head but I did rewatch some of the episodes so idk.

As I'm writing this, I see that it's not all like in chronological order as the seasons progress, but I hope you get the gist of it. I wanted to say that I cannot imagine in my head waiting entire week for the episode about Connor after Jason gets dropped off a building even though I knew that's not how he dies fr, I was scared shitless, like, I love him so much, I don't know. Also that fucking scene on the roof killed me, like it seriously messed me up and no one ever talked about it ever again (him being suicidal). Also Dick going of alone every chance he gets to do stupid shit that would 100% get him killed (babe have you heard of therapy, no?).

The thing that bothered me the most, throughout the entire show is how only Gar seemed to care about others. He was the only one to care about anyone. Only one who gave a fuck when Jason died. Like when Kory was mad @ Jason for "getting himself killed"<<<< (what?). He was the only one that was trying to find out what happened to Jason and how he came back. And he did find out (Go Gar).

I know now that that is most likely because of his connection to all the things dead and living, but they explained it very late in the show, so for someone who has no background knowledge, it was confusing.

Major thing that bothers me -> Why is everyone hating on... Literally everyone. Like these people, actors and actresses did in my opinion, amazing job. Considering the writing, okay?

Like let's be fucking for real. This is the first live action adaptation of these characters. And it could have been so much worse. Let's be honest. It could have been so.much.worse. But it's fine and I think that if people are just okay, with something being different, it would have been fine. Like it doesn't have to be the same as in comics. And from what I heard, there are many interpretations of these characters in different comics and different animated series. I don't understand why everything has to be by the book. Like I've been a MCU fan for a while. And l feel like as much as Marvel fans are like haters at the bottom of their souls (not as much as Star Wars fans) and they are (haters), I feel like they appreciate change a little more. (Haters comment is about fanboys don't get ne wrong babes)

It's fine that it's different. Different is okay. Most of hate I've seen is about Jason. And I don't know, like, people calling him a whining c word?!?!?!? Sorry, why is it bad that he's portrayed with more emotions? Or him feeling like he is not good enough (relatable) and always being second thought would bring anyone to tears (it brought me to tears). So why is that a bad thing in portrayal of this character? Like I said, I know very little about his character and I feel like this introduction is fine, it made me care about him. Isn't that what other people in the fandom want? For other people to care. Why does it have to be a specific version? It made me care. That should be enough no? It made me want to learn more about these characters. So why is everyone so offended by this version of Jason Todd? It doesn't make any sense in my head. I was literally losing my shit watching episode 11 of season 4. Last week was peek of my existence because of him showing up again. I have no words.

So yeah, I don't know. I have so many thoughts about this show and no one to talk to because my friends are lame, not watching the same shows I'm watching, watching Bridgerton and shit (no hate to Bridgerton fans).

<3 if you read it all, thank you <3

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helloblobbyblobfish · 2 years

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My writing masterpost

I am reblogging so many things, I had comments about doing a masterposts allowing people to find my writing more easily. Sorry.😓

A bit unsure how to sort the many different things I wrote, the posts will probably be updated not only with new stories but also get re-organized.

SFW FOR SURE

BH6

Big romance 2: abandonned oc x tadashi story. Should At least clean it. My first story. God it is full of faults. T.T

DC comics

The bat and the pencil: A batman x the eraser fanfic where Lenny gave amnesia to bruce. One chapter up on Tumblr. In need of transportation from A03.

Chapter 1

Blooming red: An AU where Jason Todd’s a meta with powers similar to Ivy’s. Chapters can go individually from crack to pure angst.

Jason the wannabe flower-boy: At first, Jason didn’t want to know what his powers were.

Jason the sprout: Jason doesn’t quite grasp his new powers and suffers a traumatic encounter

A plant boy in space: Much later down the line, Dick gets Jason admitted on the JLA.

A snake in the nest: Attempt at Timber. Mixed together with my love with obscure characters to make a story where Danny Temple comes asking Tim for help to keep Kobra in check, and Bernard needs to really learn about his boyfriend’s secret life.

Tron

Life with Tronzler the cat: Sam is out of the grid, and now has a weirdly behaving program as an unwanted guest. Wait, is he acting like a feline?

Linked Universe

E.E.F.K (Edy!Eldritch!Knigk!Four) : Me showing all my weird Four headcannons in one story.

Chapter 1 The fall: Sky and Four fall into a underground labyrinth. Four has a way of lighting up the path, but...

Chapter 2: Incoming! Being Written! Wind and Four talk magic! Fire!Earth! Water! WIND!: Wind is bored and decides to train his magic. Four joins him.

Original work (Mostly hypno-stuff, horror is starting to show up.)

Safety in coils : About a Naga who decides to study humans and becomes sort of an unintentional dad for some kids.

Safety in coils: The diary of the naga as he meet those kids, and especially abused Noah.

Obliviousness is contagious and my dad is a safety hazard: A day in the life of Noah

Chapter three who needs to be tweaked! Not a priority ion my work list. :( (Edit: that’s done. Should post it soon)

Lovely melody: Inspired by a somnefarious drawing on Twitter, a French teen get a romance with a merman.

The testament of Henry Branson: A young man learned he is one of the heirs to his great-uncle fortune. He and his more direct family go to the deceased’s mansion, and conflicts arises over the heritage. While everyone is out for themselves, strange deaths start to occur. Need to put latter chapters that are already written on Tumblr.

Welcome to Branson Manor! We hope you won’t stay: Meet the players!

Sins of the father: After the reading of the will, the family starts to rip itself apart immediately. Maybe they should notice the disparitions a little more...

Matai : A Salmoan sorcerer build himself a family. (Might go into the hornies later.)

Chapter 1: Fetu Lanuola “welcomes” Ace West into his household

THE HORNIES (not necessarily NSFW, just me trying to be sure you don’t get anything trying to be kinky 🙈 . Mostly original, but I started a supernatural fic)

Captions: Plenty of hypnosis-themed little (and slightly bigger) stories. Link towards the tag, or else they would be taking too much place.😮‍💨. Amongst the most notable series or individual captions around, we have:

Special hearing : A hard of hearing teen uses audio subliminals messages to get his revenge on his bullies. one caption for now, working on a second.

The champ : A teen uses a voice-based mind control to take control of the family of a rival after he is kicked off the team for being gay. 3 stories uploaded, I think a fourth is somewhere on my files...

The perfect wedding: A most beautiful and totally normal laos wedding, we swear! Might get a sequel if i have an idea. Someone had asked if there would be a sequel, back when that story was new... A one-shot for now.

The Hello series: Mostly a thing in my head, with only one caption published. A man with powerful brainwashing pheromones goes around turning people to his point of view

Phone haze: A teen discover his brother put a mind-control app on his phone and goes on a rampage. I should be able to find the second caption somewhere in my docs.😐

A Mediterranean date: While waiting for his date, Eracle is accosted by a strange guy

Thank you: A jock tries to interrupt a DnD (actually Call of Ctulhu) session a frat brother is having. Bad plan.

Coming Out Party: written for pride month 2022. A mysterious strange has an effect on the people he meets on the way to a pride parade.

The Full-blown series

A ghost of a memory: Series I really should remember exist. One chapter isn’t a lot. 🙈 A migrant mourning his dead boyfriend learn the boyfriend is kicking around as a ghost, possessing the clients of the hotel they work/used to work at.

The clock : Collab with @mathhypnostories about a boy finding a old watch with hypnotic powers! Four chapters for now!

Sasquatch and candies: Supernatural fic, post-series, Sabriel focus. Sam meets Gabriel, who has survived (again), and is planning on using a strange artifact to make Sam his.

Chapter 1: Gabriel uses a hunt to attract his love. originally a one-shot.

I dream of angel: Waking up after a dream he can’t remember, Sam get himself in a zombie apocalypse. Strange visitors come to the near-by hospital.

Do flesh drones dream of roboticlight toys? (Place-holder name. Basically, hypno/mind-control/brainwash one-shot about sciences that I headcanon as being set in the same-verse)

Shoppy’Slave: A man shops for his first slave.

The leather pet doctor: A new pet needs to be examined to figure out what kind of animal he is.

#my writing

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captainshadowgirllostfan · 1 year

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I don't understand people.

I'm looking at tumblr posts and everyone is like Season 1 and 2 is the best. But Season 3 is really great too! Everyone is complaining about too much characters. But here's something I'm noticing. Every season focuses on a different team, different characters. Hell if you ask me Season 2 focused too much and too many characters, but Season 3 sticks to pretty much the same characters, Bryon Markov AKA Geoforce, Violet Harper AKA Halo, and Forager. There's more focus on Dick as Nightwing with his new team that he made by accident and didn't really want.

Black Lightning. Artemis, Superboy and Miss Martian are more like support character but I still love Artemis and am currently tolerating Miss Martian and Superboy (even though I hate them as a couple). Garth AKA Beast Boy is getting more attention and I love how it's giving this sort of view of how artists/celebrities get depressed despite the popularity.

The dangers of social media and technology and how much it's controlling lives. There are really great themes being explored and the show really feels idk realistic in the sense when it shows us tv programs and new broadcasts, the show's universe's political debates...it's honestly a mirror of American politics (which I kinda don't like because I had started realizing American politics is in a bubble and most people abroad just don't get our politics. At times we seem stupid to them...and I kinda can understand. This is how DC politics and new broadcasts feels like too).

It's such a great show and yet everyone is focused on "friendships, teamwork and characters" and yet there's EXACTLY that in the show when you focus on Bryon, Halo, and Forager...well I'll admit there's also a lot of romances but I just ignore that...

I think people just don't like being introduced to new characters ever season...they want focus on the same characters every season so that they could see their "growth"...personally I prefer the introduction of characters I never even knew existed in DC and the focus on those characters. Before Season 3 Young Justice, I had never heard of GeoForce (or the fact that Tara had a brother...they focus so much on her betrayal of the Teen Titans, not anything about her family or that she has family members with powers too), Halo (who was actually a blonde girl but Young Justice turned her into a Quraci refugee), and Forager. There were a lot of characters I didn't know much about. Also I love the villains too, I mean they're complicated, devious and smart.

Granted I haven’t finished Season 3 of Young Justice but I am so hooked! How can anyone say that Young Justice has really started sucking. No offense but compared to how Season 2 and 3 is going, I personally feel Season 1 was boring. It was boring. It was a struggle to even care about this show and get through every episode but I did because I did like the characters enough to do that.

And Season 2 was the same but better than Season 1.

And Season 3 is better than Season 2 and 1.

It just keeps getting better and better!

Am I really the only one who thinks that about Young Justice? I seriously don’t get the complaints about this show. This show is badass!

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strunmah-mah · 1 year

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I posted 899 times in 2022

That's 675 more posts than 2021!

131 posts created (15%)

768 posts reblogged (85%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@oifaaa

@birdsbats-maddness

@theforceisstronginthegirl

@aalghul

@hadariwizard

I tagged 897 of my posts in 2022

#dc - 516 posts

#jason todd - 249 posts

#damian wayne - 130 posts

#bruce wayne - 99 posts

#dick grayson - 75 posts

#tmnt - 65 posts

#dc comics - 58 posts

#batman fandom - 57 posts

#tim drake - 53 posts

#artemis grace - 43 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#like i tottally thoughoh yeah everyone makes that joke because his main enenmies are the yellow lanterns and he's actually just weak to fear

My Top Posts in 2022:

Hey, all the big networks and stuff are looking to make “the new Game of Thrones”, somebody should make an original tv series centered on the al Ghul family.

The League of Assassins has so many internal factions and conflicts you could probably make an entire season fro just that, two if you were clever about it.

The comics tend to focus on Talia, the Arrowverse preferred Nyssa, and I don’t a thing about Dusan. In this we could get all three, as a treat.

Exploring the childhood dynamic of Damian and Mara. I imagine it’s very similar to Gamora and Nebula, kids who kinda wanna be friends but can’t because of the way they are constantly pitted against each other. But maybe they aren’t, this way we could find out for certain.

Athanasia would not have to be in this, but if she was I wouldn’t complain.

Slade Wilson as a recurring antagonist. Maybe he has his own faction of the League, maybe Respawn exists in this universe and he’s mad about that. Both could be good.

This could be a chance to make Cassandra Cain a more mainstream name. I don’t like her but I’m sure someone would enjoy her inclusion.

Characters I do enjoy though are Thea Queen and Sara Lance. I’m pretty sure they’re both arrowverse originals. Don’t make this part of the arrowverse, but I want to see more of them.

I would love to see an adaptation of Catwoman: Soulstealer in this. Selina Kyle stealing the secrets of how to make an artificial Lazarus pit seems fun.

Because I’m a Jason fangirl I have to include this: Do a variation of Red Hood: Lost Days. Except Talia and Jason stay strictly mother-son and don’t sleep together. And after his confrontation with Batman and the Joker goes bad, Jason returns as a permanent addition to the cast and takes his role as Damian’s big brother.

Speaking of Red Hood if the theoretical writer of this show would like to take on the ambitious task of having the All-Caste and The Untitled actually make sense I would be very interested. Maybe they also tie into the League of Lazarus somehow seems like The Well of Sin is supposed to the original source of that right?

Those are my ideas, somebody who knows comics better than me should add more.

88 notes - Posted April 5, 2022

Okay, so I’m sure we’ll find out who this girl is in White Knight Presents: Red Hood, But I don’t want to wait that long. So, let’s play a game called, “Who was Jason’s Robin in the White Knight universe?”

Mia Dearden

The hair color is wrong but I just read the Green Arrow story where Jason kidnaps her and I think it would be very funny if she was his Robin in another universe

Artemis Crock

Again wrong hair color, but I really think Jason would get along with a version of her similar to her Young Justice self

Sasha aka Scarlet

Not an archer, but it would be interesting if Jason’s original sidekick was brought back like this.

Helena Bertinelli

Normally older than Jason and wielding a crossbow instead of recurve bow, but de-aging her so she could be a murder Robin (it’s Jason, his Robin has probably killed people) would hardly be the weirdest thing to happen in comics.

Athanasia al Ghul

The al Ghul’s haven’t been brought up yet in this universe, but considering Jason’s main continuity background, the idea the al Ghul’s trained him and in return he trained one of their’s isn’t outlandish. Plus there’s the irony of Jason training Bruce’s daughter.

Mara al Ghul

Same reasoning as Athanasia minus the bits about her being Bruce’s kid and add in the fact that I think Mara actually does use a bow. I’m not sure Athansia does.

Lian Harper

Most of these suggestions have just been for funsies, this one actually seems likely. The girl has a habit of turning up in weird locations (she’s Catwoman’s sidekick in main canon?) But given the friendship between Roy and Jason, her turning up here would have some logic to it.

109 notes - Posted April 7, 2022

[image description: It’s the inside of a monastery. There’s two lanterns lighting everything. Jason Todd, Cheshire, Onyx, and Sensei all sit in a circle meditating. In the background Talia al Ghul watches them while holding her baby, Damian /end descrition]

[image description: It is an indoor facility on Apokolips. From left to right stand Granny Goodness, Mary Marvel, Kara Zor-El and Big Barda /end descrition]

Next season are we getting both of these squads? ‘Cause if we are, that’s gonna be redemption arcs galore.

