screenshotting this one bc I can acknowledge that I’ve got shipper goggles on and op isn’t about that life which is fair but

I feel like batfam fans misunderstand the term parentification a lot and conflate it with Dick filling a parental role for his siblings, which might be part of the “oldest daughter syndrome” that’s so often pinned on him but that isn’t what parentification actually means

If I say that Dick Grayson was parentified, then that isn’t referring to him taking care of his siblings, it refers to the way Bruce treated him. As someone capable of taking care of his emotional needs and not as the child in need of care in the relationship

Parentification is a term that’s been around for decades, and while having to care for younger siblings might be a part of the definition, it focuses mostly on the role reversal of the parent-child dynamic. I’m not going to get into the psychology of it but being parentified has very little to do with if he actually acted as a parent for his siblings and everything to do with if he acted as a parent for Bruce

This is honestly why I prefer the term spouseification, which is less ambiguous than the term parentification and I feel accurately describes their “equal” relationship and the type of emotional abuse that Dick went through

Also from what I’ve read, Dick doesn’t act as a parental figure for any of his siblings except for Damian. While he might have given extra emotional support to Tim due to Bruce being Bruce, Dick still fits solidly into an older brother role. I’m not even going to touch on Dick’s relationship with Jason which is too weak to even be considered fraternal never mind parental

I like the fact that Jason has this weird, but founded, idea that Dick is the perfect guy. And he thinks that Dick knows what a great person he is.

What's really interesting, is the fact that this isn't true, Dick does not agree with him.

He is convinced that he is 'poison' and that he isn't a good person.

So when Dick have a mental breakdown, feeling like he doesn't deserve what he got, he doesn't deserve people appreciating him, it make no sense to Jason.

And that gives me so many ideas about a conversation between those two, because Jason can't stand the fact that Dick doesn't see himself the way everyone does.

I wish I could like, make some smart character analysis of Dick Grayson but in my mind there’s just “I love him” going on a loop.

Sometimes I feel a little insane abt him. Idk how to explain it, but sometimes it feels like he’s all I can think of but the thoughts aren’t coherent. They’re just a mess of “omg omg omg I love him i love him omg omg jesus fucking- omg omg he’s just he’s just he’s just he’s just he’s just”

like, why can’t I think smart things abt how he is so self sacrificing and how he wouldn’t exchange what he has to bring back his parents and he thinks Bruce would and how he just blames everything on himself and how he cannot kill and I hate the fanfics where he kills the joker because that would wreck him so much and and and and and and

I hate to say this but I've just had the thought that maybe... possibly... perhaps... Jason would be a better partner than Dick?

I love Dick, I really do, but he has canonically lied, manipulated, hid things and not to mention what his crippling sense of responsibility would do to his communication with his partner. I imagine it could be borderline impossible for him to open up and share his aches. He is burdened with having to be perfect so I imagine that trying to shake that wouldn't go very well.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying Jason doesn't have flaws, he does, but he canonically desires loyalty, devotion, connection and so on. He has allowed himself to be vulnerable. He has bared his throat. It is integral to his character that he searches for affection and recognition so I can't help but see him as a good boyfriend. He always wanted to matter, so he would make sure the person he loves knows they are cherished.

(Either way, I love them both and they both deserve all the love, but this was just a thought)

GUYS CAN WE **PLEASE** TALK ABOUT THIS

DO YOU GUYS KNOW WHAT DAMIAN GAVE TO EACH OF HIS FELLOW BAT SIBLINGS??? Because these are all real established items in DC canon!!

I’m going to work my way back from Dick, because, OMG. 

Damian gave Dick the Sword of Sin. If that sounded vaguely familiar to you, you might be an Azrael fan because that is his preferred blade to use. What is so special about this sword??? It’s ability:  The Sword of Sin can be ignited with the mind of the wielder, if the person is powerful enough. The sword has the ability to conjure in the mind of its victims all of the sins for which they are guilty or have not atoned for.       Golly gee, I wonder who this might be super effective against. You know. Giant bat guy with a guilt complex bigger than Texas. You can bet your butt Dick is going to send Bruce through a series of ‘Nam war flashbacks before this series is over. I can absolutely see why Damian would give Dick this weapon here, as he’s known Bruce the longest. I can easily see what part in this story Dick is going to be playing as he clearly has the most directly effective weapon against Batman. Damian’s favoritism here is both sweet and a little cruel if you think about the context much. 

