Jason Todd: Robin, Red Hood, Arkham Knight Appreciation 2022

[Zaresh]

"I'm my own man! Me, Jason Todd!"

(Batman #408)

Jason Peter Todd, born and risen in Lady City of Gotham's crudest part, came to become the second Robin, the Red Hood and the Wingman; the Arkham Knight of a different, grimmer universe; The damned prince of Gotham who suffered and died by the hand of the clown prince of crime - but also the young man whose sheer will and bad luck couldn't let him rest and who made his way back from the grave.

Vigilante, avenger: he fights for fairness, for setting the wrong right and for defending and protecting those who cannot fend themselves, and he will do so crossing lines into dark areas or delivering a brutal brand of justice. A daring and sassy adventurer who has traveled not only this world and the space, but other universes. A flawed man who fights not only the monsters out but also inside, who fears the ghosts of memories and suffers from them and despite that will fight back with determination. A man who can despise himself as much as he despises others; Who makes mistakes but also rights; Who can love as much as long for being loved, and hate as much as he loves. Who can lose himself in anger as well as in loneliness.

Jason Peter Todd is a complex character, product of a complex editorial history. This is his appreciation thread and this is how we come to appreciate and ramble about him.

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Current/Upcoming Appearances:

• The Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing, written by Matthew Rosenberg, art by Carmine Di Giandomenico.
• Beyond the White Knight written/drawn by Sean Murphy (Batman: White Knight elseworld)
• Lazarus Planet: Next Evolution #1 (oneshot), Written by RAM V, BRANDON T. SNIDER, CHUCK BROWN, and DELILAH S. DAWSON. Art by LALIT KUMAR, LAURA BRAGA, ALITHA MARTINEZ and MARK MORALES, and RO and STEIN
• Batman: Legends of Gotham #1 (oneshot), written by Andy Diggle, art by Karl Mostert.
• (webtoon) Red Hood: Outlaws, written by Patrick R. Young with art by Nico Bascuñán
• (webtoon) Batman: Wayne Family Adventures S2, written by CRC Payne, with art by StarBite
• Batman: Gotham Knights – Gilded City (elseworld based on the game)
• Minor appearances in Batman vs Robin.
• Shawn Martinbrough upcomming 6 issues miniseries.

Recent notable comic appearances

• Task Force Z, written by Matthew Rosenberg, with art by Eddy Barrows and Eber Ferreira
• Future State: Gotham written by Joshua Williamson and Dennis Culver, with art by Giannis Milonogiannis
• Beyond the White Knight: Red Hood (2 issues mini set in the Batman White Knight elseworld)
• Minor appearances in the Dark Crisis event.
• Worlds Without a Justice League – Green Lantern (elseworld tied to Dark Crisis)
• Robins written by Tim Seeley, with art by Baldemar Rivas (DC Round Robin)
• Suicide Squad: Get Joker! written by Brian Azzarello, with art by Alex Maleev
• DC vs Vampires, written by James Tynion IV and Matthew Rosenberg, with art by Otto Schmidt
• Titans United, written by Cavan Scott, with art by Jose Luis
• Future State: Dark Detective #2 and #4: The Red Hood written by Joshua Williamson, with art by Giannis Milonogiannis
• Batman: Urban Legends (Anthology) #1-#6: Batman/Red Hood written by Chip Zdarsky, with art by Eddy Barrows (collected in Batman: Urban Legends Vol. 1)
• The Road to Task Force Z - back-up in Detective Comics #1041 - #1043, written by Matthew Rosenberg, with art by Darick Robertson

Other media:

• Gotham Knights game (10/25/2022)
• Harley Quinn S3 flashback cameo.

