What's up with the pure hatred for Tim Drake nowadays?

[James Cameron]

I haven't kept up with all of the current Bat-titles for some time, and before registering on this site I had taken a long hiatus from online comic book discussions, so I'm not in the loop on all of the current discourse, especially regarding Batman. I'm slowly catching my way up through different runs, but one thing that has completely shocked me is this utter disdain for Tim Drake that I'm encountering in online spheres.

I mean, people hate this guy now to the point where he's a meme. He's everything wrong with the Bat-family, he's the worst Robin, he sucks, etc., but I rarely ever see specifics. It's so meme-ified now that I missed the opportunity to witness or partake in any discussion about it. So what exactly happened? He used to be my favorite Robin. I always loved the concept behind him, how he wasn't necessarily borne out of tragedy, he just wanted to help Batman. I liked how he never had any great ambitions of being a superhero and didn't walk around demanding respect. He was funny but never a nuisance to me. I liked that he had an actual double life and wasn't Bruce's ward or adopted son until much later, he had a whole life and cast of characters to explore outside of his efforts as Robin. I loved that his loyalty to Bruce outweighed everything else, even when he was upset with him. He was the most interesting Batfam character for me growing up.

Of course the New 52 changed a lot of that - and it's a shame because it came after the incredible Red Robin solo which had some great ideas for Tim Drake's place in the DCU. But it seemed like after the New 52 DC wasn't really sure what to do with him. I thought he had some really great moments though, I liked when they brought back the Titans Tomorrow story in Tec, and even though Futures End wasn't great I liked that Tim Drake had a central role in that. I didn't really like him becoming Batman Beyond but I was just happy to see one of my favorites being a protagonist in some books.

But now I'm coming back into this world and seeing that people are done with him. It doesn't even seem like there's any reasoning with these people. So what exactly is it? I know people were upset with the bisexual thing and Bernard, but that can't be the reason. What happened in the past couple years that turned everyone against him? Is it how he's being written lately, or is it a new generation of fans recontextualizing older material and being like "no, he was always terrible" ?

[Godlike13]

He's in the way. Their repeated attempts with him and their backtracking to capture the magic of yesteryear, despite response, eats up resources and hampers the the development of other characters and the Robin brand in general.

[thwhtGuardian]

I haven't kept up with all of the current Bat-titles for some time, and before registering on this site I had taken a long hiatus from online comic book discussions, so I'm not in the loop on all of the current discourse, especially regarding Batman. I'm slowly catching my way up through different runs, but one thing that has completely shocked me is this utter disdain for Tim Drake that I'm encountering in online spheres.

I mean, people hate this guy now to the point where he's a meme. He's everything wrong with the Bat-family, he's the worst Robin, he sucks, etc., but I rarely ever see specifics. It's so meme-ified now that I missed the opportunity to witness or partake in any discussion about it. So what exactly happened? He used to be my favorite Robin. I always loved the concept behind him, how he wasn't necessarily borne out of tragedy, he just wanted to help Batman. I liked how he never had any great ambitions of being a superhero and didn't walk around demanding respect. He was funny but never a nuisance to me. I liked that he had an actual double life and wasn't Bruce's ward or adopted son until much later, he had a whole life and cast of characters to explore outside of his efforts as Robin. I loved that his loyalty to Bruce outweighed everything else, even when he was upset with him. He was the most interesting Batfam character for me growing up.

Of course the New 52 changed a lot of that - and it's a shame because it came after the incredible Red Robin solo which had some great ideas for Tim Drake's place in the DCU. But it seemed like after the New 52 DC wasn't really sure what to do with him. I thought he had some really great moments though, I liked when they brought back the Titans Tomorrow story in Tec, and even though Futures End wasn't great I liked that Tim Drake had a central role in that. I didn't really like him becoming Batman Beyond but I was just happy to see one of my favorites being a protagonist in some books.

But now I'm coming back into this world and seeing that people are done with him. It doesn't even seem like there's any reasoning with these people. So what exactly is it? I know people were upset with the bisexual thing and Bernard, but that can't be the reason. What happened in the past couple years that turned everyone against him? Is it how he's being written lately, or is it a new generation of fans recontextualizing older material and being like "no, he was always terrible" ?

There isn't really any reasoning with them, it's like Tim somehow hurt them personally sometimes.

He's not my favorite, I've always loved Dick Grayson more but I have no answer as to why he gets hate lately.

[Riv86672]

I don’t hate Tim; I’m Less than pleased at how he’s been written lately.

