Dick Grayson: Robin/ Nightwing/ Agent 37 Appreciation 2021

[SiegePerilous02]

But what I said is Dick/Babs is not really relevant when Dick is operating outside of the Bat-verse, so not getting that context reeks of reading comprehension fail. And since DC will NEVER retire Bruce, there is no point restricting Dick to the Bat-books. At least Barbara has Birds of Prey which while technically a 'Bat-book' is only tangentially so and mostly just because of her and the location. Also, narratively speaking, I don't think the ship being endgame is really interesting for either character and is a bit Peter Parker/Gwen Stacy-esque in that first love being OTP tends to be less interesting than when the character is allowed to develop and mature and then find a partner in someone else, with whom their relationship can be better informed thanks to past experiences. Or I guess the other option is just going Cyclops/Jean Grey/Wolverine/Emma Frost poly, but then again, I feel that works is because BOTH Scott and Jean had iconic love rivals in Logan and Emma respectively. A Dick/Babs/Kori relationship would be too Dick-centric.

Except not really, because bringing up irrelevancy is pointless in the first place. there is no reason for it to become irrelevant once Dick steps into the wider DCU (as evidenced by Babs being brought into the Titans show). Which he has been doing since he was Robin anyway with all the team ups with Superman and the Teen Titans, among other things. He shouldn't be restricted to the Bat-books, but wresting him from them completely is an unrealistic pipedream. Both for him and Barbara (though she too should be allowed to branch out way more than she does), but it doesn't have to be the narrative death sentence DC allows it to be either. And it's not like pairing him back up with Starfire really does much for him, in its own way it shackles him to a team book that is trapped reliving its glory days of the 80s over and over again.

The Peter/Gwen comparison doesn't really work in this scenario. You'd need to find a much better developed love interest than her (as a love interest and a character in her own right) to compare to Babs.