What happened to the YJ generation? [BYO tinfoil hat]

[Mataza]

So ive been going through the new 52 teen titans. My god what a disaster.

Im late to the party but i havent seen it discussed anywhere else on the net (but admitedly i didnt do a throrough search) so i was wondering if anyone could offer an insight into what really happened with the new 52 and this whole generation.

From what i saw ive drawn these conlusions.
They became disposable with the new and DC didnt care about the fans, so they decided to quite simply dump what they considered garbage to make room for other properties. Lodbell was ordered to write them the way he did, to reinvent them like this, so im hesitant to put all the blame on him.

Tim Drake was clearly sidelined to make room for Damian, there is just no other way to look at this. I dont know if it was PR, didio or any of the higher ups. But the character was assassinated in favor of the new Robin. Its amazing how many elements of the character got poached by others and a clear indication that the character became disposable. Dick, Jason, Duke, Harper.

Conner kent just aged Clark. In many ways he was his son. Clark was shown to be a young adult, he was more comfortable with Dick than with Bruce and having Conner around just messed with the whole direction for the character.

Bart Allen. Poor kid, he never had a chance, he just couldnt exist in a world where wally west got reintroduced in his teenage years.

Cassandra Sandsmark. She was just seen as irrelevant to the wonder woman mythos.

In limbo:

Connor Hawke. No idea to be honest, if i had to take a stab at it, they didnt want him to upstage Oliver, also hawke aged him.

Cassandra Cain. Same than with Connor i guess. Tho i believe DC just hates her.

Stephanie Brown. DC just hates her.

There are others of course, tho i really havent read that much of the new 52.

Rebirth brought a lot of it back, but it has felt so half assed. We are 2 years in and we still havent gotten any of them back, even Tim Drake is still being depicted as a naive tech guy, when that was never the character in the old continuity (or maybe only in the eyes of snyder).

So i was interested to know what you guys think, do you believe DC sabotaged these characters, didnt mean any harm and just sidelined them, or they honestly thought they would succeed.

Reminder that they turned them into: a rapist, a mass murderer, a terrorist and a thief.

PS: remember to be nice, this is just another speculation thread.

[TheCape]

They keep then around because they have fans and didn't want to lose those readers, but they didn't really know what to do with then, all the "Young Justice" line from the New 52 was a general failure, i don't think that they were sabotaged as much as just an afterthougth in their new universe, after all they couldn't even decide what was canon and what it wasn't.

[shadowsgirl]

They destroyed them completely. I don't know if it was intentional or not, but they slaughtered the whole generation.

[Holt]

With Tim Drake the problem was that it's clear the writers have no idea what to do with him. They've had trouble giving him a defined niche. Dick is the Robin who grew up and became his own man. Jason is the bad boy Robin. Damian is the current Robin. But Tim? Even having him strike out on his own as Red Robin was essentially just a retread of what Wolfman did with Nightwing back in the New Teen Titans era.

As for the others, they kinda got thrown out with the bathwater. Fans hated the darker, grittier new takes on Superboy, Kid Flash and Wonder Girl, but rather than actually fix them, DC thought it was easier to just toss them into limbo. The fact that they had attractive replacements in the forms of Jon Kent and Wally West II (particularly given the TV show synergy) made it even easier to ditch Conner and Bart.

It's DC doing what DC does. When a new direction for a character goes over badly, they blame the characters rather than the writers.

[HandofPrometheus]

With Tim Drake the problem was that it's clear the writers have no idea what to do with him. They've had trouble giving him a defined niche. Dick is the Robin who grew up and became his own man. Jason is the bad boy Robin. Damian is the current Robin. But Tim? Even having him strike out on his own as Red Robin was essentially just a retread of what Wolfman did with Nightwing back in the New Teen Titans era.

As for the others, they kinda got thrown out with the bathwater. Fans hated the darker, grittier new takes on Superboy, Kid Flash and Wonder Girl, but rather than actually fix them, DC thought it was easier to just toss them into limbo. The fact that they had attractive replacements in the forms of Jon Kent and Wally West II (particularly given the TV show synergy) made it even easier to ditch Conner and Bart.

