Dick Grayson: Robin/ Nightwing/ Agent 37 Appreciation 2021

[Aahz]

The question is where are these villains and his supporting cast?

Taylor is like 9 issues into his run, with 3 of them being a feat state tie in.
Stuff like that needs time, and a creator who is willing to put the work in and an editorial that is going in force consistency, when writers change.

Thing is with a fixed location like Blüdheaven you can build a world around the character, if the character is constantly globe trotting that's pretty hard.

[Rakiduam]

Taylor is like 9 issues into his run, with 3 of them being a feat state tie in.
Stuff like that needs time, and a creator who is willing to put the work in and an editorial that is going in force consistency, when writers change.

Thing is with a fixed location like Blüdheaven you can build a world around the character, if the character is constantly globe trotting that's pretty hard.

Higgins was constantly interrupted with crosovers and still managed to introduce a bunch of character. In the Chicago run alone, he introduced the roomies, a new job, the city, two could be villains, Zucco again, and a mythos in like 2 issues.

Seeley made Bludhaven interesting for first time ever, he tried to give it it's own identity instead of Little Gotham and Taylor undo it in one issue.

It has been decades since they introduced Blüdheavenand it hasn't help one bit to build a world around Nightwing. It's basically where the bat childrens go when they are not being used in Gotham, it's treated like kindergarten.

[Badou]

Right on the money imo.

It's not like it's the greatest status quo, but it makes so much more sense for the character. He needs to be in Gotham whenever it's time for a big Bat story. He's always around his family or they're always around him, which brings him back to Gotham regardless.

His best stories as a "solo" character has always been in Gotham. A huge part of that is what you were getting at Badou, sine Gotham just inherently has interesting elements and characters to pull from, and Dick has an inherent reason to care about Gotham specifically (which is also why he's always there anyways, whether he lives in Bludhaven or not).

As it stands now, Dick has two homes according to Taylor's run and all the ongoing Batman books: Gotham and Bludhaven. Only one of them is interesting. If the idea is that he'd be less independent, I have to ask "when has he been independent?" because he clearly hasn't been since he first moved to Bludhaven lol.

Pretty much. Gotham will always have more interesting elements to build stories from. It isn't perfect but having Dick live there puts him in the best position to have stories with more interesting and higher profile characters. Rather than split his time and spending all this effort trying to turn Bludahven into something it will never be, which is a setting that adds true value to his character, they could just write him in stories set in Gotham that have a higher chance at being memorable because of the higher level of usable assets that setting provides.

For those that don't want to completely throw away Bludhaven then I'd just do what the YJ show did and fold it into Gotham. Let Bludhaven be the port or harbor district of Gotham. You can separate Gotham into all these different areas that look unique to each other that the villains control or operate from. Like the traditional city center and business district, the entertainment district, the slums district, and the college/tech district. You can even bring in Blockbuster, for those that enjoy the character I guess, to control that part of the city. So you can keep the whole whaling imagery too that Seeley and Taylor are trying use for Bludhaven since it is set in the port. Now a Blockbuster has to compete directly with characters like Penguin, Two Face, Joker and so on which elevates his ceiling over being the only fish in an irrelevant city.

Taylor is like 9 issues into his run, with 3 of them being a feat state tie in.
Stuff like that needs time, and a creator who is willing to put the work in and an editorial that is going in force consistency, when writers change.

9 issues is more than half of what King and Seeley did on their Grayson run. That is a good sample size. Taylor's pace is just incredibly slow and no story elements he's introduced outside the Dick and Babs romance have felt like they really mattered or had any weight behind it. But the Dick and Babs romance could have just happened in Gotham over Bludahven as well. It isn't really reliant on it being in Bludhaven.

Thing is with a fixed location like Blüdheaven you can build a world around the character, if the character is constantly globe trotting that's pretty hard.

