Dick Grayson: Robin/Batman/Nightwing/Agent 37 Appreciation 2022

[K7P5V]

I’m actually happy Bludhaven doesn’t look like a Gotham copycat

No kidding, especially since Blüdhaven is supposed to be worse than Gotham

but I think ditching the Rebirth take on Bludhaven as a Las Vegas-esque city was a bad call.

I know, right?! It had so much potential, almost reminds me of the FlashPoint version of Gotham (XD)

[Aahz]

I’m actually happy Bludhaven doesn’t look like a Gotham copycat, but I think ditching the Rebirth take on Bludhaven as a Las Vegas-esque city was a bad call.

But now it looks kind of generic, and way to clean and bright for what it is supposed to be.

And Blüdhaven never had that Gothic/Art Deco look that Gotham has in it's best looking incarnations.

[WonderNight]

But now it looks kind of generic, and way to clean and bright for what it is supposed to be.

And Blüdhaven never had that Gothic/Art Deco look that Gotham has in it's best looking incarnations.

Yes please bring back the Vegas theme!! Bludhaven needs it. A look and feel of its own. Different from all the other bats!!

[Badou]

I finally caught up with the series after taking a break for a while. The Teen Jon crossover kind of softened my interested in the series as I don't care about his character and having the Nightwing book crossover into Taylor's Superman book with Jon was a little annoying. The amount he is pushing Jon being close with Nightwing just feels weird given there was no preexisting relationship. I'd have rather seen Kara or Power Girl if they were going to use a Superman character that isn't Clark, but whatever. I get Taylor is writing both books so you can't be that critical I guess.

Anyway, I love Redondo's art and Lucas' colors. It's my favorite art ever in a Nightwing book. I can't praise it enough. I love how clean the lines are and how so much color fills every page depending on the time of day from the blues, yellows, oranges, purples and so on. It's great. Then there are smaller details I really enjoy like how flashbacks have this old comic style gradient filter on it, especially in the shadows. Also every character is drawn very attractively which is what you want to see out of these superheroes. Although something did stand out to me in catching up. No real issues with how Dick is being drawn, but it does feel like they made a conscious effort to downplay Barbara being "sexy". She is always in baggy clothes and her new Batgirl costume feels like it was designed to remove as much sex appeal as possible. I get that Taylor probably did that on purpose because he likes to court fans that get upset at those things in comics, but catching up in a handful of issues it stood out. I guess it stood out because of how much they still sell Dick's "sexiness" in the book, especially in variant covers.

As for the story itself most of the complains I had at the beginning of the series still remain, but now we are like 15 issues into the run. So the excuses of saying that the run is new, or trying to ease out of the awful Ric era, don't really work anymore. The pacing has been really bad. The Heartless story has dragged on and on and even with the last two issues focusing on him again it doesn't feel compelling at all. I still don't understand why I am supposed to care that he wants to take Bludhaven's "heart" so badly. Blockbuster is still as generic as ever, and the entire story of Dick's sister as the mayor with Dick trying to "fix" the city all feel so shallow. I don't think these fixing a city story ever works because the city in 1-2 runs from now will just go back to what it always is because a bad city makes it easier to write stories in.

It's just a very odd series. It feels like Taylor is trying to write a more mellow slice of life series, but he is also doing these incredibly stretched out storylines at a very slow pace with it. So it causes this odd clash in styles where each issue it doesn't feel like much is happening. I feel like this more slice of life feel would have worked better if the series was a bunch of one issue stories about Dick's hero life, but I guess coming up with a complete story in an issue is tough. I wonder if the story is dragging out so much because Taylor wants to drag it to issue 100.

As for Dick's characterization I don't mind how Taylor write him usually. I like how the more upbeat/joking version has kind of become the go to since the Seeley/King run. I also don't mind Dick being over confident and reckless at times, but my old complains about how passive Dick is in this run are still there. He's made no real effort in trying to unmask Heartless and all the detective stuff just gets handwaved with Barbara at her computer it feels like. Then there are times where Taylor leans into Dick being too easily embarrassed with things, which feels odd. Like the accidental "I love you" scene with Babs was strange. As for the Babs' relationship I don't mind it. Some of their scenes together are the best in the series, but I don't know if it stands out more because all the other story stuff is so weak by comparison.

I guess those are my overall thoughts. So nothing really has changed for me. The George Perez cameo to honor him in the previous issues was nice with him and Dick waving to each other.

[Restingvoice]

Chris Samnee's Dan Mora's Dick Grayson

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[Frontier]

Chris Samnee's Dan Mora's Dick Grayson

FV8z459WQAIHgGi.jpg

I wonder if Samnee will ever draw a DC book...

Anyway, I love Redondo's art and Lucas' colors. It's my favorite art ever in a Nightwing book. I can't praise it enough. I love how clean the lines are and how so much color fills every page depending on the time of day from the blues, yellows, oranges, purples and so on. It's great. Then there are smaller details I really enjoy like how flashbacks have this old comic style gradient filter on it, especially in the shadows. Also every character is drawn very attractively which is what you want to see out of these superheroes. Although something did stand out to me in catching up. No real issues with how Dick is being drawn, but it does feel like they made a conscious effort to downplay Barbara being "sexy". She is always in baggy clothes and her new Batgirl costume feels like it was designed to remove as much sex appeal as possible. I get that Taylor probably did that on purpose because he likes to court fans that get upset at those things in comics, but catching up in a handful of issues it stood out. I guess it stood out because of how much they still sell Dick's "sexiness" in the book, especially in variant covers.

