Corny And I Widowmaker'ed Dick, And I Am Having A Lot Of Feelings.

Corny and I Widowmaker'ed Dick, and I am having a lot of feelings.

Because I'm 99.9% sure Dick Grayson would rather die than have his own emotions and passions ripped away from him so he could be more easily controlled with his own pre-existing adrenaline addiction.

You're right and you should say it

Um yeah so, when did Dick and Tim swap personalities?

Consumate planning planner. The dude who brood and gloom. The OverAcheiver. The Workaholic. The dude with the stick up his butt about rules. The Second Best Detective. The “Big Brain.” The dude who is 10000000% tough on himself. The #FearOfFailing. The dude who checked Bruce’s ego, and Bruce’s methodology, and didn’t blindly follow along. The master Manipulator. The Master of the chessboard and its pieces. Secretive. Finesse. Business savvy.

All of that was Dick, along with being kind and big hearted, for SEVERAL decades. So what gives?

The fly by the seat of his pants goofball with a good heart, who Hail Mary’d his way through the Hero gig, and improv’d damn well, who had brilliant instincts, but was kinda bad with emotions, and had the all the gusto of the Little-Engine-That-Could was Tim, a funny mix of smarty pants and Idiot.

Sooo WTF, peeps?

One of my absolute favorite things about Young Justice is the mind link. Seriously, just imagine all of the crazy stuff the team can do when they can actually read each other’s minds during a mission:  

- Infinite Rickrolls  - Wally making an obvious effort to not call Robin “Dick” when they’re linked and getting really frustrated    - Being spoiled about Christmas presents and surprise parties  - When one member gets hurt everyone feels it  - Dick and Wally trying to see how loud they can scream in their minds until Kaldur starts yelling at them   - Something blows up and everyone simultaneously goes “same"  - Everyone cringing when Conner and M'gann have really loud dirty thoughts about each other  - Hearing Kaldur mentally sigh at least fifteen times a mission  - When one person has a song stuck in their head, everyone gets the song in their head   - This of course leads to the entire team becoming a silent choir as they all mentally belt out Let It Go together while beating up bad guys  - When Raquel first joined, they learned that ”??????“ makes an actual sound in ones head  - Zatanna thinking backwards and giving everyone a headache  - They even linked up Wolf once just to see what it was like and they heard weird stuff like “Boy? Boy is bird?? He is puppy??? Need cuddles??? Must protect!!!” “Superboy!💗💗💗💗 Human! Best human! Best human in whole world!” “I good boy?? Treats????” “BANE BAD. KILL BANE. HE HURT BABIES?!?!?! BITE. BITE. BITE!!! I TREATS??? I DID GOOD??????” It was definitely a learning experience about how dogs work, and they also learned about how Wolf sees Robin as a small puppy in need of protection, so that was fun to tease him about.   - Conner screams even in his mind  - There is no privacy whatsoever, so that’s how the team learned things about each other that they will definitely regret knowing  - Artemis and Wally flirting all the time just to make everyone uncomfortable - Falling asleep on stakeouts leads to seeing each other’s dreams and even interacting in them - Once Wally had a nightmare about his father and everyone saw it, though Wally had no idea and was confused when they spent the rest of the week being really nice to him - On really traumatic missions, sometimes one member will get flashbacks and all of them see it too   - Dick singing Bohemian Rhapsody for five hours straight  - The team learning that M'gann curses like a sailor in her head   - Kaldur mentally goes “WTF” so many times they lost count  - Silently judging everyone together 

I just really love the mind link concept okay? 

Wither and Decay...

Guys, I’m really really...I Don’t understand this whole discourse about Tim having *more* of a say over the Robin mantle because he established something “unique” about it?

I understand why this is a widely popular take. It’s been on-blast in our faces because of comics articles and creator/writers (who wrote storylines or arcs withTim as Robin) saying that Tim was a brand established “better Robin.”

But do the math with me guys...