Quick reading guide

Step 1: Watch Batman: Under the Red Hood
Step 2: Read the current Rebirth run of Red Hood and the Outlaws (renamed Red Hood: Outlaw with issue 27

• and Red Hood with issue 51), trades:
• Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol 1 - Dark Trinity
• Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol 2 - Who is Artemis?
• Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol 3 - Bizarro Reborn
• Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol 4 - Good Night Gotham
• Red Hood: Outlaw Vol 1 - Requiem for an Archer
• Red Hood: Outlaw Vol 2 - Prince of Gotham
• Red Hood: Outlaw Vol 3 - Generation Outlaw
• Red Hood: Outlaw Vol 4 - Unspoken Truths

Old Threads
Jason Todd: Robin, Red Hood, Arkham Knight Appreciation 2021
Jason Todd: Robin, Red Hood, Arkham Knight Appreciation 2020
Jason Todd: Robin, Red Hood, Arkham Knight, Prince of Gotham Appreciation 2019

Fanfic recommendations:

List of recommended fanfics (info)

DC Forum Appreciation Thread rules:

1) No negative comments about the honoree(s) of this thread. It's an appreciation thread, not a non-appreciation one.

2) No negative discussion about any competitors of the honoree(s) of this thread. No ifs, ands, or buts. Find another non-appreciation thread to do that, just not here.

3) No negative comments about other versions of the character. For example, if you like the DCU version of Cyborg, but hate the DCnU version (or visa versa), just appreciate the earlier version and keep your comments about the latter to yourself.

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This info wouldn't be so thorough and organised without @Sergard's help.

[Zaresh]

Sorry about the blurry pics. I guess it's just how this forum deals with uploading pictures. I'll try find some other place to upload them later. I also want to upload a pic with the classic costume, but I can't decide which one.

Have a happy New Year you all!

[Frontier]

Happy New Year to Jason and his fans .

[AJpyro]

And we are back.

The Robin gravitated towards and gave a Great Bat Movie.

[K7P5V]

Hoping 2022 will be AWESOME for Jason

[Dark_Tzitzimine]

And here we go again.

[Dark_Tzitzimine]

Suicide Squad: Get Joker got pushed back to April 19th.

https://bleedingcool.com/comics/suic...ore-dc-delays/

Man, I don't think Get Joker is ever getting finished. I wonder what is causing so many issues.

Completely understandable.
But, I do agree about those moments among the trinity of Jason/Donna/Kyle being quite interesting (however few & far between they may be).

Still, no matter what, I'll always believe Challengers From Beyond has potential (XD)

Countdown to Final Crisis is worth a read if only because is the first time that DC actually took seriously the idea of redeeming Jason. He got a proper character arc where he came to terms with his shortcoming and managed to mend his relationship with Bruce in some way. Of course, everything went to hell when they realized Morrison wouldn't play ball and they unceremoniously backpedaled everything in the final issues so it wouldn't contradict Morrison that much.

Oh and if you guys like Arkham Knight version of Jason, McFarlane just announced he's coming to the Multiverse Line. Is pretty good for a $20 figure.

[Fergus]

I don't understand this mentality where fans try to ignore certain stories just because your favourite doesn't come out looking perfect. Jason fans do this more so than other batfamily fans I've noticed and I wonder why.

Battle for the Cowl

Batman and Robin

Brothers in Blood Are all canon. Imagine if fans of all the other Robins/characters decided to pick and choose their canon? It's pathetic.

Jason has so little actual lore and you guys are so quick to ditch a sizeable chunk of the little he does have because a murderer was shown to be a murderer or because he wasn't drawn as sexy as some of his fans would like.

The shallowness of it all. I guess some can only support idealised characters.

Ignoring those stories doesn't stop them being Canon so what's the point.

[Aahz]

Battle for the Cowl

Batman and Robin

Brothers in Blood Are all canon. Imagine if fans of all the other Robins/characters decided to pick and choose their canon? It's pathetic.

Are they? Ok with DCs current "Everything is continuty"-nonsense they are.

And I didn't say they are out of continuity, I said they are not worth reading because:
- Jason is poorly written completely out of character compared to how he was written since Flashpoint
- post Flashpoint writers of Jason's Books have for the most part ignored them, and there is no need to read them (or anything else post UTRH) to understand what is going on in Jason post flashpoint books, and can therefore easily be skipped
- Countdown, Brothers in Blood and BftC afaik by most people (and not only Jason's fans) seen as really bad, and therefore I can't recommend anyone to invest time and money into them

If anyone would ask me about a Nightwing deep dive I would also advice to skip basically everything between the death of Block Buster and Thomasis Run, because that crap that was published in between is simply not worth reading.
EDIT: Or maybe a better example I case of Cassandra Cain I would advice to just skip over the whole OYL era and start reading again with her joining the Outsiders.

