Batman #408

Here it is, one of the major retcons that happened after the transition to Post-Crisis for the Batfam. We’re only focusing on Dick’s appearance, the rest will be dealt with over @whothefuckisjasontodd. 

This entire story is a background retcon and is therefore a flashback, so it doesn’t take place in the present day. 

The major thing this is retconning is something that was only recently established in Secret Origins by the Teen Titans people. One thing that happens in DC is that the different departments sometimes…conflict. Dick belongs to the New Teen Titans folk, and the Batwriters, instead of leaving their Nightwing origin intact, shoehorn in some drama and retcon parts of it for more conflict. 

We open with the Joker, because why not. He’s not quite the face peeling guy from modern comics–not yet anyway–but I still hate his face. 

Dick is shot, and this is the point maybe someone should have reconsidered the complete lack of protection the Robin armor offers. 

It takes some amount of skill to tangle yourself up so effectively and not fall to your death, I suppose. 

Determinator - 2

80s Batdad was pretty free about calling him ‘son’. 

And ‘boy’. Honestly, this retcon of how Dick and Bruce separated ways is the weakest part of this origin. The stuff with Jason is fine–far preferable to the Pre-Crisis one, and feels organic for a new Robin. It’s the part with Dick and the fallout from that where gaping plot holes are apparently. It’s a little similar to the ways that Tim’s origin is weak in places and DC just handwaves it. The longer you think about it the more you go ‘hey wait a minute’. 

The first ‘what’ thing is that honestly, we’re really expected to believe that this is the first time Dick Grayson has ever been seriously injured as Robin? That this is the straw that broke Bruce Wayne’s back and he’s like ‘nope this eighteen year old can’t do it, but five minutes from now I’m gonna offer it to this twelve year old street kid under some dubious belief that street kids grow up fast’. 

This is ironic foreshadowing in several ways, really. 

Like…really? The absolute waffling that Bruce is doing here, it’s not surprising Dick is mad at him. One second he’s a child, the next a man, depending on how Bruce wants to spin it. He is literally being the worst kind of ‘do as i say’ father that I’m having actual flashbacks to frustrating arguments with my parents. This is a pure dad move tbh. ‘You’re old enough now to accept my authority’ Bruce pls. 

Anyway, this is pretty clear that Bruce is relating to Dick 100% as his kid and not a friend or little brother. Bruce is also coded quite a bit older here; he’s certainly not coming across as a guy who is close to Dick in age. 

Batdad - 1 

Bruce acts explicitly like a parent towards Dick as opposed to a friendship or partnership. 

Anyway they end on reasonable terms. Dick is basically like ‘whatever you can’t stop me from doing it on my own’ and flounces off to become Nightwing as per the rest of his origin that’s still intact as this point. 

It’s honestly…this wasn’t needed. The Batwriters didn’t bring anything new to the table, and Dick and Bruce are fine really at the end of it, so nothing at this point even changes for their relationship. Dick accepts that Bruce is an overbearing dad and shrugs and goes off and does his own thing, which he was doing anyway because of just naturally growing up. The entire thing just serves to make Bruce look hideously bad when he turns around and makes Jason Robin, but I’ll leave that for Jason’s liveblog. 

Flash #1

Going quickly over to Wally’s book for a bit before heading into Jason’s origin retcon, which contains some retcons for Dick as well. 

The birthdate here conflicts with other sources for Wally, I believe, but here’s another chronology reference for early Post-Crisis. As mentioned earlier they happen a lot early on to establish characters. 

Spoiler alert: he’s not shocked at all. 

This chronology places Wally a little younger than Dick, but the way their birthdates get swapped around makes it a bit hard to pin down, truly. They were born the same year, at any rate. 

Anyway, that’s it for Dick’s cameo over here. Off next to Batman for the first big retcon that will establish the bad blood between Dick and Bruce. 

Blue Beetle #14

The Titans only appear in the beginning of the issue, repairing Ted’s giant…flying…beetle thing. 

Dick’s job is to stand around and look leader-y. 

And we’re done with Blue Beetle. 

Blue Beetle #13

So the Titans end up fighting a Colossus ripoff and it’s pretty standard stuff. 

Though at some point Ted and Dick get so caught up in planning ways to find the bad guys that Joey has to point out that they, uh, didn’t bother to think of the most simple, obvious solution. 

The phone book.

Dicking Around - 1 

Basically, Dick Grayson is the first Robin, Batman’s protege and obvious heir who is held high in esteem and yet sometimes for a laugh or because of plot reasons, writers will write competent characters like idiots. This is a counter to track these instances of incompetence to see how prevalent they are. 

I’ll be paying specific attention to his future solo runs, as I’ve heard a lot of claims that Dick comes across as incompetent during them, which I find hard to believe is a genuine characterization for the character, but will be paying attention to nonetheless. 

This issue ends with (yet) another fight scene and the the bad guys get away again. 

Blue Beetle #12

I still have no idea what’s going on tbh. 

God he’s so 80s.

Nightwing, literally most attractive person in the DCU since forever ago. 

