#and also DC superheros was pretty cool

[kittenninja14]

Kn hiiii!!!!!! I'm recommending you wayne family adventures!!!! (On webtoon) It's like microdosing on good (kinda fanon) batfam content without having to dig through the comics hehehe

- regards, fellow dc enjoyer/ ex brainrot haver djfhdhfjshd (how does this keep happening xd)

Hiiiii Berryy!! Long time no see, girl!! (OH SHOOTT I 4GOT TO REPLY TO UR DMS AHHH--)

Thanks for the rec girl!! I'll check it out later!!! Rn I'm in a massive Monkie Kid brainrot rn so i don't think ill be reading the comic anytime soon but we'll see :)

Thanks once again for the reec loll

lolll nice to see a fellow dc enjoyed as well XD yeah dw u'll get used to have a buncha ex-brainrots XDD

https://kittenninja14.tumblr.com/post/731916269075480576/hey-yall-i-just-found-this-incredible-video-and

[allovesthings]

In my opinion, the butt jokes are incredibly incredibly tired.

So here are several fun facts about Dick that you can use for comedic effects/running jokes instead:

His hatred of Capes. Listen we are talking about Dick wore a yellow cape for 9 to 10 years in universe Grayson. The moment he changed his costume, he straight refused to ever wear a cape again, the only time he had to wear one, it was as Batman and it was very very frustrating for him.

You know that when he watched the Incredibles with Lian and Roy or Damian and Edna Mode came on screen with her hatred of capes, this was his reaction:

Someone else finally understand him. She instantly became his favorite character.

His tendency to put unknown substances/evidence in his mouth and being able to identify it by taste and his knowledge of what Heroin taste like (yep still not over it).

It's both impressive (the fact that he can actually identify something by taste alone is impressive) and gross and even his closest friends don't understand why he is the way that he is, Do we think it's the Bat training or do we think it's just Dick (tm)... I feel like it has to be just Dick, right ? considering everything in Gotham is a toxin of some kind ? How many heart attack do we think he gave both Bruce and the Titans with that ?

Dick Grayson namer of superhero things: Listen, I just learned that Dick named the Arrowcave and now I just kinda love the idea of a running joke that every time a classic superhero in contact with Robin has a goofy name for something superhero related, it probably comes from the 9 year old superhero who thought it sounded cool.

The Titans are never letting that go and Dick doesn't want to talk about it (but he secretly still really like the names, they were cool when he was 9 and pretty practical when you think about it, thank you very much).

Everyone has a crush on him (tm): Honestly it is pretty funny that everyone and theirs entire family have a crush on Nightwing (and also pretty consistent canon since Raven in ntt). The reaction of the batfam is annoyed because that's gross, it's Dick, theirs brother/son, and the Titans are amused (Donna, Vic, Garth and maybe Wally) or maybe sorta part of the people who have had a crush on him (Kory obviously , Roy, Raven).

You do need to be careful with that, but I think if you do the opposite of what DC is usually doing, you'll be fine.

Also you can also includes the disastrous first date with supergirl in that. She also had a crush on him and they date was so horrible that he considered changing superhero identity because it was so embarrassing (truly one of the greatest plot-point on Superman/batman world finest honestly and this series is genuinely my favorite modern/current series)..

His petty side when he doesn't like someone: Listen, Dick has a petty side, ask Helena circa Outsiders (2003), Talia (always), Jason circa the late 2000s (Morrison era) and Azrael (also always). When he doesn't like people but has to work with them, he is going to be a little shit because they have to know he doesn't like them. it's important. and the comedic potential of Nightwing, one of the most competent, known and admired hero of the community being so petty is excellent. 10 out of 10, I need him to work with someone he hates again just for the fun of it.

The last one is just an headcanon and do not have basis in canon as far as I know:

Sometimes, as an adult, Nightwing says Holy shit in front of a classic superhero and that superhero does a double take because they are so used to him saying Holy goly batman (and that include Batman).

[sadandyetverysexy]

Dp x Dc au: Normal is Good

Okay so hear me out— i see lots of “you can’t control Danny he’s a wild child” premises and like, I agree, I love that, but JUST hear me out. Danny who is just entranced by being treated like a NORMAL KID.

I think for best results this should be done with de-aged Danny so he’s a bit younger, but it can def work with regular Danny too.

Danny winds up running around Gotham for one reason or another doing INSANE SHIT to try and help or just survive and his family is out of the way. The explosion, Bad Fentons, etc— and one of the bats picks up Danny. This can be a dad!Jason, or dad!Dick, or classic Bruce Adoption. But they see this little shit running around and are like “no fucking way, not on my watch you little maniac”

Now, a lot of people use the “Jazz practically raised Danny” card, and I love that card and fully support it, but she was also a kid. With no other parents to consult. Who was raised by the Fentons originally and def has no clue what normal parents are like. So she probably didn’t exactly measure up to how a kid is MEANT to be raised. So Danny still had an incredibly strange childhood that just was Not Normal, but I feel like we see Danny with a deep desire to be normal. He doesn’t even really like being a superhero that much, he just wanted to be a kid.

So he gets bat adopted, and Danny is just functioning how he did growing up with the Fentons, which is No Restrictions Do What You Want. And then his bat dad (using Jason for this) is like “No. It’s Bed Time.” And Danny. Danny is ALL for that. He’s bewildered. Mystified. He’s not grumpy about being told what to do at ALL, because he’s just so shocked.

“You’re serious? You’re fucking dead-ass serious? It’s bed time? Oh my god this is so cool. I’ve never had a bed time before! This is great!” Because this is the first time he’s EVER been treated like a normal child by a parental figure. He just got sent to bed. Wow.

Having a parent who is in charge of keeping him healthy and actually enforces Danny taking care of himself is kind of cool.

“Eat your vegetables, they’re good for you.” And they won’t try to eat him back? Fuck yeah, he’ll eat his vegetables!

“No you aren’t allowed to go out at 2 in the morning, go back to bed, you have a doctors appointment for your yearly checkup tomorrow.” oh ancients, Danny has always heard other kids complain about not being allowed out at night, but to have himself told he can’t? This is so weird. And he’s never been to a yearly check up before!

“Brush your teeth before bed” “I can’t get cavities, I’m dead!” “Ya know, for some reason I don’t believe you. When was the last time you went to the dentist? Are you sure you can’t get them?” Danny has 7 cavities.

The first time Danny gets to actually use the “my dad said No” excuse, he is ECSTATIC. Jack and Maddie have LITERALLY never told him he can’t go out somewhere. Ever. He’s in a whole new world where he doesn’t have to fight ghosts, or be a hero, or anything and he loves it. He has a normal kids room without deadly weapons in it and normal kid hobbies and a fridge full of normal food and a parent who enforces a bed time, and it’s weird as hell and it’s great. Normal is pretty damn good, he has no clue what Sam and Tucker were always complaining about. Shits sweet.

[the-witchhunter]

DP x DC: Zatanna

… why don’t we pair Danny up with Zatanna more? I don’t even mean that like romantically paired (which you could if you really wanted) but just in general. She shows up briefly in a number of fics but she’s pretty tangential beyond[insert summoning scene]

But Zatanna is a pretty cool character and very importantly she’s magic AF. She’s half Homomagi aka an entire race separate from human so can relate to not being completely human, but also just magic AF which means she’s equipped to deal with ghost BS

Also, on top off all this she’s a stage magician, and a good one at that. She had a successful career even before superhero sorceress was her career path

You know what the greatest skill she could teach Danny is?