I don't believe you can in modern comics. All the famous locations were grandfathered in from a different era where it was much easier to create cities with lasting characters because there wasn't all this history, but has any book been able to create some new city for an established hero and have it matter or last in the last 30 years? Not really. You can argue that Bludhaven is the most successful "new" city created in the last 30 years but I would not call Bludhaven a success at all. Bludahven is only relevant because Dick Grayson is in it. The moment he steps outside the city becomes useless, which tells me the city itself isn't really elevating the character because it has no value beyond its attachment to Dick. I'd say that Jason's Outlaws book that had no fixed setting added more lasting elements and permanent relationships to his character than anything Bludahven has done for Nightwing since the reboot.

It just feels like it is one of those antiquated ideas that because Nightwing has a solo book writers think he has to have his "own city" since that is just what traditional heroes have, but they don't realize that most heroes don't have or need their own city. So it ends up feeling like they only stick Nightwing in a Bludhaven because they think that is the only way he can compete with Batman, but I don't want the character to compete with Batman. I don't care. I just want the character put in the best position to have the best stories possible and I don't see how him being stuck in a city like Bludhaven that has nothing in it does that.

[Frontier]

I think where you want Nightwing lives depends a lot on what you want/expect from the character and what kind of stories you want to see...and maybe to a certain extent what you can live with because he's probably always going to be around in Gotham one way or another, so whether he's globe-hopping, at Titans Tower, or in another city he'll probably still be in Gotham when stories need him to be. But some might not want to read about him in Gotham in general.

[Drako]

https://screenrant.com/dc-war-earth-...-crossover-dc/

The War For Earth-3 Crossover Event Is Coming To DC Comics


The War For Earth-3 is coming to DC Comics. Next year, a handful of comics will crossover in a brand new event that will see heroes and villains take on the characters of Earth-3. The War For Earth-3 will take place in the pages of Teen Titans Academy, The Flash, and Suicide Squad, with two issues bookending the crossovers.

The War For Earth-3 will be centered on Amanda Waller's quest for power in the DC Universe. The synopsis for War For Earth-3 #1 reveals that the Crime Syndicate will hunt down the former Task Force X leader, leading to Teen Titans, the Flash, and Suicide Squad colliding on Earth-3. The Titans and Flash will be searching for a missing student who they believed was taken by Waller to be part of her Justice Squad team. War For Earth-3 #1 will be written by Robbie Thompson and Dennis Hopeless, with art by Steve Pugh. The crossover will feature connecting covers from Rafa Sandoval (seen below). The issue will feature variants from Gleb Melnikov, Liam Sharp (1:25), and Guillen March (1:50).
The War For Earth-3, taking place in the pages of Suicide Squad, Teen Titans Academy, and The Flash, will begin in March 2022. The crossover event will run through the month's first day, starting with War For Earth-3 #1 and ending with War For Earth-3 #2 on March 29, 2022. The exciting event will set the stage for what's coming next in each of the titles featured in the crossover.

Thanks Hypo for the post in the DC Forum.

[Rac7d*]

https://screenrant.com/dc-war-earth-...-crossover-dc/

The War For Earth-3 Crossover Event Is Coming To DC Comics


The War For Earth-3 is coming to DC Comics. Next year, a handful of comics will crossover in a brand new event that will see heroes and villains take on the characters of Earth-3. The War For Earth-3 will take place in the pages of Teen Titans Academy, The Flash, and Suicide Squad, with two issues bookending the crossovers.

The War For Earth-3 will be centered on Amanda Waller's quest for power in the DC Universe. The synopsis for War For Earth-3 #1 reveals that the Crime Syndicate will hunt down the former Task Force X leader, leading to Teen Titans, the Flash, and Suicide Squad colliding on Earth-3. The Titans and Flash will be searching for a missing student who they believed was taken by Waller to be part of her Justice Squad team. War For Earth-3 #1 will be written by Robbie Thompson and Dennis Hopeless, with art by Steve Pugh. The crossover will feature connecting covers from Rafa Sandoval (seen below). The issue will feature variants from Gleb Melnikov, Liam Sharp (1:25), and Guillen March (1:50).
The War For Earth-3, taking place in the pages of Suicide Squad, Teen Titans Academy, and The Flash, will begin in March 2022. The crossover event will run through the month's first day, starting with War For Earth-3 #1 and ending with War For Earth-3 #2 on March 29, 2022. The exciting event will set the stage for what's coming next in each of the titles featured in the crossover.

