One Perfect moment - Dick gives up the pixie boots Pt 2

[icon_uk]

In the first Perfect Moment, we saw Dick announce his intention to give up being Robin to the Titans, these are his oldest friends and staunchest allies, people he trusts implicitly and shares a bond with.

Now comes the trickier part, telling his Dad..

It's important to remember that this is pre-Crisis, Jason Todd was also an orphaned acrobat, a genuinely nice kid, No street punk angst here.

Also that Batman would never DREAM of telling Dick (especially one over the age of 18) what heroic identity he could, or could not hold. It's a consistent flaw in the post-Crisis Jason Todd Mk2 universe that Bruce Wayne feels he has the right and authority to dictate what identity Dick uses, never mind relieving him of duty because he either A) was injured in a case as an adult (despite having suffered much more grievous injuries as a minor) or B) failing to be there for Batman when Batman wanted him there (Note "wanted", not necessarily "needed"), depending on whether you're reading the original or the modified version of the scene.

The "firing" depicts Bruce's control freak tendencies trumping his parental responsibilities to Dick, and is pretty much entirely reprehensible. Batman saying he's not prepared to take responsibility for Dick is one thing (Though should be very OOC) but to deny him the heroic identity he created for himself and earned the respect of much of heroic population with just comes across as spiteful.

This though is 1984, in DC terms a gentler time, one much less dependent on Batman being a mega-jerk to all and sundry (never mind his oldest son) for cheap drama, this is about people, a parent and the young man he adopted and raised.

From writer Doug Moench, and exquisite art team of Don Newton and Alfredo Alcala, I present, One Perfect Moment from Batman 368

Leafing through this issue again I wish I could post more of it, the art is absolutely beautiful, and the story a powerful one, but ones has to keep ones own rules.

Anyway, back to the plot at hand. Strawberry blond Jason has tried being Batman's sidekick but initially hasn't got a hero name of his own. Then he dyes his hair black and borrows a Robin costume, which infuriates Batman because it's not Jason's ID to use.

So Jason has switched back to his original costume, but keeps the black hair. He and Bruce have spent several pages trying to come up with new names... none of which work.



..we cut away to a scene involving Crazy Quilt setting up shop again, but that's not relevant to his sequence. Then we head back to...




Newton drawing Robin's = Love



And that was how it used to be done folks. Mutual respect, paternal pride in a son who has outgrown his original role and is ready to embrace a new one, whilst at the same time wanting to hand on his own legacy to the newest member of the family.

Yeah, that was worth losing to "You're FIRED Dick!" wasn't it... :(

Comments

[keeva]

i read that first panel as...

"Looks like this is one time when a rose is NOT a rose by any other name..."

YEEEEEAAAAAAHHHHHHH

[benicio127]

Awwwww. Though I do like Dick's passing on the torch in Batman 416. He and Bruce do get into quite the diva blow-out.

[jaybee3]

But then we're supposed to believe that Bruce forced Jason to dye his hair from red to black, when they hadn't even agreed on him being "Robin" yet?
Whatever, Morrison.

Interesting to compare the relations between Jason and Dick here to the last time we see them in BftC (aka Crazed Gattman Jason) to Morrison's B&R (balding red-haired Red Hood Jason). They've come a long way.

[requiem2adream]

Yeah, that was worth losing to "You're FIRED Dick!" wasn't it... :(

yeah, totally. Absolutely :/



This is a perfect moment. I love it when the Bat-boys act like a proper family like this. It makes my heart happy.

[rordulum]

I'd love to hear current continuity Jason Todd using 'gosh' in a sentence.

Yeah, it's a shame this is no longer in continuity (or is it again? I tend to lose track) as it's much better than Batman being borderline sociopathic in his driving away of Dick.

[icon_uk]

And even Dick is pushing his limits with referring to something as "spiffy"! :)

[his-spiffyness.livejournal.com]

I liked Jason's non-Robin costume a lot better.

[falseaesop]

Can definatly see hints of Tim's future costume in it.

[irrelevant]

Oh god, I miss these days so much.

Miss this Jay. Miss the caring Dick and Bruce showed each other. I need to go read some pre-Crisis Bats.