How to pass off his powers as a magic trick (and escaping handcuffs)

No seriously, think about it. What’s the best way of hiding your ability to make yourself turn invisible and go through solid objects? Be a stage magician! Not only can you get paid for it, but anytime someone saw him do anything he has the perfect excuse. His powers would make stage magic even easier

And on top of that, actually learning how to do certain tricks would help him. See, he’s not a ghost because he can also get out of these anti ghost cuffs.

Let Zatanna take Danny under her wing and train him in stage magic to help him hide better. He can hide in plain sight

And she’d just be an interesting mentor, she has connections with the justice league and all the fan favorite characters to toss at Danny. Constantine is her ex, she’s good friends with Bruce Wayne going back years and even had a romance for a while(I don’t think they actually dated but there were feelings) and through him the rest of the bats. She’s confident and self assured and frankly Danny could use some of that in his day to day persona

[shower-phantom-ideas]

New random DP x DC idea

Danny is strong yeah? Imagine him scruffing the other superheros

Batman is about to really wail into some guy when all of a sudden his legs leave the ground and he hears a “tsk tsk tsk” from behind him. “Come on man arent you like the worlds greatest detective? This guy is just trying ti save his kid” ok well he is The Batman so all of a sudden it clicks and hes lowkey grateful for whoever stopping him but also whost the funk. Danny dips the moment he realises The Big Bad Bat is on the same page.

The Flash is just trying to get his coffee or something and all of a sudden hes stopped, mid running, and lifted up. “Hey listen dude you can’t keep doing this. Do you know how much trouble you cause using your speed like this?”

He doesn’t scruff Wonder Woman but some dude trying to hit on her. Not like she couldn’t haven’t it herself but Danny is a big fan probably and wanted to look good in her eyes (?simp? Sam thinks so)

Cyborg is probably amazing by Danny and starts asking questions and is actually pretty hyped. (Idk the fandom forgets my cool cybro guy so im running on my childhood memory)

Superman’s got the power of flight but when Danny scruffs him all of a sudden hes bunching up like a little kitten.

[puppetwoman17]

It is my personal belief that, if Billy was somehow part of the PJO universe, or if there was a crossover between DC and PJO, he would be older than Percy and most of the kids we know.

I know, I know, we all love him as our tiny bean, but there’s just SOMETHING about older bro Billy that has my wheels turning. I’d put him as the same age(or older) as Luke in the first book. He’s like a sort of bridge between the gods and their kids, always advocating for them, trying to set the gods straight. He knows he can’t stop them from being stupid immortals, so all he can do is help Percy persuade them to pay child support.

He’s the demigods’ cool older brother who also serves as their champion. He visits camp as often as he can, even going to Camp Jupiter(cause ya know, Mercury and Hercules instead of Hermes and Heracles. I don’t know how to deal with that so I’m just gonna shut up now). They’re pretty wary of other superheroes, but everyone has at least one kind of Captain Marvel memorabilia in their room, or on their person(broach, bracelet, etc.).

Older brother Billy needs more love, in my opinion☺️

[stealingyourbones]

Not sure if this has been suggested before but what do you think about a DP x DC Cross where the JL discover Amity because the "It's Not Gay if he's Dead" joke escapes containment into mainstream? Also I love your blog! You're awesome.

aaaaa thank you sm hun! I really appreciate that :D I'm glad you enjoy my funky lil blog!

And now, I threw this idea at a fellow who is simply me with prompts but even more unhinged and they wrote a thing. I present to you, This:

------

Escaping containment implies that the content got leaked somehow. 

Maybe after so long with dealing with ghosts on their own, especially with ghosts that can control and use tech the people of Amity Park decide to self isolate. Phantom and Red Huntress are considered the only main heroes allowed in Amity, one out of pride and two out of concern of a ghost possessing an foreign hero. 

There was a fight and the tech isolation software glitched or a satellite picks up something on accident, letting a small leak occur. Nothing major, just a small joke. 

A blurry photo of a white haired teenager with a fancam like edit around him and the words "It's Not Gay if he's Dead." 

Which on its own wouldn't have taken off very much on the internet, but someone pointed out that the teenager was wearing what was very obviously a hero outfit. Leading to people wondering just who exactly this hero is or was. 

So they dig, and it turns out the “one” leak wasn't the only one to happen. 

The internet finds out there's not just one meme. There's hundreds of them. All originating from a single midwestern city and mostly focused around one person, the white haired teenager that is referred to as Phantom in most memes. 

Theres edits of a female musician with bright blue hair with text saying “that moment when a dead girl is your bisexual awakening” and “Its not a crush on a villian if shes not alive.” 

There's even photos of these slime-like creatures. With dozens of different memes referring to them. Varying from calling them green pigeons, to talking about tossing them like a sports ball.  

Theres even a photo of Dash and most of the football team are wearing group shirts that all say “It's Not Gay if he's Dead” with Phantoms logo on it, half as a joke and half because some of them would definitely date Phantom if they could. 

It's not even the Justice League that finds the jokes first, it's the younger generation of heroes. 

(It's how Tim asks Kon for a date. He sends a meme with Danny getting flunged in the worlds most tumbling superhero pose with the below text "It's not gay if he's dead." Tim immediately sends another text "But it is gay if he's an alien, 10pm picnic date?")

The different memes get passed around, none of them taking them that seriously, until it gets to Batman. One of the memes is sent in the bat group chat by one of the Bat kids to ask Jason about getting group Batburger later. “If your hero’s dead its not gay, it’s just hero worship, even if you want to meet him behind the Nasty Burger.” 

It's the hyper specific wording that gets Batman to look into it. He only finds the memes, nothing else. No town called Amity Park, no hero called Phantom, no trace outside of a reference to a defunct and wiped completely clean government branch and references to a nonexist law. 

This leads him to contact the Justice League, including the JL Dark, for a meeting. 

Surprisingly quite a few members recognize the teen outside of the memes. Flash, Captain Marvel, Wonder Woman, Martian Manhunter, Aquaman, and some of the JLD. The Flash refuses to say anything due to timeline continuum dangers. Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and Martian Manhunter mention someone like him appearing in ancient texts, but nothing beyond that. The JLD that know are physically and contractually unable to say much beyond Phantom being a hero and very important. 

It’s Captain Marvel that genuinely knows anything about him. “That's Danny, he's pretty cool. He's even helped me out a few times!”

The rest of the JL are surprised, Marvel gets more questions and answers some of them. He doesn't share the knowledge that he's helped Billy at handling the whole secret child hero thing, and that he's welcome in Amity. Just enough information to make the League stop looking into Phantom, Ember, Cujo, all of Amity. 

It works, mostly. 

Batman has never been one to let sleeping dogs lie…

-From Bones’ GhostWriter, S.

[zahri-melitor]

so i'm reading certain nightwing volumes from '96 - 02 for my current reading run following NML (shout out to @havendance, cannot thank you enough 🫶🏾) and while some aspects of how he's written is very compelling and interesting to chew on, for the most part it's been pretty....boring?? like i'm gonna keep reading it so i can have as much context as possible, but it feels more like a chore 😩

anyways, i read your response on that “who’d you choose to write nightwing” poll and i’d love to get your opinion on what nightwing runs/writers to read outside of those 8 volumes. i really wanna get into dick grayson’s character and personality! also, if it’s cool with you, anyone else please feel free to add to this!

