The Jason Todd Chronicles: Batman 411

Wow, it's been a long time since I last visited these comics, ahaha.

Part of the reason for the hiatus was that my computer that had the program I use to get pictures for the blog entries broke and it took me several months to have it fixed (living two and a half hours away from the store that it was purchased at made it kind of difficult). The temporary computer I had during that time didn't have the ability to read the comics through that particular program thanks to several broken keys and general old age, so I wasn't able to do much of anything on it.

But with the return of my actual computer, I can start back up where I left off!

Since this is a continuation of a story from the previous issue, you might want to consult the entry on Batman 410 here before reading this one.

This issue tested my patience for a couple of reasons, first and foremost being that we're still in the two-issues-long Two-Face scheme and the word "two" in some form or fashion was said so many times that I wanted to crush the comic in my hands. I mentioned in the previous entry that I'm not a member of the Two-Face fan club and reading anything with him in it is taxing. There are also a handful of goofy puns that kind of feel out of place, especially when they're coming from Batman himself. In general, there's a lot of eye-roll-worthy dialogue and the arc is handled a little haphazardly. The issue also includes a few '66 Batman moments while trying to play the serious card, and it...doesn't really work, as one would expect.

Our story starts with Two-Face robbing another bank, this time in broad daylight because he knows that Batman won't be out to catch him. As that's going on, Bruce Wayne is attending a board meeting for Wayne Enterprises that for some reason Gordon is present at. Gordon gets word from another officer about the robbery. The scene then jumps to Batman entering Gordon's office during the day and, after the initial shock of seeing the Caped Crusader out in sunlight, Gordon and Bats discuss what they think Two-Face is up to. Batman says that, based on the clues that he and Robin received last issue including the two-pair, that it was likely he was planning four robberies in four days.

My problems with the story start here, as it's never explained why Batman thinks that. My understanding is that he means the two-pair could be a "two times two equals four" kind of conclusion, but that seems like a vague suspicion instead of convincing evidence. And how does he know it would be four days? If Two-Face's compulsion can also includes factors of two, couldn't that mean he'd do four robberies in, I don't know, eight days? Spread them out a little? I'm probably over thinking it, but to me the explanation is just sort of tossed at the reader and assumed to be accepted because "Batman said it."

Batman returns to the cave and meets Alfred, explaining to him what he believes Two-Face's plans are and says that he and Robin have "some serious brainstorming to do." He asks where Jason is and Alfred tells him that he's been in bed all day. Bruce, shocked, goes to Jason's room and asks if he's awake. Jason is seen curled in bed, his face angry, but not visible to Bruce. Jason says that he's awake, and Bruce gets him out of bed by telling him that Two-Face is at it again. Seeing that this could be his opportunity to face the killer of his father, Jason puts on his Robin uniform and meets Bruce down in the cave. Bruce and Alfred both notice that Jason isn't himself. Bruce remarks that "he's never been like this...listless...almost pouting."

I'd like to stop for a moment and say, Bruce, I'm not sure what kind of kid you thought you plucked from Crime Alley, because Jason definitely had some pissy, pouting moments when you first met him. Just saying.

Despite his attitude, the Dynamic Duo head off to stop an unrelated crime and discuss what they think Two-Face's next move will be. Jason says that the evidence he gave them with the two-pair wasn't enough to explain why he varied his M.O. and what his plans were--they're missing something.

The next night, a baseball double-header is going on at one of Gotham's stadiums. Alfred and Gordon attend the game in Bruce and Jason's absence. Here is the type of dialogue that I'm referring to when I say that it tries my patience at just how stupid and ridiculous it is:

Gordon: "Tie game, bottom of the second inning, two strikes, two balls, two men on base..."
Alfred: "Too exciting, Sir!"

...I just. Ugh. That is so head-slappingly stupid, not to mention highly improbable.

While Gordon and Alfred enjoy their awful puns, Two-Face attempts to break into the stadium with his goons. Batman shows up and punches one of the cronies, and then kicks the crap out of Two-Face. He tells Robin to watch Two-Face, who is lying on the ground not quite unconscious, without getting too close. Meanwhile, Batman tackles the rest of the goons to the ground and spouts some more terrible sports-related jokes. Seeing as he has Two-Face alone, Jason grabs him by the throat and starts screaming that he'll kill him. Two-Face kicks Jason off and then punches him, managing to escape. Batman runs after him onto the baseball field and the two exchange even MORE horrendous puns until Two-Face escapes via a rope ladder on the centerfield fence.

Robin catches up to Batman and asks if Two-Face got away. Batman says yes, that he had a car waiting. Gordon shows up and actually uses the word "fruitcake" to refer to Two-Face, and Batman says that he figured Two-Face would have a back-up plan. He and Robin drive home in the Batmobile in silence, as it's pretty clear that Jason lost his cool and was a major reason why Two-Face escaped.

Once they're back in the Batcave, Bruce demands that Jason explain himself. Jason, in typical fashion, replies "I answer to nobody but me!" Bruce calls him on his "tough street kid routine" and goes off on a small monologue about how he invested time in training him, took him into his home, and trusted him.

Then the bubble bursts when Jason yells back: "Trust! Don't make me laugh!"

A trait that will become evident the more the stories involving him progress is that Jason puts a heavy amount of value on being able to trust those around him. He spent so many years alone and having to fend for himself that trust wasn't something that came naturally. In Jason's limited experience, adults were not those who could be trusted: His father was a mobster, his mother died of drug overdose. The primary people in his life who should have instilled that in him weren't there. He acted rude and stand-offish to Bruce in the beginning because he didn't trust him. Once he establishes that bond, however, Jason clings to it--so much so that when that trust is broken, it cuts him deeply.

It's also important to remember that Jason's "tough street kid routine" is exactly that--a routine, an act. He may be tough on the outside, but inside that loss of trust in the first adult to give a damn about him is painful. Jason uses his attitude as a barrier to keep people out. He doesn't want to talk about his actions or his feelings because it requires him to open up and become vulnerable. Aside from that, Jason is still a kid, and communication is not something that children are known to be good at. Learning how to communicate takes time, especially for someone like Jason who is so closed-off and guarded. It's only when he's pushed to the limit that he is able to get across what it is that's bothering him.

And to be fair, Jason is justified in his anger. Bruce kept a big secret from him, and though he did it for Jason's protection, his insistence on keeping those close to him in the dark about certain things will be a decision that plagues him for the rest of his comics existence with everyone, not just Jason. Even as recently as the Death of the Family storyline, Bruce keeps information regarding the Joker and his knowledge of the identities of each member of the Batfamily from them and that comes back to bite all of them in the butt later on. To Bruce's credit, he explains himself to Jason here and does apologize for what he did. He says that loss is harder than combat and that he didn't want blind rage to control him when he went out into the field.

Jason asks if he's "washed up as Robin," and Bruce reassures him by saying that Two-Face beat him, too. This exchange is important for two reasons:

1. One of the angles that writers love to take with Jason is that he was arrogant and over-confident in his abilities. He didn't see his skills as lacking in any way and therefore he made plenty of dumb decisions when it came to combat. These few panels alone would be enough to disprove that notion, as this quite blatantly shows that Jason did question himself and wasn't under the impression that he was invulnerable. He knew he made mistakes and felt bad about them.
2. Bruce recognizes Jason's insecurity and instead of discouraging him, he points out that he makes mistakes, too. Bruce never lost his confidence in Jason, even when he messed up. He suspects from the beginning that there's a reason Jason fell apart. He didn't see it as "typical" for him to be so brash and careless.