Now let’s talk about Stephanie’s weapon, and yes she very much is Damian’s older sibling even if she isn’t a Wayne. Damian gave her the Coup-Stick of Black Bison (A DC Super Villain.) What can this staff do???   The mystical power of the coup-stick can animate material objects and in so doing, command these objects to do its bidding. This power cannot affect living biological material, but can affect non-living organic tissue. Black Bison once used the coup-stick to re-animate the stuffed remains of a white stallion (as well as other animals). Black Bison has also used the coup-stick to control the weather, such as summoning a strong wind to deflect attackers.      Guys Damian gave Stephanie a weapon that will allow her to call on back-up, and COMMAND her own creations, a weapon that allows her to be a leader!! Something she has wanted for a long time??? Also, it sounds like it has the power to control the weather??? Damian really said #girlboss and how much he loves her without actually saying it. I cannot stress enough how well DC could do her justice in this series if they at least tried.

Now, wow. Damian really straight up gave Jason’s dramatic ass the actual Trident of Poseidon, which is an unbreakable weapon that that serves as an extension of the wielder’s own power. Damian really gave Jason not only a King’s weapon, but a godly weapon. What other powers it has might not be relevant to whatever power it might awaken with Jason as its wielder.       Damian really cut out the middle man and just said, “Look, you are stupidly strong. I’m going to give you a stupidly strong weapon. Have at ye!” And you know Jason is going to wield that thing like he’s Poseidon, rightful ruler of the sea. I literally cannot wait to see Jason just absolutely power-housing his way through whatever gets in his way.  

Lastly, but not least in the slightest, Damian gave Tim the Cloak of Cagliostro! Which I want to acknowledge right off the bat, 🎶one of these things is not like the others~🎶 And thank Rao for that, because:  The Cloak of Cagliostro is a magical item which allows the wearer to teleport, and to become intangible, and invisible.      That is the *cutest* Easter Egg ever! Gotham Knights acknowledgement of Tim’s teleporting anyone????? Tim was the only one Damian gave a defensive weapon, and not an offensive weapon to. And that makes sense, because Tim is a defensive fighter! Tim never has to be the strongest person in the room. He just needs to be clever enough to use what he knows to win. Instead of giving him a weapon to swing around, Damian gave him something that Tim could use to protect himself, and actively use to make ALL of his skillsets stronger, not just his fighting power!!! This! Is! NOT! Damian looking down on Tim or considering him weaker. He’s playing to Tim’s strengths! He literally gave his big brother a cloak that straight up is like a cheat-code of meta-powers that would suit Tim SO WELL, because he knows Tim will be able to use those abilities to bullshit levels of effectiveness!! 

It genuinely looks like thought went into what weapons each of the Robins were given. I know fanon likes to bash on Damian or bash on his relationship to his siblings, or vice-versa, but in canon it has been clear for some time now that Damian considers all former and current Robins his family. (Including Tim. He refers to Tim as Timothy nowadays, and calls him his brother, that’s not fanon) No matter if Damian is not himself right now, he’s genuinely looking out for all of their best interests, and is ensuring that each one of them is as well-equipped as possible. 

Regardless, genuinely curious to see how each of these weapons will be used by their respective Robins, and how this will all end up. Hopefully, it ends with a giant group hug that will break the internet. (Also, ngl, I hope if Tim gets a new superhero identity soon his new suit will play off of Gotham Knight’s Tim’s abilities or be based off this cloak. Just think that would be neat ✨)

The original batkid age differences still work in the current comic era, and I'm gonna keep assuming they're canon unless they tell me otherwise. (sequel to this post)

Damian is canonically 14 (as of 2021).

This makes Tim about 21, which fits with his recent 'college dropout who lives alone on a houseboat' character arc (also 2021). A comic in 2015 said Tim was 16 when Damian was at least 10, but since it's a minor difference I'm gonna stick with the ~7 year gap they had pre-n52.

So Jason must be 23 — as far as I know, no canon contradicts this.

And Dick is about 29. This causes some minor issues, actually — in 2014 he was supposedly 21 when he should have been about 24, and in 2018 he's described as 'mid-20s,' which could be a stretch depending on how much in-universe time passed between 2018 and 2021. Overall though, not too messy.

