#and honestly when comics dont make bruce the most Fucked parent ever honestly then bruce and dick moments are so good

[snowcoming]

i love when people try to make bruce and jason's relationship cuter by making it sound like dick does NOT exist AT ALL like "batman's first son and he loved him" and "he would rather lose everybody than lose jason" like im pretty sure that bruce would prefer to lose neither dick nor jason but you know what you do you 💀😂

[bitd]

dc comics? :3 maybe just gotham characters to narrow the scope

oh gd okay. um.

joker still hasn’t shown up yet but i know the most about him. which is still pretty limited because shit is so fucking varied. basically theres this guy whos insane and then this doctor is like i could fix him and hes like i cuold make her worse and then he manipulates her or something they break out of the asylum. yay. 

joker hates batman. whois bruce wayne whos parents were killed in a random event walking down an alley. i think they tried to fight back not in gotham and it esclated. regardless brucey survived and now he’s a billionaire. he’s dating the catwoman chick selina kyle and i dont think he knows that she’s like catwoman. or maybe he does. i think they’re dating normally and as batman/catwoman. maybe?

batman fights crimes or whatever? he’s a vigilante. he’s like really serious or whatever. he uses his billonaire money to finance this and has a butler who’s british and i dont know why hes british or a butler, because they are in fantasy new jersey. he never kills the guys that are around or wahtever. hes 12 in gotham btw.

oswald cobblepot talks so weird and  i dont  think hes remotely like he is in gotham at all in other canons? he’s a snazzy little small business owner by the name of teh penguin. he runs this place called the iceberg lounge.

the riddler is ed nygma and he’s literally just silly. he’s like what if jigsaw didn’t kill that much ithink. he loves puzzles. i thinkthis is the one you kin? he’s probably kissing harvey dent. in gotham he’s such a little autistic man. i think basil of bitd fame would also kin him honestly.

harvey dent is a district attorney and he also becomes two face. i  have seen the dark knight exactly 0 times while completely sober but i think h e was laying in gasoline because the joker is a cunt. i thikn he stops being a DA after he becomes evil. he likes flipping coins a lot and i think hes kinda a pretentious jokesboy. i think he’s alpha coupling this chick named glynda or soemthing?

fish doesnt exist outside of gotham but she’s fucking harvey bullcok who is like, really fucking despised by everyone ever in every other media property. he acts like haymitch though in gotham. he’s jim gordon’s partner. jim gordon is this police guy? i don’t know. its weird, ok? i think he’s the police chievf maybe? he’s friends with batman and doesn’t want him to get caught. or maybe he does. he’sn ot really good at it regardless though.

then there’s firefly and drury, who are making out. you wrote a screenplay for those guys! they’re not in gotham, but i thought maybe i would mention thme. there’s also punchline who i want to make out with and my friend of cassander kins. ummm. and jason todd who i think is really hot. he gets blown up, and then he lives through that, and everyones like wtf when he’s kinda pissed off that bruce lets him get killed and won’t kill the joker. 

there’s dinah lance who is black canary. also . she sings and then that makes everything explode >:)

roman sionis IS in gotham. he’s pretty funny in there and hasn’t done anything atrocious yet. he’s kind of ugly though. his thing is collecting old war time artifacts and he wears this mask - hes called the black mask, because the mask is black. it kinda looks like the guy from squidgame’s mask, you know the one? he’s a real shithead in birds of prey though. he’s an affably evil CEO and he cuts off peoples faces.

i wish the joker was in gotham. i hope hes like poor little meow meow able im getting kind of sick of watching the ssame btas episodes

[bigskydreaming]

I'm not sure if you got my request because i didn't had internet when i sent it, so i'll write it again xd Do you think Dick (and the batboys in general) are famouse like Bruce? Because in the comics there's not any clue about it, i've never seen anyone say something like "oh look! Its Dick Grayson!, y'know, Wayne's first ward/son And its a shame, because reporters would make such a hard life to all of them, it would maka a good narrative tool

Honestly, this is a prime example of that inconsistency I rant about, and also DC’s refusal to just COMMIT on even the most basic aspects of their universe like….uh…how many kids does Batman have. 

afhsahfklahsklfhal

Like, you would think that would meet the MINIMUM requirements of “shit you should probably have figured out and make sure everybody’s on the same page with” but DC’s like….nah, that’s not important.

So I mean…..I’m reasonably certain - like this is just my personal belief, but I’d put money on it being right, lol - but I think the primary reason there’s so little mention in the comics of how Bruce’s kids are viewed in the public eye/how much the public are aware of them (in the New 52, at least, as pre-Flashpoint there was a lot more plot around that kind of thing, especially back in the 80s and 90s)……

…is because 90% of the writers and editors have no clue either, and nobody wants to be the one to ask, and like, open that can of worms. I 100% think you could ask five different writers at DC which kids Bruce has OFFICIALLY adopted in this current continuity, and get five different answers, lol.