I will say that the resolution, by modern writing standards, is much too fast. It has a Saturday morning cartoon vibe to it, since everything is great and wonderful again in the span of like, three panels, but the needed explosion of emotions was cathartic enough that I can look past it a little bit.

Jason then says that he thinks he might know what Two-Face will do for his next crime, and the following night they return to the Lucky Dollar casino from the last issue. Lo and behold, Two-Face is repeating his first robbery. Jason says that robbing the casino a second time was the only way it fit into his pattern. Two-Face shoves a money cart at Batman and runs off towards--I kid you not--"The World's Largest Roulette Wheel. In the most 1966 Batman-esque fashion, Two-Face jumps into the roulette wheel and Batman tells the operator to hit the switch and start spinning it. The downside is a giant ball starts barreling towards Two-Face, and in order to prevent him from being crushed, Jason leaps onto the center pole of the wheel and uses it to spin around and kick the ball out of the way. The dizzy Two-Face is apprehended and the comic ends with a terribly campy exchange between Batman and Robin:

Overall, this is a tough issue to get though. Between the dialogue that ranges from solid to laughable, the awkwardly constructed plot, the haphazard resolution of Jason's anger towards Bruce, strange '66 Batman elements, and some lazy-looking artwork, it's not an issue that I hold in too high of a regard. It's not the worst thing I've read, and it does offer some good insight into both Jason's character and his relationship to Bruce, but it isn't one I intended to re-read again and again.

We're still in the early stages of Jason's Post-Crisis time as Robin, but there's already been ample evidence to prove that there was a lot more to Jason than many modern writers give him credit for. The further along the issues move, the more complicated it gets.

Frank Miller is Writing Another Batman Story Because That's Really What We Needed

You know, there are decisions made by people in this world that confuse me, maybe anger me, or even cause me to lose faith in whoever it is involved in the stupid-decision-making. Most of the time I can shrug them off and move on since, honestly, it's not like my world has been turned upside-down by someone thinking that drawing Jason Todd's helmet like this is a good idea:

And then there are some decisions that are so mind-bogglingly asinine that I'm left staring at my ceiling and wondering if maybe I somehow ended up in a parallel dimension where everything is backwards and nothing makes sense anymore.

It's been confirmed that Frank Miller is going to write, alongside Brian Azzarello, a third and final sequel to his Dark Knight Returns series called "The Master Race." Because when I think of Batman, race is definitely a topic that shoots straight to the forefront of my mind.I'm going to be pretty honest here: I can't stand Frank Miller. I hate his writing. I hate his characters. I hate that the artwork for DK2 looks like a five year-old with schizophrenia drew it. I hate that none of his female characters ever have anything redeemable about them because they're too busy shoving their tits in the reader's face. And I hate that this man continues to get work despite not having produced anything worth reading on the Batman front since 1987's Year One.

Maybe I'm destroying my "comics cred" or "Batman cred" or whatever by saying this, but honestly I think that The Dark Knight Returns and Year One are both okay at best. His characterization of the Joker in TDKR is unsettling in a way that makes me want to throw up my lunch rather than shiver with excitement and interest. The pacing in that book is also an issue, as he dedicates entire pages to drawings of anchormen/women dolling out exposition and using them as a platform for his pseudo-criticism. Year One commits the sin of just being kind of boring, with a Batman that's melodramatic and reads like a weird fanboy impersonating him than the actual character. Oh, and we can't forgot Gordon's totally necessary affair with Sarah Essen.

They're not terrible, and I would recommend reading them if for no other reason than the fact that they ARE iconic and important benchmarks in Batman's history. The fight between Batman and Superman is actually well done and engaging, but apart from that, there's nothing that's altogether worth praising in either of them. At least, not to the extent that everyone else does.

Once you get into DK2 territory and beyond, though, Frank Miller makes it clear that he's been abducted by aliens and they modified his brain in such a way that prevents him from thinking and writing and acting like a normal human being. Also, it may have regressed him back into a thirteen year-old boy mentally.

In DK2, Batman turns into a deranged, self-centered creep that treats everyone around him like their brains are made of mashed potatoes. Superman's character is turned into an incompetent fool. Carrie Kelley is sexualized and given a costume that would allow her to fit in nicely with The Cheetah Girls. Dick Grayson turns into a villain and makes himself look like The Joker because why the hell not. But perhaps the worst element of that book--aside from the atrocious artwork that really does make a case for that alien abduction re-writing his brain so he actually thinks that the world exists inside various MS Paint effects--is that Batman isn't even in the book for most it and instead Miller toggles back and forth between Carrie, The Atom, and various other Justice League members.

Then there's All-Star Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder. Just...I...I can't even fathom how this book got the green light, other than the editor at the time took one too many shots before reading the script. At the time, DC was planning on releasing a series of "All Star" books for their major characters that were designed to go back to basics and tell stories that wouldn't be bogged down by continuity. All-Star Superman went on to be considered one of the greatest Superman stories ever written, All-Star Wonder Woman and All-Star Batgirl never saw publication for various reasons, and All-Batman and Robin...became infamous for all the wrong reasons.

In ASBAR, Batman is a psychotic killer with the intelligence and perspective of an eleven year-old boy. He kidnaps Dick Grayson on the night that his parents are killed, mentally and physically abusing him for the duration of the comic. Alfred has strange romantic feelings for Bruce. Vicki Vale is a horny columnist who doesn't need to be in the story at all and at one point Batman and Robin paint themselves and their entire house yellow so that Green Lantern won't be able to use his ring on them. Oh, and the Justice League get more space and dialogue than the title characters do.

The whole thing is poorly written, badly paced, and showcases everything I hate about Frank Miller and his writing in one neat little unfinished 12-issue story:

You have the over-sexualization of women with Vicky Vale:

...in which it is of vital importance for her to be sauntering around her apartment in nothing but her underwear with giant glass windows behind her as she dictates a news story about the size of Superman's junk versus Batman's. Because superhero penises are what I want to read about when I buy a book called "All-Star Batman and Robin."

Oh, and let's not forget his commentary to Jim Lee, the artist for the book and the source of the only redeeming quality ASBAR has (the artwork):

Miller also seems to think that Wonder Woman's status as a feminist icon means that she is supposed to be a man-hating lesbian who views men as a lower species and therefore refers to them as "sperm banks:"

The trench coat is also mandatory.

Then there's his dialogue, which makes every character sound like they just walked out of Sin City. They're overly aggressive, melodramatic, and crude. And that's when they're not repeating themselves three or four times like they have some kind of disease and need to do so before feeling okay with continuing whatever it was they have to say.