129 notes - Posted June 9, 2022

Hey Can some one tell e what Roy Harper’s personality is actually supposed to be like? ‘Cause the three versions I’m familiar with are Arrow (tv series), Young Justice (cartoon), and RHATO (new 52). And those are just wildly different character. I don’t know what to do with this guy.

181 notes - Posted March 4, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

tumblr_video

[Video transcript

Text box: Make Condiment King Scary; There’s your challenge.

Red Text: TW: Discussion of Murder

The Panda Redd: OK

The screen flashes and Panda is now dressed as Condiment king

Condiment King: You know, I always hated that name. The one that the press gave me. Condiment King. So patronizing. Like I’m trying to make some grand standing of what I do, I’m not. I’m not. Wanna know how I got that name? It’s a funny story actually. See a life time ago I was just another, another goon, another grunt on the street working for Falcone. And, uh, One day I found myself at this restaurant, some, some racket Falcone’s been running and the uh, the owner decided not to pay. So I was sent to, uh, relieve him of his station. Guy finishes up his meal, I follow him into the back, stick a gun in his face. “Hands up Fucker, Flacone sends his regards.” The bastard kicks it out of my fucking hand. So the part that nobody decided to fucking mention to me was the guy was a goddamn black belt in karate. who starts throwing me around. He slams me into the fucking walls. I’m getting stains from all the shit falling off of him all over by brand new sky blue suit that I’m wearing for this fucking occasion. That is, until I see the stove. I see they’re cooking up a special brew of uh, extra hot sauce on there. You know, that it only takes three pounds of ground up chilies, consumed in one sitting to kill a man, purely from the capsaicin. Well I’ll tell you what. He figured out what it’s like to inhale that shit. I grabbed his head and I just, I just fucking held it under, I held him there, until the fucking bubbles stopped coming up. And that was it, I thought. But you see a man kills a someone with a bowl of hot sauce, in a suit soaked in condiments, and well. Everyone in Gotham’s got a gimmick. See my problem isn’t with the name it’s self. It’s with the insult that is implied. People think that what I do is silly. But I’m going to ask you something. If the ketchup on your burger was too tangy would you stop eating it? Or, or if your hot sauce wings tingled your throat in a way you didn’t expect, would you all of a sudden stop? The thing is, apart from taking a shit, eating is when people are their most vulnerable. I ask you, do you know what poison tastes like? Are you sure?

Condiment King laughs and the video ends.]

Imma bee real honest here. My ideal sequel to The Batman would be Battinson vs. this very specific version of Condiment King. If The Panda Redd didn’t play him I wouldn’t watch it.

262 notes - Posted July 3, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

#tumblr2022 #year in review #my 2022 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review

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hood-ex · 2 years

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OK, so I'm sorry to bother, but I'm curious. In Vamp Dick's fight with Jason, Jason affirms that he was holding out all this time and that he could wipe the flour with Dick anytime, right ? And I just brushed it off as some whatever thing, because, no he ain't but people seems to believe it ??

I've seen a post claiming that Jason was second best batfam fighter after Cass, that everyone will be better than Dick at one point and just ... Going on and on about how much Jason learned as a fighter, how he was taught by many teachers instead of just Bats like Dick was, that he's stronger and I'm just ... Confused about all this ? So, is Jason stronger than Dick ?

If you don't feel like answering, that's totally OK, I'm just. Yeah, I'm just really confused and I figured you'd know. Well, you or @northoftheroad

The thing people fail to take into account is that Bruce had multiple teachers and then he took all the skills he learned from those teachers and he taught all that knowledge to Dick. So it's not like Dick needed a ton of different teachers when Bruce had already done all the leg work to procure various skills from multiple people. Also, Dick's had Richard Dragon and Shrike as mentors so it's not like Jason's the only one who's branched out in the mentor department.

Now I'm not denying that Jason is a good fighter because he is. It could be argued that Dick and Jason tend to be more evenly matched when they fight each other which makes sense because, for the most part, they were trained by the same mentor. For example:

Outsiders #44

From what we've seen, one of them may get more of an advantage over the other one (an example of said advantage being Jason shooting Dick in the chest in Batman and Robin #5). It just depends.

Batman: Battle for the Cowl #3

I think another thing to take into account is that during the times that Dick and Jason have fought, Jason wasn't afraid to kill Dick and was aiming to kill him in Battle for the Cowl. On the flip side, Dick obviously wasn't going to kill Jason. He was only aiming to subdue Jason. So under circumstances like that, Dick would be the one holding back in a fight, not Jason.

In regard to DC vs. Vampires where Jason says he's been holding back, well, under normal circumstances, I would say that's absolute bullshit. But we've got to keep in mind that Dick and Jason from DC vs. Vampires are from a different universe where their skills in that universe technically have no reflection on Dick and Jason's skills in the main continuity. So it actually doesn't matter what Jason from DC vs. Vampires says because he's not the same Jason Todd that we see in canon. Jason doesn't feel the need to hold back based on what we've seen in canon.

#it pains me to try and remain unbiased during discussions like this lmao #like literally shifting my mind out of its dick grayson bubble and having to fairly examine another character on his level alskdjalksda #Dick Grayson #Jason Todd #DC vs. Vampires 6 #anon

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stxleslyds · 3 years

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Robin Jason, a friend and ally of the Titans.

PART 1.

Last Friday I was feeling extra rage-y after the news about the Titans mini with the Titans show line-up of heroes. I still think that a) Jason shouldn’t be considered a Titan or be in the team as Red Hood and b) that him going back to wearing a bat symbol on his chest is just bad but as @randomlut said there is a possibility of that book not being set in DC’s current universe and if that’s the case then okay, I will not complain about it anymore.

But this post isn’t about that Titans book it’s about Jason’s Robin’s appearances in volume two of the New Teen Titans!

Now, this won’t be an in-depth review of those issues from a story point of view, it will be a post in which I talk about Jason’s characterization and interactions with the Titans. Maybe I will even dive a little bit into why I think that the interactions that Jason and Roy have in those issues makes the relationship that they had in New52 very out of place.

Let’s begin!

· NTT (1984) #19

Jason as Robin appears here only in the last page of the issue. After the current team of the Titans appears to be falling apart Donna calls Jason and others to help in a mission, this team that she puts together resembles the “original” line-up with Robin, Speedy, (Kid) Flash, Aqualad and Hawk.

· NTT (1884) #20-21

Jason appears in the Titans tower along the OG Titans, when Donna finally tells them what the mission is all about (stopping Cheshire from interrupting a meeting) she asks if they are in on the job, Jason is not only excited about being there but about Batman actually letting him come all the way to the tower. A little bit of what Jason thinks or saw in Bruce is shown when Wally says that he “didn’t think the Batman could be thrilled by anything. He is always so grim.”

Basically, what Jason says is that the Bat isn’t that bad if you get to know him and that he cares about Jason’s education outside of vigilantism. Also, Jason seems to be grateful and very receptive of the things that Bruce taught him, he regards him as a very good mentor.

After everyone decides to help, they get on their jet. Here we have a very important interaction between Jason and Donna, she is telling him how she is feeling about the attitude of the rest of the team and about how she is a little bit lost now that she is in charge of the Titans and then she asks what Robin thinks about the whole thing, Jason is obviously thrilled once more, someone as experienced as Donna is asking him for his opinion? It blows his mind away! Batman never does that, he is always following his lead and never has a say on what they do so, to him, helping the Titans is only getting better and maybe he will ask the Bat to let him join them permanently.

Because they were talking Donna wasn’t paying much attention while flying and after they barely avoid crashing the jet, she apologizes to everyone and once more looks for reassurance with Jason, this time Jason is caught off guard but after Hawk teases him about his hesitation he tells her that “everything’s okay”.

When they arrive to Switzerland (where the meeting will be held) we have Jason’s first interaction with Roy Harper and him also slowly transforming into a burrito, that boy was cold and pissed off about it!

It’s really funny to me that Roy talking about Oliver’s pervy arrows is his very first interaction with Jason, who would have thought that a mad man would later make them besties?

They all go inside a building to get warm and for a while Jason is just chilling while the other Titans are all having an existential crisis, because here is the thing, Jason is a kid, he was presumably 14 here while all the other are in their twenties. Donna is having trouble with her new position as leader of the Titans, Wally is trying to live up to Barry, Garth is grieving his love, Roy is still very uncomfortable about being on a mission that involves Cheshire and Hank is just crazy. The others are trying to complete a mission while their real-life problems loom over them and Jason is just on an adventure with cool people.

Its not much later than Cheshire attacks the Titans, she first takes on Wally because he is her biggest threat and then detonates a bomb, now here I will give a little bit of context, Cheshire does not want to kill the Titans as of now, she just wants to incapacitate them because them being there is making her own mission more complicated, all I will say is that she doesn’t truly have villainous intentions and that she has a very weak spot for Roy.

Anyway, the bomb incapacitates Garth and Roy and Cheshire also managed to shoot Wally so only Donna, Hank and Jason are left standing to capture Cheshire, but here is the thing, Hank doesn’t want to capture her, he wants to kill her.

Jason has interacted very few times with Hank so far and it has always been Hank teasing him but now as Jason is going to fight Cheshire Hank interrupts him telling him that he will do “what has to be done”. Cheshire of course wont fall easily and I think that at this very moment she is thinking that killing Hank wouldn’t be a bad idea because he is going to mess her plans up! But not to worry as she is raising her gun Jason comes in to save his ass!

Jason is not a match for Cheshire and after that she quickly subdues him. But what’s important here is two things, first Jason doesn’t want or consider the idea of killing Jade, he just wants to capture her and bring her to justice, secondly, he doesn’t even want her to kill Hank, who has been violent towards every Titan and rude to Jason every single time that he has interacted with him. What I am trying to say is that this IS Robin Jason, he doesn’t think or act the same as Red Hood will in the future, he has his opinions on what punishments killers should get but he is not there to kill anyone himself.

There is this whole page where Donna beats Hank against a tree so he stops killing, because that’s not what the Titans do, she explains that if they do that then the public (that is already quite afraid of them) will just fear them more and they don’t need that, plus she believes that he is acting that way out of grief after losing his brother, as she is saying all of this though she is putting quite a lot of pressure on his chest and that might have ended up in her actually killing Hank if Jason hasn’t been there to stop her.

Donna is obviously not having a good time and after this she says that she “has had it” and that from now on Robin should “take command” because “its his group anyway”. Oh man…its clear to the reader that Donna is not having a good time being team leader but she also misses a certain person a lot. She is obviously not seeing Jason there, she is seeing Dick, the person that she is used to take orders from but he is not there.

Jason is aware of this, he might be a kid and might not have as many problems as the other Titans as of now but he is not a fool and he doesn’t want people to see someone else when they look at him, so he confronts Donna about what she just said/did.

Jason is just great in this scene; he just doesn’t want people that he admires to treat him as if he were someone that he isn’t. Just because Dick isn’t there doesn’t mean that he (because he is Robin) can replace him, they are not the same person and they do not have the same experience. He calls out Donna on her behaviour towards him and Donna being an adult takes responsibly for her actions and understands that ultimately, she was hurting Jason’s feelings. We have a kinda wholesome moment when they hug but because this is written by Marv Wolfman and he just can’t help himself, he proceeds to write Jason as a horny teenager. What a way to ruin the moment Marv…

Back to Cheshire, she is about to kick Wally’s face in when she decides to first tell him what he has to tell the others when they wake up, which is “Cheshire remembers”.

Wally tells the Titans Cheshire’s message but none of them truly understands what it means, Hank says that he doesn’t even understand why they are alive. Donna comes to the conclusion that Cheshire might want something from them and this is where Jason gives his thoughts, he says “Doesn’t matter what she wants. We take care of her. She’s a killer.”, its clear once more than although Jason (as Robin) wouldn’t kill anyone he does feel a certain type of way about criminals and wants them to be locked up.

After yet another verbal fight between Hank and Donna the Titans take a cable car to their next location, Jason is shown as exited about the view and the whole experience once more. When they arrive, they find Faraday (the guy that called Donna for help in #19) and he explains a bit more the situation but Jason once more is having trouble staying warm so he goes to the cable car tunnel nearby, but he doesn’t go alone, Roy goes with him because his “costume wasn’t made for this kind of weather either”, in this second interaction between these two we get to see Jason’s detective skills shine.

Jason has been watching Roy and he found his reaction to Cheshire’s message quite sus. Not only is he showing his detective skills here but he also said in a previous panel this: “The Batman keeps telling me to watch people’s eyes. And every so often I notice you become awfully agitated…like something was going on you didn’t want to be part of”. Zdarsky, hey pal, I am talking to you, look at this dude! He read Roy like an open book, this is Robin Jason, he likes being Robin and he is brilliant at it, he is methodical because he learnt from paying attention and working with Batman, so, you sir are wrong, not only did UtRH disprove your dumb narrative but so does this interaction (along all his appearances in this book).

Roy is impressed by the kid, and yeah, he calls him kid because he is a kid…Roy is visibly older than Jason as he should, do you see it Lobdell? Yeah, there is no dubious age gap between those two as you made it seem. Roy is impressed because between both of them he is the one that is most experienced, not the other way around. How did Lobdell manage to make up a whole as run where not only were Roy and Jason close in age and besties but also Jason was better at vigilantism than Roy and Roy was the one being impressed. It’s wild, wild and bad.

Back to the issue, Jason taken out of the fight quite fast once more by Cheshire and she proceeds to talk to Roy, that’s where we find out that they were lovers and that she feels weak when she is around him because he makes her feel feelings but that’s not all, she tells Roy that he is “the man that fathered my child” …Oh and now she does want to kill him. That’s where #20 ends, so let’s see what happens with Jason in #21.

In the beginning of #21 Jason is conscious once more and when he hears Cheshire’s threat, he attacks her so she can’t shoot Roy, he also says this “Sorry ‘cat’ that’s a definite no-no. Don’t you know mommy’s and daddies should never fight” I, I don’t know why he had to say it like that…the 80s were weird. While Jason is being himself Roy is thinking “Don’t be cocky kid, Jade hasn’t got a sense of humour…” but because he wants to talk to Jade, he tells Jason to go, that he will handle Cheshire and he leaves.

Roy and Jade talk, Donna and Hawk are fighting bad guys and each other and at some point, Jason joins Garth and helps him take down a couple of guys, he also tries to make conversation with him but Garth is still not talking to anybody.

Cheshire tells Roy that he will never hear about their child again and that he needs to let her do her thing and stay out of it because he doesn’t understand what’s going on, Roy doesn’t do what she asks and she “poisons” him. Donna saves a guy that Hank was trying to kill. After Cheshire leaves Roy comes to the conclusion that she wasn’t there to kill the people from the meeting or that she poisoned him, but because they were there and everything went to shit now the people that were getting together are blaming the Titans for the interruption. The whole thing is a mess and the news channel are not nice about the Titans as a whole, but I am not interested in exploring that here. All you need to know is that the people that made Cheshire do what she did to the Titans were the Brother Blood people.

It’s on the jet that we see Jason again, he and the others are going back to the tower. Because the news are painting the Titans as bad when they are arriving to the tower Jason sees a lot of people protesting about them and he feels bad. This was his first job with the Titans and he is a kid, imagine how sad it would make you if you wanted to help and after getting the job done people were mad at you. But even though he is sad about that he takes time to ask Roy if he is okay after he sees him almost running away from the tower, he doesn’t get a response but he isn’t mad about it.