-dominomasc

Hey, dominomasc. Unknowingly you've just raised one of the fundamental incongruities of how comics work.

Comics are about layers of stories providing depth to a character and about dozens of different interpretations more than they are about a single amazing run. (Some characters have That Run! But on average, most don't). Dick Grayson, a character that has existed for 84 years, has some very fun stories from all sorts of writers. His title, Nightwing, is also an excellent example of how a lot of long running titles often don't really have a stand out section that's head and shoulders above the rest.

I promise, you are never going to run out of stories to read about Dick Grayson (Comicsvine has him at 9,593 appearances as I write this). So yes, this is going to be about two things: advice on finding stories about Dick that vibe for you; and advice on understanding Dick alongside other storylines.

Taking into account what's listed above and the fact I'm moderately obsessive, I have compiled a discussion of most of the major writers who have written Nightwing runs, or who have written major titles that Dick also prominently appears in.

I am at heart a 'Dick belongs to the Bat Office' person and my expertise in most characters starts with COIE. On that basis I'm not going to dip into pre-Crisis here.

Marv Wolfman & George Pérez: New Teen Titans (1980-1993ish). I am not going to explain all the title names here; you're going to have to go get more detail from someone who treats NTT period as their special interest. Wolfman and Pérez are the architects of Nightwing as a character, separate to Robin, that Dick grew into. Read this period if you're interested in Dick as a young adult among the other Titans going through the transition into adulthood and independence, and his relationship with Kory. Basically it's a superhero young adult soap opera. It can be quite uneven in places, particularly towards the back end, and there are approximately a thousand discussions over which storylines are good and which should be fired into the sun. I am not a subject expert for this period.

Because of the state of the Titans titles in the early 1990s, the Bat office demanded Dick Grayson back under their control. Exactly when they got him back is slightly debated, but it would be fair to say Batman #500 (October 1993) marks his transition back to being a Bat character (around the start of Knightquest); by KnightsEnd and Prodigal (July 1994-January 1995) Dick is once again firmly a member of the Batman set of characters, and has remained so to date.

Prodigal, by Chuck Dixon, Alan Grant, Doug Moench: (Batman #512 to Robin #13). Use a reading list here as the stories are spread across multiple titles. Prodigal is 12 issues about Dick's first time being Batman, with Tim as his Robin, and his feelings about returning home to Gotham as an adult. Robin #13 in particular is possibly the most important issue of the story, as it's the foundation of a reset in Bruce and Dick's relationship with each other and how it is going to be characterised for the next decade or so.

Chuck Dixon: (Nightwing #1-70 1996, Nightwing: Alfred's Return, and a bunch of other one shots) So Dixon is probably DC's most prolific writer of all time, and is the architect of what's been treated as 'default Nightwing'. In this run, Dixon creates Bludhaven and the situation of Dick being its protector, out of a desire to be his own man apart from Bruce. He sets up an extensive Rogue's Gallery for Dick, the most famous of which is making Blockbuster one of Dick's main enemies. He has Dick working at a cop bar and then decide to enter the Bludhaven Police Department in an attempt to investigate it from the inside due to the levels of corruption. This is also the run where Dick and Babs get together as adults. Basically, everything about 'default' Dick that you probably know comes from this run. Dixon's great for character interaction, for world building, and and particularly at making various titles tie together - because he was writing at least 1/3 of DC's entire line for a while there he's the king of crossovers, giving a lot of depth to friendships because characters just pop between titles he's writing. His actual plots however vary between middling to occasional flashes of greatness. I'd consider The Hunt for Oracle (#45-46 and BOP#20-21) and the Shrike story (#55-58) to be the standout storylines in his Nightwing run; for individual issues I'd also point to #6 and #25 for his relationship with Tim, #16 for Dick building his car, and then his crossover issues in events tend to be quality.

Chuck Dixon and Scott Beatty: (Robin: Year One 2000, Batgirl: Year One 2003, Nightwing: Year One - Nightwing #101-106 1996) I am separating these three out from the rest of Dixon's work as they're quite important as retcons over Dick's backstory. Robin and Batgirl are well regarded rewrites of events; Nightwing is less so, partly because it's a solid example of the Jason personality retcon, and partly I think because a lot of people reading this were still well across the two 1980s versions of Dick's transition from Robin to Nightwing. I highly recommend Robin Year One, particularly with the Shrike storyline of Nightwing, as they are interlinked.

Devin Grayson: (Nightwing #71-100 & #107-117 1996, Nightwing/Huntress 1998, Gotham Knights #1-11 & #14-32, The Titans #1-20 1999) Oh, Devin. Devin Grayson is a Dick Grayson superfan (she uses Grayson as her surname because of Dick). She is really good at character introspection - Gotham Knights #1-11 contains some amazing character work. She's also not shy about establishing her own headcanons on characters and retconning their backstories. Devin's biggest contributions to the Dick Grayson lore are in establishing him as Romani and actually writing Bruce adopting Dick. Her run on Nightwing is best understood as a whump, break-the-cutie run, where Blockbuster sets out to destroy Dick's life, and in the process gets Dick fired, breaks up Dick and Babs, burns down Haly's Circus (for the first time), blows up his entire supporting cast, chases Dick out of Bludhaven and leads to Dick going under cover in the mob essentially to punish himself (also not the only time). Dick's also sexually assaulted in Nightwing #93 but I really beg people to read this in context of the rest of the run; this should be looked at as PART of the whole flow of whump, rather than as a separate situation. Grayson also had the title taken off her before she got to the 'comfort' part of the extended hurt/comfort storyline she was writing. It reads a lot better if you think of this in a more transformative fandom, ficcish manner of story rather than as a more standard run. If her Nightwing run is too grim for you, I highly recommend Gotham Knights and her Titans run; Devin Grayson is honestly best when she's writing a constellation of characters around Dick more than when she's writing Dick himself. She adores his friends and family. Standout issues to get a sense of Devin include: Nightwing #100, a self-reflective issue on Dick's history; Nightwing #81, where Dick's in hospital and Cass goes after Slade for him; Titans #15 1999, where the Fab 5 go on a camping trip together to get back to their roots and deal with a lot of tensions in the group; and Gotham Knights #8-11, Transference, where Dick and Tim team up to rescue Bruce, who's been brainwashed by Hugo Strange.

Jay Faerber: (The Titans #21-41 1999) Honestly Faerber's run on The Titans is not that Dick Grayson focused. It's entertaining if you want to read some solid Titans dynamics, but the standout characters you read this run for are Roy and Donna. Seriously, if you're into Roy, Cheshire and Lian drama I highly recommend Faerber's work; otherwise it's not an essential run for Dick.

Judd Winick: (Outsiders #1-25, 34-49 2003, Batman & Robin #23-25 2011) Winick tends to write an angrier and darker edged Dick Grayson, and he has a bunch of really common tropes you see pop out in his writing. These are no different, and thus include an awful lot of violence and characters having sex (so much sex). He can be quite funny as a writer, but honestly his Outsiders run does not have much of that humour. The Batman & Robin story is basically Winick finding some space to tie up his Jason Todd plot before Flashpoint obliterated it, more than an actual story about Dick. If you want a good encapsulating issue to get the vibe of Winick about Dick, take a look at Outsiders #21, which has a good chunk of Dick and Roy AND Dick and Bruce in it, though it's helpful to remember that this issue is set very shortly after War Games and so Dick is in a massive guilt spiral.

