#i just love it when the batbois all call bruce different versions of dad | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

aingeal98 · 8 months

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Having Bruce and Cass and the Robins thoughts and they're a bit messy and jumbled so bear with me.

Idk how to explain why the Bruce and Cass messed up but loving dynamic is so much more appealing to me than his toxic relationship with his other kids but I guess it's because the entirety of Batgirl 2000 understands that Bruce is not a perfect parent. His flaws and virtues are both deliberately and carefully written and his relationship with Cass is so layered and it makes it so that I can both laugh and cringe, appreciate the sweet moments and rage at some of his more shitty moves. It's not perfect but overall the writing is just GOOD, and there's enough material to form a solid core of understanding even when their dynamic grows past Cass's solo run. This is Cass and Bruce and this is how they tick and no writer has been able to thoroughly screw that up no matter how hard some of them were pushed to by editorial.

Compare that to how he's written with his other kids, where every writer has their own version and some have him be a perfect dad and others have him be shitty and frame it as "He's got this darkness in him" while another group of writers have him absolutely brutalise his kids or neglect them or gaslight them for angst all while knowing the kids will never receive any sort of narrative justice for this because he's Batman and he's the big flagship hero. There is no single run you can point to and say yes this here showcases the heart of the dynamic between him and Tim or him and Damian, no single run so good that all other comics about their dynamic use it as their basis for this bond between father and child. There is no consistency and no communication or understanding between writers or even an attempt to pick up what the other puts down. Batman comics will have him be a good parent or a bad parent but either way it will be all about Him. Batfamily comics tend to have him just be absolutely awful and then a few months later they have to pretend it never happened because the main bat books want to make him a good parent again.

It's all shock value that rarely lasts past the arc and writer. When Tom Taylor has Dick hug Bruce and call him dad I'm remembering that time Bruce beat him into a bloody pulp or backhanded him across the face and Dick never got to call him out on it. But we're not meant to be thinking about that in Taylor's run because this is a Good Dad Bruce comic. Taylor's Bruce and Dick dynamic is completely different to the New 52 dynamic the same way that dynamic is different to Wolfman's which is different to the original Batman and Robin. And that variety can be a great thing when it comes to comics but the downside here is that you can pick Bruce's "good dad" comics or you can pick his abusive asshole comics but you cannot find the middle ground that Batgirl 2000 hit because (controversial opinion I guess) it doesn't exist for the batboys and no writer has successfully managed to pull all the different comics together and create one.

Fans have tried. Fans have pieced together a decent narrative from the mess of inconsistencies, taking the moments of almost cartoonish abuse and the moments where Bruce is shown to care, and forming the image of a complicated and nuanced abusive parent from it all. But the great thing about Batgirl 2000 is you don't have to do all that effort of trying to make the happy fluffy hero batman and the edgy punches his sons Batman fit into one character. The writing does it and does it in a more realistic fashion too, which is saying something considering the big Bruce and Cass emotional fight is solved by Bruce letting them both get drugged and fight bloodlusted. I do think there are moments when it hypes Bruce's bad parenting up a tiny bit but compared to the absolute mess that is the writing of say, Bruce and Jason? It's just so much easier to actually engage with. Being on the same page as a narrative instead of chafing against it is just a much better way for me to read comics.

That's not to say there isn't any kind of narrative and canon dynamic for Bruce and the Robins. Tim's Robin run, Dick's various runs, UTRH, Batman and Robin etc. Just that for me none of them hit that balance Cass and Bruce's dynamic succeeded in hitting during Batgirl 2000. And to be fair it's harder to hit that balance when you're working with characters who have been through the hands of so many different authors before landing on your doorstop. UTRH probably comes closest but unfortunately everything that came after that did manage to shake the emotional foundation utrh set up to the point you can look back on it and wonder if Bruce cared about Jason much at all, despite the writer clearly not wanting it to be seen that way.

Not sure how much sense this makes but to me it's the difference between a bad parent Bruce I am actually interested in engaging with and a bad parent Bruce where I just want the kids to team up and knock his teeth out.

#dc #cassandra cain #batfam #bruce wayne #dc rambles #This is a very long and very rambley ramble. Sorry if you've made it to the end and are confused #I'm not sure if I had a point or if I was just thinking aloud #And I'm sure others will disagree with me here #But this was mostly me trying to tease through why I can accept comics making Bruce a good dad to Cass #And enjoy it fully. Whereas with the Robin boys I'm like hmm OK #but are you going to address any of the messed up stuff he put them through just last month #“he cares and he's not good at it but he's trying (but jury's still out on how successful his attempts are) "#Vs “he cares and he's good at it PYSCH he needs to be locked up on child abuse charges! Wait jk! it's batman he's a hero don't worry.”