[NOCTPHOENIX]

I don't understand it either. He's not like offensively bad but people think being "boring" is a reason

[Pohzee]

I do think its exceedingly rare to tell good stories with the entire Batfamily actually having an interesting role instead of slotting into obligatory single lines of dialogue crowded around in group shots. So with Tim being exceeding static and without a real role right now his presence in story is subtraction by addition. His presence in panels distracts and reduces what could be tighter, more focused stories.

[HsssH]

It is a reaction to his toxic fandom claiming that he is the best Robin.

[Morgoth]

I wouldn't say everyone is against him, it's more like typical fandom wars between fans of specific characters, in this case it's mostly Tim fans vs Damian fans, as usual, and DC themselves clearly like to fuel this discourse.
His current problem isn't hatred, it's lack of clear direction and refusal to somehow reinvent him, so he can get more development. DC absolutely has no idea what to do with him, and at the same time they refuse to make him move on from his Robin niche, mostly for nostalgia reasons and because some writers prefer more traditional Robin and don't want to stuck with Damian, who has different dynamics not everyone know how to write. And apparently it doesn't work with modern readership, for whom Tim is too boring.
Bad writing doesn't help, recent comicbook run by Fitzmartin was atrocious and one of the worst selling books DC had at that point.

[witchboy]

I'm not saying it's all homophobia/bihophia, but unless we're pretending that doesn't exist, that's a lot of it. It would be a pretty big coincidence that this level of hatred only came when he came out.
To be fair, it's not been handled well, but other characters have had a bad run, a fumbled love interest and not gotten this kind of hate.

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

I find myself bored of him and his friends in recent years.

So I wouldn't say I hate him, just bored.

[thwhtGuardian]

It is a reaction to his toxic fandom claiming that he is the best Robin.

I get that to an extent, it certainly galled me back in the 90's to constantly hear how awesome Tim was and how he was the greatest Robin because he was the first to carry his own solo title and in return I refused to read his solo for years...but then I grew up and realized that the book was actually pretty decent and I had missed out on some good reading back in the day.

[Pohzee]

I'm not saying it's all homophobia/bihophia, but unless we're pretending that doesn't exist, that's a lot of it. It would be a pretty big coincidence that this level of hatred only came when he came out.
To be fair, it's not been handled well, but other characters have had a bad run, a fumbled love interest and not gotten this kind of hate.

I don't go on Twitter or Tumblr or 4chan or whatever for comics discussions, but on CBR at least most of the posters who snark about Tim have done so since 2018 at least and I've seen very little homophobia about his sexuality, moreso cynicism about the decision to pick the Robin that had the least defined role at the time. I recall at the time being annoyed that they didn't choose to pursue that angle with more relevant characters like Jason or Damian who also have less developed romantic histories.

[Aahz]

I wouldn't say everyone is against him, it's more like typical fandom wars between fans of specific characters, in this case it's mostly Tim fans vs Damian fans, as usual, and DC themselves clearly like to fuel this discourse.

I thnk it is just that alot of the Tim fans have left at this point since DC hasn't put out decent Tim Drake comic in more than a decade, and it doesn't look like that's going to change anytime soon.

[Konja7]

I'm not saying it's all homophobia/bihophia, but unless we're pretending that doesn't exist, that's a lot of it. It would be a pretty big coincidence that this level of hatred only came when he came out.
To be fair, it's not been handled well, but other characters have had a bad run, a fumbled love interest and not gotten this kind of hate.

Not saying homophobia/biphobia didn't play a role in Tim's last solo failure, but Tim's issues with some fandoms started before he was make bi.

The complaints about Tim being boring or redundant started long before 2021.

[skyvolt2000]

I don't go on Twitter or Tumblr or 4chan or whatever for comics discussions, but on CBR at least most of the posters who snark about Tim have done so since 2018 at least and I've seen very little homophobia about his sexuality, moreso cynicism about the decision to pick the Robin that had the least defined role at the time. I recall at the time being annoyed that they didn't choose to pursue that angle with more relevant characters like Jason or Damian who also have less developed romantic histories.

It's there and it is real.

However in this case it's STORY content that is bigger issue. Along with folks realizing a lot of Tim and his generation's issues were fueled by those who are no longer in charge.

This has been an issue since 2011 piled on with collection of bad series that last too long because of the title not the actual content of the books.

If you were to ask folks what are Tim's issues-his sexuality wouldn't sniff the top 10. There is other bigger stuff to deal with.

Tim is just another character on the growing scale of fans being fed up with DC and they are leaving. If it's not Duke it's Step, Cassandra, JSA, Legion, JLI gang, Spectre, Superboy, Wonder Girls, Booster Gold and so on. Folks are getting fed up.

So who do you have left?

The folks who don't care about him (or those others) chirping the loudest and uncontested.