Jason’s stay with the Titans comes to and end and he says that he loved hanging out with them and is grateful for having been invited, he is so sweet!

· NTT (1884) #24

Here, for some reason, we see Jason saying goodbye to the Titans again and unlike at the end of #21 Roy is there to see him leave.

I am not going to lie though; I liked this goodbye better it feels like it’s more complete than the other one. Here he says that Batman wants him back in Gotham but that if the Titans ever need him again all they need to do is call. He also mentions Nightwing which is funny because he will be called by Donna again in #26 to help the Titans get Dick back from Brother Bloods Church.

I am going to cut this part here because issues 26 to 31 have a lot of Jason content that I want to explore and I can’t put any more pictures here, also this post is already long as it is now!

I just love Jason’s little moments in these issues, him confronting Donna and reading Roy like and open book in #20 are my absolute favourite, I just think this is a nice way to kinda show how wrong some current characterizations of Robin Jason are and what better way to do that than reading and looking into some good stories.

Oh! Before I forget, in #21 Roy leaves the Titans’ tower to go see Jade and he actually gets to meet his daughter Lian for the first time, so yeah, that was a wholesome moment!

#jason todd #robin jason todd #batman and robin #titans #new teen titans #donna troy #roy harper #cheshire #garth of shayeris #wally west #red hood #urban legends red hood

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batarangsoundsdumb · 3 years

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guess fucking what? my inbox is so fucking full right now i'm unloading all of this shit in one post.

For the 11th gotham memes: gothamites react to bruce being jacked in a tiktok he made with kids, like super yoked, ripped as hell

fucking hilarious thanks. i think i did it in one meme post, but i genuinely don't remember which one

i dunno which of the batfam would do this but one time i was sleeping over at a friends house and ended up on the floor bc the bed was so very small and i just stayed there because the rug was soft

that's a drunk jason move i don't know what to tell you

tim and jason are "i listen to pop punk" solidarity. whenever jason highjacks the batmobile theyll go on long ass car rides blaring mcr and paramore and then never talk about it again

as they should!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! tim: no jason it's my turn using the aux cord i gotta put on my jams jason: don't you dare put on weird shit tim: don't worry, you're gonna love this *plays fearless (taylor's version)

hear me out hear me out, red hood stans 🤝 nightwing stans t h i g h s

holy shit yes.

SNL au: Bruce breaks character when pretending to superman and says something like "I'm not superman! You've seen his gps!! It's from 2001!!!" @sabeanybabe

superman flies past the snl building the next day just to say 'actually it's from 2005, i'm not a heathen'

does your back hurt from carrying the batfam fandom

it hurts more from the exotic rock collection i keep in my backpack, but thanks for the concern.

I love your posts by why would you always leave the best parts in the tags?

as a treat for the people that check the tags ;) (and also because i'm committed to the short post aesthetic)

somehow your playlist was everything i never knew i needed. i mean it. this is my new favorite playlist.

and don't you dare get a new favourite playlist!

babe ur stoner tim playlist is exactly too perfect, earth is literally blessed by ur existence

babe thanks so much! i love my stoner tim playlist because it's just my usual playlist but people think it's an artistic choice that i put taylor swift and britney spears in there, when it's just what i unironically like listening to

JANDKSKDK BILLY RAY CYRUS ON THE STONER TIM PLAYLIST I LOVE IT IT

again it's not even an ironic choice, i know every single word and i genuinely like the song

The last chapter of Fundamentals of Casework has me crying at work. Thanks I love it @dudelookitsalesbian

oh babe, i'm sorry, but also, not sorry i love chapter 4 so much it's my lovechild with the 'mental illness' tag

soooo....stumbled on your tumblr by some stroke of fate??? read your DC fanfic first. which is PHENOMENAL btw. then found all the batmemes; the funniest thing EVER bc everyone forgets about regular old gothamites. kept scrolling and your blog pops up as recommended. clicked on the ao3 for shits and giggles and waddaya know?!?!? it's YOU!!! you're LEGEND!!!! ever seen that meme? it's a video of a cat that got into a baseball field and the two announcers get really invested in his escape attempt and start giving a play by play of the cat instead of the game. memeable moment: "GREAT stuff from the Cat!!!"

i seriously think about this ask every single day and it's so fucking funny to me that i've never seen the meme you're referencing, but i still find myself going 'GREAT stuff from the Cat!!!' whenever i see something funny. but wow i'm glad you liked this steaming pile of garbage

Fav dc character overall? And fav batfamily character?

don't ask me to pick between the loves of my life, but i can tell you i've cried about every single batfamily member and also wally west (my beloved)

What's your opinion on fans having a problem with batfam being "too big"? And some even claim that batfam is just "Bruce Alfred Dick Damian" and the rest of them are just "friends and allies" (source: reddit) Personally, I like batfam because of this reason but idk

stupid. a family can never be too big. i'm not that big a fan of like huge batfam stuff with everybody from every single universe, because as much as it's funny for bruce to have like 30 kids, it just feels a little too OOC for me.

This is the best tag I've seen involving the batfam, thanks for thinking of it

This is canon now @nctxrejects

lmao yeah i think at that point alfred has had to sit through like at least a dozen coming out talks and just has a pride flag collection in the attic that he pulls out whenever a kid comes out

idk why batfam hits different as compared to any other superhero family

bc it's found family and usually the other superhero families are almost all genetically related in one way or another

I don't know if you watch the umbrella academy but I saw your last post about batcest and saw the similarities. But the thing is (although I think it's weird) in TUA, they addressed it by saying "they were raised as weapons, not siblings" or something along those lines, which is simply not the case with batfam.

yeah i watched tua but i also thought it was ridiculous and they still treated each other as siblings so i didn't like the luthor/allison thing, and am glad they stopped doing that shit bc it fucking sucked.

Hot take: Batcest shippers are the same people who believe adopted siblings are not actual siblings

smoking hot take: batcest shippers are the people who watch 'my sister got stuck in the washing machine' porn

Duke was adopted by Bruce?

not technically no, but do i, tumblr user batarangsoundsdumb, look like i care?

True story but I had to change my freaking name because it used to be "Damien" and most people would go "OH LIKE DAMIAN WAYNE" like please I'm just tryna live

true story, but i don't actually think of damian when i hear the name damian, literally the first thing that pops up is damian darkh like bruh what?

apparently dc comics company supported comic stores by giving out new titles and stuff during the beginning of the pandemic to help them run and I just think that's wholesome

ah yeah that's so fucking cool, still don't like dc, the company, because this world is a capitalist hellhole and we're all owned by warner brothers or disney with no in between.

ayo looking at tumblr head canons and finding out bruce is actually a terrible father is a punch in the gut

lmao yes, in like 50% of comics bruce is a terrible father and it gives me whiplash

oooh I just saw the jason todd vs winter soldier post and the real question is: batman vs iron man

while iron man has like hundreds of cases of armor, batman could throw out an emp and have the guy dropping out of the sky in 2 seconds.

dickfast = fastdick = quickdick = quickie

magnum hot take

hey bata(?) just thought I'd let you know I have copied the obnoxious emoji and Billy Ray post for use on simping men going forth

thank you 😘🌷 (@spacebarsidecar)

why would you do that to your followers???? i get why i did it, but why would you???

what is scarecrow made the nightwing funko pop himself, like those diy-ers that paint over other ones

oh god no, horrible take, horrible take, that's a disgusting thought oh no

I see your HC that Bruce and Oliver fucked and raise you this: Dick and Roy ALSO fucked

yes they did and it was a horrible moment for jason to find out dick has fucked both of his best friends

"at this rate bruce adds like 1 child to his family every decade or so" Duke is introduced in 2013, Damian as Damian, not as an unnamed child, in 2006. And he is already 14 years old, Robins rarely remain Robins after 16 😬 It looks like a new Robin and Batkid will appear in a couple of years

i mean i can't wait? but somebody will probably die first tho, we're due for another major character death. my money's on either cass or duke this time.

BRO you're so right all of your Bruce's ex headcanons are amazing but they aren't ships, that's kinda wild. Like I don't want any peeks into how their relationship was I just want to see everyone make fun of them

lmao YES it's just i love bruce being a slut, like good for him.

I am in love with your posts your honour thank you

omg thanks are we like,, gonna kiss now?

The justice league needs to have a meeting to discuss how many of their members/partners have slept with bruce. Because through a combination of cannon & fannon (if DC wasn’t homophobic) we have AT LEAST: 1) clark 2) lois 3) oliver 4) dinah 5) john

Thats not counting villains or random civilians @dudelookitsalesbian

yes yes yes, they'll have a yearly meeting about how many of their collective exes could be out for revenge and batman's list just keeps getting longer.

tim was like "i'm drake now" and everyone was like ahh so your fursona is a dragon and tim was like pffffft no. ducks.

and what about it?

when steph's fighting livewire and she zaps her with lighting and nothing happens and then they both just. stand there awkwardly for a second and talk. yeah i couldn't stop laughing at that batgirl steph is the BEST

oh yeah that was fucking hilarious and i think it would be so cool and sexy of dc to give steph a little comic series,,, as a treat

Hi I absolutely adore all of yours "Bruce and Oliver very badly pretending they didn't fuck each other" memes

lmao i do too

I need you to know that “Bruce Wayne had frosted tips” is one of my favorite Bruce takes of all time it’s so galaxy brained. you’re right and you should say it

he also painted his hair blonde once when he was travelling and in conclusion, this is why he's being blackmailed by the gotham gazette.

you know my thing about gordon being branded as the only good cop in gotham is its a load of shit like arguably he's a good person and not working to screw people over or anything but the fact that he also works w. batman makes him a shit cop. like yea batman is better than the mob but its still illegal its still an abuse of power he just not making bank

babe, all cops are bad cops. (but yeah youre absolutely right, working with vigilantes makes you a shit cop, but also working against vigilantes just makes you an asshole cop yanno?)

ruh roh i think i’m about to add “so not yeehaw” every time i don’t like something

that's a very good vocabulary upgrade

somehow i feel like steph already knew. like babs obviously knew but i feel like bruce got high/drunk in front of steph and started telling his boarding school stories and steph was just like “oh you fucked up i’m never gonna forget this”

steph and bruce have weird uncle/rebellious niece dynamic and they just hang out sometimes and bruce will be like 'i once broke my arm when i tripped over a hedge when i was drunk so oliver drove me to the hospital on an electric scooter' and steph will just have to sit there with that knowledge in her head.

Hello I just wanted to tell you you are So right in all your steph opinions bc she is, in fact amazing and I think that's very sexy of you. Ps. Your Bruce/Oliver fic is hilarious

babe, thank you so much and yes steph is amazing and i love her and she deserves the world and she's the best member of the batfam hands down. also thanks

In Supersons we see a couple of kids that are implied to be Damian and Jon's children and the boy has laser eyes and can fly, so I asume he's not adopted. The girl, who calls Bruce grandpa, can also fly, btw. So it's canon (probably by accident) that Jon can have kids and he must have married one of Bruce's kids. (I'm hoping for Damian, mostly because any other of his children would be waaaaaaaaaaaaay too old.) @artemisa97

lmao that was probably an accident seeing as jon is a 17 year old superhero in the year 3000 (by the jonas brothers)

You know, I'm a die hard fan of your memes, but I gotta say one thing: if Gothamites actually took gas mask everywhere with them, then the Scarecrow would just be a weird dude in a weird costume, and not a villain oh so scary. DC really should just takes notes from you.

bold of you to assume there's no gothamite anti-maskers

How does it feel being the funniest person on this app?

horrible, next question.

I can't listen to Green Day or Billy Joel without thinking of your post about how Bruce got arrested at a Billy Joel concert @nightwings-kid

yeah that's your mistake, i on the other hand can't enjoy billy joel without thinking about the glee rendition of 'uptown girl'

I've FINALLY been watching the Batman animated series and I gotta say, after watching "the gray ghost" I am CONVINCED that Batman is a closeted super hero geek who was 100% freaking out the first time he met Superman and is just REALLY good at hiding it.

superman: so what do you do in your free time? batman, thinking about the superman fanfiction he's writing on the batcomputer: i have no free time

bruce and oliver be like boyfriends to co-workers 401k (do the justice leagues get 401ks??? not that bruce and ollie would need them, but-)

lmao yes just 400 thousand words of bruce realising 'oh dip oliver is such a fucking dumbass' (also i don't know what a 401 k is but i assume they don't?)

Gothamites would totally boo superman as he saves Gotham while batman is out. @meenje

he's like 'okay think about that next time you want to be saved from an alien octopus'

I just took long break from dc comics and I come back to see ric grayson ??

i think it's very cool and sexy of dc to see dick and just think 'you know what? let's just give him a traumatic brain injury' and then didn't develop his character in any real way

SPEAKING OF RIC GRAYSON, gothamites making confused memes out of ric grayson is much needed

'dick grayson is my taxi driver? can anyone explain what the fuck happened he looks like an italian plumber?'

i hate to say it but batfam are def "marvel characters" in that sense they are characters who are human but become superheroes unlike most dc characters who are gods trying to be human maybe this is why I like batfam

fair enough

#this is only like half of it #but at least you can get like a few answers #yanno fuck it #bataranswers #ask #asks #anon

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anastasiaskywalker4 · 3 years

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MisterLuu

That is actually the best pairing DC can make out of Trinity aside Lois and Clark. Or Bruce

and Clark for that matter. They both fit Bruce well, though Diana is even more matched with

him. In fact she's the best match romantically for him out there. At least so far. Though

number of fanfiction and arts on the net would suggest that that spot is reserved for

Superman not Wonder Woman :D

Except maybe for Silver and Julie - all Batman's love interest are abusive and downright

toxic. Selina, Talia, Adrea, Jet. Because in terms of comics and not relationships it fits

Gotham mold. People just tend to forget it after rebirth run. Yeah the one that made Batman

impotent and unable to do anything without the Cat around. Exactly that one. And tend to

forget how terrible as human beings his lovers really are.

Going back to the point. Both Talia and Selina tried to kill him multiple times in the past, or

those close to him. Whatever right? Who wouldn't like a lover that tried to end you few times

over. Both assaulted him physically and emotionally. Repeatedly. Both scared his body and

his mind. Repeatedly. Both tried to seduce his wards (adopted sons if u like), just to get to

him. In Talia's case that was basically pedophilia. That's just sick and makes you want to

puke. Both are possessive bitches, Cat threatening his flings while they are in bed while

Talia, well Talia can even go as far as beheading (to her credit she was right with this one).

Both makes him a goddamn hypocrite. Both face no repercussions after a cold blooded

murder while at the same time he berates Diana like a dick when she came to look for his

friendship and support after Max incident. Difference is she had no choice while Selina or

Talia most certainly had. Great move Bats, hypocrite much? And most importantly they both

lie and betray him, and leave him. Over and over again. Again, that's a constant with Cat

and miss Al Ghul. Diana never showed any of those traits with any of her lovers.

Get any counselor or psychiatrist to read actual Bat love history throughout the decades

and they would be writing books on how disfuncional they are. For a love-hate dynamics

they work fine. Or for some adrenaline fueled sex, but that's it. Hell, he even banged Dinah

when they were on adrenaline high. It all has a clinical term. Trauma bonding. As opposed

to authentic bonding. Which he could have with WW, had even one of them tried.