His blatant mischaracterization of everyone is also front and center here. Batgirl has the mouth of a truck driver and Black Canary has become an Irish bartender with a uniform rivaling that of a premiere stripper. Green Lantern is an incompetent idiot and only marginally more intelligent than Superman, who is treated like Batman's bitch and runs across the world to bring a specific doctor to the hospital for Vicki Vale because Batman said so:

Not to mention the way Bruce treats Dick like he's some kind of annoying, unneeded appendage even though he's the one who roped him into becoming his sidekick in the first place:

This also includes demanding that he call himself Robin instead of Robin Hood, which Dick picked out, and forcing the twelve year-old to eat rats in the Batcave for survival rather than, you know, using the billions of dollars that he has to buy the kid a damn Happy Meal.

And let's not forget the subtle but frightening references to pedophilia that pop up every now and again:

Last but not least, the PURPLE. EFFING. PROSE:

 "...dear Gotham calling to me like a sultry siren." What.

His version of Batman nowadays reads a lot more like a crazed fanfiction than anything literary, or even intelligent.

I could write an entire novel on why this book is a stain on humanity, and maybe someday I'll tackle that project. But for now, my main point:

For me, this entire thing screams desperation, but I don't understand why DC should be feeling desperate. After all of the criticism that was launched at them for their New 52 reboot, they seemed to be getting at least a little bit back on track. Convergence is bringing back, at least for two months, a bunch of old characters and universes for fans that haven't seen them in three years, and their post-Convergence lineup of comics looks amazing with Starfire getting her own book along with Cyborg and Martian Manhunter. They have several major blockbusters in the works that are generating all kinds of press. There's also that marketing push that DC and Mattel are working to put together that's focused exlusively on their heroines. DC is showing signs of improvement, that they're interested in entering the year 2015 along with everyone else.

So then why do they feel the need to let Frank Miller get a hold of Batman again? What has he produced as of late that isn't a complete disaster? Why would they let a man who returned to fame because he managed to acquire Meme Status with his "Goddamn Batman" line go anywhere near another Batman title, especially given how successful Snyder has been with his Batman stories?

And worst of all, why are we rehashing a book that was written over thirty years ago when there is so much new material and directions to explore with the character?

My best guess is that there are still rabid fans out there who are stuck in the 80's and would love nothing more than to see a "classic and revered" writer come back for one last hurrah. There must be SOMEONE out there who doesn't care that Miller is a has-been, washed up writer with nothing new or non-offensive to wrestle out of his deranged and crumbling mind.

Whatever the case may be, I'm hoping that this book bombs so hard that DC is forced to tie Miller up with some industrial-quality rope and shove a few pairs of socks into his mouth before tossing him into a broom closet in the darkest, emptiest corner of their office building.

Then I will be satisfied.

The Jason Todd Chronicles: Batman #410

(I am in the middle of yet another head cold, so if there happens to be an error here or there, I blame the sleep deprivation.)

It's been a while since my last entry in this series. Gotta get better at updating more frequently.

I love this issue, and I'm not entirely sure why it seems to stick out amongst the other stories of his I've read. Maybe it's because this is his first official outing under the Robin mantle, or maybe it's because I adore the way Jason is drawn here. But I think my affection comes down to the fact that this issue allows Jason's real personality to shine. In the previous issues, Jason was stand-off-ish and snippy because he didn't know or trust Batman (or any of the adults in the story, to be honest), but here Jason is adjusting to his new life with relative ease. He's curious, intelligent, and not afraid to throw out a few quips here and there. If anything, this issue encompasses all of the things that writers tend to miss whenever they take on Jason's character--all of the good, heroic things that he was capable of and instead focus on the sassy attitude we got in the previous two issues. And of course, they don't seem to understand the context of that attitude, and so he comes off as a little prick.

The story starts out with a small montage of Jason's first six months of training with Bruce, covering the basics of what he went through while supplying general commentary on Bruce's training methods. There's no real explanation of how Jason was shown Batman's identity; it's just kind of assumed that he knew it once Bats took of the cowl. It's a bit of a missed opportunity, I think, as someone like Jason would be a perfect foil for Bruce and their first few days together as father and son/teacher and mentor would have some amazing story possibilities. Oh well.

Jason asks what the giant coin in the Batcave is for one day during training, and Bruce replies that a "certain party" attempted to crush him and the previous Robin underneath it before they found a way out. Jason, after being educated in all of Batman's Rogue's Gallery, remarks that it must have been Two-Face, since the coin was meant to be a giant replica of the one he flips. Bruce says that yes, it was, and Jason asks him why they never went over Two-Face's file in the six months that he had spent researching every villain Batman faced on a regular (or not regular) basis. Based on the information we received last issue via Gordon, it's pretty clear Batman is playing one of his oldest cards: he's keeping the details about Two-Face from Jason on purpose as a means of protecting him, as Two-Face was responsible for the murder of Jason's father. Bruce gives Jason the basic back story of Harvey Dent and how he used to be one of Batman's allies and Bruce's good friend until a mob boss (who apparently has some amazing skills at hiding deadly weapons) threw a vial of acid on him during a court room interrogation and forever scarred his face.

I'm going to come out and say this right now: I don't like Two-Face. There's nothing--absolutely nothing--about any of the schemes he pulls off that I don't find, at best, improbable. Granted, the concept of Batman itself is improbable, but I don't think that the comic version of Two-Face (including the one written by Wolfman/Perez in A Lonely Place of Dying) is convincing enough for me to suspend my disbelief like I can with Batman. And honestly, if nothing else, I find him annoying. His need to do everything in twos is campy and silly to me.*

Regardless, he's the main villain in this story, so it's important to set him up as a character that Jason will be facing. It's hard for me to say whether I agree with Bruce's decision not to tell Jason about his father considering that he's so young. Information like that would be hard for anyone to process, let alone a child. At the same time, Jason does have a right to know what happened to his parent, even if that means that the truth hurts. So it's a tough decision.

Jason says that Two-Face must be unpredictable because of his need to flip his coin before deciding if he will even commit a crime, but Bruce replies that he's quite predictable. Two-Face, as I said above, does everything in a way that involves the number two. Jason says, "That doesn't sound like much to go on," but Bruce replies by saying Robin was always able to see the pattern before he did.

Two things I'd like to mention here:

1. I'm not sure if this was Collins' intention, but the reference to Robin's ability to see the patterns before even Bruce reminds me a lot of the 60's television show. If there's one thing Robin made himself known for there other than his beautifully ridiculous "Holy ______, Batman!" lines, it was his ability to solve riddles thrown at them by Joker and the Riddler. Considering how much comic fans hated that show on the whole, this is both a funny and bizarre reference. I could be looking at things too deeply, but it made me chuckle nonetheless.

2. Here is where we begin to see one of the biggest mistakes that Bruce makes as both a father and mentor: he compares Jason to Dick. I don't think this was intentional on Bruce's part, but it's certainly something that becomes apparent and that contemporary writers love to take and run with. Alfred even mentions, in the conversation between he and Bruce that follows, that he should probably refrain from mentioning the previous protégé as often as he has been, since he thinks it will stand in the way of the progress that Jason has made over the last six months. In typical fashion, he's right, but his thoughts are brushed over by the writers and by default Bruce, who hands Jason the Robin costume without even acknowledging Alfred's complaint. From the get-go, it's clear that Jason has big shoes to fill. Dick as Robin had been such a success--both in the comics and in the minds of readers--that Jason inevitably had a huge shadow to walk under. That isn't to say either Dick or Bruce wanted Jason to fail. In a later issue, Dick even gives Jason his blessing and considers him a worthy successor. But despite good intentions, that pressure to be as good as Dick would always be there. It didn't mix well with Jason's personality.  He already saw himself as someone with a disadvantage because of his background, and his need to prove his own worth exacerbated the problem. It would also be unfair for me to say that Bruce didn't have moments where he reaffirmed Jason's worthiness as Robin (he says that the suit "does belong to the real Robin," referring to Jason), but that personality flaw would be something that haunted him throughout his time beside Batman and after his death. I think it's a compelling flaw that a lot of people have; it humanizes him more, and it's realistic given his circumstances.