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m00nslippers · 5 years

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Jason is a clever bitch and I love him, in RHATO Issue #32

Okay now we’re finally moving Jason closer to the Winick version that I think is most people’s favorite Red hood--it’s not there yet, but we’re seeing the hints. The cleverness, the charm, the unrepentant sass. Oh yes, we are going places, I like what I see.

Let’s dive in here.

Whoever made that post about Jason not even needing a cover story about being dead to revive his identity was kind of prophetic because here his cover is basically, “So I wasn’t actually dead. no more details, that’s it.” Which is pretty dang close.

And I’m not sure how he managed any of this without Bruce or Alfred finding out but that is damn impressive. We know they didn’t know because we see Alfred’s reaction shot to seeing him on TV. If we don’t see him interact with a few of the other Gotham vigilantes, (or at least see a reaction shot of them all like, “What!? Jason?! The guy we had to physically blackmail to attend galas is running a casino with parties every night? That Jason?!) at some point I’m going to be pretty disappointed, to be honest.

Also, as we already knew from the solicitations and previews, Jason is taking over the Iceburg lounge and looking fancy while he does it. I love it. Jason can put on an act with the best of the batboys. Look at this well dressed man! And his hair! He has hair again, praise the Lord, hallelujah!

Completely unrelated note, that reporter has some really fancy cuff earrings or something and I’m jealous.

I’m validated for noticing Suzie Su was behind Jason in the previews. She and her sisters are part of his crew basically. It’s actually nice to see villains/characters return, too often they are just one-shot or one-note baddies but Suzie has been there since New 52 RHATO and she got a bit of humanization in the Annual when we meet her sisters. She’s not just some creepy fat lady that creeps on Jason, she’s a big sister who is trying to do her best for her family and I like that Jason acknowledges that and brings her and her family in on his scheme and even gets them out of the crime business sort-of by giving them mostly legit employment.

The way he has a bunch of ladies following him around kind of reminds me of Dick with the girls from St. Hadrian's a little bit. But they were all super into Dick and these girls don’t seem interested in Jason at all except as like a boss, which I like.

Jason, this is the kind of thing you should ask about! Ugggghh ~

Wingman looked older in the last page of the previous issue for some reason, maybe he’s died his hair or something. So we still don’t know what’s going on with him. I was hoping we’d get something, a hint but we’ve literally got nothing to go on here. I honestly think he has some kind of direct relation to Jason. Either he’s his dad’s mind in a different inmates body, or maybe a lost cousin or brother or something, or has something to do with the future like he came from there. It’s got to be one of those things, nothing else makes sense that I can think of.

LOOK AT MY BEAUTIFUL BOY! JUST LOOK AT HIM. LOOK AT THOSE EYELASHES AND BLUE EYES AND THAT SMILE.

Anyone would be charmed. I think Jason is too much of an introvert to like this kind of public job exactly, but I also think he’d be good at it. Dick might be better, because he’s just a natural extrovert, but Jason is still up there. He’s a good actor, and he really cares about people so he’d take care of those he’s in charge of. Jason would be a good boss.

“Started from the bottom now we’re here,” that’s a Drake lyric.

Could these guys be bigger dorks?

Notice that Jason didn’t kill the guys that were causing trouble, he had Miggs (his nickname for Miguel) roll them off to the docks in a ball made with his powers and those dorks were totally right, the room he made was pretty gucci. You got taste, Miguel.These weren’t necessarily real bad guys, they were just punks, and Jason might be killing again but he doesn’t just kill any idiot that gets in his way or causes trouble.

Also, technically they might have been right about Night cheating, we don’t actually know how ‘legit’ the Su sisters are playing things.

I’m sort of torn on the way the colorist is depicting Miguel’s powers, like I miss the glowiness a little bit from New 52 Teen Titans. These look a little too much like normal bricks? But technically that might be better for Miguel, they can pass as normal bricks instead of a power when they have to. They looked clear or white before when the guys walked in there so maybe he can control their color/transparency and glowiness? I still would like to see them look glowy though.

A few things about Miguel: I think these panels illustrated pretty well what their dynamic is supposed to be. I know Jason called Bizarro his ‘friend’ but let’s be honest here, Bizarro isn’t Jason’s friend--he’s his little brother.