They did not though. Out of fear of ruining their mutual respect and deep bond. In

pre-flashpoint it may have been a thing if Diana acted on it. Again, Diana, not Bruce, so cut

the crap on how he was deflecting her. He was in doubt, yeah, but clearly was ready to give

it a go. She was the one that got scared even though she was clearly had over bat hills in

love with him. Even Martian stated this to Supes. Pre Crisis ? Not really. Some flirting and

kissing, nothing more. Post-flashpoint, New 52 and Rebirth ? Also not, though DC like to

tease those two. Forever Evil gets a hint that Bruce feels more than friendship towards her,

much to Selina's dismay. And that goddamn tension when they got to spends decades

together in another realm. Mostly from Diana side again. But no. The real canon love that Diana had for Bruce was during pre-flashpoint, not counting alternative universes. And it

was so strong that it showed her loving him more than her mother and sisters. And her

lasso forced her to admit it when facing Mera. But Bruce was "dead" at that point. So yeah,

never acted upon this. Pity. You could see she regretted it.

Aside their comics history in canon universe, realistically speaking Diana is way more

similar to Bruce than Selina will ever be (or Talia for that matter). Even though at a the first

glance they are nothing alike. She's the light , he's the darkness. She believes in love and

trust, tries to see the good in everyone. He's cunning, distrustful and downright realistic to

her idealistic approach. She's honest and straight while he will not hesitate to lie or to use

violence to get results. And you know what? It makes for great couple chemistry and

tension. It may be a cliche, yeah, but Yin and Yang dynamics work. That's why Clark ends

up with Lois all the freaking time. Even on elseworlds he and Diana are a thing only after

Lois is out of the picture. But that's not the most important thing. Yin and Yang provides for

a tension yes, but it would never last in the long run. For a relationship you need also

something in common. And Bruce has that in spades with Diana.

They might be on opposite side of the spectrum but than you realize how much alike they

really are. They are both kindred spirits. Both born fighters, warriors at heart. Arguably two

of the best in the world. At least Diana is according to Batman. And judging by Wonder

Woman's choices in man that is a highly important trait to her. Both endlessly fighting for

others. Both have utmost respect and admiration for each other. Both tirelessly train to

make themselves physically and spiritually better. Constantly. And to make the other better.

Their sparring sessions are legendary. And heated. Both with a great heart and

compassion. I would argue that Bruce's compassion is even bigger than Diana's. Even

though their methods might differ they share the same goal, which he has with no other

woman. Both have the heart of a warrior and are pushed by the circumstances of their

upbringing to reach for impossible dreams. They are also two of the most stubborn and

obstinate people in DC universe. Both perfectly capable of operating solo, and yet both

performing the best in a team. And yes, Bats is a great team player. Both natural leaders

that other heroes follow without hesitation. Both selfless and able to sacrifice for those they

value, trust and love. None of the other Bat trollups have any of those traits. Not to mention

they emotionally and physically find the other highly attractive. One being a literal goddess

and the other perfect male specimen. As for Batman, his relationships tend to collapse due

to a lack of trust. He's either unwilling to bring his romantic partner fully into his world or he

can't bring himself to trust completely. While Selina got his trust now, it's recent

development. And a mistake judging by latest issues. Again. One would think he's smarter.

When it comes to Diana, he trusts her. Fully. She's not privy like BatClan is to his world, but

they aren't that close in mainstream DC. She's not a psycho with daddy issues or a violent

narcissist. List can go on. Selina on the other hand doesn't have that much in common with

Bruce than she has. Not even close. He loves her, yes. But I don't see Di leaving him

countless times over the choices he makes. Or lying, or betraying, or trying to sleep with

Dick to spite him or... you get the point. Though there is one thing that gives Kyle an edge.

Immortality. Diana won't die unless killed. It doesn't make for a great long term relationship

prospect. But then again, those are comics, and he's a goddamn Batman. He would find a

way :)

The thing is - there is no other woman that fits his world as much as Diana does. And Bat is

capable to loving deeply and going to great commitments with a special woman. He showed

it with Andrea, he showed it with Silver. Problem is he always got burned. Every time he let

his guard down and opened himself. And he would have to do it when it comes to Wonder

Woman. She deserves that. It's hard to imagine with current Bruce, but it is most definitely

possible. It would be harder than with an ex criminal or an assassin though. Because there

would be much more on the line. The other two would crawl back anyway if he messed it

up, Di wouldn't.

There is also another aspect to this outside comic universe. His partners tend to be minor

characters compared to WW. She has her own series, JL, JL dark and every major

crossover/event happening in DC. They don't. And so does Batman. Both are one of the

most popular DC characters.

Besides changes to Bruce writing that are needed to make this work (cough.. pre flashpoint

Bats... cough), it would require fitting it to their distinctive titles. And frankly Diana can easily

function without any love interest and generate money. It's even easier that way. It fits her

as an independent, strong female character. Arguably most iconic of them all. And It's most

certainly easier for DC with a tease here and there than an actual WonderBat in mainstream.

Maisterluu wrote this is a comment on a YouTube video which is dow in the comments. They make really good points for ww and bats. No hate to other DC ships with ww and bats.

#batman x wonder woman #wonderbat #dc comics #dc animated movies #dceu verse

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wesavegotham · 3 years

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So don’t hate me but I’m kinda liking damian’s animated versions better than his comic one I really like his comic one but after all the shit happening where he has been nerfed nonstop getting beat by Thomas Wayne Batman, the teen titans red hood (although Jason attacked from behind like a bitch) and now flatline beating him. Not to mention Bruce not being a father and Damian now Being blamed for everything when they all have no room to talk. God I was satisfied when his old team died in future.

This is going to be a really long post, my apologies in advance.

I absolutely get where you’re coming from. I personally still like comic Damian more because I feel like there is more nuance and layers to him compared to the animated universe Damian, but that is simply the fault of the limited time they could spent on him in the movies.

Movie!Damian certainly wins more fights than comic!Damian and was never regressed in any way that is comparable to the shitshow that was Teen Titans (2016).

You’re adressing a problem I have with comic!Damian too right now, a problem that I’ve already talked about with some people here on tumblr in private. Which is that for all the talk about what Damian can do the comics have rarely shown all those skills Damian should have being used in the actual story in recent years and that is frustrating. I find Damian’s arrogance interesting as long as I feel like he can at least back it up in some way, but in recent time he comes off as just an idiot because he has done almost nothing but fail and lose and the writers still have him act like he’s the greatest. But it doesn’t feel like he can back up his confidence anymore. At all.

If I had to name a skill that differentiates Damian from the other Robins right now then I could only list his skill to hide from Batman and that is a skill he only has for plot convenience. We don’t see him do anything to cover his tracks, we are only told that he somehow did it. And I’m pretty sure that the second this skill stops being convenient for the story it will vanish once again. It will probably end like it did with Jon, where Damian somehow hid so well that Jon said they would never find him in Teen Titans, when they wanted an excuse for Jon to not get involved with his friend’s fall into darkness, but now that DC wanted them to interact again all of that is forgotten and Jon has no problems finding Damian.

Damian is not the most social Robin, nor the most intelligent one and considering how he seemed to lose against everything and everyone in recent years I can’t say with a straight face that he’s the best at fighting or the most skilled. And that IS a problem. Damian will never be known for his social skills or his detective skills, those niches are already taken by Dick and Tim, but in theory he should be a great fighter or a highly skilled person. Damian has sacrificed his entire life for training, both in the league of assassins and during his time with the batfamily. But if Damian sucks at fighting (as in: he loses a lot more than he wins) and his skills play no significant role in advancing the plot, then what is the point of his character? Great, he’s good at drawing and likes manga now, but how will that help with a fighting tournament? Or with solving the mystery behind the league of lazarus? A protagonist is usually supposed to be able to change the situation he is in, that is why he’s the protagonist and not someone else. So what makes Damian so unique that only he can solve the situation he finds himself in during Robin and not someone like Conner Hawke? Or what makes him unique in the batfamily? I hope Robin adresses that soon.

Of course now one could say “He still has an unique position as Bruce’s biological child”, but that also was completely irrelevant in recent years. For all the moments since the start of Rebirth that had batfam-fans complaining that Damian was favored by DC because of his status as the only biological child of Bruce, there were actually very few interactions between the two. Stuff like Bruce talking about Damian or saying that he loves him was primarily found in scenes in which Damian was not present. Or it came way too late, like in Teen Titans (and Bruce refusing to hit Damian in the face because he is his child sets such a low bar, I refuse to acknowledge that as a sign of love)

If you look at how Bruce actually treats Damian or describes him then there is little love there. He ignored his 13th birthday, did nothing when Damian left him after the events of Justice League: No Justice, it had no impact on the Batman books at all, Bruce only called Damian for missions like two times, once in City of Bane (which was just so shitty, as I already explained in a previous post) and a second time in Detective Comics #1017 (He sent Damian to find a missing kid in a snow storm, while he dealt with something else), refused to comfort him at Alfred’s wake and when Bruce reflects on what happened in Teen Titans he blames most of it on Damian’s personality, both in Detective Comics #1030 and in Robin #1, and both times there is nobody questioning Bruce’s asessment. He really doesn’t have anything nice to say about Damian and apparently we are not supposed to disagree with him. So in summary: Damian seems to have no skills that make him indispensable for the batfamily, Bruce seems to have a very low opinion of Damian’s character and now that they have decided to give us Bruce searching for Damian the only reason for that seems to be that Bruce suddenly feels responsible for his child, even though that should have already been the case when Damian seperated from him in 2018 or at least directly after the second Teen Titans annual.

Even the kinda nice things Bruce says about Damian in Robin #1 can be called into question if you think about them. He says he has no doubt that Damian can take care of himself...and then we see Damian getting his heart ripped out at the end of the very same issue. Of course we know that Damian’s story doesn’t end there, so I won’t judge this too harshly yet, but to me this didn’t come off as Damian being able to take care of himself.

And I get letting Damian lose at the start of the tournament to establish Flatline as a threat and to make it clear that this tournament is not a game. I also get that Damian’s fight against King Snake was supposed to make sure that we still think of Damian as competent even though he loses later on. But at least for me, winning against King Snake was not cool or badass enough to make up for the fact that Damian was easily killed, in front of everyone, by a literal nobody like Flatline. King Snake is an old, blind guy, that didn’t show up in any DC comic I read since I started in 2018 and that was apparently beaten by Tim in his solo comic when he was 14 back in the 90s. Sorry, but that just isn’t impressive enough for me, especially since I’ve seen Damian lose so much in recent years. It doesn’t establish Flatline as a badass, it just makes me think that Damian is not that great of a fighter and shouldn’t be in this tournament.

I have some more thoughts on the tournament that make me wish that the arc will start being less about winning the tournament itself and more about something like taking down the league of lazarus soon (mainly the fact that a fight about being the best fighter is useless if the big guns are not taking part, the fact that you can only win by killing your oponent, which should be a problem for Damian and how nothing we know about the rewards for winning, becoming part of the league of lazarus und apparently immortality, is desirable for Damian), but this answer is already too long.

I’m going to be honest an admit that I did not like the ending of Robin #1 at all and that I hope that Williamson will show Damian being competent really soon because I’m not here for another pointless arc about Damian learning humility. I want to see Damian win for once, you know, like other protagonist usually do at the end of an arc and if Damian can’t even win or tell us what’s going on with him from his point of view in a book about him then I’m probably going to feel very disappointed by this book.

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roipecheur · 2 years

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2021 fic year in review

Tagged by @luulapants (ty)

Total number of completed works: 8. 10 according to AO3, but I wrote the crusade + home, where you left it last year and waited a fuckin year to post those lmao

Total word count: 289,433 (again subtracting the crusade + home, where you left it). I kind of wanted to get to 300,000 this year, but I’m on vacation now and doubt that will happen 😭

Fandoms written in: Marvel (Daredevil, The Punisher, and Defenders comics/TV), and Terminator (oddly)

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you’d expected? I have never written this much in my life before. It’s definitely more than I expected

What’s your own favorite story of the year? It’s hard to pick, but I think I’m proudest of the better half as my first bang and (by far) the longest thing I’ve ever written. I cranked out 150K from vague idea to finished story in 5 months, y’all

Did you take any writing risks this year? Well. Before this year, I’d never participated in any fandom events, and this year, I did two bangs, two fratt weeks, and Daredevil exchange. So I was white-knuckling it through a lot of that and scared I wouldn’t finish in time. I also wrote alternating POVs for the man behind the curtain and second-person for the future, a history, and the longest genfic I’ve ever written, defenestration.

Do you have any fanfic or profic goals for the new year? I’ve gotten the DD fics I want to write mapped out by month, season, or event. Pray 4 me. I also recently got into Slade/Dick after a fanart unlocked a memory of being fascinated by them in the Teen Titans show as a kid, and I have a tentative goal of wading through enough of the fucking quagmire DC comics seem to be to get a good canon vibe for their characters and interactions so I can write something for sladerobin week(s) if that gets scheduled in 2022

Most popular story of the year? gift wrapping, for sure. Written for fratt week and possibly the sweetest and least fucked up fic I’ve written for that pairing lmao

Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion: toss up between two fics. 1, the future, a history, because Terminator is not a huge fandom and the fic has background ships, but neither of them are a strong focus. 2, the law of the wood, because it’s a fratt/frattelektra AU of the 80s werewolves movie The Company of Wolves, which few people have heard of, which is based on the short story of the same name, which in turn is based off of the little red riding hood story. Also, I’ve noticed my horror fics are less popular than fics like gift wrapping, (and like that's fine, everyone has different preferences) but I have a lot of fun writing horror fics and I was proud of how I fit the characters and their stories into a very different world (also I really don't mean to sound judgey here, I just understand why these were less popular)

Most fun story to write: probably gift wrapping because it just flowed really well and I finished it just in time for fratt week, which was the first fandom event I’ve ever participated in

Most unintentionally telling story: Maybe the better half? As I said in the end notes, “You may gather from this that I don't know anything about guns and don't care to learn. In that you would be correct. You may also gather that I've lived through a pandemic under capitalism and am therefore highly romanticizing the ability to travel for an extended period of time. In that you would also be correct.”

Biggest disappointment: if I could do it over, I wouldn’t have signed up for the Marvel bang / written the man behind the curtain in the time frame I did. It was very stressful and took way longer to write than I expected, probably because (1) I burned myself out with everything I wrote earlier in the year, (2) real life was stressful from the September-December period when I wrote it, and (3) the fic itself was difficult to write. I had to erase thousands and thousands of words and rework so many of the scenes. It drove me nuts and I barely finished on time. I learned that poly fics are MUCH harder to write than traditional two-people pairings because you aren’t just worrying about X/Y, you’re also worrying about X/Z, Y/Z, and X/Y/Z, so your considerations are like, quadrupled. The format I chose to write it in, which 3 scenes per part with alternating POVs, was also extremely difficult to work with, and I’m not sure I’m completely happy with how it turned out. If it wasn’t for an event, I would probably sit on it for a year and maybe rework the whole thing in a fit of pique lmao. But I have hopefully come out the other side a better writer?