So that makes Cass 24, Steph 21-22, and Babs around 30.

Honestly I have no idea how old Duke is beyond 'high school age" — from at least 2015 to present. Which actually kinda screws things up, if we assume that all the other characters aged 4 years in that time. Like, in 2015 he was closer to Tim's age, and now he seems to be closer to Damian's. For what it's worth tho, I think of him as ~17.

Anyway, point is DC DOES let their characters age (at least since the Rebirth era started in 2016. pretty sure n52 was like, a stasis bubble or something). I'm sure the timeline will continue to get wonkier as the youngest generation of heroes grows up, but for now the Bats seem to be doing alright.

Still not over how well characterized and balanced every character is portrayed in the Teen Titans 2003 series: every single Titan can be funny, dejected, serious, determined, silly, angry, optimistic, vulnerable and tough without major inconsistencies in their overall portrayals.

Huge props to the writers of that show who knew exactly how to give each Titan a realistic range of emotions without deviating away from their basic personalities--it's an extremely difficult feat to accomplish, depicting characters through many different phases and arcs while keeping them consistent, and they did it flawlessly.

i love when characters that are always the one protecting others, staying strong for them, putting others first- get to be taken care of. get to fall apart, get to be soft and vulnerable, get to be protected and loved just as fiercely as they protect and love the people they care about

Just listened to Welcome To Night Vale and thought— why isn’t there something similar but with Gotham City? Like, a podcast about a radio channel broadcasting today’s weird phenomenons, Bat sightings, the newest Bat rumors and, of course, people taking bets on open air about when the next Arkham breakout will be (and when Red Hood will snap again and shoot Batman in the kneecap).

Ngl I think that would be hella funny.

This is quite random sorry but has Dick ever acknowledge (or as close to it) that a lot of things that Bruce did to him are abusive? (this is for a fic I’m trying to write)

Yes and no!

Dick knows Bruce is an assholes and WILL yell at him to stop being an asshole, or at least he used to. Dick would call him out on his BS and wouldn't let him get away with a lot of things, but this was once upon a time, before they rebooted everything and erased decades of character development. The closest he gets to that post reboot is after Forever Evil - everyone thinks Dick is dead, and Bruce wants people to keep thinking that, hence he forces Dick to join Spiral and become Agent 37.

Dick is, as you can imagine, not thrilled. He yells and fights and Bruce beats the everloving shit out of him in a very upsetting sequence, where Dick is half naked and Bruce is wearing most of his gear while he keeps hitting him to the point of leaving him bleeding on the floor of the Batcave.

Dick begs and tries to appeal to everything he can including the "things can never be the same between us after this", to which Bruce essentially replies that it's a sacrifice he's willing to make. Ha. I say that this is especially upsetting because Dick went through a horribly traumatic experience during the events of Forever Evil, in which among other things he was tortured by Thomas Wayne Jr AKA Owlman, who wanted to turn Dick into his own sidekick after losing his Talon. The way Bruce beats and humiliates Dick is drawn in a way which creates a clear parallel between Thomas and Bruce's actions towards Dick, in a way that suggests they're "not that different after all", but this narratively goes nowhere and I don't get why they fuck they even came up with that. But anyway.

All of this gets forgotten soon enough. Despite his own warnings Dick forgives Bruce after a very short time, pines for home and tries to communicate with Bruce in any way he can because he "misses his dad", which to be honest made my guts churn and my bile rise after Bruce nearly beat him comatose. Essentially the story forgets Bruce did all of that and so does Dick, but for the brief time Dick was allowed to be aware of it and angry about it, he was indeed aware that he was being abused even if he never used the word abuse.

This is the case for lots of stories in which similar instances happen, as I mentioned before especially pre-reboot. Dick does call Bruce out on his bullshit - especially if Bruce is being an abusive asshole to someone else, since Dick is way more prone to defend other people than he is to defend himself, like here

or here

But despite being obviously aware that there are issues in the way Bruce does things, to put it mildly, he never uses the word "abuse" (which is sort of a prohibited word for DC standards, kind of like "rape". They're way more likely to say non consensual than rape because it's a less upsetting word apparently).