Jason compares Miguel to Bizarro and I think that’s key, he sees Miguel as like a little brother that he wants to help. He’s got powers that he doesn’t understand and people keep coming after him for them. I think with Miguel and Tim it was closer to a friendship of equals at least as far as Miguel saw. He admired and respected Tim as a leader and how he always seemed to know what to do, but in the end Miguel was older than Tim, he didn’t feel like he could completely lean on him. It looks like Miguel may have latched on to Jason in that way, since he has the bat-authority too and actually is older than him and a genuinely caring guy. And look at my boy Jason! He comforts and accepts him immediately, it’s so sweat.

Goddamn it, Jason is a good older brother! He’s the best freaking older brother, damn Bruce and the whole family’s bat-morals, man! You’re all missing this! He could have this with Tim and Damian and Duke and even Steph and Cass! He would love that! He would be so good at that! It’s a goddamn tragedy, is what it is.

Also it’s interesting how Miguel acknowledges the reboots, so are his powers related to reality-warping or something so he can sense it? Or it could just be more of this suggestion that a lot of people in the DC universe right now have memories from the previous continuity, so like it all kind of happened even if it technically didn’t type of thing. I kind of thought Miguel’s powers were energy projections made with his mind, like psionically, but maybe they are literally creating matter or something? I don’t know. I really need to read more New 52 Teen Titans to understand him and his powers.

And that line, “A loaded weapon in the hands of a confused teenager. What could go wrong?”

Wow, Jason, you really went there. Referenced you’re own crazy head-state when you went after Bruce in Under the Hood.

Jason is so self-deprecating, you guys.

“When Alexander saw the breadth of his domain, he wept for there were no more worlds to conquer. “ This is apparently a quote from Die Hard, because of course it is. Jason is literally Jake Peralta from Brooklyn 99 confirmed.

Ugh, Lobdell’s version of Bruce is just such an asshole!

First of all, Jason hasn’t ‘betrayed him’ not even once, he was emotionally compromised and broke their agreement because he was acting on those feelings. He made a mistake. And Bruce cared more about his rules than Jason’s intentions or feelings or any of the good will they’d fostered in the last year or two. He acts like Jason sold him out or lied to him, when he never did any of those things.

Also, I don’t think saying, “stay out of Gotham and never come back or I’ll throw down and toss you in Arkham” is another chance, okay? It’s not like Jason got anything out of that deal, it was just Bruce not wanting to go through the trouble of hunting him down outside of Gotham because he straight-up knew that he wouldn’t be able to!

That Pretty Woman reference...

The funny thing is, Jason is more like the character who says that line than Bruce is. Bruce, kicking Jason out of the bat-family, is the one who is making the mistake. He could have had an ally, had say in what Jason did, had some limited control over him if he’d just forgiven him or talked to him at all, but because of his pride now he has none of that.

Now this, this is my shit right here. JASON HAS BRUCE BY THE BALLS. By going public with his identity he’s effectively made himself untouchable by Bruce. He’s got the identity of every Gotham vigilante in his hands, and honestly I really doubt Jason would ever give them up, even out of spite or hatred, he never did before when he could have, (he didn’t tell Hush Bruce’s identity, he just didn’t deny it when Hush figured it out, and we’re not sure if that’s even canon anymore anyway.) but it’s partly Bruce’s own doubt in Jason that is keeping his hands tied! That and the fact that if even one of his kids is outted as a vigilante it really puts the suspicion on him.

But seriously guys. Smart Jason is what Iive for.

God, Jason calling him dad, but only because he’s ‘playing up the act’ of civilian Jason Todd, has got to hurt Bruce. Assuming Lobdell’s version of Bruce has any actual feelings of affection for Jason, otherwise it probably just grates.

Lol, okay, so the situation seems to be that Jason dropped in to the Iceburg lounge to pay Penguin a visit. Cobblepot went, “Oh no! That damned Red Hood is here, hide me!” Ran into his panic room and locked it and Jason was just like, “Well, isn’t this convenient,” and made it so he couldn’t get back out.

And then presumably gangster-rules applied and Jason just got all his businesses because he said they were his and no one wanted to argue? I guess? Lobdell doesn’t give satisfying explanations, you guys. This is a testament to that.

I’m not going to lie though, this is pretty satisfying.

Alright, so I’m really excited for more you guys. This is not a perfect issue, a lot of things are hand waved, Bruce is acting even more out of character than usual, and we still have no dang clue what’s going on with Wingman, but there are definitely things here I like, and i’m looking forward to more.

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