Phew. That was long-winded. Back to the story.

After the bat-signal appears in the sky, Batman and Robin meet Gordon and Batman introduces Gordon to his newest protege. I'm assuming that Gordon was the only other person--besides Bruce and Alfred--who knew there was more than one child who donned the Robin persona, but it's not made entirely clear. Gordon is surprised, as Batman had sworn never to endanger another child again. Batman tells Gordon that "this child is older than both of us--not to mention tougher," which I think is another way of Bruce justifying his decision to take Jason in but also an interesting perspective on Jason as a character. Gordon hands Batman an envelope that was addressed to the police station and finds inside it a hand of playing cards, Poker specifically. Jason asks what it means and Batman asks what he thinks it means. Jason replies that he believes it might have something to do with Two-Face, since the cards in the envelope contain a two-pair. Gordon backs up his claim with photographs of two different sets of twins who had been spotted in Gotham, leading Batman to believe that Two-Face is assembling a gang.

Batman decides that Two-Face will strike that night, and the next panel is Two-Face and his new set of cronies standing outside of a Lucky Dollar casino. An armored police car drives up to the casino and several guards hop out. Two-Face explains to one of the pairs of twins that his plan is to follow the guards into the casino and wait until they have the vaults of cash to pull out guns on them and demand the money. The trick is that, because they will be inside a crowded space with hundreds of innocent people, the cops won't shoot while Two-Face and his men collect their bounty and leave. They do just that: Two-Face confronts the cops and the money, and when one of the cops gives him a hard time, he shoots and kills him. The other set of twins drive up to the casino in another armored car and Two-Face tells his men to load the money onto the truck.

Before they can get away, Batman and Robin show up. Batman beats the crap out of Two-Face for a little bit, while Robin, in one of my favorite string of panels ever, goes to town on the twins:

Two-Face asks how Batman figured out where he would be, and Batman says to ask Robin, since he was the one who suggested the casino. Jason explains that Lucky Dollar is the largest casino in the area and was worth a look. But Two-Face pulls a move over on the Dynamic Duo and reveals a second gun in his shirt sleeve, grabbing a bystander and threatening to shoot her. Batman offers himself up as a hostage, but Two-Face declines as he is too powerful and dangerous. Jason, in one his bravest moments, tells Two-Face to take him instead. "I'm just a kid...you can handle me," he says. Jason also points out that he's the second Robin, adding to the allure of him as a hostage. Two-Face gives in and takes Jason out of the casino, showing him his car: a "customized two-door" that's painted half orange and half purple. He asks Jason what he thinks and Jason replies snidely, "It's too much." This whole panel reminds me of a scene that appears in a later comic, although that one isn't fondly remembered by many...

Two-Face, because he's an idiot, doesn't do anything to restrain Jason in any fashion and instead sits him in the passenger seat of his car while pointing the gun at him and telling him not to do anything stupid. Jason slams on the breaks (because apparently the breaks in his car are on the passenger side) and opens the door, sending himself flying out onto the grass. Two-Face decides not to go back and put a bullet in Jason's head and drives off. Batman pulls up in a random pink car where Jason is casually sitting in the grass against a tree. He remarks that the car doesn't look like the Batmobile and Batman says he snagged a civilian car so that Two-Face wouldn't recognize who was driving behind him and decide to shoot Jason in retaliation.

The two return to the Batcave where Alfred commends Jason's job that night and asks Batman about Dick. Bruce says that he's in New York and hopes to speak to him after "things have cooled off a bit." This part of the story doesn't make a whole lot of sense, as I think it's mixing Pre and Post-Crisis continuity a little. The last we saw Dick, their "break-up" as a team ended on relatively peaceful terms. Dick was mad at first, yes, but he seemed to be cooled off by the time the issue ended. Regardless, Jason walks over and asks if the state police have found Two-Face yet and Bruce tells him no, reprimanding Jason for his "foolhardy" decision to make himself a hostage. Jason sheepishly asks if he failed the test--which I guess is referring to whether or not he passed his first outing as Robin, since no specific test was mentioned earlier--but Bruce assures him that he didn't. "The other Robin would've done the same thing," he says. This naturally makes Jason happy, and from the look on his face it's clear that Jason is proud of himself. He asks "Mr. Wayne" if he can stay up a little later and get some homework done. Bruce says to call him just "Bruce" after telling Jason that he can.

I'm not sure if Bruce insisted all of his Robins called him by his first name when not in the field. I mention this detail because later on in Hush, where Jason's resurrection is first brought out onto the table, Batman mentions that he knew the person posing as him was fake since Jason always called him "Bruce" and the person he was fighting kept calling him "Batman." Judd Winnick later brings that element into play in Under the Hood as well. It became a defining feature of his character. But I find it hard to believe that either Dick or Tim would call him "Mr. Wayne" outside of the field, and obviously when they're on patrol they would call him Batman. This just seems like a bit of an oversight to me, though I haven't read enough to know if my assumption is correct.

The comic ends with Jason discovering, through exceptionally convenient computer search methods, that Two-Face is the suspected killer of his father.

My general thoughts on this issue:

• As I mentioned above, Jason's heroic attributes shine here. He demonstrates not only his ability as a detective (albeit through a simple and contrived plot, but hey, it counts) but also as a fighter. He takes out two criminals by himself and then has the audacity to offer himself up as a hostage, knowing full-well how dangerous Two-Face is. One could argue at the end of the issue he makes a dumb move going against Batman's back and searching more information on Two-Face (a decision he makes twice, as we'll see at a later date), but it's important to remember that Jason is still a kid, and sneaking around places he shouldn't isn't anything unsual. Not to mention he had access to those files; the comic doesn't specify that Bruce locked them or kept that information stored away in a secret space on the computer so that Jason had to break into them. They were open for him to look at. How was he supposed to know what information he would find there? 

• The artwork in here, as dated as it can be in places, works well for me. I love how Dave Cockrum made Jason look like an actual child, with a round face and wide eyes. For me, the artwork on kid characters in the 80's was inconsistent; they would look like a child in one issue or even one or two panels and then turn into miniature adults in others. I suppose it matches with the fact that Jason is the youngest here and he grows older the longer he's Robin. Even so, I prefer the innocent look on the character as it exemplifies the Robin persona to me. But that's just a personal preference.

• Batman refers to the Robin costume as a "blouse." And it is hilarious.

Until the next issue!

*I recognize that Batman: The Animated Series as well as The Dark Knight's interpretations of Harvey Dent are largely praised and loved by many. I don't have much of an issue with him in other media, but I find when he's written in the comics that his appearances are tedious, predictable, and boring. There's something about him that doesn't get treated as seriously as other adaptations and maybe that's why I don't like him. Regardless, this is just my opinion, and if you happen to like Two-Face, that's awesome.