I’m guessing y’all read Tim Drake as both Robin and Red Robin, and probably didn’t read Dick’s run as Robin because it’s 44 years of cross titles and issues and it’s dated and it’s a MASSIVE bulk of info...

44 years is A LOT of ground to cover (and it so happens to be 13 years MORE than the COMBINATION of Tim’s years as both Robin and Red Robin btw).

What did you guys think he was doing during that time?

There is a FORMULA to Robin.

Robin is a child who excels. A child who is a cut above other average children because he is filled with almost inhuman tenacity. He is way above average intelligence, a gifted prodigy. He is at peak, or beyond the peak of most athletes. He accompanies Batman, and is the Watson figure to Bruce’s Sherlock, acting as both sounding board and ego check, as well as student and family member. He’s also the humanizing factor to Batman, essentially symbolizing Light and Hope for Batman to keep himslef sane by (like the weirdo co-dependent figure Bruce is).

Now, Robin is ALL of this ONLY because Dick created this TEMPLATE and, the following is Very Important...

Because he WAS Robin.

(Remember we always say that Dick never needed a name or a partition in his ID because he was a different hero than Bruce, a person who is fundamentally himself regardless of what name he goes by, with a few instances of him having to dumb down his knowledge/skill sets because he needed to protect Batman’s secret ID.)

What? Did you think Dick’s version of Robin was only Puns and Sunshine?

Did you think Tim Drake exists in a vacuum that isn’t influenced/SUSTAINED by all these very qualities?

Tim was created to *be* Robin, ergo, he took on A LOT of characteristics/attributes already *established* by Robin/Dick.

Because-say it with me now-Tim follows the SAME template.

Seriously, he’s like an AU!Dick, if Dick was some rich kid who happened to watch the Grayson’s fall to their deaths, and happened to see the quad flip performed that night and then happened to see Dick!Robin do it too, and through his (really overinflated) “Detective Powers of Observation” decided a very obvious 1 plus a *very* obvious 1 equaled a VERY OBVIOUS 2.

(It’s really not as amazing as Retcons makes it, but that’s A WHOLE OTHER THING.)

Tim happened because Bat Offices wanted a Dick/Robin-like character to fill the Void. And they wanted a character type that was similar enough that it wouldn’t shake the boat so much in that oh so iconic Batman & Robin Duo we luv so much.

(Seriously, why else do you think Tim survived so long? There was a Robin Recipe already established 44 years before he came along.)

Dick was OG NERD ROBIN. Chemist. Scientist. Accordion-playing, jingle-singing, intense, brooding, focused, no-nonsense, Mathematical GENIUS. Detective...etc.

Is this all sounding familiar? Well, it *should*

44 years of it ain’t a thing to handwave away. Dick Grayson established about 90% of what is TEXTBOOK Robin traits.

And the thing that Tim reaaaaally brought to the table...

Was the fact that he wasn’t Perfect.

Being *such* a goofball HOT MESS (tm), doing the Robin gig with 50% MORE INSECURITY...

That made Tim oddly endearing and unique as a Robin.

And his Intelligence and Methodology and ways of expressing both, as well as his own personality was hella Unique compared to poor Jason Todd pre-Crisis who was a Carbon Copy of his Bro.

Tim Drake was flighty, nervous, not quite self aware but trying to be and sincere about his exploits and insecurity playing/acting the Hero. It didn’t come to him naturally.

He was the HARD WORKING, Robin. UNIQUE and unto himself...

For all of 17 years until they switched his personality with his brother, Dick (conveniently in time for Infinite Crisis where Dick was “supposed” to have Died).

Read this for further elaboration of this Swap:

https://knight-on-the-rise.tumblr.com/post/626836604006350848/from-buttas-for-when-dick-became-more

So then he spends the next 14 years predominantly as this weirdly unhealthy version of Dick (with maybe a few offshoot instances where he’s back to being himslef again). And during these years he gets the Titles of “Best Robin” and “Second Best Detective,” and it sells this idea that he brought something to the table that is way way waaaay more Valid than anything that his brothers ever brought to the table...

