Azrael and Cassandra Cain's place on the dc universe

[bat_girl_cc]

So, in the last couple of days i came across a few discussions about this topic and other topics alike, where i saw some people saying that these 2 characters are "too powerfull" for Gotham and the bat-world, in general, which is suposed to be set in some sort of real-life-like-reallity...and you know what? thei're not totally wrong!...i'll explain:

1) First, there's no such thing as a real-life-like-reallity, in comics...in the comics, even regular citizens can do crazy stuff, stuff that would be impossible for real life humans to do...but if we look at a bare-minimum of what a comic-book-normal-human is supposed to do, for the sake of the suspension of desbelif, then i guess that Az and Cass are in the limit and probably even above those standards...and thei're back-stories, skills, and overall capabilities, justify that they are portrayed as being above them (Az is a very skilled meta-human, and Cass was trained in a way that makes other human fighters look worthless).

2) People often complain that thei're favourite characters (Nightwing, Robin, Batgirl, etc) look bad when they are in stories with these characters, and even tho these people are obviosuly biased, they are not totally wrong! in order for Az and Cass to be written properly, the other bat-family members will look bad, simply because they aren't as capable...and the solution that writters often find for this, is nerf these characters, so the fans of the other characters can accept them, or in other words "ajusting the character to the environment around them" which is obviously stupid, because without what we know about each character (thei're individual characteristic's) thei're just names...might as well make a new character altogether...what needs to change is the environment around them! not the other characters, but the stories when Az and Cass show up.

The case in point here, is that as long as Az and Cass, get treated as your every-day-street-leveler, they will never be all that they can be, there will always be people complaining..."they can't do this"..."they can't do that"..."they can't go over that certain limit"...some writters think like this as well and they will eventually use PIS in their stories...i for one, as a fan of these characters (Cass mostly) would like to read stories where my favourite character isn't "hand-cuffed"...can you blame me?

My solution? have these characters appear in titles like "Justice League United" or "Teen Titans" where people won't complain that they perform the feats that they use too, and that they should do...i'm a huge fan of the Bat-family in general, and Batman is the character that had me reading comics in the first place, and that way i started reading on other bat-related characters, such as Cass, so i enjoy Az and Cassandra's interactions with the rest of the bat-family, which could continue to happen as long as any writter on a bat-related-title feels like using them, and i would be all for it, but just not on a daily-basis, no, that wouldn't be the best choice...the best choice for me would be putting them in a place where the threat(s) justify the need for their capabilities, hence why before Cass debuted on this new continuity, i said that i would prefer if she debuted on earth-2 and was apart of like a justice league from earth-2.

And i know that there are alot of people that aren't bothered by how capable character A or characters B is, but for those that are, this could be the best choice, specially now considering that the bat-family is already huge, and by the looks of it, it's only getting bigger.

Although, regardless, i would totally buy a "Agents Of Gotham" book, featuring Az, Batman, and Cass, amoung other bat-family members

So, what do you people think? should certain bat-family and bat-related characters appear on certain environments where they don't need to be "hand-cuffed" in order to favor both the story-telling and the characters themselves amoung public opinion? or you don't think that that's a important thing?

[Aahz]

You could maybe put Azrael out of the Batfamily (and maybe very rarly have guest appearance) since he was never really a core member, and I nobody would complain (like nobody complained that the Outsiders usually don't appeared in Batman events).

With Cass the problem is different, since she is much closer connected to the Batfamily, and her fans probaly wan't her to interact with them and to appear in the cross over events. And I don't think it would damage Cass if they would scale down her abilities to the niveau of the other top fighters of the Batfamily members they do allot of quite impressive stuff in their own books, and there is really no need for New52-Cass to have pseudo-superhuman abilities like pre flashpoint where she did a lot of stuff you can't explain with her training (like moving at bullet time or punching through concrete walls and Superboys Telekinetic Force-Field).

And limiting the abilities of whole bunch of (relatively popular) characters just to write one character "right" is just idiotic, especially if this character isn't even the main protagonist.

[Cowtools]

there will always be people complaining..."they can't do this"..."they can't do that"..."they can't go over that certain limit"...some writters think like this as well

My solution to this is that I Just. Don't. Care. about relative power levels or whatever. It's not why I read comics. All that stuff just gets in the way of the story. To some people, it seems like is IS the story.

Take Cass for instance. In a recent issue of Batman & Robin Eternal, I thought it was kinda weird to see Cass destroying a bunch of killer robots so easily. In the past, her fighting ability was based less on raw skill, and more on her ability to read her opponents' body language. hence, she shouldn't have been able to fight robots with no body language.
Did it ruin the story for me? No. Because the main emotional content of the scene was Harper having a breakdown and Cass reassuring her. That's the kind of character-based conflict that I read comics for.