There is an instance of this post reboot, and it's during a conversation Dick has with Tim. I believe it happens in the Pride comics of 2022, but I don't have the panels on hand at the moment. Basically Tim asks for advice on how to please Bruce, being the man demanding and prone to bad moods, and Dick flat out replies "I spent a very big part of my life trying to please him, and I left when I realized it was impossible" which to me is so interesting since it's the textbook reaction of a former Golden Child who fell from grace and became a Scapegoat (please note that tumblr's definition of Golden Child is completely arbitrary; golden child doesn't mean "good kid", it means a child who the parent holds to the highest standards, on which there are the biggest expectations and the strongest pressure regarding everything the child does. Sometimes a parent lives vicariously through them and perceives them as an extension of themselves, but not necessarily. If you watched Encanto, Isabella is the Golden Child of the family).

Something similar happens during Nightwing's run from the 90s.

Dick lives in Bludhaven and at this point he's gone essentially no-contact with Bruce. Tim, being the new Golden Child, is trying to reel Dick back into the toxic dynamic because he genuinely thinks it's going to be good for both Dick and Bruce.

I'm pointing this out not to fault Tim in any way, he's just a kid what does he know, but to show you that indeed yes, Dick is aware that he's been abused otherwise he wouldn't have left, he wouldn't be on a no talking basis with his parental figure, and he wouldn't reply to Tim that he spent so much time of his life deluding himself into thinking that Batman actually needed him. Of course this also goes nowhere and their relationship isn't allowed to grow or heal (things are just conveniently forgotten after a while), but as I mentioned, Dick knows what's up.

That being said, I believe it's also worth noting that many many times Bruce abuses the fuck out of Dick and Dick doesn't really acknowledge it, just takes it. Sometimes he doesn't have the spoons to fight back, sometimes he thinks he deserves it, sometimes he just doesn't know how to react because Bruce strikes like an unprovoked viper (this happens especially when Dick was still a kid but already a Titan). A very good example of this is what happens after Jason's death.

Bruce doesn't tell Dick that Jason died. When Alfred offers to let him know, Bruce says "I will handle it", and he doesn't. Then there's Jason's funeral and Bruce doesn't tell Dick about it, again Alfred offers to inform him, Bruce says he will handle it. He doesn't.

Eventually Dick finds out for collateral reasons and has an emotional breakdown in front of the other Titans, which are powerless to help him. For reference, this is how he reacts when he has definitive proof that the boy is undoubtedly gone, if there was any doubt that Dick did care about Jason.

So Dick goes to the grave with Kory but then decided to confront Bruce alone, and Bruce, in the abusive feat of the century, blames Dick for not having showed up to Jason's funeral, despite having refused to 1: tell him about Jason's death AT ALL, and 2: refused TWICE when Alfred very gently suggested to inform Dick.

Dick of course argues that he didn't know anything, and so Bruce reacts by gaslighting him, telling him they he never cared about Jason and in fact he was angry that Bruce adopted Jason and not him. Which is not true, Dick just wanted to know WHY Bruce adopted Jason and hot him. Oh and also punches him in the face when Dick tries to argue that Jason was an untrained kid. Please note that when all of this happens, Dick is hurt and can barely stand on his feet, having one of his legs in a cast.

Cherry on top, Bruce explicitly saying that he never should have had a partner and never will again, essentially "our partnership up to this point meant nothing".

In this instance Dick is too neck-deep in his own self guilt to see that he's been through a sequence of extremely abusive behavior, and never really faults Bruce for that, using the easy-coming rationalization that Bruce was in pain, suffering for Jason's death, couldn't see reason etc etc (quick PSA: someone suffering isn't entitled to abuse and gaslight anyone. And even if we really want to enable Bruce cut Bruce some slack because he was grieving, it doesn't make his behavior any less abusive. Regardless of the reasons why, the way he acts here is very damaging towards Dick who in turn did nothing to deserve it, and is grieving Jason too).

See, the problem with Dick and Bruce is the sysyphean nature of comicbooks. Dick is doomed to be the original Golden Child who falls from grace, becomes the Scapegoat, but ultimately can never be completely free of the clutches of the relationship he has and had with Bruce, for better or worse. And since he can't ever truly get out and can't ever completely be independent, the abuse end up getting downplayed. If Dick never truly gets away from Bruce it's because it's not that bad, isn't it? Nay, it's because Dick cant. He is quite literally not allowed to, same as Bruce is not allowed to truly grow from his mistakes and learn to treat his former partner, sort-of-child and dear friend with the respect and love he actually feels for him, because despite all of this and because this is fiction, Bruce does love Dick more than it can be put into words and would set the world on fire for him. But, alas, he also is doomed to keep treating Dick like shit and never really learn from his mistakes.