And I’m over here just 🤭 at the basic Uninformed, Dissconnectedness of it all, while kinda wondering at the kind of Bias that goes into NOT putting these threads TOGETHER?!!!!

Seriously? SERIOUSLY?!!

GOLDEN AGE FIGURE do you NOT get what that means?!!!!

It ain’t even competition, my dudes. Dick MADE Robin, and every child that comes after him is essentially working off the Template he first established 80 YEARS AGO.

THAT needs to carry some weight. I mean it’s even beyond the argument of favorites or bias. Those are behavioral archetypes that are offshoots of what Dick himself established.

So saying Tim has more say in where or to whom Robin goes because he made it “unique” is like saying the guy who copied from a blueprint gets more say over the bloody Inventor.

Seriously...Tim is textbook nepotism if I ever saw it. Young hero team made up of sidekicks ringing any bells?

(Oh no but Young Justice was *Totally* different...yeah totally).

(Yeah and then he “graduated” to Teen Titans)

(But...that’s just development)

(Uh huh)

Hell, Tim was himself for 17 years only. Uniqueness stopped in that moment. So he didn’t even get a chance to Reinvent Robin properly.

And the weird version of him that came after turned him into The Most Unhealthy little Meglomaniac, that would eventually devolve into Gun-toting Batman so...

Unless y’all were going for that sorta “reinvention,” in which case the position of murdering ex-Robin has been filled lol.

YAY UNIQUENESS...?

And time itself nerfs Dick’s exploits as Robin just because the gadgetry and aesthetics of the times doesn’t really translate how aesthetically and technically sophisticated fictional storytelling has gotten...and y’all get distracted by the bare legs and pixie boots but don’t acknowledge him yeeting the Joker off a scaffold at 8-9, or standing up to Blood’s mental torture at 17, leading the first group of young heroes against demons, would-be gods, inter dimensional conquerors...etc

Oh and the very FACT they LET A CHILD BE A SUPERHERO IN THE FIRST PLACE WAS BECAUSE HE WAS SOOO GIFTED!!

But I assure you, if we see a faithful reinterpretation of HIS Robin, set in slightly more modern times, there’s a reason why he not only made the Mold but Broke it when it came to BEING Robin, because that’s who he was. (And why authors and creators seek to recreate it with their Mary Sue self-insert ‘OC’)

And why Dick Grayson, above all the others that came after him, has MORE of a right to say where Robin is needed.

And if canon told us anything, any decision Dick makes (while written in character) is always going to be the Most Selfless and Heroic one, because that’s who he is.

Seriously, if you don’t believe me. Ask yourself. Which choice between Tim returning to and having a greater say over Robin, and Damian keeping the mantle, produced the MOST Regression of character development?

(I am cackling at seeing Tim as a 12 year old again. Hope this time they keep him In Character for longer than 17 years).

Oh but yeah Tim “made the mantle his.”

“Oh it was soooooo a part of him that he went by Red Robin because he couldn’t move beyond it!!!”

Lol first off...Multiversal Nepotism thy name is Tim Drake. Just the fact that title was some AU Dick’s automatically made it FREE REALESTATE for Tim (and Jason)

I’m like...guys, wake up and smell THE UNHEALTHY PATTERN here?

My OTP is Dick/ground breaking growth and sense of autonomy. What’s yours?

“Oh it’s parasiting off of Big Bro’s pre established character traits and or identities, and ANY and ALL his exploits, and then pretending as if THAT is not occurring, and giving full credit and favoritism and Bias to my fav...but it’s TOTALLY different. Totally.”

Me:

😐

Some of you are living your BEST LIVES in an alternate universe. And some of us are worried.

Editorial and writing reasons aside, I still think its hilarious how so many heroes want to be in the Justice League, but don’t get the chance, or are only in one roster for like a month and never come back. And then there is Nightwing, who has been canonically offered a JL membership multiple times and a spot on the active roster and he sort of is expected to lead it in the future. But he is like “nah I’m good” but still sometimes has to begrudgingly accept because Batman is missing or some other nonsense.