Biggest surprise: That I fucking wrote this much. I still can’t believe it lol

My favorite part of fandom this year: Discord servers have been a gift. It’s so hard to talk to people consistently on tumblr and so nice to have a place to consistently chat about stuff. And! Working with artists for the bangs I wrote: @reddbl for the fratt big bang / the better half and @mock-speed for the marvel big bang / the man behind the curtain. I fuckin Suffered™ while writing the man behind the curtain, but @mock-speed is lovely and made the process better both by encouraging me and drawing gr9 cover art. Also, special mention for this post (featuring a fic I still have to write) with thanks to @frankencastle and @eobardthawneallen because to me, this is a peak fandom experience: people coming together and using their talent to create the most absolute nonsense you’ve ever seen.

Tagging: @alistrawrites @sevdrag @lovetincture and anyone else who wants to do it

#gremlin posting #year in review

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duketectivecomics · 4 years

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You might've answered this already and I just didn't find it, but one thing that always perplexed me about Duke was how old he was in comparison to the other Batkids. It's obvious he's younger than Dick and Babs, and I pretty sure he's younger than Jason and Cass, and older than Damian, but I cannot tell if he's meant to be Tim and Steph's ages, younger, or older. Could you help me?

You’re all kinds of good here, anon!!! I answered a similar ask abt the Order of Adoption but didn’t dive into specific ages on that post BECAUSE well they didn’t ask lmaooo but ALSO:

Comic ages are very fluid usually! While Years™️ might pass in the canon proper, or while time seems to slow to a crawl, having a character’s age outright stated is something that occurs very rarely for most characters, if at all!

Because it’s always much easier to have a floating age range to work and play around in! It’s easier to keep a character Perpetually 12 or 16 or 25 or mid-40s or- you get the idea. SO, with that in mind. Let’s do our Best to Break Down What Age Duke Might Be Currently A N D how it might interact with the Other Batkids!

(Warning for a Very Long Post, lots of issue citations, and a LOT of comics terminology regarding specific runs/events/continunity. I’m gonna try to keep it as clear/concise as possible ofc but plz keep these things in mind! If you’re not at least marginally familiar with Bat-Comics, you might find yourself feeling a little lost here!)

So from the Zero Year arc we see a common Trend that plays out pretty consistently with Batfam comics: a Life-Changing Event Occuring while the protag is Young™️.

(Batman (2011) #30)

With how Duke is drawn in these particular issues, and given the trends of the past, I’d place him in the 8-12 range. The historic precedent being ofc that that is the same range that canon usually places both Bruce and Dick at for their Tragedies™; the more benign reason being that he... just very much Looks to be drawn in that Range. He’s very clearly an Older/Prepubescent child here.

Fast Forward to his Next Appearance in the Endgame arc and-

(Batman (2011) #37)

He’s definitely older! He’s wiser! And he’s giving Batman a fistbump lmao. Again, no strict age given here BUT, since they condensed each Robin to a Year or Two tops with Bruce (its n52 and its fucked up is what it is), we can assume it’s been at least 4-5 since Zero Year (which would mean if we go off the age range I proposed for that year, then theoretically he could be anywhere from 12-16 here, and I think that tracks pretty well. Not Perfectly and Certainly Not so well with Pre52 continuity ofc, but I’ll talk about that later!)

In We Are Robin, while its not stated Directly In The Text, it IS given as an Informational Tidbit that Duke is 16 (specifically this can be found at the end of issue #4)! (Sweet sweet canon confirmation FINALLY)

We know that WAR takes place Fairly Soon after Endgame (almost immediately, give or take a month or two given that Duke’s been placed in a few foster homes at this point and has racked up Quite A File) now, again id like to remind y’all that while this is a NICE starting point to have, keep in mind that comics are fluid and this may be retconned slightly/ignored in later stories bc Keeping Duke 16-ish is in DC’s Best Interest at the moment. (Having Relatable Teen Characters afterall is a Good Marketing strategy™️. And the longer they can Keep them Young, the Better)

With that in mind let’s take a moment to Highlight the fact that Duke and Damian have crossed paths at this point AND the storylines that have occurred during this year that were meant to be in conjunction with one another!

Because Prior to Endgame, Damian had Died! And just a year (in real, meat-space time) before We Are Robin, he was resurrected and had begun his “Year of Atonement” in the Robin: Son of Batman maxiseries. Midway through both this series and WAR (and, we can assume, midway thru this “Year” for Damian) the Robin War begins/ends and we see at least one major Moment between these two boys who will soon call one another brothers:

(Robin War #2)

Given that R:SoB is followed up VERY quickly by Teen Titans Rebirth (in which Damian celebrates his 13th birthday), we can conclude that Damian would be 12 during this time (well, 12 and 1/2 to play it safe lmao). That being said, this Confirms about a 4yr gap between Duke and Damian! (One Batkid down at least! but he’s the key to the others so put a pin in him!)

As We Are Robin draws to its conclusion, DC was releasing another arc that would eventually flow into the Rebirth Era, by the end of which, Bruce would approach Duke with an Idea (which involves Bruce becoming Dukes temporary guardian & as he states Many Times “Trying Something New” with Duke).

And thus the Rebirth Era begins, and Duke began his Year of training (most directly encapsulated by the Cursed Wheel arc in the All-Star Batman run:

(All-Star Batman #1 (back-up story))

Bruce introduces Duke to a training regimen that Alfred has named “the Cursed Wheel”. It encompasses all the training Bruce and the other bats have undergone and condenses it down into color-coordinated segments that will take Duke a Year to Complete.

It can be assumed that by the End of this Year Duke will somehow miraculously still be 16, despite, again, an entire ass year passing.

There’s one story that takes place mid-year in All-Star Batman, and the Cursed Wheel is meant to be capped off by Duke’s first Official Day as the Signal (in the titular Batman & the Signal ofc) BUT, near as I can tell after this story, Dukes age is not brought up again. So until they DO bring it up either in Batman & the Outsiders or whatever future run Duke becomes involved in, we can assume DC will be working with the idea that he’s meant to be in that 16-18 range from here on out (ie still a minor).

But, dear anon, you might be saying “okay, that’s cool, but how does that relate to my question abt how he falls in with the other Bats?” You’ll have to be a little patient with me here, but I think I may have cracked the code!

Keep in mind I’m gonna be addressing both the Post-Crisis to Flashpoint Continuity (ie mid-80s to 2010 in comics history) and the N52-slash-Rebirth Era (2010-Today). Its generally agreed by fandom and DC alike that these points of rebooting &/or Major Events constitute the era of “Modern” comics, and that everything from the 80s-on might more or less be canon on some level, even if not All of it is.

(Plus, most of fandom usually likes to borrow elements from both eras and much more rarely from stories before it, SO-)

Lets do a quick rundown of how everyone who’s Closer to Duke’s Age, Relates to each other first, age-wise:

Given that Jason was 15 when he died, in A Lonely Place of Dying its established that Bruce had become increasingly reckless since his death, and by the end of the story, Tim has stepped in to fill Robin’s shoes (he states that he’s 13 during this story btw). Pretty soon after, Stephanie Brown is introduced & established to be about a year older than Tim (wish I could pin-point a specific issue BUT, i unfortunately haven’t read any Tim OR Steph-involved comics that predate No Man’s Land... Besides the aforementioned Lonely Place and Young Justice technically, but im working on remedying that soon!)

NOW, during the No Man’s Land event, Cassandra is introduced, and pretty soon into her Batgirl run, its revealed that she’s around the same age as Jason (or at least how old he Would Have Been, had he not died.) Now, given that Jay has an August bday and Cass has a January one, fandom sometimes likes to play around with the idea of one being older than the other (OR even speculating/placing them in an AU as twins/siblings, given that Lady Shiva (Cass’ mom) was a Possible Candidate to be Jason’s biological mother but that’s a Whole Other Thing i wont get into here.)

The point being, Cass, in this era of comics, IS slightly older than Tim and Steph. At Tim’s start as Robin, their ages could either line up like: Tim-13, Steph-14, Cass-15 (being a few months ‘behind’ Jay), then Jason at 15/16 (depending on how soon Tim filled the role after Jay died in April) OR Jason-15/16, Cass-16/17 (in this case she’d be a few months ‘ahead’ now instead)

So brief detour to talk New 52, however! Because Tim, Steph & Cass all got switched around from where DC originally left them prior to the reboot! Now I haven’t read much of them in this era, other than Batman & Robin: Eternal, so my Understanding of their current ages is Spotty at Best. The general consensus seems to be that while before N52, Stephanie had been attending her first year of College (& doing VERY WELL i might add), with the reboot she was set back a few years alongside Tim to a vague Late-Teen state (so 16-18-ish, instead of a Very Clearly Established 18/19). Cass is probably the worst off for this reboot, given that B&R:E basically constitutes her new origin for the new continuity, and does nothing to confirm her age (all I really know is that she’s a Vague Late-Teen too... Probably? Maybe?), given how much they infantilize her, and subsequently how fandom in turn has taken to infantilizing her too, theres a semi-popular fanon that places her Younger that Tim and Steph. And I, for one, propose that we ignore that bc its Weak Sauce my dudes.

Some fans chose to ignore N52 continuity due to this vagueness, and will stick to the ages established before the N52/Rebirth reboots. But its something to keep in mind regardless bc we’re all obviously going to pull from what’s most familiar to us!

But WHERE could we place Duke with regards to them, then? Because them being “Late Teens” is certainly much too vague to work with!

This is Where Damian is the key!

Because Damian is one of those rare exceptions to the Reboot Rule. His story flowed almost seamlessly over from before to after. While he was made a Robin at the age of 10, he continued to grow and learn even after the universe was being rewritten to suit the whims of DC editorial.

If we choose to ignore how everyone else’s ages and origins were swapped around, and stick with the growth that was presented before the reboot, then we can draw some interesting conclusions!

Firstly, though Stephanie also had Died and subsequently Returned, she hadn’t lost much, if any time, from the Ordeal. At the start of her Batgirl run, she is enrolled at a Gotham university and making headway with a more firm foot in the Batfamily (even to the point that she and Damian spend a few issues bonding. At this point in time, Damian is definitely 11, and again, Steph can be assumed to be 18/19 during the course of her run. We’ll assume 18 for clarity’s sake.)

So, then when Damian is 11, now our line up is as Follows:

Dami - 11, Steph - 18, Tim - 17, Cass 19-21 (the range depending again, if you subscribe to Cass being either older/younger than Jason).

WHICH MEANS, If during Robin War Damian is 12 (and a half) THEN We’ve got an age line-up that Potentially looks Like This:

Dami -12(and 1/2), Duke - 16, Tim - 18, Steph - 19, Cass - 20-22 (And Obvsly Jason, Babs & Dick at their varying Older Ages than everyone here)

and im just now realizing i Didnt include Harper in this line-up, but thats bc she’d also throw a big wrench in all this. I’d personally throw her in with being Steph’s age, but I’m pretty sure she was supposed to be either that, or between Steph and Cass (again, since its N52, i believe Cass was/is assumed to be Younger than Steph, but that contradicts the assumed following of pre52 canon that we have for the above line-up, obvsly, and so we ignore that lmao)

All this to say, however, that canon and fandom is what you make of it, and if you want to wiggle these ages around a little, you’re more than allowed! God Knows i usually like to skew the Tim-Steph-Cass age group to be a tad older than this in my own fic writing, and I like to have Duke start as a Robin at 14/15 instead of 16, but that’s just bc I like the dynamic potential it could bring with them being Definitively Older that him, and thus in a more secure place to be Mentoring him right alongside Bruce & the others.

But you might see these age ranges and want to do something Different (say, making Tim, Steph, Cass, & Duke all the Same Age at 17 instead! And that very well tracks with how current comics kinda looks right now!) and you’re absolutely valid to do so! Because again, comic character’s ages are meant to be fluid, not fixed!

And at the end of the day, its all about wanting to see these teen heroes kick serious ass haha

#duke thomas #guest starring:#batfamily #damian wayne #tim drake #stephanie brown #cassandra cain #randywrites #randys meta #meta #asked and answered #anonymous asks #this was A LOT and i tried to throw some humor where i could #but uhhhh yeah!!! i hope this helps anon!!!#also just realizing its TWO AM WHERE DID THE TIME GO #ah well. Worth It

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thevindicativevordan · 3 years

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Why I Like Superman

This is a post I’ve been going over and over in my head, trying to suss out my feelings. The simple fact is I love Superman, and I have for as long as I can remember. I wore Superman pajamas as a kid. I watched cartoons like Superman: The Animated Series, Justice League, Legion of Superheroes, and was hyped as hell when he showed up on The Batman cartoon. I drew variations of the S-shield all over the sides of my school notebooks, and I tied a towel around my neck and pretended I could fly.

One of my favorite Xbox games to play was the Superman Returns tie-in game (remember those?), because it was the only game I could play that let me fly around, shooting off heat vision and freezing people with arctic breath. I still remember the opening that had you destroy asteroids, and being absolutely wowed as a kid by the big finale which had you slam into the largest asteroid at supersonic speed to destroy it. Took me forever to beat the Warworld arena level though because I didn’t know how to block.

Because there were no local comic shops near my home for me to go buy issues at (not that I even knew what a local comic shop was at the time), I kept up with his, and the rest of my favorite DC heroes adventures, via reading the DC wiki. I spent so much of my time waiting for my mom to get off the computer so I could go online and catch up that my parents installed parental blocks because they were worried about what I was doing.

In short he’s been a constant favorite of mine throughout childhood, through my teenage years, and straight on into adulthood. I never developed the dislike or distaste for him that some people did, and he never dropped out of the top spot for me like he did for others. There were times when he shared the top spot for me with Batman and Spider-Man, until One More Day wrecked my relationship with Spidey and I grew bored of the endless cycles of Batman being a dick to the Batfamily and then learning he needs them. But even throughout his lowest points (and God have there been so many of those in the last decade), he’s remained the top guy for me.

But why? I think it’s in part because of the type of genre he embodies. He is of course The Superhero, and he lives in the genre he founded, but he also lives in a type of optimistic science fiction genre that’s downright extinct nowadays. As a kid I was a massive science fiction fan, and my dad was friends with a guy who was also hugely into science fiction. This guy had a basement full of science fiction books written from the Golden Age of Science Fiction, up until the cyberpunk era kicked off in the 1980s. He was happy to hand novels off to me, and his private library beat the hell out of our public one. I devoured stories of fearless heroes in space exploring new worlds, first contact with alien races, mindbending new technologies that seemed like magic, about transcending our mortal flesh and becoming part of a universal, transcendental whole, stories that didn’t just talk about technology but about the human condition. Stories that while sometimes bleak, painted a positive picture of the human ability to overcome our inherent flaws and be a powerful force for good. And ultimately Superman speaks from the same source.