Now, obviously if one character beats another, it has to make sense - but if it doesn't make sense according to the 'official 'power levels', it can still make sense emotionally. Let's say Cass gets beaten up by Deathstroke. If this is solely to make Deathstroke seem more badass, then I'd be pised. But if it's so Cass can rally and defeat him and learn a lesson about self-confidence or something, then I'd be happy.
An actual example: In Harley's Little Black Book #1, Harly Quinn knocks out Wonder Woman with sleeping gas. Wonder Woman should be fast enough to avoid attacks like that, but if she did, then the rest of the story wouldn't happen, so I'm willing to let it slide. Context is everything people.

[SOLID MATTIC]

I don't know about Azrael, but with Cass its just as simple as people needing to understand that beating people up isn't the only measurement of one's value. Cass CAN NOT READ ffs. Readers getting upset at Cass being better at punching things than their favourite characters should really think about that fact for a few seconds. Characters have strengths and weaknesses, it just turns out Cassandra's strengths are punching people and her weaknesses are almost everything else related to being a vigilante.

In her imo excellent solo Cass teamed up with Steph and Tim and they both came out of those partnerships looking pretty great as they brought things to the table that Cass didn't have. The idea that Cass can't function in the bat family "because she makes everyone else look bad" is ridiculous to me, she's a child trained (abused) to be an assassin with one very narrow skillset not some all powerful mary sue. Good writers who understand her character should have no trouble with her.

The above post is also pretty good, really all that matters is whether or not a character is interesting enough to be involved in interesting stories. As a fan of Cassandra Cain I would say that while her being a badass was very fun what was really interesting was her story of trying to find her place in the world after being abused into being an assassin by her father. Watching her work out her own identity while everyone around her pushed her into being their ideal version of her (Batman= a heir/ Cain= a perfect assassin and daughter/ Shiva=someone who could finally kill her/ Barbara= someone she could save and live vicariously through, etc) was what made her an endearing character, not her relative power levels with other characters.

[Godlike13]

The above post is also pretty good, really all that matters is whether or not a character is interesting enough to be involved in interesting stories. As a fan of Cassandra Cain I would say that while her being a badass was very fun what was really interesting was her story of trying to find her place in the world after being abused into being an assassin by her father. Watching her work out her own identity while everyone around her pushed her into being their ideal version of her (Batman= a heir/ Cain= a perfect assassin and daughter/ Shiva=someone who could finally kill her/ Barbara= someone she could save and live vicariously through, etc) was what made her an endearing character, not her relative power levels with other characters.

Um, what now?

[Aioros22]

Obviously, since my favorite did not look bad at all against Cassandra, I could care two cents about which chair she sits.

[SOLID MATTIC]

Um, what?

Evidence is throughout Cassandra's solo, Barbara constantly asserting that what Cass needed was TLC and time spent as a "normal person" (save/help). She constantly butted heads with Bruce over her wellbeing. The evidence for living vicariously through is a little thinner but to me its subtle but there. I'm not saying Barbara consciously did this, more of a sub conscious thing.

[bat_girl_cc]

You could maybe put Azrael out of the Batfamily (and maybe very rarly have guest appearance) since he was never really a core member, and I nobody would complain (like nobody complained that the Outsiders usually don't appeared in Batman events).

With Cass the problem is different, since she is much closer connected to the Batfamily, and her fans probaly wan't her to interact with them and to appear in the cross over events. And I don't think it would damage Cass if they would scale down her abilities to the niveau of the other top fighters of the Batfamily members they do allot of quite impressive stuff in their own books, and there is really no need for New52-Cass to have pseudo-superhuman abilities like pre flashpoint where she did a lot of stuff you can't explain with her training (like moving at bullet time or punching through concrete walls and Superboys Telekinetic Force-Field).

And limiting the abilities of whole bunch of (relatively popular) characters just to write one character "right" is just idiotic, especially if this character isn't even the main protagonist.

1) Her training changed her period! It kinda changed her body, it amped her reactions, her pain-tolerance, etc, even tho it's not exactly stated word by word, its pretty well shown. she dodges bullets which was something that she was trained to do (it was shown) and her punching power is directly correlated with her speed like of how fast she moves.
2) I want to see Cass interacting with the other members of the batfamily as well, and that could and should still happen, but she should be on a title that allowed her to be portrayed as good as she can be. the majority of the characters that she interacts with, hold her back (showings-wise)...when you have Cass on issue #70 stating on her thoughs that she held back her entire life, and she only fought for real because she knew her opponents were dead (they were zombies) that's saying something...its obviosuly because her opponents "can't take it", if she fought actual big threats she wouldn't need to hold back, but theres no-one like that in Gotham (she has no way of beating clayface or poison ivy, but even if she could, you can't have them appear on every issue)...if she was appart of a team book such as the Teen Titans or the JLU.
3) My point exactly! why change the characters (which is dumb and non-sensical by the way) when you can change the story?...also, Cass looking better in fights than other popular characters isn't strange, its the way its supposed to be, if they aren't as capable as she is, then they shouldn't be portrayed as such, its as simple as that.