There’s been so much handwaving about Dick’s status ever since Spyral, and again - I think its because nobody bothered to think through the logistics of the Hypnos/global-mindwipe machine BEFORE writing it into the story, and then once it did occur to any of them to like….wonder just how specifically it worked, they were like, fuck it, better just be as vague as possible. So, according to Grayson, everyone Helena didn’t program into the exclusion list before the satellite was activated should have no recollection of Dick Grayson, which is why he was able to ‘go back to his old life’ and be Nightwing again, without worrying about his secret identity having been unmasked…..

But what does that mean for his official identity as adopted son or even just ward of billionaire Bruce Wayne? People can’t have NO memory of Dick Grayson and still remember that Bruce Wayne took in a kid named Dick Grayson. I mean, as far as I can tell, the overall consensus in the comics seems to be that after the satellite was activated, Dick just kinda started from scratch as ‘Dick Grayson’ like, he was free to be himself again, but it was like he was a blank slate/came out of nowhere as far as everyone else was concerned. But again, that means as far as anyone outside of their close circle of family and friends know….Dick Grayson is a non-entity to Bruce Wayne and the two have no history. 

Which I mean, is fairly shitty and you’d think if nothing else, there’d be massive story potential there for delving into Dick’s character and his relationship with Bruce and examining how he felt about ‘having his old life/identity back’….except with the caveat that as far as the world is concerned, his life and identity don’t and have never included his father.

Cut to DC: Naaaaaaaah.

But even WITH that, plot holes persist, and abound, because…..why didn’t the satellite erase the Court of Owls’ knowledge/memory of Dick? Even before Luthor gave Cobb those goggles and files to help him with bringing Ric into the fold, Cobb clearly was already stalking Ric and knew exactly who he was….the Court obviously already had that doctor in place while he was still in recovery…so, whoops. I mean, you could probably come up with an explanation about the Court, via their own tech and resources, having had some protections in place 24/7 that kept the satellite from affecting them even though they weren’t on guard for it specifically…..but again, Occam’s Razor….I feel like the real answer is DC just didn’t care enough to think things that far through. Especially since the average Bludhaven citizen, like Bea, at least didn’t seem totally blown away when Ric revealed to her that amnesia aside, he was supposedly some rich billionaire’s adopted kid….which again suggests that as far as the writers were thinking, people in general are familiar with the idea that Bruce Wayne has more than one kid.

Then you’ve got Jason’s whole situation, and to be honest….I really only have the vaguest idea what’s going on there, because reading Lobdell books is against my religion, and I am a devout and deeply spiritual person, as you all probably can tell. I mean, I know that there’s something going on where like, Jason had himself legally resurrected in the public eye and is openly referring to himself as Bruce Wayne’s formerly-assumed dead foster kid……but like, is that the official official word, or would other writers if you asked them say they’d been operating under the assumption Bruce had adopted Jason too at some point in the Rebirth timeline, or….idek, man.

I…..honestly don’t have the faintest fucking clue what to make of the many back-and-forth retcons about Tim and his parents and his official place in the Batfam/relationship with Bruce, and am actually slightly terrified of even trying to make sense of that clusterfuck of a Gordian knot, so my official stance on Tim is to just like….back sloooooowly away from the anthropomorphic-migraine-masquerading-as-a-backstory, without like….agitating it and accidentally setting off another multiverse Crisis birthed wholly from just that one all-consuming black hole of a retcon.

I mean, there’s a reason I basically just shoehorn all the kids’ official pre-Flashpoint family statuses into anything I write in Rebirth continuity, and that’s not just stubbornness and my refusal to play the “now this kid is adopted…now he’s not…now he is again….except he’s not….oh he’s adopted again…..oh wait now he’s not again" game. 

Its like. Also for the sake of my sanity and stuff.

(And also hahahahaha fuck you DC times infinity, every time you use the words “blood son,” or “real family” in a comic, or have one of Bruce’s other kids refer to Bruce as “your father” when talking to Damian, as if that’s not an utterly bizarre and roundabout way for any sibling to refer to their mutual parent and thus I j’ete REFUSE to acknowledge it as valid….ahem, anyway, my point is, every time they do that in a comic, I double down and headcanon Bruce throwing a random as fuck gala for literally no other purpose than to remind all of Gotham that he has half a dozen kids and they’re all better than everyone else’s. Ugh. Kill it. Kill the “blood son” nonsense with fire and lightning and also lots of stabbing maybe).

Anyway, that’s my official stance on DC’s stance on Damian in the books.

Then as far as Cass goes….ugh, her origins were pretty much utterly butchered by the New 52, which IMO has also failed to give us Cass and Bruce bonding and dynamics sufficient to Sate Mine Ire™, sooooooo…..I mean, my perception of the current canon is that Cassandra’s official status is “secret mystery foster child that nobody really knows about,” but because I do not care for that and there’s the whole not sufficiently sated ire thing I mentioned, I officially reject this canon and willfully replace it with pre-Flashpoint Bruce and Cass love and adoption. DC’s welcome to kiss my critically acclaimed hiney if I’m doing it wrong.