It’s not just about the powers, although those who completely dismiss their appeal are making a mistake I believe. It’s about humanity, about our ability to transcend our base natures, reflected in this Strange Visitor from Another Planet, who embodies our virtues and our vices, who is torn between the fear of doing too much and the fear of doing too little. Who hides his true self behind a pair of glasses because he craves the fellowship of humanity more than any amount of glory or riches. His no-kill rule a firm affirmation of the value of life, all life everywhere no matter it’s form. His greatest love, Lois Lane, is his co-worker and greatest rival as a reporter, who has everyone’s number in her phone, be they crime lord or living saint. His greatest friend, Jimmy Olsen, is the guy everyone else ignores or bosses around, but is a rich kid weirdo who gets up to all sorts of bizarre adventures that keep the Daily Planet afloat. His childhood friends are superheroes from the future, his home City of Metropolis is 10 years ahead of everyone else in terms of technology, his dog can shatter concrete via barking at it, his home den is a ice crystal castle situated at the North Pole, like Santa’s Workshop. In short his life is one where even the mundane corners hide fantastical attributes. By living among us, he helps to elevate us, to make our daily grind interesting by seeing through the lens of his life. As others have said, we walk our dogs around the block, he walks his around the solar system.

But it would be a mistake to assume that Superman doesn’t tackle the darker sides of life too. Even the most optimistic sci-fi novels that I read as a kid had dystopic elements in them, intended or not. His home planet of Krypton was our technological superior, yet ignored the warnings of it’s chief scientist, and died a victim of it’s own greed and arrogance with Kal-El as the Last Son. His birth parents died in the fires of self-perpetuated genocide, his adopted parents the Kents often fall to mundane heart diseases or accidents, which even his power can not save them from. His greatest enemy Lex Luthor, is the one person who can understand his loneliness, his need for the public’s approval and acceptance, and yet the shared enmity between the two has ruined any chance of them forming a friendship that could have been. The shining City of Metropolis venerates Luthor as well as Clark, reflecting the greed, selfishness, and callousness of it’s other favorite child. Suicide Slum stands as a testament to the limits of how much Superman can improve life. The Phantom Zone is a spinechilling example of the inhumane treatment of prisoners. His foes ran the gauntlet from greedy businessmen out for money at any cost, to victims who have suffered at humanity’s hands and seek revenge, to sociopaths who treat other peoples pain and lives as a source of amusement, to murderers who care not from where the blood flows, only that it does, to tyrants who seek to crush all resistance underneath their heel, to gods who wish the elimination of free will itself. Each of them force Superman to confront the fallibility of human nature and wrestle with whether or not his faith in both them and himself is justified.

In a sentence? I love Superman because he’s a character you can do almost anything with, from comedic hijinks, to serious dramas, to distributing horror stories, to exciting adventure stories. He reminds me of the best type of science fiction stories, ones that explore people and existence from all sorts of angles, that never lose sight of the emotional human core at the heart of all the high concept existential concepts. He’s made me laugh, cry, think, get motivated, get angry, and sometimes just get writing. He brings the big ideas and the human emotions that keep me reading comics throughout all the Big 2′s bullshit. He still believes in the human capacity for good, in spite of our flaws, in spite of how few of us seem to believe in that capacity ourselves, and he shows us that it’s still there by touching our hearts through his stories. That’s why I like Superman, and why he’s my favorite superhero.

#superman #dc comics #lex luthor #lois lane #me

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bitimdrake · 4 years

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hi, it’s the void! i’m back. okay, regarding any metas you feel like writing. i wasn’t kidding when i said they all sounded great. i loved the timeline you did for Dick, especially because i haven’t been reading DC that long and it was great to understand how events happened and stuff, and more timelines like that would be amazing, , but i’m actually mad curious about your thoughts on how Dick and Tim are similar? like i've seen a lot about their relationship as brothers which is great but (1/2)

but now that you’ve said it, it kinda makes sense. although the only specific thing i can remember is them both insisting on going to public school. anyway, i'd love to hear your thoughts! (2/2)

I very probably will end up doing more timelines because I had fun! but unless there’s a specific request I might wait until I’m fully done with my pre-flashpoint read through. Onward to your actual question, though!!

tl;dr: Dick and Tim are both true heroes on the side of good, very smart, social and well-liked, team players, highly prone to (often unnecessary) guilt, susceptible to becoming more Batman-like in their worst moments, and able to fight against that with The Power of Friendship (i.e. trusting and relying on others).

but lets start with the reason why Tim and Dick ended up so similar in-universe, which is that out-of-universe they’re the most similar.

They’re the archetypical, “light to Batman’s darkness” type Robins.

[Dick to Alfred, in flashback: “No, it’s not like that, Alfred. I mean, I know the danger, and I really try to careful. But I also know I’m doing good, that I’m helping people. I think in a way I’m helping Bruce, too.” “How is that, sir?” “I used to think he was more real as Batman than as Bruce Wayne...but because he just can’t be some cold super-hero around me, I think Bruce is becoming more real, too. Look I know what we’re doing is important, but it’s not everything. Mom and Dad always taught me to enjoy myself. I think maybe I’m helping Bruce to sometimes enjoy himself, too.” | (Batman #438)]

(p.s. go read batman year 3, ft grieving bruce, bruce & dick & alfred Feelings, young dick grayson flashbacks, and the cameo first appearance of baby tim)

[Tim, to Bruce: “B-Batman, it’s hard for me to say this to you--but since Jason...died, everyone’s notice how you’ve...changed.” / “You need someone to make you slow down just a bit and wonder what could happen. I mean, how many times have you been hurt these past few months?” | (Batman #442)]

They’re the two who had truly long runs as Robin: post-Crisis Jason had about a year and a half, Stephanie a few months. If you include all reboots, Damian has had a decade, but I ignore everything after Flashpoint since the characterizations changed so wildly, and he only had 2 years preboot. Meanwhile, Dick was Robin for over 40 years, and Tim for 20.

They were really the only two preboot that had time to live and grow in the role of Robin. They had time to become staples of the greater universe and connect with many other characters. They had time to become long-lasting members of notable teams.

They both were introduced in the sidekick role, but soon started leading stories as main characters in their own right instead of supporting characters to Batman. Tim got his own Robin series, and then continued into his Red Robin series. Dick was the regular star of stories within batfamily anthology series—though I’m not familiar enough with the golden/silver/bronze ages to cite those off-hand, sorry—and then in the modern age got a Nightwing ongoing until he took over as Batman.

(By contrast, Jason and Damian have only really lifted to starring roles post-Flashpoint, previously having always shared billing as Robin. Post-resurrection, Jason was a sporadic guest character, usually an antagonist. Steph started as an occasional Batman guest star, then become a supporting character to Tim in Robin, and only much later became a main character once she got Batgirl. Cass did get her own Batgirl book right off the bat, but, look, out of universe and narratively Cass is so very different to the boys, and was still always very isolated from the rest of the dcu. Barbara as Oracle is the only one who had the same central status as Dick and Tim, but being neither Bruce’s kid nor a Robin, she has a completely different, far more independent role.)

tl;dr: If you read preboot comics, there really is a distinct way in which Dick and Tim are treated as fundamental main characters in the universe in comparison to all the other batkids.

i can’t believe how long this is already getting so I’ll see you under the cut

[Alfred, to Bruce: “Oh, he was sad, certainly--But also more than that. He’s changed considerably over these past horrible days. When he first came to us, I dared entertain hopes that you might, through proximity, become more like him. Bright and more optimistic. But I’m afraid exactly the opposite has occurred. I’m afraid he’s become more like you.” | (Robin #132)]

(alfred is talking about tim here, but, spoiler, imma argue that this could literally apply just as well to either dick or tim)

Those out-of-universe similarities all come together to mean Dick and Tim had to fill pretty similar roles. Dick was created in a very lighthearted era to appeal to kids and give Batman someone to talk to, and Tim was created very specifically and carefully to Not Be Jason Todd and convince readers that a kid sidekick was still reasonable even after one of them had been killed—but the outcome is the same.

They’re the good kids. The reliable ones. Sure, they sometimes fight with Batman or make the wrong choice or struggle, but those are problems they overcome instead of defining characteristics. They were the ones who could be solidly in the role of the Robin without making readers question if they really should be Robin.

As young characters who led their own stories, writers naturally leaned into making them relatable to kids*. And when they graduated, all that established characterization kept them as The Good Kids into their future identities, even as they matured.

(*I think this is super key in comparison to Damian, who is ofc a very young kid, but who pre-Flashpoint had most of his appearances in series that weren’t necessarily geared towards kids: Batman, Batman & Robin, etc. Ergo he could be violent and bloody and chop off heads, and not have to take have any kid- relatable traits or stories. Compare to Super Sons, which I haven’t read, but from what I understand is very geared towards kids and therefore tries to make Damian more kid-friendly and kid-relatable to match.)

Dick and Tim have pretty much the same skillset all non-meta, Gotham-based vigilantes have. They’re great martial artists, they flips off buildings, they’re very smart and great detectives, etc etc. Fanon tends to exaggerate any difference in skill, but honestly by the time Tim is full-grown there’s not any hugely noted gap between them. Dick is more acrobatic, but they’re both excellent fighters. Tim’s detective skill are more likely to be mentioned, but they both are great problem- and case-solvers—and Dick has solved cold cases while sick at home, or ruined mystery movies with friends by figuring it out two minutes in, etc.

[just for kicks, here’s a horribly cropped side-by-side of Ra’s calling each of them “detective” | (Red Robin #12 / Nightwing #152)]

They’re both also very empathetic and caring. This seems pretty well known for Dick, but sometimes missed for Tim, so I’ll remind here that Tim became Robin exclusively because he wanted to help Bruce and help Gotham. He’s the only bat who became a vigilante without having any preexisting personal tragedy to motivate him, because he just wanted to help that much.

Also well known for Dick but often forgotten for Tim: they’re both social, friendly, well-liked people. Dick, of course, has friends all over the place (though, imo, keeps his closest circle of friends pretty exclusive), and generally has no problems socially.

The same is pretty much true for Tim. He doesn’t have the connections across the superhero community Dick has (tbf Dick’s been around 50 years longer), but he is similarly very comfortable in social situations. He’s a confident kid, particularly once he’s been Robin for awhile. Tim swapped schools approximately 2437 times in the Robin series, and very quickly made friends at all of them:

[Tim, to random jocks: “Excuse me, guys?” “Who’re you?” “I’m Tim Drake. I’m new here and have only one friend so far, so I can’t afford to lose him. The trouble is that he’s madly in love with Darla here and dying to talk to her. Now, as we all know, the official-rules-of-guys dictate that you’d be fully justified in beating the snot out of anyone dumb enough to make a pass at your girl. So here’s the deal. Just this once, I’m willing to take the beating coming to him. I’m not suicidal enough to try fighting back, but I still suggest we go outside so that you’ve got all the room you need to do a proper job of it.” (pause) Random jocks: “Hey, you’re all right, Tim.” “You’re pretty cool. Funny, y’know?” “Besides, she really ain’t our girl. Darla don’t date nobody.” “Come on. You can buy us sodas while your bud takes his shot at her.” “Or a double bacon burger.” | (Robin #122)]

The confidence, lads.

Like I said, they’re the “good kids,” and that applies to both sides of their double lives:

As civilians, they got good grades in school (not that that separates them from the other batkids), they generally followed the most important rules, and were relatively well-behaved kids—if not sometimes considered boring. (It’s important to remember here that, as the guy who was Robin in the 40s, Dick was once the ultimate square. Even though he was Robin until he was 19, it wasn’t until he became Nightwing that he was allowed to do adult things like “be shown in bed with his girlfriend,” and it really wasn’t until the 90s that he started to shift away from being known as the conventional, straight-laced guy.)

Dick is canonically a lightweight because he barely drinks, even though he’s specifically trained to resist other drugs. Tim is regularly teased for being so very virginal. Dick and Tim are probably the people who always appoint themselves designated driver, even when they intend to drink with their friends, and there’s already an assigned DD, and they really were planning to just have fun, they swear, but listen, someone has to look out here and make sure everything is okay and be responsible and, anyway, alcohol is bad for you.

As vigilantes, they stick with the Code and they don’t kill. As far as I can tell, the no killing code has never been shown to be deeply and personally vital to them in the way it is for, e.g., Bruce and Cass. But it is important to them: something they follow stringently, try to get others to follow, and a point of horror when they (perceive themselves to) break it.

Here’s some clips after Tim got dosed with a superspeed drug and accidentally killed Lady Shiva. (“What?? Tim killed Shiva???” Yes, but don’t worry; it will literally never be mentioned again ever.)

[Tim’s narration: “Cleared her airway. No breathing. And no pulse. Okay, so this is weird. I’m trying to bring someone who’s killed so many back to life. So she can live to kill even more.” / “But if I can save one life. Even if it’s Shiva’s. Have to fight down the poison in my blood. I deliver pressure to Shiva’s heart too fast and--and I’ll have killed her twice.” | (Robin #52)]

And here’s Dick after accidentally killing the Joker in a rage:

[Tim, to Dick: “Nightwing?” “What… What have I done?” “Omigod… He’s dead.” “I…I killed him.” | (Joker: Last Laugh #6)]

[Barbara, over video chat: “Even Bruce would admit it. The world would be better off if the Joker were dead. So don’t let this destroy you.” Dick shuts off the connection. | (Nightwing #63)]

(Dick has another sorta-kill in Nightwing #93, where he doesn’t pull the trigger himself but steps aside to let someone else do it, and he has a guilt breakdown from that as well. Even though, again, the person killed was awful, and in that case there weren’t a lot of other options left.)

I probably don’t need to tell you that Lady Shiva and the Joker are horrible people and mass murderers, to the point where resuscitating them (Tim in the first case, Bruce in the second) is arguably the less moral action. But Dick and Tim both have the same reaction of horror at what they’ve done, and refuse to entertain how the world would probably be better off without said villains. Killing is wrong, and that is the only thing either of them allow themselves to think about.

Unlike the other pair of batboys, these two are inarguably, fundamentally heroes and not antiheroes. On the occasion where they’ve tried to be darker (e.g. Dick after that accessory-to-murder thing as “Crutches”/Renegade or Tim early in Red Robin) it pretty much always stems out of feeling awful, and only makes them more miserable and depressed. In both cases, they’re taking on the role as some kind of self-punishment.

[Conner, to Tim: “Wait a second. This is all a punishment, isn’t it?” “What are you talking about?” “Taking on the identity of Red Robin--The “failed” Robin. Isolating yourself. I know what guilt can do to you, Tim.” | (Adventure Comics vol. 2 #2)]

[Dick: “I let him get shot. A bullet was fired and I failed to throw myself in front of it.” // “I’m not undercover with the bad guys--I am the bad guys.” | (Nightwing #112)]

Both of them have a tendency to feel responsible for anything that goes wrong, and especially anyone who dies—whether it’s someone they had a hand in killing, someone they failed to save…

[Tim’s narration: “Dad thinks this is part of the punishment. For me it’s therapy. Just last week I was holding a kid my own age and watching him die. And I couldn’t stop it. Some hero I turned out to be.” | (Robin #47)]

...or just someone they love who got hurt:

[Roy, to Dick, just after Donna’s death: “Stop this. You’re upset, we’re all upset...But this isn’t the time to make decisions.” “When is the time? When we kill more of our friends?” “It wasn’t our fault.” “The hell it wasn’t.” “Dick, don’t act like I don’t care! Don’t pretend that this doesn’t kill me inside. But you can’t tell me that Donna would want--" “I can’t tell you what Donna would want. Nobody can because she’s dead, Roy! What do you want to do? Just strap on our guns and wait for the next thing? Wait for the next madman, or alien, or psychopath to come along so I can shove people I love into harm’s way?! How many should we kill before it seems like a bad idea?!” | (Titans/Young Justice: Graduation Day #3)]

(Donna is a full hero in her own right, who makes her own decisions and definitely wasn’t shoved into anything by Dick, but there’s a guilt complex for you.)