The Jason Todd Chronicles: Batman #409

(My intention was to upload one of these at least once a week, but several days ago I was struck with an awful head cold that had me miserable and unable to do much of anything for three or four days--and that I am still recovering from. 'Tis the season. *sigh* As a result, I needed to wait until I was a bit more…functional in order to write this overview. So, I’m a bit late, and this is probably awful writing, but here it is!)

Batman #409 starts out right where the last issue left off, with the first page offering a brief synopsis of what happened in a very epic way: “And on one such night, one such year, the Batman’s annual nocturnal pilgrimage to the site of his parents’ murder has proven particularly satisfying. Because he has been able, this night, to place an orphan of the streets into the hands of those who might insure that young Jason Todd not become…JUST ANOTHER KID ON CRIME ALLEY.”

The irony of this is intentional, as we were left off last time seeing Jason surrounded by a bunch of kids who were ready to attack him with Ma Gunn off to the side smoking a cigar. My biggest nitpick is the use of “on” instead of “in” Crime Alley…but I’m assuming that’s just the way they wrote in the 80’s and complaining about it is pointless.

I'd also like to give a gold star to Max Allen Collins for using the phrase "nocturnal pilgrimage" because it's..it's just amazing. 

The next page gives us a tiny summary of what happened last issue with Batman explaining how he ran into Jason when he tried to steal his car tires and then commenting on how he had street starts but needed a conventional education to get anywhere beyond those streets—and that's why he sent him to Ma Gunn’s school. The dialogue mentions that her methods were “unorthodox,” which makes me curious as to what exactly Bats thought she was doing at this school that was odd but not necessarily dangerous enough to worry him.

The Jason Todd Chronicles: Batman #408

You can read the introduction to this endeavor here.

And so we begin with Jason’s first appearance in Batman #408.

Well…technically this wasn’t his first appearance, either as himself or as Robin, but after Crisis on Infinite Earths, many of the books and characters that had been involved were reconstructed or redefined to new or more interesting dynamics and simplification in their stories. The concept worked for all of like, five minutes because it didn’t take long for things to get messy again with continuity errors, retcons, and Elseworlds stuff.

Jason was one of the characters to have his personality and background changed in a significant way after Crisis. As a result, he got a brand-new telling of his origin in Batman #408, which is why this is written as a first appearance. He was basically a brand-new character. Pre-Crisis, Jason was a circus performer like Dick and so much like the original Robin that, aside from his red hair (that Bruce made him dye because reasons), readers couldn’t tell them apart. Which is great if you had problems with Dick no longer being Robin and turning into Nightwing, but not so much if you’re looking to tell fresh, new stories.

Pictured: Originality

The comic is titled “Did Robin Die Tonight?” which I think is a pretty great title as it has a bit of a double meaning here, as we’ll see in a minute. It’s also a great attention-grabber, although considering that the Joker pops up in page one, I think it’s safe to assume that it could have been titled “Batman and Robin Watch Paint Dry” and people still would have been excited.

Context is Important: The Jason Todd Chronicles (Intro)

(I promise at some point this blog will contain things other than my fan-gushing and rambling about Jason in some form or another. I DO have other interests, I swear.)

I’ve written at length about the crafting and marketing of Jason’s character from post-Crisis until his death in 1988, but despite all of my venting and searching for explanations, there’s still a vast majority of people who either choose to accept that Jason had always been a snot-nosed punk or haven’t read his appearances to form an opinion. After seeing many panels of him from his appearances post-Crisis, it’s easy to assume that the soul-crushing hatred had a legitimate reason to exist. But the problem is most of those panels or pages are taken out of context of the larger story that was being told. When you go back and read his appearances in the comics surrounding certain events or decisions, you get a far more complete picture of those events or decisions and the character motivations behind them. As a result, Jason ends up looking a bit more sympathetic as a tragic figure rather than a pain in the ass.

Basically, context is important.

With that in mind, I’m going to spend the next few weeks delving into the full run of Jason’s appearances starting from post-Crisis and ending with his death. This will include just the issues from Batman (#408-#429) for a couple of reasons:

• His controversial character/revamped backstory are told in Batman. All of the “big-name” events he was involved in also happen here, including his death.
• Detective Comics was inconsistent with his characterization and most of his appearances there treat him as Dick 2.0.
• Because of his short-lived tenure (in real world time, he was only around for about two years in his PC form), there aren’t many times where he pops up in other books or stories.
• Tackling more than one book would be too brain-twisting and headache-inducing.

I’ll include analysis when I feel it’s necessary, but for the most part my goal is to provide people with a way to absorb his history without having to go out and purchase twenty different comics. If you find, at the end of this adventure, that you still don’t like him or don’t see why other people do, that’s fine. But I want people to have an informed dislike of him rather than going by the hatchet-job of his characterization between 1988 and 2011 or on the word of some very sour comic readers.

Enjoy the ride.

Source

A Quick "Defense" of the New 52

The following piece was written while I procrastinated and stressed about my finals. It also took about two hours compared to the three or four that I can spend nit-picking every detail of the things I typically post. Basically: it's not my best work here, but it's representative of my thoughts on a subject that's been floating around in my head for a while and wanted to get out. Read with caution.

 
I want to take a minute to discuss a topic that may seem outdated, but keeps appearing the more that I browse the web and lurk on comic book community social media outlets: DC’s New 52 Reboot.

The general consensus of readers falls into two camps: People who absolutely and passionately hate it, and people who have accepted its existence and choose to move on with their lives by reading the good titles.

I would like to stress here, before I elaborate on the title of this entry, that neither opinion is wrong or bad. Everyone has a right to think or feel a certain way about the direction of a company’s platform and approach to their product, especially considering that we are all consumers of said product and should be making educated purchases based on our tastes and overall quality of the work.

That being said, however, I’ve noticed that there continues to be—despite the fact that it’s been almost four years at this point—a considerable amount of complaining, bashing, insulting, and general angst hurled at the New 52 reboot and, to a lesser extent, those who read the titles and enjoy them without any real knowledge of the cannon that came before it.

I’m going to clarify right away that I don’t fit well under either readership label. The first comic I ever purchased on my own and read wasn’t a specific issue—it was a graphic novel—and it was from the 80’s. I have done a decent amount of research and investigation on my own of DC’s history but have read few comics between 1990 and 2011. The ones that I have were close enough to the reboot date that it practically doesn’t even matter; most of what happened in them (in least in Batman’s case) is still in continuity. I am more actively involved and, you know, reading things from the New 52 than I am with the pre-boot.

Part of this is a practicality issue. Volumes of comics before 2011 tend to be either nonexistent, hard to find, or pricey. In the case of Stephanie Brown’s Batgirl volumes, they’re upwards of $50 used. I’m assuming this is because of her “character-in-limbo” status that’s become a bit of a sad inside joke amongst DC readers as she has yet to appear in continuity. But still: fifty dollars?! $20-$30 for a volume is the average for most. Though it may not seem like much, when I can get a New 52 volume for $8 or $9…there’s just no competition. As much as I'd love to read some awesome stories, I do have food and gas and clothes to pay for. Pre-boot volumes typically collect a story arc, event, or crossover rather than individual issues of one character’s comic, which means that even purchasing those volumes I'm bound to be missing chunks of the mundane, non-epic comics (and I like those). Which is a shame, because I have heard wonderful things about Cassandra Cain’s Batgirl run and would love to read it, but I’m not paying $50 for what is essentially six issues and maybe two hours of continuous reading material. Action Comics doesn’t even appear to have volumes outside of the New 52, and Superman is their flagship character next to Batman.