Which brings us last, but certainly not least, as its only this way because I go sequentially and Duke is still Shiny and New comparative to the others and will be until the next inevitable fostering/adoption/clone hi-jinks bumps him up the sequential ladder (except I randomly switched Damian and Cass around this time because LOOK I DONT MAKE THE RULES, THERE ARE NO RULES i hvea Adhd hiccup sob leavem e aloooone soooooob)…..

Duke’s official status, much like the rest of the Batkids, can be summed up as Honestly, I Really Don’t Have A Fucking Clue And Am Just Winging This Whole Thing.

I mean, there’s less inconsistency with him, due mostly to the fact that so few writers other than Snyder use him (boo, hiss, and not just because I hate having to give Snyder credit for stuff - look, I love his Duke, but I loathe how he writes Dami, its a thing, I just…don’t get me started). But what inconsistencies there are….well….they’re a bit glaring.

Basically one major storyline showed Duke as being an official foster kid/ward of Bruce’s and living out of the Manor with Bruce and Damian and occasionally Tim when he’s not off road-tripping around the multiverse….and then Batman and the Signal had Duke in the care of his uncle, who was stated to be his legal guardian and Duke was constantly sneaking out in order to meet Bruce in the special Signal-cave he built specifically for Duke to operate out of so he didn’t have to like, drive all the way out to the Manor to change just so he could then drive back into the city and patrol. And then Batman and the Outsiders just said fuck all that, here’s Duke and Cass hopping hemispheres with the Outsiders every other issue, so apparently nobody’s making unscheduled visits anywhere back in Gotham to make sure these two are where they’re legally assumed to be, which again, for the record is…..*error, source not found*

LOLOL and the really fun thing about this little back and forth is I’m pretty sure allllll these conflicting takes are all the work of the same writer. Like. GET ON YOUR OWN PAGE, DUDE.

Also, again I have to assume the “Can’t Be Bothered To Give A Shit, Or Maybe They’re All Just Really Bad At Logic” curse has struck again, because….uhhhh…..

….at no point anywhere in Duke’s stories have I seen Bruce or literally anyone else express concern about the fact that Duke living with Bruce as his official foster, like he definitely and clearly was at some point at least…..means that literally every single one of his We Are Robin friends who knows that he was taken in by the Batfam (and there’s several of them who know this)….like, by the transcendent properties of You Can’t Honestly Think They’re That Dumb, that’s a good five or six civilians out there who probably took all of five seconds to play connect the dots and figure out the Wayne family, having officially taken Duke in on paper…..is pretty likely the Batfamily.

I mean, I like all of Duke’s friends and would definitely headcanon/write them as all being trustworthy and able to keep this knowledge to themselves for Duke’s sake, if nothing else, but I mean, its pretty unprecedented for Bruce to out himself and all of his kids/allies by extension, to like, that many civilian teenagers all in one swoop….

…sooooooo, you’d think, AGAIN, logically, maybe, perhaps, this is the kind of thing that should be brought up in a narrative somewhere as a plot point worth delving into, y’know, just for shits and giggles and maybe a little bit of that whatchamacallit - oh right, character development, but.

Cut to DC: Naaaaaaah.

 *throws up hands and does the I Can’t Even Shuffle all the way home*

In conclusion:

DC is a mess. The official/public status of each and every Batkid is a mess. Except for Damian, the blood son, but we have that pencilled in on the schedule to be killed with fire and also stabbing, so he can get filed under ‘just a fucking mess’ with the rest of his siblings. Hashtag Solidarity.

I mean, I say just write or headcanon their official status however you damn well please, and it’ll STILL be more effort than I believe DC has put into organizing and staying consistent with all of this, and thus STILL make more sense than what we currently have to work with.

*Shrugs* If they don’t care enough to provide a clear canon blueprint to follow when mapping the Bat Family Tree, I can’t be bothered to care if the one I make up myself happens to contradict one single mention of one kid’s official status as claimed by one issue of one book.

Especially if it was written by Lobdell.

Jason’s just a foster son my ass. grumble mumble bitter vengeful swears and a pox on all DC’s houses. WHY DO YOU PEOPLE HATE ADOPTION SO MUCH, INQUIRING MINDS WANT TO KNOW AND ALSO FUCK YOU.

[bigskydreaming]

hi, im new to reading actual comics and i just read the court of owls. this was the first time id ever seen bruce actually hit dick—does that happen a lot? i was honestly shocked at it. and bruce never apologized. im trying to understand why bruce would do that—why do you think? i dont think the comic was glorifying it at all but it was still there and im a little dumbfounded as to why the writers thought that was appropriate to put in there. what are your thoughts?

Its shitty writing. That’s the ultimate answer. Every instance of Bruce’s kids ever has been an instance of shitty writing, because it never gets addressed or followed up on, and its not like there’s EVER a good reason to write a father hitting his kids unless you’re specifically centering the kids and trying to write a story of abuse and learning to recognize and accept that yes, this is actually happening to them now what do they do with that awareness and understanding....and let’s be frank, that’s not a story that DC has ever desired or intended to write with Bruce in the position of that father.