Bruce Jones: (Nightwing #118-124 1999) It's One Year Later! Bruce Jones moves Dick back to New York City (as Bludhaven went boom due to Chemo in the lead up to Infinite Crisis) and theoretically sets up Dick's status quo out to Reborn. So. The story Jones is most famous for is the first 4 issues of the run, which are generally referred to by fans as the TentaTodd story. Jason Todd turns up to run around annoying Dick by ALSO dressing up as Nightwing and committing crimes. He also turns into a tentacle monster for a bit. It is certainly a story that exists, but it actually is pretty in line with Jason and Dick's relationship up to Flashpoint: Jason turns up to be a brat who wants attention, does violent things, and Dick exhaustedly kicks the shit out of him and gets him locked up while despairingly going 'why is this my life'. Because of Jason running around killing people as Nightwing, the NYPD get mad at Nightwing and start trying to hunt him down. Jones is for the completionist.

Marv Wolfman: (Nightwing #125-137 1999) Lacking any better ideas, Wolfman gets a run on Nightwing. It's not Wolfman's finest work, to put it bluntly, and it's very obvious that Marv hasn't actually read any of Dixon or Grayson's runs. Marv does set Dick up working as a gymnastics and trapeze coach, which is always a decent job for him. If I had to pick one story from Wolfman, read Nightwing #127, where Dick gets buried alive and digs his way out of the grave.

Peter J. Tomasi: (Nightwing #140-157 1999, Batman & Robin #20-22 2011) Tomasi loves Dick Grayson, and particularly loves Dick's connection to his friends and family. Let me put it this way; in the lead up to Final Crisis and Blackest Night every title got an Origins and Omens short story on the back of an issue. Most books used it to write creepy or introspective reflections on awful stuff especially deaths that have happened to the characters. Tomasi used his to have Dick take Barbara skydiving for her birthday, and echo a bunch of themes from his first issue. I think this is one of the most mature and grown up looks at Dick prior to Flashpoint; Tomasi treats Dick as a grown adult with an adult relationship with Bruce. I love Freefall. Read Freefall to see some really interesting meta on Dick's relationship to the concept of falling and to the concept of catching falling people, a theme that's frequently present in his stories.

Grant Morrison: (Batman & Robin #1-16 2011) Astonishingly given how much of Reborn was designed by Morrison, they don't actually seem to care that much about Dick as a character more than as a prop to set Damian against. Dick's extremely focused on Damian in this title but also does not actually appear to like Damian very much. If I were going to recommend one story out of it I'd probably point to Batman & Robin #7-9, because Dick gets to be a giant hypocrite in them and tries to resurrect Bruce. It goes badly, for all involved.

Scott Snyder: (Detective Comics #871-881, Gates of Gotham, and like every Bat event during n52) The Black Mirror is probably my favourite piece of Dick!Batman storytelling set during Reborn. It's just elegant in terms of how hard Snyder pushes Dick and how his reactions are very much not those that Bruce would have. This is helpfully extremely obvious in that The Black Mirror and Gates of Gotham are actually part of a trilogy, the third act of which is Court of the Owls and due to Flashpoint Snyder had to rewrite CotO quite extensively including swapping Dick out of being Batman and having Bruce as the lead. Read The Black Mirror for Dick having a minor breakdown while solving a complex case with links to James Gordon and Babs. Read Gates of Gotham for incredible Dick & Tim & Cass & Damian fourway storytelling that shows the dynamics of every pairing out of the four.

Fabian Nicieza: (Nightwing #138-139 1999, Batman #703 & #713, parts of Battle for the Cowl, Nightwing #51-56 2016) The thing about FabNic is when he's on, he's very much on, and when he's not it can be painful. I actually almost would have skipped him on this list, but he very much deserves recognition for writing the Nightwing issues of Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul, which alongside the Robin issues portray exactly how far Dick will go for Tim; and for Batman #703, which is the only issue prior to Bruce's resurrection that actually puts Dick, Tim and Damian on page together as heroes. He also got saddled with writing the start of the Ric Grayson saga under the script of Scott Lobdell, which, well, is definitely at the 'not well regarded' end of his oeuvre. FabNic is again a writer that is really good at character interaction, and I tend to find whenever I'm reading events where there's heaps of writers involved and he's there, the issues I really enjoy are the ones he's had a hand in.

Tony S. Daniel: (Battle for the Cowl, Batman #692-699 & #704-707 & #710-712) Oh, Tony Daniel. Why. Daniel's stories are probably the most classic-Batman of the Dick!Batman stories. His stories revolve a lot around drama at Arkham Asylum, with Harvey and Gilda Dent, and with the Falcones. On balance I think you could probably actually trade Dick out for Bruce in half these stories and it wouldn't make a huge amount of difference. If I were going to suggest one to try, maybe go with #710-712? It's Harvey focused and it has Kitrina Falcone and doesn't actually depend on the whole Jeremiah Arkham thing.

Kyle Higgins: (Nightwing #1-12, 0, & 15-29 2011) For a reboot of Dick Grayson down to his fundamentals, and working within the requirements of the 5 year time line, I like Higgins' work on Nightwing. Sure, I could have done without him burning down Haly's circus, again, and all the Court of the Owls revelations, but some of that was clearly dictated to him, and they way he gave Dick time as a teenager with relationships with other characters at Haly's before his parents died worked quite well. If I were going to cite a favourite part of this run it's probably the last section, #18-29 when Dick moves to Chicago and tries the 'strike out as my own hero with my own city, screw you dad' thing for the first time in the new timeline. Higgins put in quite a bit of cast building work and it's a shame none of it ever got used again between Forever Evil and then Rebirth just ignoring everything during this period.

Tom King and Tim Seeley: (Nightwing #30 2011, Grayson #1-20) I'm going to treat these two together here as I can't actually easily subdivide the run between them. This is the longest period Dick goes undercover working as a spy because his life has just gone to shit. He is both spying on Spyral (for Bruce) but also his job within Spyral is as a spy and special agent. Think James Bond, except Dick also gets to be the focus of the objectification camera. Some people enjoy it as a change of pace, some people can't stand it because it's just a very weird story for Dick and Dick's generally personally unhappy when he's stuck undercover, and it definitely is a highlight in the 'did you know Tom King worked for an intelligence agency? Tom King is working out his feelings about working for an intelligence agency again' oeuvre. If you want to try an issue, I recommend Grayson #5 as probably the best character and storytelling piece in the entire run.

