Originally Posted by
Badou
I think Snyder wanted Duke to be Robin, but he just couldn't do it because of Damian. I feel like there was a flashforward in his run where Duke was shown as Robin, or maybe it was another black Robin. I know in that Future's End story he was Robin there. It's just I don't think the Signal is ever going to catch on with how crowded the Batman family and DC's collection of young heroes are now. There is just no room for him and with long form superhero comics being even more niche than ever before I don't know if there is an audience to support him enough to keep him around. It really feels like DC stretched the Robin identity out too much and now these group of characters are kind of cannibalizing each other for pieces of history, stories and relevance where it gets frustrating for their fans.
We've been seeing Tim struggle to find an identity and direction after moving on from Robin for a decade now. It's been a mess in my opinion. Having him lead young hero teams is the only thing that has been keeping him around it feels like, but none of those teams have been that successful. The recent Young Justice book that got a big push completely flopped. I have been wondering if DC will pull a Wally West or a Helena Bertinelli and just race swap Tim to be black to fill that black hero role DC desperately wants in Gotham, but doing that would pretty much mean the death of characters like Duke probably. Which goes back to my point about how these characters are cannibalizing each other.
I really just wonder what these kind of comics will be like 5-10 years from now. I get that creators will still want to create new characters because it is better for them financially to do so, it is one reason why you are seeing Tynion create a bunch of new characters in his run, but it feels like we are already at the breaking point with how many characters these kind of comics can realistically support.