So flat out, no equivocation, every instance of Bruce hitting his kids ever, has been shitty, unacceptable writing, no matter the context or the follow-up, because the end takeaway at the heart of the matter is always, always, always, that whatever each writer’s actual intention when writing those scenes, they definitively did not ‘intend’ for it to be seen as abusive.

But that means jack shit in terms of whether what was actually shown on the page, was in fact abusive. Which has been the case, more than once, and with more than one of his kids.

So unfortunately, he has been physically violent with Dick on more than one occasion, in which there was no chance of it being spun as mind control or like, them fighting as equals because of some story position or whatever, where it was just definitively, a father hitting his son for his own emotional reasons or whatever. It happened after Jason’s death, it happened in the Court of Owls arc, it happened after Dick briefly died and was resuscitated in Forever Evil and Bruce was trying to get him to go undercover without anyone else knowing he’d survived yet. There have been a couple other times where the two of them have come to mutual blows in a fight that started as just a verbal argument, but I tend not to focus on those for a number of reasons but tbh, mostly just because its an uphill battle getting people to address even the times when its most clear that Bruce is without a doubt unjustified and dishing out abuse that is in no way reciprocated. There’s no real chance to even get around to the scenes that are complicated by additional layers.

And again to be clear, this kind of shit writing isn’t just limited to Dick. Bruce has been physically violent with Jason ever since he came back as the Red Hood in more than one altercation, with there being the flimsy justification in some of these stories that well, technically Jason is ‘the bad guy’ and Bruce is just doing what he has to in order to stop him....but with more than one instance of Bruce being overly violent with Jason in ways that he isn’t with even some of the worst criminals or villains in other stories, thus making it impossible to interpret as anything other than Bruce’s aggression being heightened by his emotional turmoil at Jason’s actions, the fact that he’s fighting his own son, Bruce’s own issues, etc, etc....

Which ultimately all just boils down to...Bruce is violent with Jason and to degrees that he isn’t with even his most notorious villains, and his own emotional state is the only explanation possible, which makes the over the top nature of Bruce’s violence in these scenes outright abuse, no matter the existence of the ‘well Jason technically was doing something that Bruce was trying to stop, it was more of a hero vs antihero thing rather than a father vs son thing’ attempt at spinning it otherwise. Notable and notorious instances of this are Bruce’s way of ‘finishing’ things in UTRH, RHATO #25, etc.

With Tim, the only real instance so far has been Batman #71, the King written bullshit I spoke of, and tbh I’m still so steamed at his attempt at justifying that, like, just read the latest issue to see the full story there because I refuse to even dignify that particular bit of abuse apologism with a paraphrasing.

And unfortunately, Bruce has definitely been written being emotionally abusive with all his kids at various points or another, with again the real culprit usually being dumbass fuckferrett writer assholes who wouldn’t know how to write a healthy parent/child interaction if your Higher Power of Choice directly appeared in their room, shining with benevolence and full-on “Do Not Test Me On This”  wattage, and then handing them a script that word for word laid out how to write out a healthy parent/child interaction for the scene they were beginning....like, they’d STILL find a way to fuck it up, that’s how bad these particular writers are at recognizing This Is A Good Action and This is A Bad Action, Bad, B-A-D, DON’T DO IT.

And the thing is, that’s not Bruce Wayne at his core characterization. I don’t believe it is anymore than even the most die-hard Bruce fan, which I most decidedly am not. I’m here for his kids, he can stay when he’s doting and on his best Dadly behavior, but he’s always on thin ice with me at this point and on his own, I’m usually just like meh, wouldn’t adopting an orphan right about now be a better use of your time?

But for sure, Bruce absolutely has been written as a good parent in canon as well, and has everything he needs character wise to constantly have that portrayal of him upheld and prioritized instead of his worse traits but like. We have definitely gotten Bad Dad Bruce in canon, and more frequently than any of us would like....which is where we usually turn to fandom, for fix-its.

And there’s lots of Good Dad Bruce Wayne in fanfics. Its even its own tag. And I have no problem with most of those fics in spirit, or the concept in general, I’m just very opinionated and knee-jerk about abuse apologism across the board, so I mean...if it were up to me, I’d much rather normalize tags like “Bruce Wayne Can Be A Good Dad” and “Bruce Wayne Can Be A Bad Dad.” I don’t generally like broad-sweeping declarations made about characters that no one person can ever ensure consistent characterization for, so no matter how understandable the intent, I object to the idea of Good Dad Bruce Wayne protection squads or tags on the basis of like...how easily that can lead straight into abuse apologism, with people making the claim “Bruce would never do what he did in canon story (x)....because Bruce is a Good Dad and good dads don’t do that.” Well no, they don’t. In theory. Cuz problem is in reality, supposedly good dads do things like that all the time, because nobody IMO is truly good or bad, they just do good or bad things and even a person with a track record of doing mostly good things can occasionally surprise people, even themselves, by doing something horrific.