Thanks Hypo for the post in the DC Forum.

Well there we go, now everyone who wanted Dick to be mixed up in the GREATER DCU should be satisfied.

I'm satisfied that the Nightwing title is not included into that crossover mix, so Taylor can proceed with his story uninterrupted.

[Avi]

Taylor is like 9 issues into his run, with 3 of them being a feat state tie in.
Stuff like that needs time, and a creator who is willing to put the work in and an editorial that is going in force consistency, when writers change.

10 with the Annual. So 7 Issues without Fear State. You know how long Humphries' Nightwing arc was? 7 Issues.

The others already mentioned Grayson and Higgins run. Let me compare the current one with them a little more:

Grayson used its first Annual to build up the supporting cast and further the story. In Taylor's we got more Bats both in the supporting as well as the villain role.

Higgins gave Dick a personal villain when Dick was involved in the CoO crossover while the Fear State crossover gave the Batgirls a new villain – except not even that really because Seer is also Jace's villain.

Whether Editorial is going to finally force a little consistency remains to be seen. They might because things have changed, but I'm not confident they will.

Thing is with a fixed location like Blüdheaven you can build a world around the character, if the character is constantly globe trotting that's pretty hard.

I would like Blüd more of it actually were so, but we have evidence that a fixed location hasn't helped Dick at all in the last years.

https://screenrant.com/dc-war-earth-...-crossover-dc/

The War For Earth-3 Crossover Event Is Coming To DC Comics


The War For Earth-3 is coming to DC Comics. Next year, a handful of comics will crossover in a brand new event that will see heroes and villains take on the characters of Earth-3. The War For Earth-3 will take place in the pages of Teen Titans Academy, The Flash, and Suicide Squad, with two issues bookending the crossovers.

The War For Earth-3 will be centered on Amanda Waller's quest for power in the DC Universe. The synopsis for War For Earth-3 #1 reveals that the Crime Syndicate will hunt down the former Task Force X leader, leading to Teen Titans, the Flash, and Suicide Squad colliding on Earth-3. The Titans and Flash will be searching for a missing student who they believed was taken by Waller to be part of her Justice Squad team. War For Earth-3 #1 will be written by Robbie Thompson and Dennis Hopeless, with art by Steve Pugh. The crossover will feature connecting covers from Rafa Sandoval (seen below). The issue will feature variants from Gleb Melnikov, Liam Sharp (1:25), and Guillen March (1:50).
The War For Earth-3, taking place in the pages of Suicide Squad, Teen Titans Academy, and The Flash, will begin in March 2022. The crossover event will run through the month's first day, starting with War For Earth-3 #1 and ending with War For Earth-3 #2 on March 29, 2022. The exciting event will set the stage for what's coming next in each of the titles featured in the crossover.

Thanks Hypo for the post in the DC Forum.

The cover looks promising.

A shame that Shrike is dead already, would have been cool to see him in Talon's place, and that this Owlman isn't the one from Forever Evil. I guess there is hope that what happened in FE influences how Dick interacts with this E-3 version. But probably not.

I hope this Titans event is better than the last and that the "teaching Titans' get treated better than they have been so far in TTA. New writers sound promising in that regard.

[Claude]

Well there we go, now everyone who wanted Dick to be mixed up in the GREATER DCU should be satisfied.

I'm satisfied that the Nightwing title is not included into that crossover mix, so Taylor can proceed with his story uninterrupted.

Well, that sounds pretty interesting - and nice to pay off the TTA/Suicide Squad connection from earlier in both runs.

Red X reveal in TTA #12 to have an Earth 3 element, then, to connect it all? Earth 3 version of Dick?

Wouldn't mind Hopeless as the new writer on whatever Titans book comes out of this, whether its still TTA or something else.