And neither of them deal well with grief. This is more pronounced with Tim, who lost a whole bunch of extremely important people in a very short time, and reacted with things like cloning attempts, Lazarus pits, and world tour wild goose chases, but it’s true for both.

[Soon after Donna’s death, Dick sits silent and alone as his answering machine speaks: “I’m not here. Leave a message after the beep.” Roy, over the phone: “Dick, it’s Roy--pick up the phone...C’mon...Please...I know you’re there...Just pick up. Dick, we need to talk...You can’t just...Please… You can’t just leave me hanging out here. I’d rather we...y’know...try to go through this together...if you’d just let me… Please man… Okay. Fine. I’m here when you’re ready.” | (Teen Titans/Outsiders Secret Files)]

[Soon after his father’s death, Tim curls up in bed as Dick speaks through his answering machine: “Tim, it’s Dick. I know you’re there… C’mon, Tim. Pick up...Pick up… Tim, pick up...Please, kiddo...Pick up… I know you can hear me, Tim…” | (Identity Crisis #7)]

(thank you for setting up this perfect parallel, comics)

So, grief and guilt, the two biggest things that push both boys to their worst. Which brings us to our next point: So You Were A Teenage Vigilante Adopted By An Emotionally Repressed Father Figure And Now You Have Terrible Coping Methods.

When they hit these rough patches and fail to dig themselves out, Dick and Tim react pretty much the same way. They self-isolate, overwork themselves trying to control and fix everything, get overly serious and grim, and fail to take care of themselves, sometimes out a misplaced sense of guilt and sometimes simply because their own wellbeing takes second place to trying to save everyone else.

Or, in other words, at their worst, both Tim and Dick emulate Bruce.

During the (short! it was pretty short!) time Dick was a cop, he overworked to the point where he was doing virtually nothing to take care of himself or hang out with friends, too busy trying to take down the BPD as a cop and save people as a vigilante. After his dad and Stephanie (seemingly) died, Tim outright dropped out of school (under the pretense of being homeschooled by his fake uncle) because he didn’t see a point in devoting his time to anything that wasn’t The Mission anymore.

And even in good times, they each have shades of those traits! They both tend to be the most grim/serious on any team (or out-of-Gotham friend group), and are prone to secrecy and occasionally to trying to control things behind the scenes—all to the point where being teased or accused of being too much like Batman is a common sentiment from their friends.

[Donna, to Dick: “How long, Nightwing--How long have you been conducting secret investigations behind our backs?” “I’m sorry, Donna. But I needed to be sure my suspicions were correct before I--" | (Titans #99)]

[Wally, to Dick: “Okay. I tried. You’re on your own. You want to play the martyr? Go ahead. But I never thought you wind up like Bruce.” “What’s that supposed to--" | (Nightwing #63)]

If I took the time, I bet I could find like a billion examples of the Titans mocking Dick for being too Batman-like, but just take these two more serious examples.

imo, contrary to popular belief, this is actually far less prevalent for Tim, but still definitely gets its moments:

[Kon, to Tim, being retrained by Cassie: “Yeah, I’ll bet! Batman give you some tips for handling us, huh?” (Cassie: “Kon! This isn't the ti--") Tim: “What...is that...supposed to mean?” Kon: “You gonna make me spell it out for you?” Tim: “It think you’re going to have to, yes.” Cassie: “Kon, please, not here, not n--" Kon: “Hey, he wanted to hear it? He’s gonna hear it. So...Do you have files? On us? Or did you think we weren’t gonna hear about it? About how Batman had files on everyone in the JLA--his friends, his teammates--on all their weakness and how to beat them in case one of ‘em went rogue. Well? You’re his protege. You take the lead from him in everything. Have you figured out ways to take down each of us? Are you as paranoid as he is?” | (Young Justice #36)]

(man, remember that time bruce was such an untrusting bastard that he nearly destroyed not one but two different superhero teams? good times)

Whether or not they’re actually up to something shady (and in this case, Kon is wrong as it turns out), Tim and Dick both have that quietly secretive thing learned from Batman. And they both have to deal with being under Batman’s shadow; I mentioned earlier that both have fought with Bruce, and they definitely have, but I can’t think of a time they’ve ever done so publicly.

They both deal with the worry of being seen as purely an extension or lesser copy of Batman, and on a more internal level the worry of becoming like Bruce.

Dick gets more arcs that focus on the former—Possibly because, as the original Robin, this is a big out-of-universe question for his character too. How do you make the character who was Batman’s sidekick for 40 years, who was created long before the idea of sidekicks growing up ever existed, his own man and able to stand out from under the shadow of the Bat? (answer: turns out it’s actually pretty easy if he becomes wildly popular and beloved in his own right)

Tim gets more arcs that focus on the latter—possibly because, as a teenage character who was more or less in a long-form coming of age story during his time as Robin, there was still a sense that who he would become in the future wasn’t set in stone and his personality would continue to shift and grow.

But both of them ultimately want to be their own person, and much as they love him, neither of them want to become like Bruce. Or to make this parallel absolutely explicit:

[Tim’s narration: “Here’s the thing: no one can predict their own future. The best a guy can do is to look to those who’ve been much longer on the same path as him, and see what a life of walking that path has done for them. For me, those people are Bruce and Dick. You see what I’m getting at? Bruce has been on the job the longest. It’s slowly driven him mad and eaten the human part right out of him. But what about Dick? Surely a guy like him can’t dedicate himself to this line of work and keep a level head on his shoulders? I wanna yell “He can!” but I can’t forget the glimpses I’ve seen recently of the same kind of monster eating at Dick, too. Little things that, looking back now, I can remember seeing in Bruce a few years ago. Should I call them “early warning signs”? Do I dare to assume it’s a disease I can’t catch with time?” | (Robin #100)]

On the bright side, Dick and Tim aren’t Bruce. They are, as noted, both far more social people, prone to far more openness. And because becoming like Batman is always narratively portrayed as a Very Bad Thing for them, that means it’s something that they usually get to fight against and overcome to be happy, healthier people.

[Wally, to Dick: “Don’t stand there blinking at me, Grayson. What do you want, a mission statement? Fine. My mission is to keep you from turning into your guardian. Batman may be a loner, but you need a family around you.” “You’d really join another team just so I could have a social life? You’ll never last.” “Ten bucks says I stick it out longer than you do.” | (Titans #1)]

[Tim: “People...You think you know how I feel about Batman? Trust me: right now, you don’t. No, I don’t have files on you. Batman and I are different, believe it or not. I have friends. He has...associates. That’s becoming more and more clear to me… And that’s all I intend to say on the subject.” | (Young Justice #36)]

[Tim: “I realized you were playing with me. But this is me, refusing to play. Did you think I was going to run all around the city, desperately trying to save everyone all by myself? I’m not Batman. I have friends.” | (Red Robin #12)]

(i can’t believe bruce is never around to hear tim roast him like this rip)

So Dick and Tim specifically fight against those Batman-esque impulses by having close friends who they truly love, trust, and can rely on as a support system.

I can throw out lots of other little similarities between them if you like: both preferred public school as you mentioned, both orphans, both traumatized after witnessing their parent(s) death.

They both started with a complicated and not necessarily parent/child relationship with Bruce (Dick and Bruce initially having been just as likely to be referred to as brothers; Tim initially having his own living father and a relatively professional relationship with Bruce), and explicitly said Bruce wasn’t their father. They both eventually shifted in their feelings and later considered Bruce their dad.

They both still love and care deeply about their original fathers, and rarely actually refer to Bruce as “dad”. They both lived with Bruce long before being officially adopted (Dick as his “ward” and only adopted as an adult; Tim living with him temporarily while his parents were away or comatose and adopted after his original dad died).

They both were unwillingly stopped from being Robin once temporarily (Dick fired in Robin: Year One; Tim forced to quit by his dad) before later returning to the role. They were both later permanently fired from the role by the current Batman, and extremely upset about being replaced. They both are consistent and reliable parts of the bat-team, except for a single period after they were fired and spent time away (Dick with the Titans in NYC; Tim around the world looking for evidence Bruce was alive).

…and so on and so forth.

(The fanon note to end this post is that they each have a tendency to get wildly exaggerated by fans to the point of getting flaws they never had in canon—but in completely opposite directions: Dick gets flanderized into a perpetually cheerful, ever caring, lynchpin of the family; often with the entirely non-canon flaws of being stupid, oblivious, and/or overbearing; often without his more serious, workaholic, clever, or occasionally manipulative side. Tim gets flanderized into a perpetually depressed, genius-level IQ, uber-workaholic control-freak; often with the entirely non-canon flaws of being socially anxious, paranoid and untrusting, and/or entirely unwilling to take care of himself at a basic level; often without his more social, trusting, goofy, or occasionally cocky side.)

In conclusion, Dick and Tim definitely have differences and qualities unique to each of them, but they’re more similar than they are different and also I can’t believe I am writing long analyses of fictional media on tumblr dot com but it turns out i miss writing essays and have lots of Thoughts.

thank you for asking, the void.

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firebunnylover · 3 years

Text

LoSH S2 discussion

I love Legion of Superheroes. And i love season 2, but that doesn’t mean I don’t think about how it could have been improved. In terms of quality, it varies more than season 1. Some parts are top tier while others… eh.

Season 2 is darker than season 1. And there’s the inherent stigmatism that darker means better. But it’s not true.

A horror schlock film is not inherently better than an animated film.

I don’t blame the staff on all its shortcomings. Kids WB was on its deathbed, so they probably had less time to work and iron out ideas. And executive meddling.

The second season had a lot of good elements, but there are things that weighed it down. I am here to discuss how to improve said things.

Heads up: ended up editing part of this post after rewatching the episodes.

This first bit is more of a personal preference, but instead of the 41st century, maybe move the original source of conflict to a farther region of space, one that the UP doesn’t interact with, and has been growing in terms of turmoil until they finally resort to bringing the Legion over. In other words, it has just been put aside by everyone else to the last minute.

Parallel to Brainy’s relationship to Brainiac. He doesn’t want to deal with it. He never brings it up. But maybe if he did, he wouldn’t have gotten corrupted.

This place still has plenty of old documentation of the original age of superman, so Kell is disillusioned with the ideal glory days. Keep Kell Edgy.

Kell’s home and K3NT still gets destroyed - reflects Krypton’s own destruction.

SPEAKING OF KELL:

Make his story more apparent that it’s one realizing that kindness is not an inherent weakness. And neither is being soft. He was raised for fighting and killing Imperiex, and was taught to think that they were weaknesses. Have him realize his identity can be beyond the Clone of Superman made to kill Imperiex. Or rather, have him react more to realizing that he’s moving beyond his given identity.

To clarify; they do address his development in the show a few times, but I want more continuous development instead of the rapid nods we get. Have him try to interact in a more humane way with others. Especially with other members of the Legion. Where they have to take a double take in seeing him acting not that edgy. Maybe offer more flashback of him fighting Imperiex in comparison, and how he treated allies then.

Also put K3NT’s story under the microscope. I doubt Imperiex just came out of nowhere with his attacks. Plus the fact they went far enough to send a hitman after a fucking child? That screams yikes and maybe we need to double check the story.

And an overall issue to be addressed is what rights do robots have and what conditions need to be met? Because let’s face it, we make robots to do complex work for us. But Colu is a culture where the main people ARE robots. Like in Transformers. What line do we draw between non-sentient robots vs the sentient ones in the 31st century? And what about cyborgs/people who give up their original bodies for robotic ones?

Plus Imperiex himself came to be because of the perfected combination of organic tissue and robotics. This topic of robots and individuality/personhood could have been a fun topic to explore.

Don’t sideline the girls. Leave TG alone.

Don’t put SG in a coma for nearly the whole season - seriously it’s the reason why the guys make one bad decision after the other. Although with that said, it’s because she’s not around we got the majority of s2 plots. She’s the goddamn mom of the squad. Just make her busier and unable to keep an eye on her idiot boys for the plots based on bad decisions to happen.

Or have her deal with after-effects of what Esper did to her. Maybe after a whole season of being the emotional support character, have her be the one in need of emotional support or not being able to help directly, especially when the group needs emotional support. Emotional support paradox.

Maybe don’t make Cosmic Boy appear as much as a dick in the episodes where he does show up. He’s trying to hold this goddamn team together, and there’s a goddamn tyrant trying to conquer the galaxy. HE’S FUCKING TIRED AND STRESSED. AND IM SURE THERE ARE A BUNCH OF JERKS WHO WANT TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THAT TO DISSOLVE THE LEGION. Better yet, throw in some more backstory with him and his little brother Pol!

And in regards to Imperiex… The dude has a lot of potential. I like his voice actor, Phil Morris. The guy voiced Dr. Sweets from Atlantis.

But his writing needs help.

In the original DC comics, he’s the embodiment of Entropy. Anyone who’s seen Madoka is probably familiar with what that is. But if you're not, here’s a definition: “ the measure of a system’s thermal energy per unit temperature that is unavailable for doing useful work...” He’s the embodiment of that energy that cannot be used for anything. And Entropy grows over time.

Another definition of what Entropy is “lack of order or predictability; gradual decline into disorder.”

In the comics, he’s more of a cosmic being as a result of him being an embodiment of unusable energy. He’s been in existence since, well, the beginning. He had destroyed the universe and recreated it multiple times. Okay, so that lines up with how the show portrays him. And technically, he does get the universe to reset itself in the 41st century when he alters the 31st century enough.

But I personally feel that making him a cosmic being is kinda… meh?

I personally prefer more personal villains most of the time. Don’t get me wrong, an Eldritch being done right makes a great character, but I can’t see Imperiex as one. At least not LoSH’s version.

Plus I like it when the protagonist sees the villain has a point and has changed as a result for the better.

You know, over a year ago, I used to think that it was impossible to make a tyrannical villain who’s presented as real evil seem complex.

And then… I was introduced to TFP Megatron.

Now for you LoSH fans who haven’t watched Transformers Prime, Megatron was once Megatronus. A low caste member who worked in the mines and Gladiator games. He wanted to fix the growing corruption of Cybertron. To make things better.

But his worse personality traits took over, and he lost that good motivation. Now he’s just fighting to win and defeat Optimus Prime.

But despite the change of goals and ideals, he doesn’t want to simply abandon his relationship with Optimus. He and Optimus, or as he used to be called, Orion, were fighting for the betterment of society. And they meant something to each other. Megatron doesn’t want to just get it over with. He wants fanfare for his victory over Optimus. And he doesn’t want anyone else to rob him off that. But he isn’t opposed to getting Optimus/Orion back on his side. It’s because of this you can still argue that there is a remaining shred of good in him.

They were the best young lovers anD NO I AM NOT CRYING OVER THEM!

Also, the fact we know he was part of a minority group in the form of the lower cast that was enslaved can make us sympathize with Megatronus of the past, as well as understand how he came to be.

It doesn’t mean we forgive him for his actions - and he has done a lot of shitty things. And I mean a lot.

But his history is more understandable. TFP Megatron’s a fall from grace.

OK I’m done dissecting TFP Meg’s writing.