 And like, when we’re talking about fictional characters I’m all for arguing that something was out of character because with fiction you CAN actually consider a writer’s intent and compare and contrast it with what’s on the page, like you CAN technically say well, the writer SAID in this interview here, that they did this because they were thinking x, y and z....and then you could feasibly point to the actual on the page depiction of that scene and say okay but look at x, y and z here...what we actually got clearly isn’t what they claim they were actually going for, so they fucked it up, it wasn’t even their own intention, so like....I argue that this was out of character and shouldn’t be given too much weight. 

You can’t do that in reality. Impact is what matters. The effect. Not the cause. The intent. No matter how uncharacteristic an up until that point  ‘good dad’ striking their kid is for them....they’re not a character. They’re a person. It CAN’T be out of character, its them that did it, their action that caused the effect of their kid being abused, with no take backs for that, no rewind that will ever undo whatever effect that has on the rest of their relationship from that day forward, or whether they even have one at all.

And people have trouble setting firm boundaries on what they will defend in fiction versus what they will defend or call out as indefensible in reality, it isn’t nearly as either or as a lot of people try and tell themselves it is, IMO....like, my stance tends to be that if you can’t even condemn a fictional character for doing a clearly abusive thing, how do you think you can definitively say you’re sure you’d be able to condemn a loved one for doing a clearly abusive thing? Y’know? Its not as easy to separate as people like to make it out to be, so I’m hugely against abuse apologism in fandom because I think a lot of times....the way we react to these things in terms of favorite fictional characters can potentially end up a training ground for how we react to these things in real life, if they end up happening at a later point.

So I’m very critical of Bruce in a lot of my posts, but its not because I don’t want him to be good for his kids or don’t think he can be written that way....and not even because I don’t get the thought process behind ‘well I don’t view his character as being capable of that when he’s written the ways that drew me to his character in the first place, and this kind of behavior isn’t what I’m here for, it isn’t escapism for me and it just depresses me so I choose not to interact with or acknowledge these specific parts of canon.’

My issues arise from the specific ways a lot of fans attempt to write around these instances of canon, in order to not have to factor it into Bruce’s character and their view and depiction of it...while often times failing to apply similarly transformative energy to the characters Bruce hurt in these instances of canon. And when that happens, its a problem, IMO....because you end up writing Good Dad Bruce Wayne....and his kids who are at times resentful or bitter or argumentative or wary...as they are shown at times to be in canon....largely BECAUSE of those moments in canon where he’s written at his worst and does fucked up things. But without acknowledging those parts of canon at all, AND without similarly rewriting the course of events in his KIDS’ lives as much as you do in Bruce’s himself.....the end result often ends up being that you have Good Dad Bruce Wayne and a bunch of stubborn brats that according to this narrative spin have no reason for being as resentful or bitter or argumentative or wary as they’re being here...since THEY’RE still being written according to their full, overall canon characterization, with no specific chunks chiseled out.

And then of course, my other major issue with abuse apologism in fandom arises from how often fans seem willing to tackle the possibility or instances of Bad Dad Bruce Wayne in order to write fix-it fics and headcanons and meta for the times he’s hurt Jason or Tim or Damian, etc.....but then selectively erase or ignore the instances he’s done similar shit to Dick...because so much of this fandom insists on this take that he’s specifically favored by Bruce and has received special treatment that justifies the others’ occasional resentment of him, and the resentment of their fans for him. So there’s this kinda thing where you end up with a lot of fandom ignoring or refusing to acknowledging some fairly pivotal canon events because Bruce Would Never Do That, He’s A Good Dad.....AND then on top of that you have a lot of the rest of fandom ignoring or refusing to acknowledge some equally pivotal canon events because Bruce Would Never Do That To Dick, He’s A Good Dad To Dick...Its Just Everyone Else He Fucks Up With.

And that kind of selective acknowledgment of abuse for reasons of personal character preference like...get under my skin, BIG TIME. *Shrugs*

[bigskydreaming]

Whats Nightwing and Deathstroke's dynamic? Why does it make you wince? Im not very familiar with it.

Nightwing and Slade actually have a really interesting and compelling dynamic in a lot of ways, that can be really good when written well and really terrible when not. My biggest issue is it is that its not sexual in the comics (Slade is a good thirty years older than him) or in other adaptations that have a version of it, like the Teen Titans cartoon. But fandom being fandom, Dick/Slade is a bigger ship than like, half his actual canon ships, so any new take on it always comes with a big sigh at all the new Dick/Slade shipping that’s gonna crop up or have a resurgence cuz of it. And I’m annoyed enough with YJ right now that I’m not giving them the benefit of the doubt that they’ll do anything new or interesting with it that’s worth having to wade through pages of new Dick/Slade noncon in the months afterwards. Its a ship that generates a lot of non-con fic in particular, or at least my old favorite, ‘dubcon’, with the dubious part of the consent referring to the fact that it usually involves mind control or brainwashing, both tropes that show up a lot in their interactions anyway. (Not that there’s anything dubious about this NOT allowing for consensual anything, just that people love to call it dubcon because….fuck if I know).