[Iclifton]

10 with the Annual. So 7 Issues without Fear State. You know how long Humphries' Nightwing arc was? 7 Issues.

The others already mentioned Grayson and Higgins run. Let me compare the current one with them a little more:

Grayson used its first Annual to build up the supporting cast and further the story. In Taylor's we got more Bats both in the supporting as well as the villain role.

Higgins gave Dick a personal villain when Dick was involved in the CoO crossover while the Fear State crossover gave the Batgirls a new villain – except not even that really because Seer is also Jace's villain.

Whether Editorial is going to finally force a little consistency remains to be seen. They might because things have changed, but I'm not confident they will.



I would like Blüd more of it actually were so, but we have evidence that a fixed location hasn't helped Dick at all in the last years..

Dude comparatively to Taylor’s run Higgins and Humphries sucked. No ambition. This run has a side cast. It includes Barbara. And to be honest, she’s been a great addition to the book. Taylor has taken a more character centric approach than other writers. We’ve got a ton of great character moments and Dick has had a great showing.

I’m glad that instead of wasting page space to introduce a bunch of new characters that will be thrown away immediately, we are getting a character centric run. Also, in the short amount of time we’ve seen Heartless, he’s already much better than the other villains introduced in all of the above mentioned runs.

Also, we have no evidence that fixed location doesn’t help. The current run is selling great. The only time the character went international was Grayson which did not sell nearly as well.

[Claude]

Also, between this and Shadow War - kudos to DC for relatively contained crossovers between sympathetic titles and covered by a single writer. Much more palatable than the lengthy mish mash these things can often be.

[Frontier]

https://screenrant.com/dc-war-earth-...-crossover-dc/

The War For Earth-3 Crossover Event Is Coming To DC Comics


The War For Earth-3 is coming to DC Comics. Next year, a handful of comics will crossover in a brand new event that will see heroes and villains take on the characters of Earth-3. The War For Earth-3 will take place in the pages of Teen Titans Academy, The Flash, and Suicide Squad, with two issues bookending the crossovers.

The War For Earth-3 will be centered on Amanda Waller's quest for power in the DC Universe. The synopsis for War For Earth-3 #1 reveals that the Crime Syndicate will hunt down the former Task Force X leader, leading to Teen Titans, the Flash, and Suicide Squad colliding on Earth-3. The Titans and Flash will be searching for a missing student who they believed was taken by Waller to be part of her Justice Squad team. War For Earth-3 #1 will be written by Robbie Thompson and Dennis Hopeless, with art by Steve Pugh. The crossover will feature connecting covers from Rafa Sandoval (seen below). The issue will feature variants from Gleb Melnikov, Liam Sharp (1:25), and Guillen March (1:50).
The War For Earth-3, taking place in the pages of Suicide Squad, Teen Titans Academy, and The Flash, will begin in March 2022. The crossover event will run through the month's first day, starting with War For Earth-3 #1 and ending with War For Earth-3 #2 on March 29, 2022. The exciting event will set the stage for what's coming next in each of the titles featured in the crossover.

Thanks Hypo for the post in the DC Forum.

I guess Dick is leading for the Titans portion of the crossover. Hope he's used well.

(They probably won't mention any of the New 52 Crime Syndicate stuff even though he's fighting Owlman here).

[Grayson - The Dark Heir]

https://screenrant.com/dc-war-earth-...-crossover-dc/

The War For Earth-3 Crossover Event Is Coming To DC Comics


The War For Earth-3 is coming to DC Comics. Next year, a handful of comics will crossover in a brand new event that will see heroes and villains take on the characters of Earth-3. The War For Earth-3 will take place in the pages of Teen Titans Academy, The Flash, and Suicide Squad, with two issues bookending the crossovers.

