The many *controversial* loves of Barbara Gordon/Batgirl/Oracle

[WonderScott]

I like Dick and Bas together, but I wouldn’t mind retconning Jason Bard to being a contender.

No Jason ever though. That whole bit in The Three Joker’s felt too forced. Babs wouldn’t go for him, to me.

[Daedalus]

No Jason ever though. That whole bit in The Three Joker’s felt too forced. Babs wouldn’t go for him, to me.

That was all kinds of weird. It has been weird ever since that started in Batman Eternal.

[godisawesome]

Pretty much *any* Robin who’s not Dick feels wrong to me, either because the chemistry doesn’t make sense, or it feels too derivative, or because it feels like someone just made a basic mistake in identity and didn’t admit it. The Jason stuff has already been talked about, but does anyone remember how Arkham City suddenly aged up Tim and had him in a relationship with Babs from almost out of nowhere?

Looking back, it feels like it almost had to be the result of the writing team just wanting a “classic Robin” and forgetting that Dick was the classic Robin they wanted, just in a new costume.

I can sort of tolerate them compared to the attempts to make Bruce a serious contender in the “game” - though some of that is because people keep on insisting on not just doing a gross idea but also making it a loathsome mistake. Who tthe hell thinks that Babs being reduced to Bruce’s way-too-young fling or almost-baby-mama-while-engaged-to-Dick was a good idea? Who the hell enjoys that?

(Yes, I know the answer is “Bruce Timm”, but seriously!?!)

[John Venus]

Pairing her with Jason and Tim feels like a poor attempt to emphasize her youth. Like she's perpetually a teenager or a college age student still trying to navigate through her love life instead of a grown adult woman with life experience.

Babs should be more like a big sister figure to Jason and Tim.

[John Venus]

It's also unimaginative. The best you can do is romance arc? Seriously? I prefer a meaningful platonic relationship over a boring and trite romance arc.

[Micael]

Pairing her with Jason and Tim feels like a poor attempt to emphasize her youth. Like she's perpetually a teenager or a college age student still trying to navigate through her love life instead of a grown adult woman with life experience.

Babs should be more like a big sister figure to Jason and Tim.

It all starts with her transformation post crisis, DC has been pushing to keep her young and college age for decades. She was supposed to be Dick's "big sister" too you know but they wanted them both together so she had to become younger. She was introduced as a grown adult woman and she was allowed to seem more mature on her oracle days but I guess that's not what DC wants for Batgirl.

[godisawesome]

It all starts with her transformation post crisis, DC has been pushing to keep her young and college age for decades. She was supposed to be Dick's "big sister" too you know but they wanted them both together so she had to become younger. She was introduced as a grown adult woman and she was allowed to seem more mature on her oracle days but I guess that's not what DC wants for Batgirl.

Meanwhile, Jason got aged up a year or two on his return from the dead so he could be more of a peer of Nightwing instead of Tim. Babs went from having probably close to a decade on him to maybe being his peer.

…Of course, that “retracted age syndrome” only makes the weird desire to make her and Bruce a bad fling even worse, and she definitely was kept pretty young i Timm’s work.

[John Venus]

It all starts with her transformation post crisis, DC has been pushing to keep her young and college age for decades. She was supposed to be Dick's "big sister" too you know but they wanted them both together so she had to become younger. She was introduced as a grown adult woman and she was allowed to seem more mature on her oracle days but I guess that's not what DC wants for Batgirl.

Yep. I'm aware.

It's just sad that the most notable thing DC managed to do with Barbara after un-crippling her was to pass her around the Bat Family.

[godisawesome]

Yep. I'm aware.

It's just sad that the most notable thing DC managed to do with Barbara after un-crippling her was to pass her around the Bat Family.

Many writers have shown they care about the character and try to go further, but on an editorial and corporate level, it definitely feels like DC’s preference for Babs as Batgirl was more about being fans of her name recognition than of her as a character. She kind fi got written the same way Tim was in the Arkham Series - as a handy copy write name to slap on a vague collection of “archetypal Batgirl” traits.

[Micael]

It's interesting that most of the complaints fans have about the bat characters are very tied with how they interact with the batfamily or how they fit in it. The family concept is a two-edged sword although it creates interesting dynamics and interactions it also often hinders and limits the characters and their personal stories, honestly when they are together they lose their individual complexities because the writer has to fit them into a "team dynamic" so characters can't play the same role or share character traits. That's why Barbara is written as the school girl batgirl and they keep using her as a love interest for the male characters. It's lazy writing

[godisawesome]

It's interesting that most of the complaints fans have about the bat characters are very tied with how they interact with the batfamily or how they fit in it. The family concept is a two-edged sword although it creates interesting dynamics and interactions it also often hinders and limits the characters and their personal stories, honestly when they are together they lose their individual complexities because the writer has to fit them into a "team dynamic" so characters can't play the same role or share character traits. That's why Barbara is written as the school girl batgirl and they keep using her as a love interest for the male characters. It's lazy writing

Writers who are more skilled at and interested in their personalities being nuanced usually succeed in keeping it from being a “dynamic overrides personality” type of story (Chuck Dixon was the absolute master of this) while more average writers can handle the nuance and personalities better with *some* characters or at some times (Kylo Higgins in The Gates Of Gotham miniseries, Gail Simone with some characters) and bad ones rely entirely on dynamics (Scott Lobdell).

Babs as Oracle *and* Batgirl worked great in Dixon’s stuff without losing her personality to dynamics, Simone made her name managing her well before she became Batgirl again, while stuff like the Eternal books were pretty miserable with many of the characters’s personalities, probably because they weren’t quite as good at handling things consistently with their writing roster.