But anyway….in the comics, Deathstroke is a mercenary who’s one of the Titans’ earliest and most iconic enemies. Though at various times and depending on who’s writing him, he’s sometimes an antihero and even a semi-trusted ally of the Titans (usually with Dick specifically), other times a villain but with his own personal code of honor that means he won’t help the Titans or other heroes but he’ll refuse to take jobs that would pit him against them, and other times he’s full on remorseless and sadistic villain who hates them all and wants them all dead.

He also had three kids, his son Grant (the first Ravager), his younger son Joseph (Jericho) and his youngest, their half-sister Rose (the second Ravager). Basically, the first time he interacted with the Titans was when the supervillain group HIVE put out a contract to have the Titans all killed. Slade turned them down cuz of his personal honor code and how young the Titans were, but his son Grant accepted the contract in exchange for HIVE giving him superpowers to help him fulfill it. The process didn’t work right though, and when fighting the Titans, Grant’s powers overloaded and killed him.

Slade blamed the Titans for this, and vowed to finish the contract and kill them as some twisted way of honoring Grant. He doesn’t do Logic so good, well no, its more like he doesn’t really do parenting so good, as in he tends to have fuck all to do with his kids 364 days of the year, but then something bad happens to one of them and suddenly he thinks he’s Dad of the Year and going 0 to Homicidal in six seconds flat is the way to make up for all the times he’s let them down or screwed them over, instead of just…not Doing That.

So Slade recruited a young meta named Tara Markov (yup, that one) and trained her as his apprentice specifically to help him get revenge on the Titans. At his prompting, she joined the Titans as a spy for him, feeding him intel and plotting against them in one of the best known comicbook storylines of all time, The Judas Contract. It was up there with some of the X-Men’s best known stories like the Dark Phoenix Saga and Days of Future Past. (In the 80s actually, the Titans comic book was almost as popular as Uncanny X-Men at the time. Like way more than the Justice League. They were DC’s big hitters, popularity wise - specifically the lineup that for the most part was centered around Dick, Donna, Starfire, Beast Boy, Cyborg and Raven, with other members like the original Titans and later ones like Pantha and Wildebeest coming and going at various points in the 80s too).

Ultimately, Tara made her move and betrayed the Titans, enabling Slade to kidnap each of them one by one and turn them over to the HIVE….all except for Dick. In the meanwhile, he was approached by Slade’s ex-wife Adeline Kane - who has an equally all over the place dynamic with Slade, like sometimes she’s his worst enemy and other times she’s manipulating events behind the scenes to help him without him knowing, because she still loves him…it basically just depends on who’s writing her, same as with Slade. Also, Kane is Adeline’s maiden name, she’s distantly related to Kate Kane aka Batwoman in some extremely complicated manner I can never remember, but that’s mostly just trivia. I can’t remember a time its ever been relevant to a story, and it has nothing to do with Slade’s interactions with Dick.

ANYWAY. Point being, so Adeline, who blames and hates Slade at this time for their son Grant’s death, along with their other son Joey, seek out Dick and offer their help rescuing the Titans and defeating Slade. Joey is a metahuman as a result of Slade’s altered DNA (he has regenerative powers and is actually immortal, due to experiments the army did on him while he was a soldier). So Joey was born with powers although they didn’t activate until he was a young adult. His codename was Jericho and his power lets him possess peoples’ bodies. He’s also mute, and I’m half expecting him to show up in YJ fairly soon. If not this season then hinted at by the end of it. Also wouldn’t surprise me if they had plans to have him be gay in the YJ universe. He’s a character who was coded as gay practically from his debut. Joey/Dick is actually probably Dick’s oldest and most enduring slash ship, for the record.

So Joey works with Dick to rescue the Titans and defeat Slade, who’s captured and goes on trial for kidnapping the Titans. Joey ends up joining the Titans in the aftermath, and Adeline’s yay good, this was my Sekrit Plan all along, I did all this solely in the hopes that you would end up a superhero and have positive influences and not end up a murdering douchebag of flexible morality like your dad cuz fuck that guy, am I right Titans?

Did Adeline really just do all of that because she wanted her son to have more friends? Like…idk honestly it could go either way. Like….it IS the kind of thing she would do, tbh, so its as likely she was telling the truth as it is she just wanted to screw Slade one last time to avenge Grant and then was like hey if I take credit for my kid ending up a Titan now, I could probably play the “you owe me one” card later if I ever need to. Addy does like handing out “you owe me one” cards, just to be safe. Never know when you might need one.

The thing all this has to do with Dick is like, so it basically ended up being Dick versus Slade in the big finale, while Joey was rescuing the others and helping them face off against Tara. And for whatever reason - with multiple takes on this offered by multiple writers in the decades since - something about Dick just stuck with Slade and he’s had a kinda fascination with him ever since. Like he’s always talking about how much more he could teach Dick than what he already learned from Bruce, trying to convince him he’s got a killer instinct that Bruce just suppressed and its holding him back, blah blah, like saying he’s good, but Slade could make him great, so he surpasses both Bruce and Slade. TBH, he spends WAY more time obsessing about Dick and getting Dick to join him than he bothers paying attention to his own kids. 