Objectification - 1 

Yeah you knew it was coming. This is not just ‘People are attracted to Dick Grayson’ but that he’s actively objectified either in the narrative or on a meta level. I’m pretty much always going to put villains in here because they generally always come off as super skeevy. 

Blue Beetle #11

I’ll be honest I have very little idea what’s happening here. This issue has a lot of flying beetle’s and people turning into rats and then Gar’s evil stepdad assembles a team to defeat his stepson and the Teen Titans and frankly even Ted Kord is confused. 

Dick and the Titans literally just appear right at the end of the book. This is a multi-part story arc in Blue Beetle so we’ll see what happens in the next issue.

Secret Origins #13

It’s time for an origin establishment! While many books did continue where they left off (including New Teen Titans), a lot of fact dropping and origin retellings happened as a lot of changes were happening to characters due to the Crisis. 

So things like ages and backstories were lampshaded heavily, and origins were retold to establish them in the new continuity. 

This is the first of Dick’s origins in Post-Crisis, superseding any information we had from Pre-Crisis where a contradiction occurs. It will not be the last, but later ones are considered retcons, while this one is more accurately an establishment of his Post-Crisis origin. Parts of it will be retconned very soon in Batman during Jason Todd’s new origin. 

We open with Dick and Joey, after Dick chases a flying alien monkey into the sky for metaphorical and symbolism reasons. This takes place on Dick’s 20th birthday, so back around New Teen Titans 18 or 19. Dick and Joey are good friends and Joey is super sweet, so Dick’s going to tell him his entire origin. 

So, uh, apparently ages 0-4 are when nets are appropriate for small children and one you’re 5 you’re old enough to endanger your life. Good to know. Personally, I now understand why young Dick Grayson wasn’t at all weirded out by his new guardian Bruce Wayne chucking him in front of guns. 

In his Post-Crisis origin, Dick is confirmed to have just turned 10 when his parents die. A later retcon might make him even older, but this is the original Post-Crisis establishment and I believe the youngest Dick can be said to have been in Post-Crisis. So if you’re taking notes for continuity and fic purposes, 10 is the youngest you can go. 

Note that this origin lampshades Dick’s temper and rage, implying it started here and that Bruce’s intervention and the origin of Robin is an outlet for that kind of rage. 

The Original Angry Bird - 3

Robin’s debut was just before he turned 11, giving him a solid number of months just in training. Note that at this point Robin is a name that Batman came up with, not Dick himself. One thing later retcons loved to do with Bruce and Dick was really break their relationship and make things bad between them, even though the softer version of their break is honestly perfectly understandable and natural.

Despite their similarities, Dick really doesn’t want to be just like Bruce

Apple Flew Away - 1 

It’s a theme that Dick really doesn’t want to be like Bruce, and will get ridiculously defensive if his friends call him out for acting just like Bruce. He does at times deliberately do things because he’s trying not to become him. This tracker is for when attention is called to his attempts, no matter how successful or unsuccessful they end up being. 

Follow the Leader - 3

Dick reaches the Titans, and from his retelling it’s apparent that Dick saw early on that being a leader and operating separately from Batman was something that fulfilled him. He values his friends and friendships a lot and even if we didn’t know that Dick was going to grow up and away from Bruce, we would suspect just from the way he talks about his time with them. 

In this origin, Dick’s natural growth and independence is the reason that he and Bruce broke apart. Bruce’s expectations for Dick and the implications that Dick is his son and heir are very strong in the issue. 80s Batdad is also pretty strict and his reaction to Dick deciding that he wasn’t ready for college is, uh, pretty overbearing dad-like.

You’re underselling his reaction a little there, Dickie boy. 

Dick basically says that he wasn’t ready for college, his focus was very much on Robin and because he didn’t need to get a degree and earn a living (Bruce has obviously set him up with money and Dick’s probably on his will as his heir at this point, lbr) he has no driving motivation to do it. Dick admits it freely himself, so it’s an interesting perspective on how growing up in Bruce’s household obviously impacted him. He recognizes that he’s fairly privileged and admits it freely. As someone who values his independence and freedom it’s given him the opportunity to do what he loves and remain untethered to things that would limit his freedom. 

Flying Free - 1

As this is his first Post-Crisis origin, this tracker is to keep track of this strong theme and motivation where Dick places primary importance in his life on his independence and freedom, and actively resists being tethered down or someone attempting to override or decide things for him. 

Dick lampshades that the Titans are his true calling. Working solo isn’t the be all and end all, it’s really working in a team environment. Dick is a natural leader and people person who gets fulfillment out of working with others, more than he ever would just running around solo. This is the basis of this character’s growth since Pre-Crisis and the popular flagship Titans runs. It’s is going to be an interesting contrast to see how later writers justify his relative isolation in his solo run in Bludhaven. 