Tim Seeley: (Nightwing #1-34) Good stuff I can say about Seeley's run includes that he used Rebirth as a impetus to rebuild Dick's status quo. He did quite a lot of world building for a new version of Bludhaven, he got Dick back into Nightwing and back into a blue V costume for the first time in 7 years, he's interested in looking at the Grayson family and not so much in terms of the Court of the Owls stuff. He likes Dick and Damian's time as Batman & Robin. Seeley's also a fan of a lot of character beats in terms of Dick's characterisation that were pioneered by Devin Grayson - particularly in terms of Dick being easily attracted to women, being impetuous and hot headed at times, and in the Romani retcon. I don't necessarily see eye to eye with Seeley on all of his characterisation and story choices, but he does a lot of repair work on getting Dick back to being Nightwing, including things like repeating beats from the Dixon and Grayson runs so that Dick has that backstory again, and what that means for his character. I might suggest Nightwing #8 2016, because it revolves around Bruce and Dick and the concept of falling (I'm a sucker for a good falling metaphor) or #9, which is literally a discussion of the changes between n52 and Rebirth with both of the Clark Kents, and in which Clark points Dick to return to Bludhaven (in a sort of re-encapsulation of Clark originally giving Dick the inspiration for the name Nightwing, but this time pointing him to what people treat as his default 'home'). If you like the shape of Dick as Bludhaven's hero from fic, you probably will find Seeley's run has stuff to enjoy.

Sam Humphries: (Nightwing #35-41 2016) So Humphries' storyline is another good example of what a lot of the current run of Nightwing contains since 2016 - reinterpretations and new versions of old stories. In this case, it's an adaption of the Hanging Judge storyline to have taken place in Bludhaven in Bruce and Dick's past. I don't mind it as a story, but it's definitely there to remind you of old story beats.

I haven't yet read Benjamin Percy's run, or any of Ric Grayson yet (which is a combination of Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza and Dan Jurgens), or Tom Taylor's run, so I don't want to give you too explicit opinions on these.

In general terms from experience on other titles and what other people have said: I really loved Benjamin Percy's Detective Comics #35-36 story in n52 and I suspect his Nightwing writing is a perfectly acceptable fill; nobody particularly likes the plot surrounding Ric Grayson, and the fact Scott Lobdell had a hand in plotting it seems to me to explain a bunch of the aspects of the scenario premise that upset a lot of people; Dan Jurgens is a DC workhorse who can turn his hand to anything; and Tom Taylor's run has been described as many as 'rewrite the arc of Devin Grayson's run but make it light and fluffy and free of consequences'. I honestly think if you haven't read much Nightwing yet, Taylor's run may be a good transition run to try to see if he's your vibe; I keep getting the impression he probably makes a good intro for new readers.

If you have any other writers you would like my impression of, please ask specifically; as I've said, Dick's been written by a LOT of people over the years.

[lorbanery]

I just need to talk about Dick Grayson and Jon Kent's relationship for a minute

Just 'cause I keep seeing people file it under the typical Super-Bats dichotomy (Bruce and Clark, Tim and Kon, Jason and Bizarro, Damian and Jon)

BUT

Have you considered: Dick is the Superman to Jon's Robin?

Just

Just listen

There's the obvious justification that's just "Dick is much older than Jon", sure. But there's more nuance here.

Dick is different people to different generations of heroes.

To his own generation he's the responsible best friend everyone knows they can rely on, but also know better than to think of him as superhuman because they've all seen him at his worst (and by worst I don't just mean "most depressed" I mean most "shouting at his four year old niece" bitchy asshole).

I'm skipping Jason because he doesn't have his own generation he just kind of awkwardly pilfers people from Dick's and Tim's until they'd willingly shank Batman for him.

To Tim's generation he's a legend who they quickly realized is actually almost as out-of-touch as the first gen heroes. They're like a big queer friend group and he's the one kid's kind of square straight older brother. He's cool, he's supportive, he's always willing to drive them places, covers for them when they ditch class or are out past curfew, and he WILL throw down with anyone's homophobic parents; but he always has a lecture ready about underage drinking and while he laughs along with their "I'm too gay for this" jokes, you can tell he doesn't really get them. At least he's always excited for Pride. He buys himself a new "ally" shirt every year.

(Disclaimer: Previous paragraph was meant merely as a demonstrative metaphor and not to express any definitive opinion on Dick Grayson's sexuality. @ DC Comics let that boy be bi)

But to Damian's generation? Dick Grayson is a parental figure. When Damian and Jon were first starting out their superhero careers, Dick was not only acting as Batman, but as Damian's guardian, two roles most people, in-universe, expected him to be in permanently. And for Jon Dick wasn't just his friend's dad; when Clark had to leave Earth, forcing Jon to step into the role of Superman, and Jon expressed concern over being up to the job, Clark specifically told Jon to seek out Dick.

Because Jon, of course, was a teenager facing down not only the responsibility of being a superhero, but of bearing the weight of being a famous figure of hope. Something Dick had already done as the first Robin, and had helped at least a little two other teenagers navigate.

Now, I'm going to take a little tangent here to explain why Dick is the Clark in this situation.

When we talk about Dick's tragic backstory, a lot of little details change from retelling to retelling; but the one thing that stays consistent is the fact that Bruce took him in because Dick reminded him of himself. They both watched their parents get murdered at a young age (sometimes the exact same age, depending on the retelling); neither of them had any immediate family to take them in; both of them were only children who suddenly found themselves with the burden of being the sole carrier of their family's significant legacy. But that's pretty much where the similarities end.

Bruce was raised in a wealthy family, in a mansion in a major metropolitan city where his family had deep roots all the way back to its founding. Dick was raised by a very much working class family that lived out of a trailer/wagon/train most of, if not the entire year, traveling all across the country and/or globe. If they had a permanent residence anywhere, it was probably one of the suburbs around Tampa that were historically the off-season homes for circus performers (at least that's where I would put it).

Bruce was able to stay in his childhood home with a guardian who'd known him his whole life, who knew his family history and legacy. He was able to step into his family's legacy when he grew up and even expand it well beyond what his parents did.

Dick had to leave not only the circus he grew up in, he had to leave behind the entire community and culture and ended up being raised in a world that was completely different from it. Raised by a man who certainly respected his family and their history, but didn't know much about it or what their hopes and expectations had been for Dick.

While the path that eventually led him to becoming Batman began, for Bruce, that night when his parents were murdered, he didn't actually start seriously working towards and mentally taking on that responsibility until he was much older. In some cases he was in high school, in some not until after he graduated. But he taught himself and learned how to be a hero as an adult. He was in his twenties when he was taking the responsibility of other people's lives onto his own shoulders; when he was learning how to be most effective; when he was learning in real time the consequences of doing something wrong.

Dick started training and/or working as Robin the moment he became a permanent member of the Wayne household. He was anywhere between roughly 8 and 16, depending on the retelling, but in every version he was very a child or teenager taking on that responsibility of other people's lives, learning in real time the consequences of doing something wrong. He was trying to navigate school and a social life while feeling that responsibility for other people's safety and having this huge secret he couldn't talk about. He was given these special skills from his birth family's legacy that his adoptive parent warned him to hide from people lest they guess his secret. He had this overdeveloped strength and fighting skills that meant he had to consciously hold back when he fought bullies in school.

But while that doesn't describe Bruce, it does describe someone else in Dick's life: Clark. He lost his parents at a very young age leading him to be raised in a completely different culture and world by his adoptive parents. They respected his birth family and their culture, but knew nothing about them. They were a working class family, who lived in a small town. He developed his powers when he was just a kid. They were a part of his family legacy that his adoptive parents encouraged him to hide to keep his secret. They created a sense of responsibility in him at a young age to use them to help and protect people. They made it so that he had to hold back when he fought bullies in school. He had to learn how to navigate school and a social life while feeling that responsibility, while having this huge secret, and learning the consequences of doing something wrong when he was trying to protect people.