We know Imperiex was a slave, and was originally organic, who’s from a society where his purpose is literally just to fight, and was gradually stripped of his original body. He was originally stripped of any agency before then though.

But he says this was a good thing. Calling his original body a weakness. And refers to his old self as a pathetic slave.

He gave up whatever softness he had.

Also, this is where K3NT’s story needs to be reexamined. Imperiex was made during what K3NT described as “A Time of Extended Prosperity”. That time had freaking slaves. And K3NT says that when Imperiex did rise up, they were unprepared. So… they were prosperous, but lacked defense to prevent anything like that happening? Or perhaps those who were in charge were that unpopular that it was easy for Imperiex to start the war.

What made him decide conquering the galaxy was the next thing to do after he had every bit of his original self stripped away? Why go as far as destroy it?

What I’m trying to say is that they could borrow a few pages from the Megatron book. Maybe he was once trying to better the society he was part of, but he decides to play the violent card at some point. And somewhere along that strategy, he starts to lose sight of the initial goal. With that, being the victor and in control becomes the main one.

Or perhaps he has grown cynical of the galaxy as it is and decides it just needs to go all together, and then start from scratch.

Like the second definition of Entropy, he gradually declines in predictability and descends into disorder.

Maybe to juxtaposition the fact that Brainiac became the main threat at the end, make him the opposite or foil to him. Rationality or logic do not serve as first-or-second influences to decisions under pressure. Emotions and his own perceived ideas do.

Speaking of Brainiac, maybe offer more of the OG Brainiac. Give us more of that smooth-voiced Corey Burton.

Or TFA Megatron.

Seductive Bastard.

I’m sorry I have fallen for the shady-business-mafia-boss-but-morally-grey robot.

Also, the members of the legion that only get one episode focus? Give them more screen time. You can’t just introduce superman’s new adopted son Karate Kid and just not bring him for another speaking role again!

Actually, that brings me to another point.

As @spandexinspace pointed out, his episode is not the best, and is arguably the worst written of the whole series. Things that are issues do get brushed off to the side.

So a proposal on potential rewrite:

First, have the legion look over its current rules and what exceptions/changes they need to make.

Explore the subject of kids having to participate in these fights.

To clarify, kid shows are meant to be escapism for kids.

Shocking, I know.

So it makes sense that some characters would be the same age as the viewers.

But while this is good representation, as you get older, you find yourself going “WHY WOULD THE ADULTS LET THEM ENDANGER THEMSELVES?!”

Kids having to fight at that age does have consequences. Batman Beyond certainly addressed it. So did Steven Universe Future.

Steven ended up being responsible for so much, that when he no longer needed to take care of things, he was unsure of who he was. And then there’s the fact he ended up with PTSD because of him having to fight so much. Then you have the fact that Greg and Rose never intended to raise him like their caretakers did... but as good as their intentions were, they still caused damage. Rose for… all the gem stuff. And look, Greg is a great dad, but not enforcing anything for Steven when he’s growing up still has it’s cost.

With Batman, he’s obviously going to do his damn best to keep kids safe, including the Robins. But sometimes, it’s not enough. He wasn’t able to keep Tim safe in the event with the Joker in Batman Beyond. Where he was held captive and tortured.

But the Batkids are never expected to resolve this stuff by themselves. Because Batman knows how much you can get screwed up as a kid. He fucking cares.

And to be fair, in most continuities I’m aware of, the other sidekicks came out pretty okay overall.

Except Jason Todd.

So my proposal?

Have Val originally with Grimbor, as a sort of Protege. But have the legion capture him, only to go “uhhh this is a child with no powers”. And Superman, being the good, wholesome paragon we all love, takes him under his wing.

In all honesty, I want Superman pulling a batdad for Karate Kid in his intro episode the whole time. That was the best part of the episode for me.

Plus after the events of “Cry Wolf”, the Legion should examine the no-killing rule. Because they do need to kill Imperiex to save the universe. But that goes against the code. But they can argue it’s a necessity. But Mar Londo is also a monster. He’s the everyday monster some of us have grown up with.

When do you need to make exceptions to kill someone?

And my final main suggestion:

Add more Mekt.

What the heck were you guys expecting? You all KNOW me by now. I LOVE MY GARBAGE BOY.

Joking aside, here’s what I would do.

Have the Chained Lightning episode pushed back, but have Mekt with Imperiex earlier. Most of us would yell “Why the heck would you join the guy whose main goal is to destroy the galaxy?!” But this is one of the easiest things to address.

Explore more of his past. Use the comic sources with him being outcast for being a solo on Winath. With that in mind, him deciding to side with Imperiex can make sense.

Why try protecting something that has done nothing but hurt you?

There’s actually a pretty good reason why he would side with Imperiex, as seen in Champions and Lightning Storm. Remember, Mekt was willing to cheat to get ahead of the sports competition he was introduced in. And also was thrilled when fighting Garth and was beating him on his own. He likes being in power.

Imperiex offers him that.

As for why Imperiex would bother with Mekt? That’s a little harder to answer. He knows that Mekt has a soft spot for his brother, and in turn sister, which proves to be the reason why the Tachyon Cannon fails. You’d think Imperiex would remove a huge fatality.

But he doesn’t.

Maybe he could hold another type of value for Mekt. Perhaps... nostalgia?

I’m still sold on the idea that they were sleeping together.

Also, give us a conclusive answer on where Mekt stands with the LSV. In the comics, he was the leader, but that role was given to Tyr in the cartoon more or less.

OK I think this has been polished enough for me to post now. What you guys think? Feel free to add on!

#legion of superheroes #legion of super heroes #losh #OH GOD I STARTED THIS IN SEPTEMBER #IT'S FINALLY DONE

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whetstonefires · 4 years

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Do you think the DC fandom maybe, Infantilizes Tim a little too much? Like for a rich kid character who's main trauma for a long time was a getting left home alone too much there's an oddly amount of meta abt how much how much his parents hurt him~ compared to, y'know the two poor characters who grew up with physically abusive dad's+druggie mom's, or the two that were raised assassin cult's, etc

…well, yeah, I do kind of think that? His whole schtick for so long was being too old for his age in ways that didn’t sacrifice his jokey, relatable teenager energies. It’s weird how little of that we see anymore, sometimes.

And then DC broke him and discarded him and he’s sort of awkwardly hanging around getting reimagined as more woobie with every fan generation. It is weird!

But tbh I do get it. And I think the reason his parents’ failure of him and his vulnerability get played up so much, and Jason and Steph’s sufferings (while used a lot for things like motivation and context) not dwelt on quite so much in the same lugubrious style, are kind of the same reason.

Which is that canon didn’t commit to it. Jason and Steph’s experiences with bad parenting were foregrounded and retconned more dramatically awful several times. (There’s some definite classism in how that was approached imo, and I’m never budging on being mad about DC retconning out Catherine being sick and then ignoring her forever in all Jason characterization because a drug death invalidates a person ig, great message during the opioid crisis guys.)

They engaged and coped with it–Steph (and Cass, our #1 canon batfam parental abuse victim) pretty directly, Jason a little less so because of the dubious and fluctuating canon status of most of the content more specific than ‘poverty, homelessness, theft, parental drugs and crime in there somewhere,’ so most of his parent issues have been focused on Bruce. He sure has dug into them tho. 😂 Rarely well or productively, thanks DC, but it’s explicitly part of his character, is my point.

Whereas upper-middle-class Tim was always treated by the narrative as fortunate and unharmed by his experiences with his parents. Even though they were clearly behaving badly in several ways, and Tim showed signs of being harmed by it.

Tim outside of immediate moments of frustration always was of the opinion he was Fine, and Very Fortunate Actually.

Therefore a huge chunk of the numerous everyone who’s got parent-related mental and emotional harm, but has struggled to have that validated and hasn’t responded with a lot of anger toward the parent, identifies with Tim. The only one who’s never really lashed out at his parents for fucking up with him. The one who still needs it explored, because canon ultimately didn’t.

[editing post to put in a readmore because lol it’s long, post otherwise unchanged]

(Dick obviously didn’t ever have any Issues with the Graysons, but he Angry Teenagered at Bruce so hard it changed Bruce’s characterization permanently, rip.)

The things Jason, Steph, and Cass have been through are dramatic, obvious, and fit stereotypes because that’s what they’re based on.

That’s important content to have, but because it’s right out there in your face even people who identify with it quite a lot are less likely to feel the need to work all the way through it again in fanworks. That part’s there. It’s text.

(Well actually Jason having been physically abused kind of wasn’t? I think? It was mostly assumed on the basis of stereotyping and Jason’s not caring about the man much even as he felt possessive of information about his death, which is valid. I don’t actually know what’s up with Willis now, Lobdell did some weird shit that lacked emotional resonance or staying power because he’s Lobdell and has no soul.

Cass’ wandering years are also ludicrously underdeveloped. But very very few comics fans or writers can personally relate to being amazing child warriors with no grasp of language living feral under bridges. That part of her life is consistently represented in terms of absences, in terms of its deviation from the norm and the deficits of normality it left her with, which is typical but unfortunate.)

The interesting things to do with these characters are often informed by the bad stuff in their childhoods, but there’s relatively rarely that much more to say about the fact that those things were bad. They know they’re bad. They’ve had a lot of on-panel rage about it, as discussed above. Steph and Cass both beat the shit out of their dads.

Jason is, in fandom especially, a sort of Platonic ideal of a kid who’s mad about his bad childhood and really bad at figuring out where to point that rage.

(Damian is a whole other kettle of fish, because he’s been lumbered by so many detailed retcons coming so fast no two people can seem to construct compatible models of what his early childhood was like, and even more because he’s still ‘a child’ enough that he’s necessarily in a different stage of processing than someone who’s officially only a few years older than him at this point, but still functionally 8 and also 20 years older, and whose parents are no longer in the picture to continue screwing up.

Also there’s no question that if he brings up an abusive thing the League did, he will be validated by his current environment about his realization that it was in fact bad. There’s a lot of fic on that theme! But it doesn’t have the same tone precisely because it is usually understood that that support will be there if he wants it. Realizing that his previous context contained things that were wrong keeps being made the focus of his arc.)

The badness of Tim’s childhood, on the other hand, was mainly in subtext. Even when we were clearly meant to understand Jack was fucking up, like when he canceled plans with Tim at the last minute to go on a date with Tim’s stepmother, or that infamous time he came to apologize for not being a great parent and got mad Tim was distracted by a crisis on TV so he flew into a rage and took the TV and smashed it and was like ‘that’ll teach you,’ it wasn’t leaned into.

The story didn’t treat Jack as a minor villain to be overcome but like a sort of environmental hazard of childhood, like homework, to be endured and coped with. Tim said things like ‘it’s fine’ and ‘at least he left the computer.’

(And like. It’s not about having a TV and computer in his room. It’s about not letting a child have boundaries, pointedly not respecting a child’s possessions, creating an emotionally insecure environment, punishing minor infractions in proportion to their momentary impact on your own ego, physically lashing out at a proxy for the child…)

Rather like Tom King later didn’t understand about the punching from Bruce, whoever did that story (probably Dixon? I don’t care enough to check) did not understand how serious a case of bad parenting that scene was. That is most definitely textbook abusive behavior. (It’s a hell of a lot more common abusive behavior than being a lame supervillain or shooting you when you screw up, and a lot more specific than ‘was a thug, might have hit me, dead now.’)

And Tim was never allowed to be mad at his parents about it. It was fine. He needed to be ignored so he had the freedom to be Robin. He deserved his dad being mad at him because he was keeping secrets. He complained too much, although objectively he did not.

The universe punished him for ‘complaining,’ more than once. We cut straight from him shunting aside his disappointment that his postcard from his parents was just to say they weren’t coming home yet after all with ‘if it will stop all the fights they’ve been having lately it’s more than fine’ to them getting kidnapped.

He agreed not to come on the rescue mission. His mom never made it home, and his dad was in a coma for a while. And then ultimately Jack died as a result of Tim’s decision to be Robin, immediately after finally deciding to accept it.

So Tim walks around feeling a huge burden of responsibility for his parents’ deaths, and completely unable to process any hurt they did him as real or valid, especially in comparison with the far more blatant awfulness other people have been through, and canon is clearly never going to address it. Or even acknowledge it properly.

Let me repeat that because it’s kind of my main point:

People are fixated on getting Tim’s emotional abuse validated because that’s an incredibly important step in recovering from emotional abuse, and it’s one canon consistently denied him.

How ‘bad’ things are ‘in comparison to’ problems other people have is a bad and unhealthy way to engage with trauma. Okay? That’s just a really harmful framework to apply to pain.

It’s also a way that both Tim and people with experiences similar to Tim’s are encouraged to engage with their own experiences, compounding the existing problems.

So. Not a form of relatable DC was ever actually aiming for when they tried so hard (and pretty effectively) to make him a relatable character as Robin, but an enduring one for a lot of fans.

So Tim’s childhood is a natural target for fanworks in a different way than the traumas that have been made explicit and taken seriously by the text. And then a lot of that got compounded by the way the introduction of Damian as Robin was handled, and the lack of resolution that got. And his current status as not quite having a place in the family anymore.

So between the level of projection encouraged by that context and how relatively difficult to access Tim’s Robin run has become ten years after the fact, this has led to a lot of fanworks on these themes that are based mostly on other fanworks, and stray further and further from the original content.

So at this point there’s an entire wing of Tim’s fandom wherein this side of him has expanded enormously, and he primarily exists to suffer, frequently in ways that 1) escalate to a point that is inarguably ‘valid’ and hard to dismiss and 2) set him up to rebound from it in whatever way the writer finds emotionally satisfying or useful–being ultimately cared for and reassured by people who value him (the most infantilizing option but like, popular for obvious reasons), or unveiling his brilliant scheme that was causing him to pretend to be passive in the face of mistreatment, or turning around and using his genius ninja skills to wrest power back from his abusers, or just laying down some sick burns about being treated fairly.

But not that many of the last one, because that’s mostly done with other batfam members.

Tim’s become a vehicle for a lot of vicarious coping that Steph and Jason just aren’t appropriate for, because they get angry and they get even. And those are stories that exist already, so there’s less scope for telling your own.

And because Jason’s reaction pattern is ultimately so masculine (i’ll make them all sorry! with my guns! blam blam!) while Tim’s is pretty gender-neutral, the demographics of fanfic mean that the bulk of the people using Tim vicariously in this manner are female-aligned, which has over time feminized this archetype of him a lot. Sometimes in ways I find really uncomfortable, like there’s a lot of forced pregnancy stuff which activates my panic buttons. x.x

But, ultimately, it’s fandom. People are going to do what they’re going to do, DC in their perpetual fail has hung Tim out to dry in narrative terms, and I’d rather the people who are using Tim for victimization narratives over the people who can’t dismiss or discredit him fast enough now that his position has been filled. 🤷‍♀️ What we gonna do? Fave’s in an awkward spot. DC hates us. This is the life in this comic book pit. XD

Also if you’re the same anon who left me a callout about op of that weird Steph post in my inbox, or if you aren’t @ that person, 1) I refuse to get involved so I’m not answering that ask 2) those aren’t even particularly dramatic fandom crimes? That’s pretty normal? That’s just…Caring Too Much About Ships And Disagreeing With Me.

Do I also feel those opinions are kinda bad? Yeah. But I disagree with everyone about something. Chill.

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