Anyway this is just very sweet and establishes Dick’s romance with Kory and the reason he’s in love with her, which has little to do with her stunning beauty and everything to do with how she lives life. I’m a little choked up. The New Teen Titans really did do a great romance between these two. Dick also hangs a lampshade once again on freedom, on a more metaphorical level, so this is also another example of:

Flying Free - 2

At this point Dick’s origin is a pretty standard re-telling of Pre-Crisis, with tweaks mostly to his age as opposed to actual events. Jason Todd’s origin is coming up very soon, where the Batwriters will slaughter Dick and Bruce’s relationship in the name of drama, as they apparently didn’t like the New Teen Titans’ version, which essentially boiled down to ‘Dick grew up’. Considering the mess that the Batwriters made, I wouldn’t consider their version an improvement. 

New Teen Titans #31

This is the last issue of this arc, which is great, because then we can move on to Dick doing things other than being brainwashed. 

Dick doesn’t appear for the climatic fight where Raven is like ‘lol nope’ and wins the day and a bunch of reporters want interviews with the triumphant Titans, but following that is an epilogue, which provides us with some closure. 

It looks like an unusually dressed family ready to sit down for dinner tbh. 

Robin is about to take his leave, and he really hopes Batman hasn’t...watched the news and figured out where he’s been (80s Batdad is super strict, okay, Jason can’t patrol on school nights either, and Bruce is still mad Dick dropped out of college).

Dick Grayson kind of lives for calling Bruce out tbh. Anyway this is cute Dick and Jason stuff, pre-retcons for both of them (this arc is explicitly still canon in the 2000s with the later retcons just...influencing it a bit. Geoff Johns clearly didn’t read it though because Raven didn’t even meet Jason while not brainwashed, so she can suck an egg and stop victim blaming tbh). 

Little Wing - 1 

Much is made of how little Dick and Jason interacted and the quality of their interactions in canon, so this is a pretty simple counter. Just tracking Dick being an okay brother to Jason or holding affection for him. Will obviously see limited use after Jason’s death. This counter kind of opposes Dick Grayson: Only Child, but it’s specifically for Jason rather than the rest of the batkids as a whole, who aren’t quite as complicated by the various retcons that happened during the late 80s before Jason’s death. 

Your mileage may vary about how much this counts since Jason’s backstory retcon and Dick’s firing of Robin retcon having been applied yet, but as this story is quite explicitly Post-Crisis, those retcons don’t completely supersede the existence of this storyline (just like Nightwing: Year One doesn’t erase this story from being Post-Crisis canon). 

Dick asks his teammates for forgiveness for being a giant asshole while under the influence of Blood, because he’s a good guy at heart. Kory remains awesome and extremely protective of him and it’s very cute. 

Donna is basically ‘in hindsight, maybe you were a little angrier and meaner than usual’. It’s a bit of a backhanded compliment lmao. 

Cyborg tells it like it is. 

Donna is basically like ‘pls take it back dear god’ about being the Titans leader.

But Dick is like ‘finder’s keepers’ and then Kory is basically like ‘i have lived too long without his touch’ get it Kory, and runs off with him, literally. 

It pleases me immensely whenever she just picks him up and carries him off. 

Unfortunately, Dick hasn’t forgotten that Kory is a married lady now, and while Kory is like ‘so?’, Dick puts a bit more importance on it. 

...also Dick apparently thinks that she’s married to her brother and not Karras, I’m crolling Marv pls I can’t believe an editor didn’t pick that up. 

It matters to Dick that Kory married her brother, okay, he does not support incest. 

And that’s the end of that. For now.

New Teen Titans #30

Things pick up where they left off, with the Titans in a bind. 

Poor cyborg. But it’s enough to have Dick snapping out of his brainwashing briefly to save him. 

I decided not to count each instance of brainwashing in the counter because Mother Mayhem is like whammying him every other panel at this point. 

The cavalry gains a bunch of prominent heroes including Superman, but the Church of Blood starts attacking major cities with tanks and brainwashed people, so they all go to deal with that, leaving Magenta (Francis Kane, who gathered them) to be like ‘???? BUT BROTHER BLOOD IS CONTROLLING THEM IF WE DEFEAT HIM IT’LL BE FINE’ but she’s basically the prophet Cassandra in this scenario.

Anyway, somewhere Jason lets out a sigh of relief without knowing why because Batdad gets dragged off by Superman and still doesn’t know his younger kid is involved in this mess.

And by somewhere, I mean right here. This panel is adorable what kind of Big Brother Worship. 

Big Bird - 1 

The little siblings that Dick accumulates are thought to have a tendency to hero worship the original Robin, this counter is to track how prevalent that actually occurs in canon. Will also include the occasional non-Batfam kids he mentors, if he’s taking that kind of role with them. 

The Church of Blood has now decided that Dick Grayson is more trouble than he’s worth brainwashed, cause he keeps breaking it, so they’re going to execute him. But not right away. They’re going to wait, and put him on a ship and take him to another country and execute him there, because that country has laws that will allow it to happen or something (that’s literally their reasoning I’m aghast at this logic tbh but they’re a cult so I’m also not shocked). 

Robin drops down to break Raven out of her brainwashing, or try to, by showing her what the Church did to her mother.

Meanwhile, the captured Teen Titans are being shipped off to be executed, legally, and are saved by Magenta. Donna calls Dick useless and the Titans go to save the day. 

Dick’s role in this arc is definitely damsel in distress, it’s quite fun.