The War For Earth-3 will be centered on Amanda Waller's quest for power in the DC Universe. The synopsis for War For Earth-3 #1 reveals that the Crime Syndicate will hunt down the former Task Force X leader, leading to Teen Titans, the Flash, and Suicide Squad colliding on Earth-3. The Titans and Flash will be searching for a missing student who they believed was taken by Waller to be part of her Justice Squad team. War For Earth-3 #1 will be written by Robbie Thompson and Dennis Hopeless, with art by Steve Pugh. The crossover will feature connecting covers from Rafa Sandoval (seen below). The issue will feature variants from Gleb Melnikov, Liam Sharp (1:25), and Guillen March (1:50).
The War For Earth-3, taking place in the pages of Suicide Squad, Teen Titans Academy, and The Flash, will begin in March 2022. The crossover event will run through the month's first day, starting with War For Earth-3 #1 and ending with War For Earth-3 #2 on March 29, 2022. The exciting event will set the stage for what's coming next in each of the titles featured in the crossover.

Thanks Hypo for the post in the DC Forum.

Oh hey, an event I can actually be excited for lol. Based on the covers, it looks like the main characters are Dick, Wally, Kory, Vic, and the real Conner (who's finally showing up in something again after the Bendis YJ run lol) which is a cool line-up. Plus, it looks like Wallace, Red X, and Dane Nevermore might also be relevant based on the variant covers, on top of Bolt who seems to be the character in the synopsis. Basically, all characters that could have some neat interactions with Dick.

On the CSA side, this Superwoman is actually Donna Troy (and seems to be paired against Kory), so that's gonna be interesting on its own, but that it would be nice to see Dick and the Titans interact with her. Even if Owlman doesn't remember the Forever Evil stuff, it wouldn't really matter. Dick and Owlman have had a rivalry since he was Batman and leading the JLA. It was his plan that put the CSA down back then, so I'm hoping this is more of a reflection of that than N52 stuff. William Cobb vs. Dick again is nice, not because of their obvious and old history, but because it feels like the pay-off to the last Teen Titans Academy/Suicide Squad crossover.

[Pohzee]

Yeah see I'm more interested in this than seeing Nightwing kick it with (Red?) Robin and the Batgirls.

[Rac7d*]

Yeah see I'm more interested in this than seeing Nightwing kick it with (Red?) Robin and the Batgirls.

Yes Nightwing for all
hopefully the cover delivers what they promise and its not a forever evil situation

[MakeNightwingGreatAgain]

Well there we go, now everyone who wanted Dick to be mixed up in the GREATER DCU should be satisfied.

I'm satisfied that the Nightwing title is not included into that crossover mix, so Taylor can proceed with his story uninterrupted.

Haha this is a very limited take on what people said about Nightwing and the greater DC Universe. Its not that Dick cant have cross overs, its that his runs are filled to the brim with crossovers whether its batfam or some continuity changing event. His runs are always cut short and they tend to be the runs that take him in better directions (Tomasi, King, Higgins). We want to see Dick interact with the great DC Universe in his own comics and to eventually spawn a second brave and bold style comic with him teaming up with multiple people on various missions. Crossovers are great when they are limited, but even if its with the greater DC Universe, its still annoying. By this point, I think Dick could theoretically have three different comics that he can "lead" if DC actually invested the time in making Dick more of a flagship character like Harley and the Trinity.

As lacking as Taylor's execution of including the Titans and Supes has been in my eyes so far, he is showing Dick has relationships outside the Batfamily.

That said, I still think the Nightwing title should have a Brave-and-the-Bold-style back-up where Dick can team up with a wide array of other characters.



If only this weren't so true. Though Titans United seems surprisingly good to Dick from the previews I have seen considering it is more or less a tie-in to the Titans TV Show.



Can't speak for the other books but reducing Grayson to a Bat-adjacent Spyral is equally as false of a narrative.

There's no question that Spyral was originally a concept for Batman, but it had no Bat-visuals or characters except for not-Kathy Kane, Helena, and Dick by the time Grayson came around, but Helena had nothing to do with Gotham or Bruce at that point, and Kathy Kane aka Luka Netz was a completely different character. Seeley and King basically reinvent Spyral.

During the "Grayson phase" Dick interacted with Luthor, Midnighter, Superman, and other Wildstorm and Checkmate characters, plus his own supporting cast while also featuring in Titans Hunt and teaming up with Starfire. That's more DCU-centric than Batman-centric, even with R&B Eternal coming out at the same time.