Clark related to Dick as a kid/teenager in ways that Bruce never really could. Clark understood a lot of the struggles Dick was facing, the weight on his shoulders. That's one of the many reasons he was, typically, very friendly and supportive of Dick; why he treated him as a respected colleague ; why he was always happy to spend time with and chat with Dick, even when Bruce wasn't around. He became a second trusted mentor to Dick, someone who understood what it was like to dedicate your entire life to protecting people; to spending your entire life as someone potentially dangerous to normal people; to being removed from your family legacy and their culture and taking up that of your adoptive family instead.

That's why, when Dick finds himself in situations where his life is drastically changing, one of his first stops is always Metropolis. That's why, when his life drastically changes and he doesn't come to Metropolis, Clark comes to check in on him. And Clark doesn't always have good advice to share to help Dick find his way. But he has enough similar life experience that it makes him pretty much the only mentor figure in Dick's life that Dick can really talk to who best understands him and his unique struggles.

Back to Jon.

When Jon was forced to become Superman, he was worried about how to be Superman. How to take on that kind of responsibility when he was so young. Clark sent him to Dick not just because he had a unique perspective on what Superman needs to be as someone who's been a fan, a colleague, and a friend; not just because he could teach Jon how to fight and protect himself and others even without his powers; not just because he's an excellent teacher. But because no other non-super has as much experience navigating the complex life of being a high profile kid superhero.

And Dick taught him. He trained him, and he told him about his father and his legacy, about who Superman was to the people who cared about him and worked with him.

And well after Dick's gone back to being Nightwing, even when he's not a constant fixture in Damian's life anymore, even when he's off in Bludhaven, when Jon finds himself struggling to navigate a new situation as a superhero, one of the first things he does is seek out Dick. Dick doesn't always have good advice to give him, but he does have similar experiences that help him understand Jon and his unique struggles.

[rapidhighway]

is teen titans good? i never actually watched it but ur art is tempting me to give it a try … superhero stuff is not typically in my realm of interests lol

I think it's pretty good, especially if you're interested in watching a fun show about a group of friends who fight crime together. There's lots of villain of the week, character-focused episodes with some very cool gems here and there. Also, TT doesn't require any knowledge of dc at all imo xd like, it definitely enhances the experience when you can point at a guy and go "I know him!" but it's really not needed for the plot or anything

[maxwell-grant]

Any thoughts on the second Mr.Terrific?

I like him quite a bit. I'm not super well read on the guy but he feels like a character Jonathan Hickman would have made a star out of by now if he worked for DC, or at least an extremely Hickman-esque set of ingredients. He is not just an omnicapable genius Great Man of science and technology with spiritual or emotional or moral blindspots, but an omnicapable-yet-compromised Great Man who defines himself around an ideal and statement of intent that can clash with the practical reality around him. He quite literally wears on his sleeve his own arc words to be repeated for emphasis.

And there is a bit of a tension in his composition also in that, he wears the most straightforward possible motto taken straight from a Golden Age guy, he's defined one of the purest distilled ideals a superhero can wear ever put on paper, and has an origin about him taking up superhero work as a newfound and sole meaning in his life, but he is not a traditional superhero, he is a Doc Savage kind of guy modeled after the heroes of the bastardverse across the street. Much of his origin is defined around the fact that he is just not operating on the same wavelength everyone else is. He is very much not a bastard, it is important that he isn't, but still, Batman would not get invited to the Illuminati, where as Michael might. He helped form a rip-off of it, even.

But to me he also feels like a character who still needs some work put into him to reach something really great. He's a guy with a killer design and a pretty good origin and sometimes occasionally a cool personality and generally is very useful to have around as a handyman gluing plots together, but who always seems to sit at a weird middleground between Reed Richards, Tony Stark, and Not-Batman that keeps him rather undefined. In his present state he is a plug-and-play character to explain plots as they happen, rather than the center of uniquely interesting things himself. He sits at a middleground now where he is too big to be street level, but he's not powerful or big enough to save the world on his own, so he's forced to fill out the stuff in between usually in mediocre spy or tech guy roles.

On the other hand, that malleability can also be a strong point to him, the fact that you can insert him anywhere from detective stories to scaled all the way up to managing a Justice League. He has legacy baggage but he is not a guy you really need to explain, you can put him in the big leagues and big stories and he explains himself as is. And it seems that people kinda get that he should be a bigger deal than he actually is, that he is open to bigger and better and more interesting things to be done with him, but there needs to be more put into it. He needs his own set-ups. He is a cool design and a cool guy and within those, really cool ideas waiting to happen.

I have been really loving the set photos that have been coming out of James Gunn's Superman and particularly the ones with Mr.Terrific, it's making him click with me a bit more and I think the movie might be what pushes me to outright love him. Given Gunn's statement comparing Holt and the other heroes to workplace buddies, he just makes intuitive sense as a guy who does things with Superman at the weird sci-fi superhero job which they both have whether it's to knock asteroids out of orbit together or deal with runaway super dogs. There is a pretty lovely World's Finest kind of symmetry to them that I really hope to see expanded on.

[professoruber]

Bette Kane as CEO of Kane Industries

DC Comics Bombshells (2015—2017) #7 - Digital Chapter #21

I did a post a while ago on Bette Kane which discussed a bit of the treatment her character has gone through. She does seem like a pretty interesting character, one whom has had the misfortune of often being pushed to the sidelines and undermined.

So I thought it would be neat to share these panels from DC Comics Bombshells; basically a 1940s Elseworlds centred around female superheroes in the homefronts during World War 2. It seems pretty fun from what I've seen, and I thought it had a pretty cool concept of having Bette take over Kane Industries and act as a philanthropist (presumably because Bruce himself won't be active in this timeline until sometime later).

Is interesting though that Bette specifically got control of Kane Industries and not Kate, which would suggest that Bette's father is older than Jacob? At least in the timeline of Bombshells.

I think I have seen some interpretation which have her be the daughter of Philip Kane (who in the current timeline ran Wayne Industries while Bruce was growing up and also when he was training to be Batman). Probably isn't the intention though since it would presumably have been mentioned if Bette's dad was dead, and also because Philip talks to Bruce about how Martha knew he wasn't fit to be father (which was his justification for having being rather absente in Bruce's life).

Even if it doesn't entirely fit with things, still is an interesting concept in my opinion.

[nitewrighter]

I think one of the reasons dc/warner bros like to push Batman (other than “cool/dark/edgy”) is ironically, it’s the easiest hero to sell toys of. As a character with no powers, he has to make do with tech, that means accessories! He can’t fly and doesn’t have super speed, ergo the Batmobile or batwing, or a bat jet pack! He needs different suits for different jobs, so that justifies variant figures! With other heroes, you’d just get the figure and that’s it. Why would the flash need a car? Why would Superman need power armor? If you’re old enough to remember, or research back enough, you’ll know the stupidity of the Superman mobile, or the just sad justice jogger. You could have a super figure’s eyes light up to show heat vision, but that’s about it. I guess you could have a green lantern toy line with construct accessories, but clear green plastic might be flimsy or too expensive, I don’t know. I’d think this was why they gave Wonder Woman a sword and shield, cuz they thought the lasso was lame, if not for BoYz DoNt LiKe GiRl HeRoZ! (Convo for another time, but even as a kid I hated that, and I was a boy)

So tldr, one of the reasons dc pushes bats is once upon a time they saw dollar signs at the idea of bat ji Joe.

