Dick Grayson: Robin, Nightwing, Agent of Spyral Appreciation 2018

[yohyoi]

Ric for a year... We are gonna get Ric for another year.

[Ascended]

Ric for a year... We are gonna get Ric for another year.

??? Did I miss some news?

[oasis1313]

Yeah, then Death of The Family happen, but that's on him too. He doesn't have to torch the circus.

By the way, it's been a month, right? How's the sale on the current dickishness?

You mean "DickLESSness"?

[byrd156]

Ric for a year... We are gonna get Ric for another year.

Where was that said?

[Restingvoice]

You mean "DickLESSness"?

Oooh. That's better!

[oasis1313]

Where was that said?

It's been going on since--what?--September? It's still slogging around in March with no sign of stopping. Uncle Dan sez revenge is a dish best eaten cold. Real cold.

[oasis1313]

Why does Dick have to look so filthy and grungy, like he's never taken a shower? Are we supposed to take it as "edgy" or "gross"?

[Godlike13]

The season finale was ok. It was good to see that Dick still cares about Bruce despite how angry he is, but it left so much up in the air and half done.

[Darkcrusade25]

Remember when Higgins wanted to frame his run with Dick as the "Prince of Gotham"?

Loved Higgins' run. My first Nightwing run ever. I was more familar with the TNBA Nightwing and I enjoyed the 'Things Change' theme Higgins brought

[Vordan]

bc then we lose people like Jason, Damian, Connor, et c.

My question, honestly, is why do we need them to have definite ages and why do we need a definite timeline and why do we need it all to make a clear logical sense? When I first got into comics I worked out like a ten year timeline that had bruce in his late 20s/early30s, Dick in his early twenties, et c., but as time has gone on I care about that way less.

In my mind, as long as Dick acts competent I can read him as someone that lost his parents when he was 8, started *training* soon after, took the streets with Batman a few years later, and is early/mid 20s now having been a hero his whole life. And I can do that and read Bruce as a late 20s early 30s guy whose been doing this for quite some time as well.

B/c I'm pretty comfortable with comic time not working like real person time. In comics world time time isn't really a strict progression of cause to effect. From a non linear non-subjective viewpoint, its more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly, timey-wimey... stuff.

We don’t. That’s a fool’s errand anyway because the characters are never going to be allowed to age beyond a certain threshold. It’s important to know “what” happened, not “when” it happened. And even then some continuity contradiction should be expected, you can’t expect the writers to perfectly recall every bit of 80 years of continuity. I expect them to address what happened in the run that directly preceded them and if they do that I’m happy.

[Dzetoun]

The season finale was ok. It was good to see that Dick still cares about Bruce despite how angry he is, but it left so much up in the air and half done.

Yeah, it was kinda okay I guess. Too much up in the air, like you say. And it was undercut badly by trotting through tired themes that have been driven so far into the ground they must be approaching China by now. Again with Batman and the Joker? Really? As soon as they started in on that I knew the episode was in trouble.

Not to mention that it also undercut some of the emotional heft in Dick’s backstory. If we go by what he said (granted it was an illusory world, so maybe we shouldn’t) Bruce isn’t a killer but is just cold and brutal? Well, so is Dick (who is a killer besides), so where does he get off being so d***ed pissy about Bruce?

Oh, and in the process he fully informed Trigon of Bruce’s identity and defenses. Which would make an interesting thread to follow up, should they decide to go in that direction.

[Konja7]

By the way, it's been a month, right? How's the sale on the current dickishness?

Well, Nightwing 52 and Nightwing 53 sell 26K each. Maybe the variants help.

It's sad Grayson 17 (the last number of King and Seeley) sold only 30K.

That would transmit a bad message for DC.

[Dzetoun]

Well, Nightwing 52 and Nightwing 53 sell 26K each. Maybe the variants help.

It's sad Grayson 17 (the last number of King and Seeeley) sold only 30K.

That would transmit a bad message for DC.

Well, Nightwing appears to have the problem of a narrow range, with reasonably (but not absolutely) stable ceiling and floor. The good part about that is that it is very hard for editorial fiats and just bad writing to destroy the character. Witness the only period Nightwing/Grayson has been out of print in 23 years was while he was Batman. And there has been a lot of terrible writing and editorial meddling in that time. If you add the time he was the central character in the Titans, that means he has been in continuous print for the greater portion of almost 40 years.

The bad part is that there isn’t much incentive to put effort into the character. If he sells about as well with just any old thing as he does with his better stories, then all the incentives are for DC to just keep his title chugging along and use him as a supporting player for Batman.

I think at this point the best that one can hope for in terms of comics is that DC use Nightwing to develop promising talent and encourage them to think big and original (see Grayson). Alternatively, one might hope that an experienced writer take on the character out of a desire to experiment with a worthy concept, like Waid with Daredevil.

[Dzetoun]

Following up with my post above about Dick in Titans, IGN has an interview with the show runner here:

https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/12...an-cliffhanger

It sounds like they are still wrestling with some pretty big things, including the specifics of Dick’s relationship with Bruce and what Bruce taught him. Note Walker refers to episode 11 as a “dream,” which is probably mostly semantics but may imply that they don’t want to tie themselves to anything. (I assume mostly the dream was generated from Dick’s mind, with the ripple effect indicating points where Trigon interfered). Superboy’s role is still undefined, and Batgirl is totally off the table for now.

What was going to be episode 12 is now episode 1 of Season 2. I think Den of Geek had a good point in their review where they said that the pacing feels more like a regular 22 episode season than a short 11 episode season. In that sense, this was more like a mid-season cliffhanger than a season finale. Unfortunately, it doesn’t sound like we are getting to Nightwing anytime soon.

Oh, there’s also a couple of interesting videos linked on the page, including a set of clips where the Titans cast talks about killing in the story.

[yohyoi]

Titans is now a Dick Grayson show and I'm not even mad. Hopefully, Dick learns from this. He has let go of Robin, but years of anger and hatred are still there. I love that Dick stood against Bruce instead of crying and begging him to go back. When Bruce acts like a jerk, Dick should call him out and not follow him. It's great to see a Dick Grayson with a backbone after Abnett making Nightwing a Justice League lapdog.