[Godlike13]

Evidence is throughout Cassandra's solo, Barbara constantly asserting that what Cass needed was TLC and time spent as a "normal person" (save/help). She constantly butted heads with Bruce over her wellbeing. The evidence for living vicariously through is a little thinner but to me its subtle but there. I'm not saying Barbara consciously did this, more of a sub conscious thing.

How is it there?

[bat_girl_cc]

My solution to this is that I Just. Don't. Care. about relative power levels or whatever. It's not why I read comics. All that stuff just gets in the way of the story. To some people, it seems like is IS the story.

Take Cass for instance. In a recent issue of Batman & Robin Eternal, I thought it was kinda weird to see Cass destroying a bunch of killer robots so easily. In the past, her fighting ability was based less on raw skill, and more on her ability to read her opponents' body language. hence, she shouldn't have been able to fight robots with no body language.
Did it ruin the story for me? No. Because the main emotional content of the scene was Harper having a breakdown and Cass reassuring her. That's the kind of character-based conflict that I read comics for.

Now, obviously if one character beats another, it has to make sense - but if it doesn't make sense according to the 'official 'power levels', it can still make sense emotionally. Let's say Cass gets beaten up by Deathstroke. If this is solely to make Deathstroke seem more badass, then I'd be pised. But if it's so Cass can rally and defeat him and learn a lesson about self-confidence or something, then I'd be happy.
An actual example: In Harley's Little Black Book #1, Harly Quinn knocks out Wonder Woman with sleeping gas. Wonder Woman should be fast enough to avoid attacks like that, but if she did, then the rest of the story wouldn't happen, so I'm willing to let it slide. Context is everything people.

I agree with you in the sense that i enjoy Cass as a whole, not only her fighting-skills, but everything about her.
And i don't care much about what some fans of other characters think, this post is a possible solution for the people that do care...Although i can't help myself but to think that these characters are being "held-back" because they don't have equally capable characters to interact with on a basis...take Cass for exemple, on issue #68 (i think) she stated that she could had killed Shiva and Deathstroke if she wantted too...and you don't get much higher at street-level than these 2...really, Az and Cass should be featured more on a environment where they don't need to hold back all the time, and fans of other characters won't feel bad for they favs, just make Az appart of the Justice League Dark, and Cass apart of the Teen Titans (just giving random exemples) problem solved!...and you can still have them making guest appearences on other bat-family titles whenever the writters want too.

[bat_girl_cc]

How is it there?

You have Batgirl #39 and #40 as a exemple...Bruce argued with Babs because Babs thought that Bruce only saw Cass as his favourite weapon, because Babs and Cass went on a "vacation" but Bruce already knew about a group that needed to be stopped and would be there, Cass and superboy stopped them.
During that time, Babs even made Cass wearing a bikini, lol.

[Godlike13]

Non of that shows how Babs supposedly lived vicariously through Cass.

[bat_girl_cc]

I don't know about Azrael, but with Cass its just as simple as people needing to understand that beating people up isn't the only measurement of one's value. Cass CAN NOT READ ffs. Readers getting upset at Cass being better at punching things than their favourite characters should really think about that fact for a few seconds. Characters have strengths and weaknesses, it just turns out Cassandra's strengths are punching people and her weaknesses are almost everything else related to being a vigilante.

In her imo excellent solo Cass teamed up with Steph and Tim and they both came out of those partnerships looking pretty great as they brought things to the table that Cass didn't have. The idea that Cass can't function in the bat family "because she makes everyone else look bad" is ridiculous to me, she's a child trained (abused) to be an assassin with one very narrow skillset not some all powerful mary sue. Good writers who understand her character should have no trouble with her.

The above post is also pretty good, really all that matters is whether or not a character is interesting enough to be involved in interesting stories. As a fan of Cassandra Cain I would say that while her being a badass was very fun what was really interesting was her story of trying to find her place in the world after being abused into being an assassin by her father. Watching her work out her own identity while everyone around her pushed her into being their ideal version of her (Batman= a heir/ Cain= a perfect assassin and daughter/ Shiva=someone who could finally kill her/ Barbara= someone she could save and live vicariously through, etc) was what made her an endearing character, not her relative power levels with other characters.

Agreed, but i'm just talking about fighting-skills, i mean, wouldn't it be better if Cass was alawed to be as awesome as she can be, and still be apart of the bat-family while not being "hand-cuffed" by its limits?

[bat_girl_cc]

I'm basically talking about having the cake and eating it too win-win

[bat_girl_cc]

Non of that shows how Babs supposedly lived vicariously through Cass.

I was just providing a exemple for what solid matic was saying.