So again, the answer to your question is yes and no. Dick is aware of how much of a difficult person Bruce is. He's aware of the domineering aspects of his personality. But he will ultimately brush it off in the name of the good that there is and there was between them, and he will keep answering Batman's call every time, because he's not allowed to ever truly grow apart from him. It doesn't matter how much he gets angry and how much Bruce hurts him, they're indissolubly tied in this dynamic and unless there is a huge shift in the way DC execs handle things, I don't see how this dynamic can change in the foreseeable future. Sadly enough, because I'd really like to see something new.

coming out as someone who doesn't think dick grayson has eldest daughter syndrome, I'm sorry guys it's the truth

I actually think dick is the eldest son of a divorced single mother like— he learns to be self sufficient because he doesn't want to bother her, she's stressed enough as it is, working long hours trying to support the both of them and he asks "hey can I help?" constantly as if he's begging her to to tell him what she needs, he promises he can help carry whatever it is that's weighing on her, he can take it! he's the man of the house now, remember? they're in this together, please talk to him, he can push what ever pain he's feeling aside if she would just let him help again

it's easy to ignore the ache in his gut whenever she tells him about how the divorce proceedings are going, or how expensive rent is getting, or how jenny from HR has been up her ass again for one reason or another, it's just these are adult issues, and if he was an adult he could help her with them, that ache he learns, is helplessness

if he were actually 'her little man' like she calls him, he would be able to help her, but he's not, stuck in a malleable state after his childhood was sharply cut off at eight at twelve at sixteen

(if he were a man though, that would also mean he was someone now capable of hurting her like dad did, and he fears the look she gets when he does something that reminds her of what she has lost, he wants to stay young forever, tucked between her arm and rib cage, when she smiled at him before everything went wrong)

he gets protective, aggressive when she starts dating again because he saw how deeply she was hurt last time, bares his teeth and remembers how she told him that he was the only man she needed in her life, he tells his friends to lay off when they tease him, “momma’s boy” like loving her is something to be ashamed of, something he was supposed to grow out of a long time ago

LET'S DISCUSS DICK GRAYSON AND THE WAY HE DEALS WITH THE DEATH OF LOVED ONES

Disclaimer : most informations can be fanon, canon or just headcanon

The guy obviously lost a LOT of people in his life, his parents, Jason, Donna, Bruce, Wally, Damian..., and even if some came back to life, the pain never go away. I have a few headcanons about the way he deals with that, so here we go ✨

The death of his parents :

(I'm not sure how many years old Dick was canonically when they died, but I'm going to go with eight.)

At first, he felt shock. This couldn't be happening. He didn't just saw his parents fall. It wasn't true.

Then, he felt sick. His parents dead bodies were lying right in front of him and the only thing he could do was throwing up.

After that, the tears. No one could make him stop crying. He was shaking and whenever he felt a little better, horrible images came to haunt his mind.

And suddenly, numbness. Just nothing. He was silent and he felt empty.

The first two weeks after Bruce took him in Dick stayed incredibly silent. To be honest, he only spoke once. ''Why do I always eat alone?'' he asked Alfred while taking his breakfast. The butler felt his heart breaking as the little boy ask that question. He tried to explain that Bruce was busy, but he knew that it wasn't an excuse.

He then asked Bruce to stay more with his new ward knowing that loneliness wasn't going to help him grieving.

The third week, he started talking, to Alfred, only, short sentences without looking in the eyes, but, still, it was progress.

The fourth week, he was able to talk to Bruce, and to even laugh with Alfred.

And the fifth week Dick felt happy for the first time. Bruce took two days off to spend time with him. Alfred gave him a few piano lessons, and the nightmares started to fade, even that horrible feeling inside his stomach started to disappeared. And it felt weird. His parents died. How could he feel happy. He wasn't supposed to be happy.

Dick felt guilty a lot. He felt guilty because he didn't save them. He felt guilty because he survived and they didn't. He felt guilty because sometimes, just sometimes, he felt happy without them.

Even when he grew up guilt was still an important part of him.

He feels guilty to be happy with Bruce.