The fact that it has been an easy excuse to put as many Bats into his stories as possible ever since Dick isn't allowed to say "Get out of my city" anymore while also pushing him into Batman Issues for the sake of it instead of truly giving him something to do.

The question is where are these villains and his supporting cast? Even the new support characters Taylondo introduced have been overshadowed by Babs and Tim. Heartless has been twiddling his thumbs for four months but not particularly ominously. The crossover is obviously bat-centric but the Annual used a Bat villain too instead of using a Nightwing foe.

And just some villains and a supporting cast aren't enough. Higgins' Gotham arcs also had those. They even had the same connection to Dick as Taylondo's new characters have: the circus and Zucco.



Well, you answered the problems people see and what might be better with your "Ok"s.



RHatO had a chance to have a long-term direction as well. Hell, every book has. Blüdhaven gets a new direction every year too. It looks different the second a new writer takes over. The exception being Dixon -> Grayson and Seeley -> Humphries.

I don't think Blüdhaven is inherently bad, but it doesn't help Dick as a character either. Not since it blew up.

I'm just convinced Taylor is just re-using his plot idea from his amazing Spiderman run and then just slapping the Nightwing title on it. Unlike spidey though, Dick doesn't have much to work with lore wise as an independent character, so where Spidey excels at being the everyman with extremely dangerous enemies, Dick is like not even comparable. Which is why he has to rely on overselling Dick Babs and Dixon plots. I LOVE Dick and Tim interacting, so ill accept that, but we will also see how long it lasts. Even though there have been other characters featured in the solo, they never seem to stay around. Only person Dick is truly interacting with is Babs.

For characters like Dick, I really wish writers would just treat him like a brand new OC and start over, especially when it's at the beginning of a new continuity. The fans will deal. They have been dealing for years now. The loud minority will be loud but as long as the storytelling and world build is good, they will have readers and supporters. DC also shoots themselves in the foot by forcing writers to cater to continuity and status quo instead of letting them experiment. I prefer to have some kind of continuity, but that continuity should only have to make sense within its own world. So N52 continuity doesn't need to piggyback off pre-flash point because it was an entirely new timeline. Re-introducing other continuities within the N52 line made things difficult and now writers again don't know what is and isn't canon (just like before the hard reboot).

I was surprised when I found out how many writers have actually passed on writing Nightwing. Writing for Nightwing must be a hassle due to all restrictions, plot changes and pandering that are required of the author.

Taylor is like 9 issues into his run, with 3 of them being a feat state tie in.
Stuff like that needs time, and a creator who is willing to put the work in and an editorial that is going in force consistency, when writers change.

Thing is with a fixed location like Blüdheaven you can build a world around the character, if the character is constantly globe trotting that's pretty hard.

I mean, Tomasi only had 14 issues and his first story arc was like 3 books long! And he became hands down one of the best writers for Nightwing. A story arc doesn't need really be over 3 issues to do a good job with story telling. If you look at it as a movie, each panel represents a moment in a scene, each scene on a page is equal to one minute. Your avg movie is around 60-100 minutes, so a story arc told in three issues is equivalent to 75 pages. So, that is pretty equal to a decent length movie (one hour and fifteen minutes). Since the 90s, writers have been writing for the trade, which is why we have story arcs that should have been told in 3 issues, told in 12! Its crazy because of how slow the plot moves. Id rather ongoings have 3-4 self-contained story arcs per year with one major story building over them than just one story told over the year.

You can definitely have story arcs dedicated to Dick's time in Blüdhaven and then Dick's time globetrotting or whatever. Its an ongoing. By the 5-year time mark, Dick should have established lore and world-building that is iconic to his character.

Gotham, Titans and Bludhaven are all tired for Dick because he never grows as a character in either environment. Its like a prison for Dick: its either he is stuck as being the batman character in Titans, he is stuck being the sidekick character in Gotham or he is stuck being a stagnant vigilante with no life in Bludhaven.