And okay, back to hating the first Crisis. Again. D:

Also, Morrison? You need to get your Jay continuities straight. *eyeroll*

[proteus_lives]

Makes me think of the final scene of the Under the Hood movie. Which was heart-breaking.

[ficticons]

Lovely. I like Jason's enthusiasm about getting the Robin suit while at the same time being in utter awe of Dick, Bruce realizing what this handover means for Dick, and some of the dialogue (particularly "did I pass the mustard?"* "Only at a hotdog cookout, Jay. On occasions like this, the word is "muster" - and you pass it, all right, with flying colors" and "So long, Robin. Be great.")

Out of curiosity, what issues are the post-crisis "relievings of duty" in?

* before reading the second and third word balloons I was all "what's mustard got to do with this??" :P. I think I even went back and read the previosu panels to see if I'd missed anything.

[aubreys_master]

Batman 408 (I believe) for the original post-Crisis version, and Nightwing: Year One (issues 101-106) for the later update. :)

[icon_uk]

Note that Dick is the first person to "properly" call Jason Robin, after the handover. His wishing good luck to not just Jason, but his old ID.

A shame I couldn't include the discussion that Bruce and Jason have immediately after this, where they discuss the fact that Jason has been given not just a legacy, but a repsonsibility, and acknowledging the fact that Dick has taken it upon himself to start from scratch again. (More or less)

[megami18]

Well, as much as I do love this scene, and I know that I will be extremely unpopular here for saying this, but I kind of prefer the angsty-tension between Bruce and Dick. I kind of like a Bruce who can do so much for others but always shoots himself in the foot when it comes to his own relationships. I always thought that when Bruce fired Dick he really expected Dick to return home and, obviously, became very lonely when he didn't. I like a Bruce who just can't bring himself to admit how much he needs his loved ones to be close.

Okay, feel free to throw virtual objects at me. I'm ready!

[irrelevant]

Wing ding or batarang? XD

I guess I'm just an old, old school girl. Overly angsty Bats get on my nerves, possibly because there really is such a thing as too much angst, and the Batfamily filled that quota years ago.

[megami18]

"Wing ding or batarang?"

Hm. What does it say about me if I say "both, please!"?

See why I like an angsty Batman? Glutton for punishment. :P

[icon_uk]

Nah, no objects, ot even a discarded pixie boot! Just discussion points.

The problem with angsty-Bat is that is, IMHO, makes him seem insufferably juvenile and thus unfintely less admirable. The Batman who would irrationally fire Dick the way he did is not the same Batman who could empathise enough to take on Dick in the first place.

Essentially he abrogates repsonsibility for Dick because it's inconvenient to him, no matter how he tries to dress it up.

Ironically, with Jason Mk1, Bruce would have had a sort of claim to the Robin identity since he created it for his own training as a teenager. With Jason Mk2's timeline Robin is, and always has been, Dick's creation. Batman had no more right to say he couldn't be Robin than he would have to say that Clark couldn't be Superman, or Diana Wonder Woman.

Instead of a gradual shift, highlighting maturity in Dick, with Dick having learned independence from his college days, and his leadership of the Titans showing that he has a new role to fulfil, we have his father figure acting like a complete idiot, with the emotional maturity of a three year old shouting at him hysterically "If you won't play my way then you won't play at all... so there... Nyah!" it's only a wonder Dick didn't tell him to sod off an continue being Robin just to spite him.

[axelrod]

I'm not very familiar with canon - there's a lot of it, after all - but is it possible to argue that Bruce has changed over the years to become less forgiving and more rigid? Good qualities - high standards, discipline - are starting to become bad qualities. He's getting older and so is Alfred - even Batman has to have some complicated feelings about his own death and that of his oldest family member, friend, and ally, who is the one person who WILL NOT LEAVE HIM. I don't know if it's true that his authority is challenged more often by various Gotham-based capes, but if so perhaps being challenged makes him unwilling to admit he's wrong about anything. Hence how he treats Stephanie, perhaps - he's in charge, he doesn't have to explain himself, and he doesn't have to take her skills into consideration when what he wants is to be in control.