And as much as I think digital comics is a fantastic idea…when there are no volumes and I want to read a large amount of them instead of one or two, $1.29/$.99 adds up fast. I’m also not inclined to buy digital comics—visual mediums like this work better, in my own humble opinion, when you have them in front of you as a tangible object. It’s a personal preference, I know, and I don’t decry or judge those who love digital comics; like a said, it’s a great idea on the whole. It just doesn’t do much for me.

With all of these things being said, I think that the way DC approached the New 52 was a smart business decision. If you look at the state of the comic book industry at this point in time (and even back in 2011), it’s obvious that a large portion of investment has and will continue to be given to the films/television shows that are being made because they are garnering more attention and money than the comics themselves. There is a new generation of audience members that are being introduced to these characters through cinema/television, and both Marvel and DC are attempting to take advantage of this. The New 52, in many ways, is reflective of this shift. The entire idea behind the New 52 was to take characters back to basics so that the younger/newer audience less familiar with what had been going on in comics before could more easily get on board. They wanted to make them fresher and more accessible. Barbara Gordon is known more to the general public as Batgirl? Put her back in the role. No one, other than comic readers, was aware that Dick Grayson spent over a year as Batman? Return his Nightwing mantle. People think that the JLA are a bunch of boring, perfect demi-gods? Start back at the beginning and establish a new dynamic. I’m not saying these were all good changes, but they were certainly intentional.

What’s great about the New 52 is that is functions well as a jumping off point. People often ask, when they’re interested in getting into comics, what a good place to start would be. This is where the reboot helps out a lot. Rather than having to wade through decades of continuity, figure out who everyone is and where they stand, someone can pick up the first volume of Superman or Batman or Green Arrow or Justice League and start reading. After all, Action Comics and Batman were at issues #904 and #713, respectively, when they were restarted at #1. Even after almost four years of continuous storytelling, most of the rest of the DCU is still only at issues #36 (for the core group of comics). This is much, much, much less intimidating than 900 or 700-something. Readers have the option to read back issues from before the reboot because they want to, not because they have to.

What?! What do you mean someone doesn't like me?

Once someone has started reading parts of the New 52 and has become invested in certain characters—and their relationships with others in their particular circle of people—it makes it a lot easier and less stressful to go back and read comics from the pre-boot because they already have a foundation. Yes, some of the characters differ a great deal from their New 52 incarnations, but if someone enjoys New 52 Green Arrow and doesn’t like the pre-boot one, what exactly is lost? Does it make them less of a Green Arrow fan because they prefer the “new” interpretation of the character over the “old?” It still gave them a way into the comic and character, and maybe liking one book will encourage them to read more.

I’m not saying that all of the elements of the New 52 are perfect. I’m not bowing down and worshiping the ground any writer or artist walks on or planning to get a tattoo of the New 52 logo on my arm. There is no one on this earth that can ever tell me the five-year timeline makes any level of sense or that Jason Todd’s origin as some weird “creation of the Joker” isn’t kind of contrived and silly. There are good books and there are bad books. Good writers and bad writers. Good ideas and bad ones. Just like in every other medium, there are going to be variations in quality.

And yes, the pre-boot had some terrible things in it as well. Let’s not forget that All-Star Batman and Robin was a pre-boot book, and no one likes to remember that even exists.

Robin is cuter than Miller's attempts at being a good writer.

The reality is this: The comic book industry has always been eager to reset their universes in order to attract new readers. As I said in a previous post, DC and Marvel are still businesses and they want to make money. If it wasn’t the New 52, it would be something else. Give it another few years and I’m sure they will reset everything again. And I get it: it’s frustrating to constantly have to readjust and re-learn things and deal with change on a regular basis. If DC and Marvel want to continue to be a successful industry, then they have to change. They can’t stay stagnant because people don’t stay stagnant.

But despite all of the change, all of the screwing around with characters and origins and whatnot, it doesn’t mean that the books you loved are gone from existence. I’m sure as time goes on, more volumes of certain characters will be put together and become available. You can continue to love Stephanie Brown and Cassandra Cain even if they never appear in a single New 52 book (which they really should, but that’s beside the point). The New 52 isn’t the be-all-end-all of comics, and neither is the pre-boot. If the New 52 functions as a great jumping-off point, than the pre-boot becomes more accessible and can grow a person’s love for this particular universe. That’s what it did for me. And isn’t that what’s important—that people can find a way into an awesome medium that has traditionally been known to scare new readers away with its complexity?

Be nice to people who like the New 52 and accept that it’s probably going to change again in the near future. If worse comes to worst, head cannon is a lifesaver.

...seriously, DC, put Steph and Cass in a book. Please.

Batman #424: Is It Really That Bad?

Perspective-defying cover art!

If Jason Todd's tenure as Robin was controversial, issue #424 of Batman probably did little to ease the fury that was starting to boil in the hearts of fans. The issue itself has become a bit infamous amongst the comic community, specifically the Batman community, and I can see why that would be the case. There's a lot of interesting, dark, and unforgiving subject matter to be found in these few pages and more than one of them I can see not settling well with readers, even amidst the dark-and-decrepit 80's comic culture.

I purchased a copy of this issue within the last few days because my ever-growing curiosity and love for retro comics is still going strong, and because I also wanted to see the entire story for what it was, in context, rather than just looking at scans of the controversial last two pages and then reading a synopsis.

The story itself centers around the playboy son of a diplomat, Felipe Garzonas, who sexually assaults a woman named Gloria Stanson. Twice. Batman and Robin arrest him after his second assault (the other one is not part of the story but is mentioned to the cops by Gloria), but because his father is a diplomat, Felipe possess diplomatic immunity and can't be held in custody. Evidence for the assault was also limited to Gloria's testimony and a black eye, both of which are discredited by Garzonas. The rest of the story focuses on Batman and Robin's plan to bust Garzonas on drug charges--in particular cocaine--which will be enough to have him deported back to his home country.

I'll discuss the infamous final two pages in a minute, but I first want to look at the rest of the comic, as there's a lot in here that is really good.

DC's Greatest Failure: How A Bad Marketing Stunt Tainted Jason Todd's Character

It’s no secret that sometimes, in an attempt to garner more fans/customers/attention, companies will lay out big stunts or features that are designed to impress the masses. Most of the time, these events go the way of anything viral on the Internet or social media: they bring in people and press for a few days and then disappear from existence only for those companies to plan something else in the years following that will make an even bigger impact. But every now and then, an idea can be taken to the extreme and find a way to derail itself. When that happens, companies are left scrambling to pick up the pieces and employees are scrutinized until a supposed perpetrator is found. They make a public apology or just do their best to sweep the situation under the rug, praying that their slip-up won’t hurt sales. Yet, despite all their efforts, the stigma of that mistake never fully goes away. Unlike with a successful gimmick, people can’t forget the time that a certain company dropped the ball and produced either offensive or hilarious results (depending on your point of view).