[RedBird]

I don't understand this mentality where fans try to ignore certain stories just because your favourite doesn't come out looking perfect. Jason fans do this more so than other batfamily fans I've noticed and I wonder why.

Battle for the Cowl

Batman and Robin

Brothers in Blood Are all canon. Imagine if fans of all the other Robins/characters decided to pick and choose their canon? It's pathetic.

Jason has so little actual lore and you guys are so quick to ditch a sizeable chunk of the little he does have because a murderer was shown to be a murderer or because he wasn't drawn as sexy as some of his fans would like.

The shallowness of it all. I guess some can only support idealised characters.

Ignoring those stories doesn't stop them being Canon so what's the point.

When asked a question about a recommended reading list, people are allowed to have their own opinions about what they consider is a good read or not, or what they feel is a required read to understand a character.

Literally no one was discussing the canon or noncanon status of the books, just their opinions on what they felt was more relevant and what was worth a read. Read and consider posts carefully before jumping into an irrelevant rant.

Also....

Imagine if fans of all the other Robins/characters decided to pick and choose their canon? It's pathetic.

Putting aside the huge generalisation that apparently no other fans of comic characters ignore stories. Neither is it appropriate to then resort to name calling/insults just because you disagree with peoples opinions.

Are they? Ok with DCs current "Everything is continuty"-nonsense they are.

And I didn't say they are out of continuity, I said they are not worth reading because:
- Jason is poorly written completely out of character compared to how he was written since Flashpoint
- post Flashpoint writers of Jason's Books have for the most part ignored them, and there is no need to read them (or anything else post UTRH) to understand what is going on in Jason post crisis books, and can easily be skipped
- Countdown, Brothers in Blood and BftC afaik by most people (and not only Jason's fans) seen as really bad, and therefore I can't recommend anyone to invest time and money in them

If anyone would ask me about a Nightwing deep dive I would also advice to skip basically everything between the death of Block Buster and Thomasis Run, because that crap that was published in between is simply not worth reading.
EDIT: Or maybe a better example I case of Cassandra Cain I would advice to just skip over the whole OYL era and start reading again with her joining the Outsiders.

All of this.

[Dark_Tzitzimine]

Besides all the points already brought up, is it worth noting that the writers themselves pick and choose their canon, and that is precisely one of the biggest issues when it comes to Jason. Flaws aside, Lobdell left a solid foundation that dealt with most of his baggage and left him ready to be taken in new an interesting directions, but most of the writers seem content to simply rehash UTRH Ad Infinitum so Jason keeps going back to square one everytime new writers come abroad.

[Zaresh]

To add to all that's been already said, even if Aahz would've talked about leaving out stories from canon, just because you can't understand the way someone thinks, doesn't invalidate their way of thinking or makes their way of thinking and feeling lesser. It just means that you (or me, or someone else) don't understand the way they think and reason.

This is comics, a hobby. Each one chooses how to enjoy it in their own ways. It's not a religion, no matter how much we keep using the word "canon".

[NK1988]

Finally getting around to reading these Red Hood comics I bought years ago. They trimmed a lot of fat in the Under the Red Hood film.

But yeah, Comxiology rules because of this Guided View mode. It makes reading comics so much easier and more satisfying for me. My eyesight sucks and the action in comics or especially manga is so much incomprehensible bleh to me a lot of the time but at least VG helps some and also adds a really cool flow to reading dialogue.

Wish I had any idea why "we can't rely on Oracle anymore" though.


Also, it says for the blurb describing the first volume of Outlaws that "Jason Todd[...] put his past as the Red Hood behind him." Does that mean I have to read a previous comic to explain why this happened or is it addressed in Outlaws? Since I'm skipping a lot of stuff, I dunno if I'm missing a "villain to hero" transition somewhere.