Meet the Absolute Robin's - Absolute Batman #19

[icon_uk]

How to kill my interest in Absolute Robin's in one panel

I confess I've only been glancing at the Absolute Batman title, it's just.. not to my tastes. If you're enjoying it, then more power to you, but not for me.

However, me also being me, I was interested to see what they'd do with the concept of Robin.

So how does the latest issue introduce the concept? With one panel they poured cold water over me.






The first person they introduce as running the Robin Program is Slade bloody Wilson? Whose everyone remembers for grooming the distinctly underage Terra, and who in many iterations has something of an obsession with Dick Grayon's Robin? (and yeah, I appreciate the irony in that sentence)

THIS IS NOT A CHARACTER YOU INTRODUCE LEADING A BUNCH OF KIDS!! This is a character you take a flamethrower to if he goes within 500 yeards of a schoolyard.

Ahem, sorry, had to get out of my system.

Also NINE Stars and Stripes behind him? Guy trying too hard to make a "patriotic" point.





Based on covers, we also know they're going full Sentai/Giant Robot



Which is at least a novel idea, but seriously?!?

Oh well, maybe the next issue will delight me utterly... though I'm not holding out TOO much hope
 

Comments

[cainofdreaming]

Hopefully they at least have a combiner.

[wizardru]

So, are they sanctioned by the government or the police? Or just vigilantes that hold press conferences?

[blues32]

Government, I imagine. After having their palms liberally greased with Joker's cash anyway. Or perhaps just blackmail.

[blues32]

So Slade is "The Man Who Was All Used Up"?

[icon_uk]

Looks more than a bit like Marvel's Deathlok

[cainofdreaming]

Not enough necrotized flesh. And Deathlok actually has two eyes, even if one is either a big yellow or a red cybernetic orb.

[thenicochan]

The idea of the Robins as a Voltron esque team would make a fun AU book-- it's the stuff fanfic is made of. I don't love the art so much, but I love Tim pulling his shades off in the group shot in the most scathingly sassy way.

It's been so long since Tim was allowed to have any sauce.

[thanekos]

There is a symmetry in " Snyder/Dragotta setting up Absolute Deathstroke as primarily Alfred's enemy -> Absolute Deathstroke's running the Robins ".

[shakalooloo]

The framing is that Batman will save the kids from Slade, I guess? So that's a good thing.

[blues32]

Not sure if that's possible. Joker had a hold of them before Slade did. He probably messed them up something fierce.

[scorntx]

So at some point they're going to be joined by a sixth team member, right?
Ordinarily, I'd go with it being Carrie, but given this is Scott Snyder, odds seem a lot better it'd be Harper.


(... Steph being the same height as Dick and Jason just feels wrong.
Darkseid's evil really has tainted everything.)

[super_fly]

I mean isn't this the point of the Absolute universe? Taking everything you know and love about DC and making it wrong, because Darkseid poisons everything in it.

[akodo_rokku]

Yeah. This is the Bad Place.

[jlbarnett]

considering the number of heroes we still have I feel like it's more like Darkseid's failure to completely ruin everything

[superfangirl1]

The Robins are really cool idea, I wonder how they will go plot wise? Will they be heroic, but just misguided?

[sisterofbloomerjunior]

The God-damned Bat Zaku.

[mastermahan]

I generally like Absolute Batman, just because it's fun seeing the mythos filtered through Cronenbergian body horror. A Poison Ivy whose face splits apart? Yeah, sounds good to me.

And because so much of it is horror, I'd honestly be fine if we just skipped the Robins. I don't want to see these characters inflicted with gruesome fates like everyone in this book. I expect them to have the same level of ill fortune as horny teens at Camp Crystal Lake, or lesser Teen Titans.

Or, alternately, make Robin Sentai Team an Elseworld, because I'm not sure it fits this title.