To a certain extent, this is a Watsonian attempt to explain major differences in characterization, but is it feasible? Esp with the right Bruce-POV fanfic, probably a series of vignettes spanning several incarnations of Robin ...

[irrelevant]

but is it feasible?

Bruce before the Crisis was an entirely different creature from Bruce after the crisis. And there was no good explanation for the change aside from the fact that the writers wanted to make the Bat family interactions 'edgier'.

In 1986, you had forty-some odd years of Bruce and Dick caring for each other, showing that caring, pretty much working together and hearing each other out and not being dicks to each other. I'm sorry, but there is no good in-continuity explanation for the abrupt change. Which is why a number of older Batman fans who still read Bat comics roll their eyes at the progression of the newer continuity.

Is what you're describing feasible? Imo, no. There isn't much that can explain the dividing line of the crisis except for, oh, the crisis itself making a bunch of DC characters suddenly OOC. Which is patently ridiculous, but you know, comics. *shrugs*

[psychopathicus_rex]

So what ARE the names they've come up with, then?

[jelly_ace]

IIRC "Guano" was one of them.

[psychopathicus_rex]

Now THERE'S a kid with self-esteem problems.

[irrelevant]

*snicker*

Actually, it was a joke -- you have to have read the issue in question, and it was pretty funny. XD

[psychopathicus_rex]

Actually, I think I've read that bit before; anyway, I knew the context - it's just that, well, taken seriously... I mean, yow.

[irrelevant]

lol. One of the many things pre-Crisis Jay had that post-Crisis Jay really didn't was good self esteem.

[psychopathicus_rex]

So I've gathered.

[icon_uk]

Amongst others, and some more in jest than others; Wonder Boy, Peregrine, Cardinal, Guano and Tonto.

[psychopathicus_rex]

'Peregrine' and 'Cardinal' aren't too bad, actually - they're not quite as snappy as 'Robin', but they're not bad names. I actually named a Robin-expy 'Cardinal' in a short story I wrote once.

[icon_uk]

I'd have opted for "Bluejay" myself, and altered the costumes colours a little.

"Cardinal" isn't bad, but it just wouldn't work for me because when I hear the word, my first thought it for the Roman Catholic role, not the bird.

[psychopathicus_rex]

Isn't there already a 'Bluejay' in the DCU? He was that little tiny guy in the JLE, if I remember correctly. (Of course, that was most likely written AFTER this, but still.) 'Bluebird' might work better.
So do I, but in both instances, whether religious or bird, one of the first things that comes to mind when I hear 'Cardinal' is 'Red', which is a prominent color in the Robin-costume.

[junipepper]

For me, it's a baseball team... But they are very beautiful (the birds, not the ball players); you could make a really striking costume with that basis.

[julian]

I'd seen the Titans stuff before, but not this.

It's a) damn good art (I learned about Don Newton on SD), and b) entertainingly mildly purple prose. ("The atmosphere of the Batcave congeals awkwardly," is an /awesomely/ ridiculous and yet wonderful line.)

Also, I heart Dick & Bruce-as-Dad stuff.

[icon_uk]

If, in all my posts, I have introduced one person to the lovely work of Don Newton, my time has been well spent! :)

[bradygirl_12]

Yeah, the "You're fired!" scenario always came across as cheap soap opera. The only good thing about it was Dick spending time with Clark and getting inspired by the old Kryptonian legend to become Nightwing.

Bruce just acted like an idiot. I can understand his fear for Dick's safety, but after all they've faced together? Seemed a little weird to me. And taking away an identity of Dick's? Douchebag territory, Bruce!

I like seeing a rational Bruce who has his issues but can interact with his family without being a jerk all the time! :)

[sun_soraya]

Now you did it. Dust in the eye? More like a whole beach. :(

That's a very touching scene, well written and beautifully drawn. Is it too hard to produce more high quality comics like this today?

[aaron_bourque]

Being a fan of the idea of each Robin having their own outfit, I actually really like that suit Jason's wearing. But this is pre-Crisis Jason, and it makes sense for him to wear something so circus-y.

[robinzegblu]

Reminds me of Dark Knight Strikes Again when Bruce said Dick "couldn't cut the mustard."