With his new family.

Part two (coming soon)

Jason's Advice To Duke & Dick's Advice To Him Parallel

Okay, hear me out. If Tim idolized Batman instead of Robin, Bruce would be dead.

Disclaimer: I am not perfect and don't know everything there is to know about comics! Some shit here may be accidentally based on fanon rather than canon! Please be nice!

Tim, of course, respects and looks up to Batman. Bruce is his mentor and his father, so it's safe to assume he loves him as well. But his Hero™ is and always has been Robin, Dick at first but especially Jason judging by the timeline. Most people in Gotham view Robin as an addendum, an extra, nothing more than a kid sidekick. They’re disappointed if her shows up without Batman, and question his abilities. Tim’s hero worship combined with his knowledge of their identities, in this case, allows him to see things as they truly are. For Tim, Robin is a light in the dark, a balancing act with Batman, not his sidekick but his partner. He’s a necessary part of the Dynamic Duo because while Batman represents Justice, Robin represents this Hope for a better future. Sure, he’s just a kid; by all accounts he shouldn’t even be out there fighting, but maybe, if he is, no other kids won’t have to fight as hard just to survive. He represents the soul of Gotham, underneath the criminality and corruption; a city full of people, tough-as-nails, saying “No, fuck you, this is our city” despite the constant danger. He represents the people who come together in times of crisis, who help out their neighbors when each new disaster strikes. He’s trained in martial arts, of course, and he’s a skilled fighter, but Robin’s primary job is always the safety of civilians. He’s the one that gets scared little kids out of a burning building while Batman keeps the villain of the week busy, the one who stays behind with SA victims walks them home because Batman is too much for those things. He uses fear where Robin uses kindness, compassion, and love.

Tim sees this. So, when Robin dies and Batman is getting rougher, more violent, more careless, he notices. He notices that Bruce is picking bigger fights than he can handle, taking hits he could dodge, breaking four ribs instead of two, barely making it back to the manor each night. If he idolized Bruce, at this point, he would trust him the way the rest of Gotham does. He would assume it was a rough patch, and Bruce would recover, and that Batman would always save the day. He would see a solitary hero, the way Batman wants to be seen. He wouldn’t think it necessary to reach out to Dick for help, and even if he did he would think Nightwing would be enough help. He wouldn’t understand the importance of the Robin mantle, the specific role that needs to be filled. Nightwing can represent a lot of things; fluidity, positive change, and freedom come to mind immediately, but there's no world where Nightwing represents Gotham and Hope the same way Robin does. He can’t serve the same purpose anymore, not in that uniform. Bruce would die at Two-Face’s hands in that very first arc, I have not a single doubt in my mind.

Then, as Tim comes back to Gotham post-training and actually starts to help out, it’s common for him to be the conscience. He falls easily into the role of Robin, the role that makes him protector of the innocent. He’s not like Jason, raised by these streets in a very different way, though I wouldn’t say either is better or worse. Where Jason struggled and had to fight, out there each night pre-Bruce out of necessity rather than choice. He knows all the best hiding spots and back-alleys because it kept him alive. He chooses to be Robin because he needed a hero and wants to be that for other people. Tim chose those streets, and he chose them for Robin. He knows the best hiding spots because they put him closer to the action, because he raised himself on all those cold nights alone on rooftops with his camera. He knows the back-alleys because they made him faster, made it so his little kid legs could keep up with his hero so he wouldn’t miss a moment. He lives for Gotham nights, for the thrill of seeing everything, getting to know everything. He chooses to be Robin because where his parents failed to teach him how to be a good person, Robin stepped up. He bases his morals off of watching Robin help people, and because he’s a kid he assumes that it’s normal to behave with altruistic intentions and prioritize others.

There’s a point to be made here, briefly, about how this lends itself to Tim’s self-worth issues and insecurities. If his job is to assist, supplement, guide, and fill in the blanks when Batman fails, he doesn’t have the option of failure. He expects that how he does his job, as long as the job gets done, doesn’t matter because he doesn’t view himself as the hero. He never views himself as a main character in his own story; he truly thinks he’s doing what anyone else in his position would gladly do. This is why he overworks himself, why he’s known for living, for lack of a better term “like a goddamn ninja turtle”. It’s why he’s always Robin or Red Robin or even his public persona Timothy Drake-Wayne but rarely Just Tim. Very few people get to see Just Tim, normal Tim, because if they’re seeing that then he’s not doing his job.

