According to Morrison, it was dye. And that caused Jason to go in the lex Luthor path:
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"Never assign to malice what is adequately explained by stupidity or ignorance."
"Great stories will always return to their original forms"
"Nobody is more dangerous than he who imagines himself pure in heart; for his purity, by definition, is unassailable." James Baldwin
Unfortunately, every media he appears. He is also constants race bending.
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Maybe because of the New 52 Batgirl run, i don't like her characteristic being a stereotype teenager girl.
comic book fans fixation with red heads will never not be the silliest shit to me. like, I genuinely don't understand it.
THE SIGNAL (Duke Thomas) is DC's secret shonen protagonist so I made him a fandom wiki
also, check out "The Signal Tape" a Duke Thomas fan project.
currently following:
- DC: Red Hood: The Hill
- Marvel: TBD
- Manga (Shonen/Seinen): One Piece, My Hero, Dandadan, Jujutsu Kaisen, Kaiju No. 8, Reincarnation of The Veteran Soldier, Oblivion Rouge, ORDEAL, The Breaker: Eternal Force
"power does not corrupt, power always reveals."
This whole 'only redheads get race bent' feels like something that started off as a joke until people started taking it too seriously and now we have people acting like there is some serious attempt to erase red heads from the Big Two. Funny how nobody complained about Netflix's Daredevil/Matt Murdock being brunette but a lot of belly aching over Jimmy Olsen, Mary Jane, Starfire or whichever character got changed in an adaptation. I like red heads but that takes a back seat to diversity and representation.
You've conflated your pre-Crisis and post-Crisis facts.
Jason Todd was red haired. That Titans page looks like it's from a Baxter book or a reprint--you can't trust colourists. In the regular newsprint comics, Jason's hair was red (or maybe you could say it was strawberry blond). Jason dyed his hair black himself. The story arc in the pre-Crisis comics was that Jay wanted to become Robin, but Batman didn't want him to become Robin (didn't want to put him in harm's way, didn't think he was ready for that job). It was Jason who decided to dye his hair when he posed as Robin--Bruce didn't force him to do anything. If anyone other Jason played a role in him adopting the Robin costume and identity it was Dick. He gave Jason his blessing to become Robin and wear the costume--and then gave himself a terribly designed outfit (I guess he didn't take Home Ec in high school) and he stole Superman's Kandorian codename.
Batman forcing Jason to dye his hair black is one of those retcons that came after the Red Hood story arc. Of course, because by then Bruce was a total whack job who had no parenting skills.
On topic, I don't think it's an unpopular opinion. Marvel arguably gives slightly better treatment to red haired characters. The Distinguished Competitor replaces red haired characters with other hued coiffures. In movies and T.V. shows, they routinely cast non-red haired actors in the roles. Marvel does that, too, but not as much. So by comparison they have a better track record.
The DCEU had a redheaded Lois Lane despite her traditionally being black or brown-haired woman. Tula is a redhead in Young Justice despite having brown hair in the comics. The live-action adaptation of Stephanie Brown has red hair despite being blonde in the comics. Redhead characters are everywhere in animation. Poison Ivy is consistently portrayed as a redhead in both live-action and animation.
And for those who think Marvel rarely changes redheads:
* Scott Lang - Redhead in the comics, played by an actor with dark hair in the films.
* Norman and Harry Osborn- Have auburn hair in the comics, played by blonde or brown-haired actors in the movies. Harry is also depicted as blonde in the MTV Spider-Man show.
* Daredevil - Has red hair and yet has been played by an actor with dark hair twice. Charlie Cox even refused to dye his hair red because he thought he would look stupid. A black actor who said this would have the Internet crying for their head. Matt is also depicted as a blonde in the 90s Spider-Man cartoon.
* Colleen Wing - Redhead in the comics, portrayed by a black-haired actress in the Netflix show.
* Janet Van Dyne - Has auburn hair in the comics and is played by a blonde actress in the movies.
Last edited by Agent Z; 06-29-2021 at 12:43 AM.
I said this in another thread, but the most likely reasons redheads tend to get racebent is that the majority of them are supporting characters and not the main character. Most adaptations of golden and silver age source material (understandably) racebend some of the cast to increase the diversity level, but they very rarely are gonna be bold enough to actually do so to the lead character.
Look at the list of the redheads fans complain about being racebent:
Mary Jane - Love interest
Commissioner Gordon - Supporting ally (and even then has he EVER been portrayed by a redhead in any adaptation even before Jeffrey Wright was cast?)
Iris West - Love interest
Jimmy Olsen - Main character's best friend
Bow - Supporting character
Wally West is pretty much the only racebent redhead character who was an actual lead, and even that got retconned away.
The discussion also ignores that this happens to pretty much every hair color demographic as well. Is Valkyrie being a black woman in the MCU blonde erasure now? Hell, in the new Superman cartoon people are already bitching about, they look to have an Asian-American Lois in addition to Jimmy being black.
Problem with the "redhead" Jason, is that was pre-Crisis. As that one was also practically a clone of Dick Grayson in origins. Post Crisis Jason was naturally black-haired and the one to die Death in the Family.