Also the fact that you can make Batman Merch out of anything just by making it black and/or gray and just slapping a Batman logo on it--it's just probably a lot easier than finagling around other hero's color schemes.

Thinking about the Batsketball again...

But on a lore level, yeah, Batman is basically the "Cool Toys" superhero. You pretty much have every person in the DC universe commenting on how many "Cool toys" Batman has, or how much of a manchild having all those "Cool Toys" makes him. Like, I hate hate hate Frank Miller and of course I would fight him any day of the week, but the one thing All Star Batman and Robin had going for it was the GIANT BEAUTIFUL JIM LEE ILLUSTRATED BATCAVE PULLOUT MULTI-PAGE SPREAD. Like I need you to picture me in bed, giant glass of ice water on my nightstand, absolutely fucking miserable as I trudge through the worst fucking Batman characterization of my goddamn life, and then, AND THEN-- I go, "Oh, this is a pull-out," I carefully unfold it because library book, and then my jaw drops. I literally felt all the 8-year-old boy parts of my brain activate, and then you have young Dick Grayson's voice narrating it with five little words: "And it just. keeps. going."

A thing I really do like about all of Batman's tech and toys is they're all very tactile, and one of the things that's making Arkham Knight very fun as I'm playing through it is this factor of figuring out which of your little gadgets to use in which situation, and you're so proud of yourself when you figure out when the game expects you to use a certain gadget without the game cuing you to do so, or when you get a new gadget and then go back to all the parts of the map you previously weren't able to access without it (Baby "Square shape goes in Square hole" brain activation...) and the game also has very fun sound and vibration design and camera work to make using the various doodads feel very tactile even as it's happening in the game, but okay, let's take all those factors and pivot to Superman.

Superman doesn't have the Batcave, he has the Fortress of Solitude, and the Fortress of Solitude is not a Toy Chest like the Batcave is. The Fortress of Solitude is not a teenager's basement room to brood. The name itself is very intentional: It's Superman saying, "Yes, I save humanity, but I need breaks from it, I need a space to contemplate my work and my heritage, as well as get some distance from it for perspective, or else I will go fucking bonkers." And it's not just a house or a trophy room, either, it's a museum, it's an archive. I think about the Grant Morrison commentary about the bottle city of Kandor being a family heirloom like a snow globe or a music box--beautiful and yet distant, and that also sets a lot of the mood for the Fortress of Solitude: If the Batcave is a big toybox full of robot dinosaurs and a batarang target range and a lot of tactile stuff, then the Fortress of Solitude is a lot more, "You can look but please please please do not touch unless you really know what you're doing." You touch one crystal in the Fortress of Solitude and Jor-El's giant hologram head pops up booming 'KAL-EL, MY SON, THESE ARE THE PRECIOUS RECORDED HISTORIES OF OUR PEOPLE--' and you're like "Oh Jesus fuck how do I turn this off---"

One of the things I've come to really like in recent comics is how, as Superman has embraced having a family, that the Fortress itself feels warmer and more dynamic--Lois is using it as a space to research and write a book about Krypton, Kara tinkers with Kryptonian technology, Jon spent stints there as a toddler in Superman: Space Age, Krypto is there... It's actually kind of reflected how museums have become a lot more dynamic and kid-friendly in recent years. It's still clearly a space they all respect, but there's a much stronger element of enrichment than, "Look at this thing behind glass."

But anyway, yeah, Superman's stories are really more, like, fantastical than Batman's, so it goes to reason that Superman-play is more daydreaming and broad imaginative concepts while Batman-play is more physical and tinkering. So Batman in general is more likely to have lots of toys.

[callmelilianno]

So, i'm curently writing a DC AU-

ARIA WAYNE

Has a cool adoptive dad (who still doesn't understand the definition of "cool" after practically raising a million kids) but still smiles (softly, of course) when he hears any of his children call him this way. Has like a billion siblings (only 5 in papers).

BACKSTORY:

Her parents sold her to a group of meta traffickers a few days after her 9th birthday. They started experimenting on her, a pair of big wings started to grow on her back and feathers started appearing all over her skin. Of course, she wasn't the only one who had to put up with all that suffering, because after almost four months in captivity, two certain children, who weren't too much older than her, seemed to also have been taken by the group. That's how the three of them became friends.

After what seemed like an eternity for the poor kids, but only having been over two years and a half, the Justice League were able to track the traffickers who kidnapped them and, eventually, found the three children. While the three of them have already gotten used to each other by now, they couldn't wait more than to go back to their parents. At least, the other two wanted to. Aria didn't want to do anything with her parents, after finding out they were the one who put her through the torture in the first place, that's the last people she would want to see. That's how Bruce Wayne decided to take her in and raise her as his own. She got to meet her new brothers and sisters. It's a pretty big family. Aria decided to use her powers for the greater good and asked Batman if he could train her. After the whole "you're too young to be out there" conversation (which was weird, considering how old the Robins were when he took them out), he decided to do as she said. She was training for 7 months before she went out on her first official mission, giving herself the code name "Girl Bat", which was later changed to "Raven" (the last one was too...you got the point).

In her time spent out on either patrolling, or missions, she got to meet other heroes and vigilantes, as well as the two certain children she met not too long ago. The thing is, they are also heroes themselves. What a coincidence, huh? Finally, almost 5 years after Bruce took her in, the Justice League decided to initiate a team of young heroes who could work for them as a public unit, going on missions that the Justice League couldn't take care of. She became the leader of 'Team Zero' after the members of the Justice League voted for such. She is now operating with her curent superhero teammates, Girl Flash, Boy Flash and Nova, and hanging out with them at their base tower in Metropolis in their free time, as their civilian selfs, Diana West, Rian West and Octavia Prince.

(Only now I see how much I wrote 🥲)

(Don't repost without credits, thx!)

[got-into-worm-by-mistake]

Gestation 1.3 Live Reactions

(This is me, writing reactions as I read, because why the fuck not. They're not complete, mature thoughts taken after I sit back and evaluate what I've read. Consider them as such)

My training schedule consisted of running every morning and every other afternoon.  In the process, I had picked up a pretty good knowledge of the east side of the city.  Growing up in Brockton Bay, my parents had told me stuff like “stick to the Boardwalk”.  Even on my runs, I had scrupulously stayed on the Boardwalk and avoided the bad part of town.  Now it was Sunday night and I was in costume and breaking the rules.

Running off the boardwalk in the middle of the night in costume looking for crime to fight feels like the least of your rulebreaking, Taylor.

Just moving from one block to the next, you could see the change in the area.  As I made my way into the Docks, I could see the quality of my surroundings decline steeply.  There were enough warehouses and apartments in the area for even the most destitute to find shelter, so the only people on the streets were unconscious drunks, whores and gang members.  I steered clear of any and all people I saw and ventured further into the area.

I always love it in stories where the setting becomes a character, and from what I hear, that's definitely going to be the case for the city of Brockton Bay.

 Anyone paying attention to the local cockroach population might think something was up,

That, I think, would be a list that would include exactly zero people at this point. Even exterminators wouldn't be 'paying attention' to the cockroach population, per se.