The comic book industry is certainly no stranger to this phenomenon. In fact, many of the choices that writers and editors make on behalf of characters, such as costume designs or who will wear the mask, are often controversial enough within their own circle of readers. It takes a lot to do more than simply ruffle the feathers of many comic book fans, although the rise of social media has enabled audiences and writers to interact on a far more personal and direct level than they ever were before. But just like any other company, comic book big shots like DC and Marvel are still, at the end of the day, a business, and their first and foremost interest is making money.

And lots of it.

The history of comics is similar to most other forms of media in that it experienced a rise and fall regularly over the course of the 20th century. After the Golden and Silver Ages of comics in the 40’s-60’s, readership began to peter out, and sales of comics dropped considerably from what they had once been. The 1970's and 80’s brought about a new age for comics for both DC and Marvel. For DC, it was a dark one, an age where many of their superheroes and other characters were receiving re-writes and retcons in the wake of their Crisis on Infinite Earths event that reset their universe in an attempt to consolidate the tangled mess that had become their cannon. Several DC characters had already undergone grittier transformations prior to the event, such as Green Arrow’s Speedy who, in the 70’s, was baptized into the new era by way of a heroin addiction.

Batman #408

Along with Batman’s comic generally dropping itself into the Angst Bucket, the character of Robin was given a re-vamp. After Dick Grayson had left Batman’s side to lead the Teen Titans and become Nightwing (rocking that hideous-as-hell collar), a new Robin arrived on the scene named Jason Todd. His origin story made him a nice little Grayson Clone as a way to let fans adjust to the loss of such a legendary character that many readers had grown up with. The only real difference between him and Dick was that Jason, at the start of his tenure, had curly red hair that was promptly dyed as a way to make himself look more like his previous mantle-holder. After Crisis, the writers at DC found an opportunity to make Jason his own character. They scrapped his copy-cat backstory and replaced it with the tale of a young boy that had been born and bred on the streets of Gotham. His new character spoke with slang speech, had a bit of an attitude, was arrogant, and had more guts than he probably should have had at the tender age of twelve. Hell, he came into contact with the Caped Crusader because he was caught stealing the tires off of the Batmobile.

And as infamy would have it, the most well-known aspect of Jason’s character is that he died. And he didn’t just die--he was beaten within an inch of his life with a crowbar and then blown up with a bomb. Batman arrived in time to find his body and hear the dying words of his mother lament the fact that he was a much better child than she deserved. For well over a decade, Jason remained dead. His time as Robin was memorialized with his costume hanging in a glass case in the Batcave, forever a reminder to Bruce of his greatest failure. Jason was then marred in future comics as the “Bad Robin,” the reckless and impulsive failure who died because he didn’t listen to Bruce.

Note: This was, in fact, approved by the Comics Code Authority

I will admit that Jason’s story was the source of my interest in comic books. After watching his 2010 film and reading into what happened (and I posted a review of that here), I felt I needed to explore what this world of comics was and how Jason fit into it. So maybe I’m biased, or maybe I’m still relatively ignorant. But what I will say is that I came into this scenario with fresh eyes, as someone who had never had an attachment to the previous Robin or even Batman to a large extent. Given the evidence presented in both the movie and the comic that featured his demise, I didn’t see this Robin as anything other than a fascinating, tragic figure.

The infamy surrounding what happened and his later blatantly inconsistent interpretations are incredibly obvious to someone like me, who was neither alive during the time in which he was killed or knew anything about him going in.

So what about those gimmicks I mentioned earlier? Well the entire situation behind why, exactly, Jason was murdered is layered in gimmicks and company nonsense. Along with darker storylines, characters, and settings, the 80’s brought about early experimentation in technology (I imagine that at the time Bruce having a computer in the Batcave was more-or-less impressive to many readers). DC, like everyone else, was interested in finding new ways to use this technology for the sake of gaining attention and interest. One of the new features that they had been toying with was the idea of a phone poll which Dennis O’Neil, the then-editor for the Batman comics, described as “heeding the opinions fans express[ed] in letters and conversations at conventions and comic shops.” It was, essentially, early social media. The gimmick worked by having Jim Starlin, the writer for Batman at the time, set up a storyline, titled A Death in the Family, in which it was left ambiguous whether or not Robin was dead or alive. They then placed an ad at the end of the comic inviting readers to call a hotline number (after being charged a paltry 50 cents) and cast their vote for whether or not they wanted him to die. After the 36 hours allotted to vote, the numbers were tallied: of 10,614 calls, 5,271 wanted him alive and 5,343 wanted him dead by a margin of 72 votes.

As Denny said, “Hail and farewell, Jason Todd.”

The reaction to the stunt was unexpected. In the Postscript to the graphic novel, O’Neil writes:

“One of the pro-Jason votes was mine[...] any essential alteration to a lengthy series would necessitate much redefinition, much editorial scrambling. I was prepared for long hours at my desk if Jason died.

I was emphatically not prepared for the reaction. As soon as the news of Jason’s expiration got out, our publicity whiz, Peggy May, began getting calls from journalists. Dozens of them. For three long working days and part of a fourth, until Peggy declared a moratorium, I talked.”

Not that anyone could blame poor Peggy.

People across the country were outraged. The big question was why they would choose to kill off a child, especially one that was holding the title of one of the most iconic characters in pop culture history.

While O’Neil believed that many readers only voted to let him live because they were under the impression that the Robin they were going to kill off was Dick Grayson, I find that assumption to be unlikely. Dick had been around since 1940 and had become an iconic figure in the DC Universe. He was as legendary and as popular as his mentor, and went on to be successful even apart from Batman. After the reboot, it was still made clear that Dick was a member of the Teen Titans and had taken on the mantle of Nightwing. Very little of his history had been changed. Long-time comic readers would have known that. They would have been, at the very least, familiar with the notion that Dick was Nightwing and Jason was the new Robin.

As for the media backlash, it wouldn’t be all that surprising for the general public to assume that it was the original Robin, since comic politics and retcons weren’t exactly common knowledge. But again, O’Neil implies that much of the anger and vehemence from the media came from the disdain for the stunt itself, rather than because it was Dick Grayson. O'Neil remarks in the Preface to A Lonely Place of Dying:

“…one reporter claimed that the whole event had been rigged—that, in fact, we had decided on Jason’s demise ahead of time and staged an elaborate charade… several colleagues accused us of turning our magazines into a ‘Roman circus.’ Cynical was a word used. And exploitative. Sleazy. Dishonorable.” 

People were upset and offended by the nature of the crowd-sourcing tactic, viewing it as what it was: a gimmick designed to garner attention. A reporter for The Globe and Mail wrote an article mocking the stunt, saying:

"How far will this go? We picture an author drafting a scene in which a private eye is to rush headlong into a gangster’s hideout rather than wait for the police, but the shamus won’t budge. He won’t touch the doorknob. He’ll sit on the front stoop and insist that no self-respecting character would be so dumb as to walk into certain danger all by himself, and that if the author wants to press the point he should hold a poll of the readers and see whose side they’re on.” 