It really isn’t inherently sexual though, its a weird kinda pseudo father/son, pseudo mentor/mentee type thing. And its not entirely one-sided, because Dick at various times IS…tempted? Kinda? Like whenever Dick’s having some kind of crisis of conscience, or he’s pissed at Bruce or is questioning the effectiveness of superheroes or why they do the things they do or what does it all matter blah blah blah like omg I love you Dick, I really do, but sometimes you are such a drama queen, my god, blast some My Chemical Romance, experiment with drugs and chill out already, its not that deep. (LOL I kid. Well mostly). But point being, every once in awhile something happens that puts Dick in a funk and makes him second guess himself, and he spends like….a month being convinced he should reinvent himself as the anti-Bruce, that’s the solution, and this usually sends him in search of Slade except he’s always like ‘OH FANCY MEETING YOU HERE, THIS IS TOTALLY RANDOM AND NOT ON PURPOSE’. 

And Slade likes to take any opportunity to try and convince him like BE A BAD GUY DICK, KILL PEOPLE FOR MONEY, ALL THE COOL KIDS ARE DOING IT. Except inevitably Slade does something that pisses Dick off and Dick snaps out of it and is like NO, IM A HERO AND THIS IS BAD, I REMEMBER NOW AND I’LL NEVER JOIN YOU, YOU’RE NOT MY REAL DAD I HATE YOU! And then they fight again, but with swords, not words, and then they’re like crap, we’re too well matched, this is going nowhere, you’re a worthy opponent, the only one I can truly respect, blah blah and then they call a breather and Slade’s like hey kid, wanna grab a beer and Dick’s like yeah but only if you promise not to kill anyone. And Slade’s like ugh fine.

And then Slade’s all, look kid, its been fun but its time you went home to your real family and your real life, this isn’t you, you’re a hero, I can’t try and turn you into something you’re not, its Wrong. And Dick’s like….umm yeah, I know, I literally JUST said that, how hard did I hit you? And Slade’s like NO SHHH, DONT TRY AND ARGUE, GO, YOU GO NOW, GO ON, LIVE YOUR LIFE, YOU DONT BELONG HERE IN THE DARK WITH ME, YOU’RE ONE OF THE GOOD ONES, GO BACK TO YOUR OWN KIND.

And Dick’s like no seriously dude, I already called my dad to come pick me up, what are you even on right now, are we having the same conversation?

Slade, sobbing paternally: I HAVE TO LET YOU GO, ALL I EVER DO IS HURT MY KIDS, I’M A TERRIBLE FATHER, ITS NO WONDER JOEY HATES ME.

And then Dick awkwardly slips out while Slade’s mid monologue, with his head thrown back yelling up at the sky and shaking his fists like WHY GOD WHY IS THIS THE WORLD WE LIVE IN WHY - because the thing about Slade is he’s actually even MORE of a drama queen than Dick, he just hides it better. Most of the time. But seriously tho.

Anyway yeah, this is like…a pattern with them basically. And Slade’s like, you’ve inspired me, I see in you the man I could’ve become, maybe even that I can still be, and he like doubles down on his personal honor code and becomes a Mercenary With A Heart for a couple years and even helps out the Titans every now and then (basically just whenever Dick’s in trouble and he goes on a killing spree, like NOBODY IS ALLOWED TO MURDER MY KIDS BUT ME - also by this point in time, Joey had died because Slade literally killed him, I forget why, it was a dumb story, but its okay Joey came back, its not like his name is Uncle Ben. But yeah, killing his kids is kinda a thing with Slade too, and he’s very proprietary about it).

And then he falls off the wagon and is like fuck, I forgot how much I like murder, ugh, you should have never tried to make me change, THIS IS WHO I AM, and Dick’s just like….I literally do not know where you’re getting these conversations from, like am I there when you think we’re having them, am I just blacking out…do I need to see a doctor??? And Slade’s like YOU WILL RUE THE DAY YOU EVER MET ME, GRAYSON, FROM NOW ON I AM THE TITANS’ MORTAL ENEMY and runs off all dramatically while Dick’s like…..wut, and all the other Titans are like srsly, dude, what is WITH you too, and Dick’s all I DON’T EVEN KNOW, HE’S JUST LIKE THAT.

In all seriousness though, ultimately my take on their dynamic is that for Slade, Dick’s a combination of seeing himself and Grant in Bruce and Dick’s dynamic, and its like….all about his regret and missed opportunities. Like, he tends to be super judgey of Bruce and critical of how he trains (and raises Dick) and passive aggressively like *I* would never do that and Dick just kinda lifts an eyebrow and is all, you’ve literally killed two of your three kids. 

But like, Slade kinda views himself as the anti-Batman and thus Dick is inadvertently cast as Grant, but its like Slade can never decide if he thinks Bruce is actually holding Dick back from his full potential and he wants to push Dick the way he thinks Bruce refuses to, or if like, he blames Bruce for getting Dick involved in this life, the same life that got Grant killed, and wants to protect Dick from Bruce and from the same thing happening to him. So its this weird mix of Slade manipulating Dick sometimes and pushing him way further than even Bruce ever does and saying its for his own good, but also randomly mixed in there are these bouts of extreme protectiveness, and there’s like zero rhyme or reason to which he is on any given day and there’s never any way to predict where Slade will land and so it always fucks with Dick’s head in a big way, he’s like…I’m getting whiplash.