I knew who these guys were.  They were members from the local gang that left the tags ‘Azn Bad Boys’, ABB for short, all over the East end of the city.  More than a few went to my school.  As far as the criminal element in Brockton Bay went, they weren’t small potatoes.  While the typical gang members were just Koreans, Japanese, Vietnamese and Chinese forcibly recruited from Brockton Bay’s high schools and lower class neighborhoods, the gang was led by a couple of people with powers.  Gangs didn’t tend to be that racially inclusive as far as who joined, so it said something that their leader had the ability to draw in members from so many different nationalities and keep them in line.

Ah yes, the ABB. One of the parts of Worm that I gather ages poorly, and may not have been all that well thought out. But that's hardly surprising, nor a black mark against Wildbow or Worm.

As for it being so ethnically diverse, I'd say that has as much to do with how everyone is grouped together under the 'Asian' heading here in the US, rather than Lung being particularly open-minded. Though I could be wrong.

He went by ‘Lung’, had successfully gone toe to toe with whole teams of heroes and had managed to keep himself out of jail, as evidenced by his presence here.  As for his powers, I only knew what I could scrounge up online, and there were no guarantees there.  I mean, for all I knew, he could have misled people about what his powers did, he could have a power he was keeping up his sleeve for an emergency, or he could even have a very subtle power that people couldn’t see at work.

Another cool choice, especially given what I gather is Taylor's penchant for Puzzle-boss wins later on, as it were. Also one of the reasons why information really is so vitally useful in Worm, and how Taylor's powers are key for that.

Most conventional superhero verses I'm familiar with definitely lend themselves more to an approach where a supervillain or superhero's powerset is largely established - obviously DC and Marvel can't avoid that, but even other superhero media seems to have that too.

But the internet is full of lies, mistakes and misrepresentations. Really makes you wonder what the in-universe wikipedia entry for Superman is like tho.

I decided to move away from where I was and find a better vantage point to monitor their conversation, which seemed like a good compromise between my curiosity and my self preservation. 

Very fair. Going against the fire-breathing armored dude who can eventually become a dragon does seem hazardous to one's health.

They were going to kill kids?

And so the Wormverse turns. Had she not heard the word 'Children', or had Lung used a different word, or just said 'The Undersiders' or whatever...

1.3 doesn't really seem to have a whole lot going on honestly but it isn't nothing, and sometimes you just need a bit of a bridging chapter.

[saibug1022]

Ranking My MCs on How Likely They Would Be Adopted by Batman

Not a single person has ever asked for this. However, I have seen so much batfam stuff on my dash it's been living rent free

Val Ebony (ILITW) If you told me Val moved to Gotham and was a vigilante for a few years and then moved back right before ILITW I think I would believe you. This man has the whole package: dark hair (his hair is brown underneath all the dye), tragic backstory, shitty parents, even shittier bio dad who's also a villain, homicidal rage, he even died! But overall what got him to the top is just because of how well he fits with the Gotham and the Bats' vibes and aesthetics. Like it just feels right.

Eros Blackwell (Immortal Desires) Batman would have showed up in Crimson Beech to try to recruit Eros only for Eros to explain they do in fact still have a mom *who is on thin ice with me rn). However. They still get REALLY close, especially when they find out Gotham is on a ley line. I'm tempted to say Eros, Cas, and Gabe fuck off to Gotham after ID 2

August Rose (Crimes of Passion) So August's backstory is that they grow up most likely without their mom, and then their dad is mysteriously murdered. August tries to solve it themself but fails and instead becomes a detective to solve other crimes and hopefully find justice for other people. They're gruff, badass, and too damn clever. They were definitely Robin. Hell they could be Batman for all we know and it just wasn't mentioned in CoP

Magnus Bishop (Laws of Attraction/Into the Windverse) While slightly less likely only because he becomes a lawyer instead of some sort of detective or hero. However, he absolutely has the potential. His parents were murdered when he was young, he was tormented at school and betrayed by his friends, he was neglected by his foster mother and separated from his sister, all before he turns 18. He even gets super powers eventually. He has the determination, the ambition, and hell the whole reason he became a lawyer was to defend people from the systems that beat him down his whole life.

Asterin Nightbloom (BOLAS) I mean Asterin is pretty obvious, he's like the quintessential hero. Dead parents (twice), super skilled, heart of gold, etc etc. He's practically born to be a hero and I think he'd be such a good bat. Maybe not a Robin unless it's just for a few years before becoming his own hero

Leon Vance (It Lives Beneath) The main reason Leon is so high up is because he is so fucking capable. That's what the bats are known for among other heros. And of course there's his classic bat backstory. He's a badass, he unearths a CULT, has a cool and unique signature weapon, forms his own team and even has a super hero suit. Best part, he looks good the whole time.

Damian Stone (Murder at Homecoming) There's the obvious stuff like being a genius, a detective, unsolved mystery haunting the narrative, solving a murder, looking good doing it, socially awkward, etc etc, but I also have to add that I literally named them after Damian Wayne. In fact their name was originally gonna be Tim after Time Drake but Damian sounded better. However, they do suffer in the rankings seeing as they have both of their parents, both of which are also very good parents.

Callum Wayland (Hero) Listen, Callum would be a great DC hero but in terms of Batman relations I don't think he'd be adopted. Unfortunately for him the Super Family parallels are just too hard to ignore. However I could see him being a Bat's emotional support Super so they'd see each other a lot and I think Bruce would be begrudgingly fond of him when he finds out Callum punched a corrupt rich guy into the stratosphere.

Castor Athantis (It Lives Within) Castor has all the makings of a PHENOMENAL DC superhero but again I just don't see them as a bat. They have too much of a mystical connection. They're more likely to run ith someone like Constantine. I'm sure they'd be associated, I could definitely see Castor joining Justice League Dark, but that's it

Emrys (The Cursed Heart) Emrys will fight for people but it's not something they're really going to pursue. They have the backstory for it, don't get me wrong, but going out and punching bad guys just isn't really their thing. In a modern au they might be some sort of friend of Bruce's and a Batman ally but they wouldn't be a hero.

Julian Athantis (It Lives Within) Julian is just as good a candidate as Castor, down to mystical powers. But Julian would only be a hero to help Castor, if he was one at all. He just wouldn't have his heart in it. He'd show up, help other heroes, and I could definitely see his and Lincoln's apartment being open to be used as a safe house, but he just doesn't want to be a hero. Not as in he's just not interested, more as in he actively does not want to be a hero.

Taylor McKenzie (Endless Summer) Taylor is in a similar boat as Julian where he doesn't really want to be a hero. He'll show up to big planet-threatening shit but otherwise he just wants to go to college and love his friends and husband. I could see the Justice League, Batman especially, keeping tabs on him so they'd know each other but that's about it. More likely Taylor would just go create problems for Dr. Fate when he's bored and then go back to minding his business.

Apollo Solaris (The Elementalists) Apollo really fits the hero archetype. However. I think if he stepped foot in Gotham city he'd explode. Or maybe Gotham would. They just clash so severely that even if he did meet Batman for whatever reason they'd hate each other.

Mattheo Lazarin (Bloodbound) Listen. Mattheo has enough on his plate being the Bloodkeeper and dealing with vampire shit. He doesn't have time to care or be a hero.