All of these factors lead to Tim’s conclusion that if no one else can get Batman out of this state, least of all Batman himself, of course the next logical conclusion is that it’s his responsibility to step up and do the job. Furthermore, it’s only because he idolized Robin that he can fill the role properly because his relationship to Bruce, especially in the beginning, is nothing like Dick and Jason’s relationships with Bruce. He’s not his kid, doesn’t bring Robin’s joy and hope home, so instead he has to work twice as hard in the field to keep Bruce away from the edge. He’s the first of the Robins to view himself as Batman’s protector rather than the other way around, and he’s the only one who Bruce acknowledges when he tries to fill that role. Bruce accepts it when Tim manages him, reorganizes his files, forces him into the medbay, even when he very occasionally goes as far as to outright scold him rather than just pressure him to make the right choices. He’s given an inch and takes a mile, because he believes (rightfully, in my opinion) that if he doesn't then all hope is lost. And Bruce allows him to help, to guide, as much as he’s willing to because he’s not his kid first. He’s Robin first.

This mentality carries over to the Red Robin arc, where Tim spends an entire year chasing after Bruce to save him. He does it alone, and although he asks for help he doesn’t actually expect it. Furthermore, because his morals are based off of Robin in his infinite altruism rather than Batman with his rigid rules, he doesn’t mind working with Ra’s al Ghul. He doesn’t mind betraying Ra’s by killing his men, by blowing up his bases. He doesn’t tell Bruce about it to protect Bruce from having another murderer under his roof, and because he doesn’t think it matters enough. Bruce isn’t surprised when Tim is the one to save him. I believe he would have been if any other Robin had shown up. He and Dick have had a strained relationship for years, he and Jason aren’t even on speaking terms, Stephanie was so often full of rage at him throughout her run as Robin and is dead at the time, and he doesn’t even really have a relationship with Damian. Aside from all of that, he’s assumed dead. He can’t assume the Justice League will spend their time saving a dead man. And yet, despite all of that, he isn’t surprised when Tim is the one to pull him out of the time stream. He’s disoriented, sure, and a little surprised it was possible for him to be saved at all, and he even wants to hear about how he figured it out, but his doubt is never placed on the fact that Tim would be the one to understand and tear the world apart to bring him home.

I believe this also helps to explain Tim’s struggle with letting go of the Robin mantle, outside of the fact that he was the first to have the choice to move on taken away from him. If he’s always been Robin first, always felt the weight of that on his shoulders, what is he supposed to do when his very identity is stripped away right as he loses everyone who got to really know him as Just Tim? How is he supposed to cope with having to reconstruct his own idea of who he is with no one around to remind him? Humans are social creatures. We learn and grow with and because of each other. He’s encouraged by Dick to grow quickly out of Robin to fill a new role, which is a nice sentiment from Dick’s own point of view, but he’s lacking a sturdy foundation. Not because it’s not actually there, or because he lacks personality or morals, but because he truly views himself and all of his good decisions as just what anybody would do and what Robin is supposed to do. He doesn’t consider that following these morals makes them his, makes them the building blocks for wherever he goes next, he considers them to be traits of a character he no longer plays; a purpose he no longer serves.

(This is the second time I've posted this, so if you see another version that's why!)

Think about Dick Grayson, such a loyal and loving person, having to leave Bruce and Gotham so many times over the years. Whether Bruce pushed him away once more, or maybe he just felt so sick he just had to leave. Sometimes nobody's at fault, it just happens. People drift away, and maybe Gotham was never truly his hometown anyway.

They'll never be 9 and 25 again, each other's whole world.

They say you never love anything the way you love your first child. Bruce will forever miss the little boy he took in, with great fear and greater love. He misses the little ball of sunshine that was shaking his chandeliers and rocking his world.

They say the firstborn ages with their parent, that the two are maturing together. Dick will forever miss the man who wrapped his jacket around him and told him it'll be okay when he was sobbing on the circus floor. He misses Bruce's soft smile, the one he had when there were fewer wrinkles, white hairs, and all sorts of aches.

The persistent heartache that it is to love and to be loved by Bruce Wayne. The pain of having to be the one who leaves first.

Tiktok slideshows are going to be the end of me.