It's DC doing what DC does. When a new direction for a character goes over badly, they blame the characters rather than the writers.

Ain't this the truth.

They destroyed them completely. I don't know if it was intentional or not, but they slaughtered the whole generation.

"Has anyone seen my wallet?" LOL

[Batgrayson]

Tim Drake was clearly sidelined to make room for Damian, there is just no other way to look at this. I dont know if it was PR, didio or any of the higher ups. But the character was assassinated in favor of the new Robin. Its amazing how many elements of the character got poached by others and a clear indication that the character became disposable. Dick, Jason, Duke, Harper.

I don't think this was the idea. Besides Tomasi & Gleason's Batman and Robin, Damian was more or less sidelined until Morrison came back to finish his Batman run on Batman, Inc. Snyder was the main writer of Batman, and he never used Damian as Bruce's partner, he only appeared in issue #1 in a party, and in issue #17, when Bruce rescued his allies from Joker. At that time, Damian was murdered, and Batman & Robin turned into Batman and guest star.

Snyder said he didn't want to use him on Batman, because he felt it was wrong having a kid exposed to dangerous situations. Instead, he tried to force Harper Row to be Batman's coolest, smartest and most useful partner. After Damian's death, Snyder also tried to force Duke to be the new Batman's partner, even after Damian came back to life.

All these things also helped to sideline Tim's place in the bat family. Even in Batman & ROBIN Eternal, he was only a secondary character. That series was more like Harper Row Eternal. Damian hasn't been Batman's partner since 2012. There`s no more "Batman & Robin".


About the other characters, maybe these will be SPOILERs for you:

Cassandra Cain and Stephanie Brown have already been reintroduced in Batman Eternal and Batman & Robin Eternal.

Conner, Bart, and Cassie from a possible future, along with their Tim, have also appeared in the story Super Sons of Tomorrow.

There have been some references to Bart in Flash current series -images, statues, flashbacks from Wally-

Green Arrow's writer during Rebirth wanted to reintroduce Connor, but he is now out of the book.

[king81992]

Honestly, the decline of YJ began with some of John's more sketchy decisions when he wrote TT. Lobdell just continued what John's started and put his own unique spin on things.

Tim(and most of the TT)got shafted because of Damian's popularity. Also, it seems like the current writers have no idea what they want to do with Tim.

There is no reason for Kon not to exist with Jon. Jon and Kon having adventures together would be really cool and sell like crazy but writers don't seem to realize it yet.

Bart is probably close to returning, there have been a lot of references to him in the Flash. Could he return after Flash War?

Cassie...excluding the movie, the Wonder Woman franchise is kind of a mess right now. If writers were truly creative, Jason would be her father. That would justify all the focus he's getting right now.

There have been rumors that YJ will be getting a relaunch because of the cartoon coming back but nothing is confirmed.

[Godlike13]

I don’t think it was intentional. They wanted those characters to be the backbone of a line for them initially.

[Mataza]

I don’t think it was intentional. They wanted those characters to be the backbone of a line for them initially.

They were intentionally writen as completely different characters tho. So they were merely using their names and fans to push something else.

The olympic athlete, the psycho, etc. Also instead of the fun bunch from YJ or the capable new generation of titans these were a group of misfits with an x-men vibe.

[Godlike13]

They could have went the way of Wally West, like they did with a lot of characters at that time, but instead they tried to make them fit, and made them the first incarnation of the Teen Titans and the flagship book of an entire line. It was poorly done, and it crashed and burned, but they tried to do something with them and invested an entire line and franchise behind them.

[TheCape]

Honestly, the decline of YJ began with some of John's more sketchy decisions when he wrote TT. Lobdell just continued what John's started and put his own unique spin on things.

Tim(and most of the TT)got shafted because of Damian's popularity. Also, it seems like the current writers have no idea what they want to do with Tim.

There is no reason for Kon not to exist with Jon. Jon and Kon having adventures together would be really cool and sell like crazy but writers don't seem to realize it yet.

Bart is probably close to returning, there have been a lot of references to him in the Flash. Could he return after Flash War?

Cassie...excluding the movie, the Wonder Woman franchise is kind of a mess right now. If writers were truly creative, Jason would be her father. That would justify all the focus he's getting right now.