[Daedalus]

It all starts with her transformation post crisis, DC has been pushing to keep her young and college age for decades. She was supposed to be Dick's "big sister" too you know but they wanted them both together so she had to become younger. She was introduced as a grown adult woman and she was allowed to seem more mature on her oracle days but I guess that's not what DC wants for Batgirl.

Well, she's not college-aged now. She must be in her late 20s, alongside Dick.

I think she was deaged once (after Crisis) and has mostly remained the same since (New 52 time compression no longer withstanding).

It's interesting that most of the complaints fans have about the bat characters are very tied with how they interact with the batfamily or how they fit in it. The family concept is a two-edged sword although it creates interesting dynamics and interactions it also often hinders and limits the characters and their personal stories, honestly when they are together they lose their individual complexities because the writer has to fit them into a "team dynamic" so characters can't play the same role or share character traits. That's why Barbara is written as the school girl batgirl and they keep using her as a love interest for the male characters. It's lazy writing

The Batfamily (and the rest of the supporting cast/rogues gallery) is what makes the Batcorner of the DC Universe so interesting and different. Batman by himself is fine, but with his supporting cast, he’s gold. He has adoptive children, which is thematically resonant with his own trauma, and gives him some depth that is lacking when he’s around, say, the Justice League.

Most of the Batfamily’s interactions are with each other, so bad writing will affect that most. This isn’t a complaint about the Batfamily per se, but about a specific writer. Good writers do wonders with the Batfamily (something difficult to replicate in the other heroes’ books).

Pretty much *any* Robin who’s not Dick feels wrong to me, either because the chemistry doesn’t make sense, or it feels too derivative, or because it feels like someone just made a basic mistake in identity and didn’t admit it. The Jason stuff has already been talked about, but does anyone remember how Arkham City suddenly aged up Tim and had him in a relationship with Babs from almost out of nowhere?

Looking back, it feels like it almost had to be the result of the writing team just wanting a “classic Robin” and forgetting that Dick was the classic Robin they wanted, just in a new costume.

I can sort of tolerate them compared to the attempts to make Bruce a serious contender in the “game” - though some of that is because people keep on insisting on not just doing a gross idea but also making it a loathsome mistake. Who tthe hell thinks that Babs being reduced to Bruce’s way-too-young fling or almost-baby-mama-while-engaged-to-Dick was a good idea? Who the hell enjoys that?

(Yes, I know the answer is “Bruce Timm”, but seriously!?!)

I agree with this pretty solidly. The Dick-Babs romance is iconic, so it sometimes spills into adaptations with other Robins in what feels like almost an unfortunate mistake. Tim should be what, 10 years younger? As for Babs-Bruce, that one we can blame squarely on Bruce Timm. And agreed, I don’t think anyone else besides Bruce Timm enjoys that.

[Aahz]

Meanwhile, Jason got aged up a year or two on his return from the dead so he could be more of a peer of Nightwing instead of Tim. Babs went from having probably close to a decade on him to maybe being his peer.

Jason's age in comparison to some other characters is anyway kind of wired.

I mean originally he was iirc about the 3 years younger than Beast Boy, 7 years younger than Dick, Roy & co. and 14 (pre crisis) or 9-10 (post crisis) years younger than Barbara and imo only about a year older than Tim.

But for some reason he is now usually treated like he was roughly the same age as Dick and Roy.

That's kind of similar to what is happening with Damian who is also aging up while ages of the Batcharacters seem to be static.

Btw. the Batgirl that was around the same age as Jason was pre flashpoint actually Cassandra.

[Daedalus]

Jason's age in comparison to some other characters is anyway kind of wired.

I mean originally he was iirc about the 3 years younger than Beast Boy, 7 years younger than Dick, Roy & co. and 14 (pre crisis) or 9-10 (post crisis) years younger than Barbara and imo only about a year older than Tim.

But for some reason he is now usually treated like he was roughly the same age as Dick and Roy.

That's kind of similar to what is happening with Damian who is also aging up while ages of the Batcharacters seem to be static.

Btw. the Batgirl that was around the same age as Jason was pre flashpoint actually Cassandra.

Jason's age is somewhat static in relation to Dick, if only because story demands it. If Dick left to become Nightwing at 18, Jason must still have been a child/early-teens by then, so that Bruce could catch him stealing the wheels to the Batmobile. That's at least a 6-year difference, if Jason was 12.

Barbara's relative age is not as set in stone, though we have confirmation very recently that she is the same age as Dick (the Nightwing #78 flashback to middle school for both of them).

[Aahz]

Jason's age is somewhat static in relation to Dick, if only because story demands it. If Dick left to become Nightwing at 18, Jason must still have been a child/early-teens by then, so that Bruce could catch him stealing the wheels to the Batmobile. That's at least a 6-year difference, if Jason was 12.

In the original comics Dick was 19 when he became Nightwing (and iirc 21 when Tim became Robin).

But the thing is that comic writers seem to mostly ignore that differnce nowadays. At least they often team up Jason with characters that are Dick's age without adrssing the differnce.
Pre flashpoint they put him on a team with Donna and Kyle, post flashpoint with Roy and Kory, rebith with Artemis (who I guess is older than Donna, but I'm not 100% sure).
Now we get an elseworld mini series where he is teamed up with Harley, Firefly and Wilddog, who are even older...

The only real exception to this is Rose Wilson, who is actually close to his age canonically.