O'Neil later went on to emphasize the fact that they didn't kill a human being, child or not: “First of all, let me speak to the shock: We didn’t kill a real kid. This is paper and ink.” There’s no mention of it being Dick; just that is was a child, a child that was brutally murdered at the hands of a psychopath for no other reason than because he knew it would hurt Batman.

Reader reaction to Jason’s time as Robin has also been pegged as virulent hatred. Many comic fans and employees of DC insisted that Jason was seen as a whiny, annoying usurper of the Robin mantle up until his death and that many people wanted him out of the picture. In the special feature short Robin’s Requiem: The Tale of Jason Todd, found on the Blu Ray copy of Under the Red Hood, Judd Winnick (who later went on to write Jason’s resurrection story) remarked, “Let them put their money where their mouth is: if they really don’t like him this much, we’ll leave it up to them if they want to kill him off.” The assumption was that readers had it out for this young kid born and bred in Crime Alley, yet Denny O’Neil’s commentary in the Postscript contradicts that idea:

“This Robin, Jason...well, we didn’t know how people felt about him. Some seemed to like him, some didn’t. Others were suggesting that The Batman commemorate his fiftieth birthday in 1989 by reverting to what he had been when he first appeared, a relentless loner. So we had a character whose popularity was, at best, uncertain, and we had a telephone experiment we wanted to try.” (emphasis me).

Uncertain. Not, “hordes of screaming, angry fans wanted to see this kid bathed in blood and left for the buzzards.” Sure, there will always be a group of people who dislike a specific character for various reasons, and I personally believe a lot of the hatred that did surface towards Jason was rooted in the feeling that Jason had taken the role of Robin away from Dick who had been a fan favorite for several decades and not so much that he was “annoying” or “bratty” or “a little snot.” Winnick even admits that the notion of making the character unlikeable came after they decided to kill him. A decision like that is borne out of a desire to justify an action taken, and that is why I believe much of Jason’s legacy has been tainted by anger, hatred, and victim-blaming. It isn’t out of ignorance on the part of the writers; it’s out of a desire to make Jason Todd look like he deserved death in order to shift the blame from the writers and DC.

The irony of their argument against Jason is that there are plenty of examples of people who liked Jason or who, at the very least, thought he had potential as a character.  One reader even wrote to say that he insisted on dialing the Kill number because he wanted to see if they would actually do it, not because he didn't like the character.

After the media explosion, DC was forced to backpedal faster than a circus performer on a unicycle. Reading some of the commentary is hilarious because it’s incredibly obvious that everyone involved--O’Neil, Starlin, and other people in charge of what has been dubbed The Stunt--tried desperately to place the blame for Jason’s death on anyone but themselves. Unfortunately, that included the character himself (despite the fact that O’Neil, again, contradicts himself by saying that he was just “paper and ink” and then calling comics the “post-industrial equivalent of folk tales” that “must evolve...or become irrelevant to the real world they mirror.” Way to go, Denny) and the fans of the comic. The Postscript even opens with O’Neil’s protest that became a mantra in the days (and decades, really) following Jason’s death: “We didn’t kill the Boy Wonder. The readers did.” On the back of the graphic novel, three out of seven quotes explicitly state that the readers are the ones at fault for what happened, all of which would have been chosen by the people who put the novel together. The fact that the infamous “guy with the MacIntosh who rigged his computer to vote every few minutes” story continues to surface and is cited by many of the creative staff as the real reason Robin died again speaks to the company’s desire to hot-potato the blame to someone--anyone--else. Never mind the fact that they were the ones who set up the hotline and Jim Starlin even openly admitted to hating the character of Robin (on more than one occasion it’s been stated that he wanted to give Robin AIDS).

The whole situation just makes me picture a handful of little kids being caught in the act of painting a wall by their mother and when asked who did it, they all pointed at the paintbrush.

In the decades that followed, Jason continued to be beaten with the “bad Robin” stick, with various characters calling him reckless or impulsive or brash or disobedient or anything that could possibly justify his death. It was almost as if there was an unspoken policy that Jason be depicted--whether in flashback or through conversation--as deserving of his death as another means to establish a reason for his demise. He was re-written as a punk, someone who was asking to be killed because he dared to act like an actual child and have emotional problems after the death of his parents. There's even a scene in Gotham Knights #43 (which I do, all things considered, think is a genuine and decent story) where Jason is seen smoking and Babs (Batgirl at the time who was asked by Bruce to get an emotional reading from him after the incident with a certain diplomat and a certain balcony) calls him out on it. Even Batman, who blames himself for what happened pretty regularly in cannon, is still always being told by someone that “he did his best” and “there was nothing else he could have done” to prevent Jason’s demise by other characters. It seems DC isn’t very fond of making one of their heroes out to be a human being that makes mistakes, let alone one that resulted in the brutal murder of a twelve year-old.

Gotham Knights #44

It would be an amusing look at how marketing affects story lines and characters if it didn’t result in the ugly reality of an emotionally traumatized child being blamed for his own death that came out of his desire to protect his rotten mother who sold him out to the Joker and put him in the situation in the first place.

Why would they do all this? As I mentioned above, DC comics is still a company that is out to make a profit on their books and characters. Having their writers or--God forbid--their most popular characters made out to be anything other than positive role models would be a death wish. The back-pedaling they did after The Stunt and the subsequent retconning of Jason’s character speaks to that. “If his murder was justified--if he was just a punk that couldn't listen and had an attitude and SMOKED--then the unholy mess that came from it was really just people overreacting. It wasn’t OUR fault. We just have really vindictive readers. Now go by our new issue of Batman. There’s a new Robin and he’s NOTHING like Jason--he’s rich and awkward and not socially adept, just like many of our readers!”

And perhaps the greatest irony is that their biggest blunder, the character who died because some writers and execs needed cannon fodder for their gimmick, came back to life in the early 2000’s and experienced unprecedented popularity, according to Judd Winnick:

“When we re-introduced Jason Todd as the Red Hood, I was surprised at how many of the readers liked him and liked him in a way of liking him as a hero. Basically, the best way to put it, was they thought he was cool. And that was not really my intention.”

I wouldn't exactly describe this as "cool;" more like disturbing. But okay.
Batman Annual #25

So where does that leave Jason? Well I think the blatant reality of marketing getting the better of a character has pulled out from the shadows a desire of many people to defend Jason. His anti-hero status and the fact that audiences were so willing to accept him (generally speaking) says that the culture at large is changing their perspective on troubled characters. More people are jumping on board the Sympathy Bandwagon or, at the very least, are willing to set aside the twenty-something years of convoluted interpretations to welcome Jason Todd into the realm of “cool anti-hero.” And even now, there are still many readers who are interested in seeing Jason overcome his anger and vengeance and mend his broken relationship with not only Batman and the Batfamily, but DC fans as well.

Hail and farewell Jason Todd? I think not.

Quotes from Robin's Requiem: The Tale of Jason Todd were taken from here.

Other graphic novels/comics include:

A Death in the Family (1988) by Jim Starlin
A Lonely Place of Dying (1989) by Marv Wolfman and George Perez
Gotham Knights #43 & #44 (2003) by Scott Beatty
Batman Annual #25 (2006) by Judd Winnick
Batman #408 (1987) by Max Allan Collins