That's being true to the spirit of the Burnside costume. I know Babs Tarr emphasized it wasn't skintight spandex compared to some of her other costumes.

Which is also kind of ironic when the teen Batgirls are wearing skintight spandex .

[K7P5V]

I wonder if Samnee will ever draw a DC book...

Yeah! A Samnee-drawn Nightwing series would be awesome (IMHO):

[Felipe Silveira]

Batman Family 13 (1977)
The Batman Family 013-018.jpg

[MakeNightwingGreatAgain]

Batman Family 13 (1977)
The Batman Family 013-018.jpg

lol she was literally fake sleeping xD she avoided dick like the plague in this series haha in a nice way though. I actually have a couple issues. Its fun but not serious. Even the wedding issue she was like "please god no"

[Felipe Silveira]

lol she was literally fake sleeping xD she avoided dick like the plague in this series haha in a nice way though. I actually have a couple issues. Its fun but not serious. Even the wedding issue she was like "please god no"

she tried to deny it, but sometimes she couldn't.
The Batman Family 009-002.jpg
The Batman Family 010-004.jpg

[Badou]

That's being true to the spirit of the Burnside costume. I know Babs Tarr emphasized it wasn't skintight spandex compared to some of her other costumes.

Which is also kind of ironic when the teen Batgirls are wearing skintight spandex .

The Burnside costume did that as well, which is funny to compare it to the teen costumes like you said, but I feel like Babs in the Burnside comic still wore normal clothes that showed off her curves, like dresses or things she would wear around her apartment? I get she was college age back then, so maybe that is a reason for it.

But to be fair I guess maybe this is just Redondo's style as well. I haven't read a lot of his previous work so maybe that is just how he draws characters. Much more conservative. I guess even in the actual issue, outside variant covers, Dick is probably drawn with less focus on his "sexiness" compares to past Nightwing runs or the Grayson run.

[Felipe Silveira]

The Burnside costume did that as well, which is funny to compare it to the teen costumes like you said, but I feel like Babs in the Burnside comic still wore normal clothes that showed off her curves, like dresses or things she would wear around her apartment? I get she was college age back then, so maybe that is a reason for it.

But to be fair I guess maybe this is just Redondo's style as well. I haven't read a lot of his previous work so maybe that is just how he draws characters. Much more conservative. I guess even in the actual issue, outside variant covers, Dick is probably drawn with less focus on his "sexiness" compares to past Nightwing runs or the Grayson run.

He knows how to do it, if Taylor gives the chance....
Nightwing 079-012 (2).jpg

[Frontier]

she tried to deny it, but sometimes she couldn't.
The Batman Family 009-002.jpg
The Batman Family 010-004.jpg

If only Babs knew then...

(Has she ever gotten along with his other girlfriends? I don't think so).

[Ascended]

Nightwing Rebirth actually was pulling some pretty decent, if not better, numbers than Taylor. Nightwing kinda always sells in the 20-40k range depending. Seeley's Nightwing did just as well as Taylor is currently doing. Funnily enough, Dixon also sold in the same area lol its largely the reason why Nightwing is a comparison for how well DC Comics is doing. If youre doing better than Nightwing, then youre a top seller and on your way to the A-List treatment. IF youre doing worse than Nightwing then there is a problem. I think Dixon said Nightwing was considered a guarantee or something, so DC likes to keep the book around for numbers. Nightwing has a super dedicated comic book fanbase thats for sure.

I think I heard somewhere that Nightwing was/is DC's most consistent selling title, with the lowest amount of sales atrophy. Or it's one of their most consistent at least. Something like that. We can look at old Diamond numbers for ourselves and see the stability. Which, let's be honest, has bitten us in the ass more than once. It took almost two years of Ric Grayson before sales finally started to collapse and DC was forced to do something about it.

Finally got to the LCS for #93. It was solid. Not as fun as the Wally team-up or the "one-camera shot" chase issue, but solid. The stuff that's been working is still working, the stuff I wish was different still isn't different. I remain very satisfied, even if I myself would have Dick doing much more high scale things.

[Felipe Silveira]

I think I heard somewhere that Nightwing was/is DC's most consistent selling title, with the lowest amount of sales atrophy. Or it's one of their most consistent at least. Something like that. We can look at old Diamond numbers for ourselves and see the stability. Which, let's be honest, has bitten us in the ass more than once. It took almost two years of Ric Grayson before sales finally started to collapse and DC was forced to do something about it.

Finally got to the LCS for #93. It was solid. Not as fun as the Wally team-up or the "one-camera shot" chase issue, but solid. The stuff that's been working is still working, the stuff I wish was different still isn't different. I remain very satisfied, even if I myself would have Dick doing much more high scale things.

No, Scott Lobdell was selling very poorly, he was selling below 20K when he was taken out. Dan Jurgens recovered a bit, but wasn't consistent in keeping above 30K, which is where Nightwing is usually at.