And then on Dick’s end, like, the thing about Dick like I’ve mentioned before is he’s a huge people pleaser? Like he’s a very empathetic caretaker type personality who sinks a huge amount of his identity into being everything for everyone, to the extent that he tends to lose sight of himself in the process, sometimes. And he’s also a perfectionist who was raised with the most demanding father of all demanding fathers ever, and has a lot of abandonment issues and insecurities that Bruce’s mutant power is to trip over and set off in the worst possible ways.

And so I think the reason Dick keeps seeking Slade out every now and then is not because he ACTUALLY wants to ever take Slade up on his offer and genuinely become his apprentice or partner and like, turn his back on how he was raised. I think the point of it for Dick is the fact that each and every time he ends up affirming for himself no, wait, this ISN’T actually what I want, I just needed to be reminded of that, to remember that. That he always pulls himself back before going too far. And at the same time, I do think on some level he likes that Slade is this kinda constant in his life, that at the end of the day Slade is like…so fixated on his potential and his achievements and his worth as a fighter and a hero, because like….Dick Grayson is a person who craves validation but will never ask for it ever. 

And he’s one of those people who everyone is just so USED to liking without even thinking about it that it never occurs to them when talking amongst themselves about how great he is, that they forget to say this to his actual face? And so he never hears it? And never asks for it, because gasp, then people might think he’s needy, and that would be bad, so he mostly just goes and sulks in his apartment about how nobody likes him and he’s terribad. Except for Slade. Slade always compliments him on what a good fighter and what a good planner and what a good leader he is, so hmm wonder what he’s doing. He hasn’t committed any crimes in six months and I can’t find any reason to track him down and bring him in? Ugh, that asshole. Okay, ummm, I guess I could tell him I’m thinking of turning evil again, I haven’t done that in a couple years, he’d probably buy it.

And then later Bruce is pacing around the Batcave wrathfully shaking his fist, like “Damn that man and his sick hold over my son, if only I knew how he keeps getting his hooks into you!”

And Dick basically shrugs and plays games on his phone. “He mostly just tells me I’m special, and that’s nice to hear.”

Bruce, still pacing and ranting and fist shaking: “What kind of evil genius is he, how master a manipulator he must be to be able to get inside your head and upend your normal views of right and wrong, to make you entertain these ideas of working with him, learning from him…”

Dick: No its seriously just the saying nice things about me bit. I like that.

Bruce: If only I had a code word or phrase I could use to snap you out of whatever brainwashing he seems to be able to affect you with any time you come near him, perhaps some kind of alien tech….

Dick: You could try “I’m proud of you, son.” I mean if you’re taking suggestions.

Bruce: There’s also the possibility of a magical component to consider, blast, I hate working with magic so of course he WOULD do something like that, ugh I suppose I could ask Zatanna or Jason Blood for help there…

Dick: Cool cool, well this has been a fun and productive chat as always, so you keep doing…all that…and meanwhile I’m gonna go ponder my fixation on father figures who are 100% more committed to obsessing over their failures as a parent than like…actual parenting of their actual kids.

Bruce, ten minutes later: Dick? Where are you? DID SLADE GET TO YOU AGAIN? RIGHT UNDER MY NOSE? CURSE THAT MAN AND HIS UNNATURAL SKILLS, HOW DOES HE DO IT??!?

Anyway, that’s Slade and Dick. There’s also the whole Renegade thing, when Dick asked for Slade’s help in infiltrating the Society of Super Villains in his fake villain identity as Renegade, with you know, lots of Slade trying to corrupt him and also trying to murder any supervillains who looked as his not!son the wrong way. 

And then there was the time Slade brought his daughter Rose to Dick to train and said he couldn’t teach her himself because his track record with training his kids and them not ending up dead is like, not good, and he’s superstitious or something? Idk, I forget his logic, it was probably bad though.

And Slade was like, I only trust you to be a competent teacher for my daughter, I want you to teach her everything you know! Except for like, being a hero. None of that nonsense. I FORBID you from trying to make my daughter into a hero or the deal is off. (The deal being that if Dick did this, Slade would not do crime in Dick’s city for a year).

And Dick was like, you got a deal. I will train Rose but there will be NO trying to make her a hero, I swear. /he said while crossing his fingers behind his back because duh.

And Slade was like okay, fine, you got a deal, I will absolutely still do crime and be villainous but only in every place except for Bludhaven specifically. /he said while crossing his fingers behind his back because duh.

And then Dick tried to make Rose a hero and then Slade blew up Bludhaven and that was definitely a thing, so…yeah.

In summation, Slade and Dick are weird but also very interesting but also if we get another rehash of the Renegade/apprentice arc aka the Teen Titans cartoon adaptation of that story aka the single most popular Dick Grayson fic trope of all time, like….I swear I will probably get a brain bleed.