There have been rumors that YJ will be getting a relaunch because of the cartoon coming back but nothing is confirmed.

Yeah, Johns idea into making then more iconic was when their true downfall started, specially because by "iconic" he meaned make then more like their mentors, so we pretty much with Superman lite, Wonder lite, KF generic and Batman from the early 2000s lite . Althougth Kon and Tim managed to recover some of their old spark after TT.

[CPSparkles]

Honestly, the decline of YJ began with some of John's more sketchy decisions when he wrote TT. Lobdell just continued what John's started and put his own unique spin on things.

Tim(and most of the TT)got shafted because of Damian's popularity. Also, it seems like the current writers have no idea what they want to do with Tim.

There is no reason for Kon not to exist with Jon. Jon and Kon having adventures together would be really cool and sell like crazy but writers don't seem to realize it yet.

Bart is probably close to returning, there have been a lot of references to him in the Flash. Could he return after Flash War?

Cassie...excluding the movie, the Wonder Woman franchise is kind of a mess right now. If writers were truly creative, Jason would be her father. That would justify all the focus he's getting right now.

There have been rumors that YJ will be getting a relaunch because of the cartoon coming back but nothing is confirmed.

Again Thank you. I really want Conner and Jon to have what Dick and Damian have. Best bros.

[Raijin]

Again Thank you. I really want Conner and Jon to have what Dick and Damian have. Best bros.

There's no evidence to even support that though. Fans never show up for the type of books they claim they want. When it fails, they'll be the first ones to blame the publishers. A company can only do but so much. Fans need to stop with this BS gimme gimme attitude.

[CPSparkles]

There's no evidence to even support that though. Fans never show up for the type of books they claim they want. When it fails, they'll be the first ones to blame the publishers. A company can only do but so much. Fans need to stop with this BS gimme gimme attitude.

There is no evidence to support otherwise either.
In supersons of Tomorrow Conner was hell bent on protecting Jon.
There's no reason why the Superverse can't have Jon [son] and Conner [clone] or why they can't have a good relationship.

They don't necessarily need a title together but I feel that Conner and Jon can co-exist

[Armor of God]

Tim Drake was clearly sidelined to make room for Damian, there is just no other way to look at this. I dont know if it was PR, didio or any of the higher ups. But the character was assassinated in favor of the new Robin. Its amazing how many elements of the character got poached by others and a clear indication that the character became disposable. Dick, Jason, Duke, Harper.


Rebirth brought a lot of it back, but it has felt so half assed. We are 2 years in and we still havent gotten any of them back, even Tim Drake is still being depicted as a naive tech guy, when that was never the character in the old continuity (or maybe only in the eyes of snyder).

There's a lot of wrong here. Damian was introduced and became Robin well before New 52. If anything New 52 sidelined Damian a process which continues in the Batman books to this day. Snyder used him in about 9 issues most of which involved Tim and others. King has used him in 5 along with a reference or two. He was barely in New 52 Tec, definitely less than 5 issues and same goes for The Dark Knight. What Damian had was a 4 issue solo mini, a short lived 13 issue ongoing and a Batman team up book from where he vanished for 2 years because of his death. He was not in Batman Eternal, showed up in Batman and Robin Eternal near the end and has appeared in about 4 issues of Tynion's Tec which has focused on Tim, Steph and Cass. The difference between Damian and Tim is that Morrison and Tomasi have done a far better job with him in far less the number of issues than it took Tynion the primary supporter of the 90's crew. The Eternals were devoted to Cass and Steph's reintroductions while his Tec has continued with those characters along with heavy focus on Tim and Kate. But in about 130 issues Tynion has done virtually jacksquat with those guys. He resorts to nostalgia, surface level personalities, singular traits that entirely define these characters, making others look bad to prop certain characters and so on.Blaming Lobdell and establishment and another character whose doing well is easy but what about Tynion? He clearly was given the job of fixing them which he evidently wanted but where are the results? Those Eternal books in particular were just a waste of time.
Its not Damian's fault Tim writers fail to get Tim even when they profess to love him and ultimately these problems trace back to Johns era Teen Titans anyway.