#uh anyway read batgirl 2000 and we are robin and batgirl 2009

[casscainmainly]

op complaining about not curating your fandom experience to ignore racism while not curating their own fandom experience and ignoring people who enjoy canon 😭 although yeah not gonna ignore prevalent racism in fandom is a good thing I think

Yeah this!! Also I'm not sure if OP knows that fanon is nearly inescapable? So many canon fans won't even look through character tags anymore because it's flooded with fanon. OP also tagged Cass, Duke, and Steph, were they expecting Cass/Duke/Steph fans to prefer fanon to canon??

This is the last I'll say about this discourse for a while, but honestly it shouldn't even be fanon vs. canon. It should be fanon + canon fans vs. racism/sexism/ableism. There's nothing inherently harmful about fanon fans, some are great and engage with POC and women, but a lot don't. There's a difference between having comics-inaccurate headcanons, and actively perpetuating racist/ableist stereotypes and excluding women.

Frankly, 'just look away' is not an appropriate response to people calling out fandom prejudice. Fandom should be an inclusive space, but inclusivity means examining and interrogating our biases. Whether or not you like canon, whether you've only read WFA or have read 1000+ comics, this holds true for all of us. I know the conversation is old at this point, but honestly I'd prefer people complaining and being annoying one thousand times over people ignoring the problem.

[coolgirl]

how do i start reading about the batkids i’m really overwhelmed help

fuck it if I know… probably the smartest way to tackle it is to follow this list, which pretty much covers the vital Batman related arcs. PERSONALLY, I don’t care about reading about all the batkids, I just picked my favorite ones and just.. read everything I could about them (and lucky for me my favorite batkids don’t have thousands and thousands of comics so ! yay!) here’s some reading orders I made (except for the Damian one)

Jason Todd

Stephanie Brown

Cassandra Cain

Damian Wayne

Duke Thomas

Okay so, if u wanna read it in some kind of order, heres a bit of a general chronological-ish list thats probably innacurate bc i haven’t read all of these and the ones i did read was.. a long time ago. anyways, i hope this is useful, and again, imo its not necessary to read everything in order, but this might help to know a bit whats the timeline of some major events i guess? also i’m definitely going to be editing this post as people point out the mistakes rip! 

(the batkids i added to this timeline are the ones that have active roles in rebirth atm, Dick, Barbara, Jason, Helena, Tim, Stephanie, Cass, Damian, Duke, and the basics of Azrael, Kate, and Luke because i love them)

Dick’s time as Robin (that i have no clue how it goes but uuuh read Robin Year One / The Long Halloween / Dark Victory / The New Teen Titans up until #53)

Batgirl: Year One  

Birth of the Demon and Son of the Demon (here’s the original comic about Damian getting conceived)

Jason time as Robin (post crisis) stop before death in the family

Nightwing: Year One 

Batgirl Special #1 - The Last Batgirl Story 

unfortunately… you gotta at least know a bit of what the killing joke is about

NOW read death in the family… two blows one after the other, If you’re reading the trade that includes a lonely place of dying DON’T read that yet

now you can read the rest of the new teen titans up to #59

now A Lovely Place of Dying, which is Tim’s introduction. 

rest of ntt if u wanna

NOW for oracle!barbara you can either read the suicide squad comics as a whole, which includes little hints of her coming back, or you can skip to  issues #48 and #49. Then The Batman Chronicles #5.

Huntress Vol. 1 - Helena Bertinelli’s introduction

NOW! Steph’s introduction happened on Detective Comics #618

Stephanie’s list, if you’re following the whole list stop at Robin #70 (Tim’s solo is really good to know about them)

Azrael vol. 1: Fallen Angel - Azrael’s introduction

Batman: Knightfall - you know the infamous pic of bane snapping batman’s back like a stick? here it is.

Nightwing (1996)

Young Justice (1998) (NOT the one based on the tv show)

Birds of Prey i would say.. up to #7 

Batman: No Man’s Land

now it’s Cass Time!  Batman #567 was her introduction, and Detective Comics #734 n Legends of the Dark Knight #120 are vital to her story.

Batman & Huntress: A Cry for Blood / Huntress: Year One

Titans (1999)  

Batman Gotham Knights (2000-2006) is a good comic for batfam interactions

Rest of Birds of Prey ig

Teen Titans (2003)

Batman: Hush

Batgirl Volume 1 up to #52

War Games (when Stephanie dies rip)

rest of Batgirl

Batman Lost Days / Batman: Under the Red Hood 

Robin #172-174 (2008) steph comes back!!

Batman: Batman and Son He (Damian) is here babette

Batgirl volume 2 (2008-2009) and  Batman and the Outsiders (2009) are good cass comics up to #14

Robin/Spoiler Special (2008) 

Batman R.I.P. 

Final Crisis

Batman: Last Rites

battle for the cowl SUCKS the only important thing to know is that Dick is Batman now

Batman & Robin (2011) up to #12

Batwoman: Elegy 

Batgirl (2009) up to #14

The Black Mirror is a really good bats dick story.. or so i’ve been told

Red Robin

Batman: Return of Bruce Wayne #1-4 

Batman and robin from #13 to #14

Batman: Return of Bruce wayne #5-6

Batman and Robin #15-16

Batman:The Return 

Batman INC. (2011)

everything else in Batman and Robin, and Batgirl

Gates of Gotham #1-5 (2011) 

OK NOW.. N52. So new 52 was the reboot and it basically just took everything i just mentioned and threw it out of a fucking window. Changes: Barbara is Batgirl again, Cass and Stephanie didnt exist in this timeline for like four years, somehow Jason isnt such a dick, i think Damian didn’t get so fucked over, and uuuh i have no clue what happened with Dick and Tim but i think their whole story with their teams (teen titans / titans / young justice) got incredibly fucked over. Almost every single member of the Batfam (that didn’t get booted from this contuinity) got either a solo or a team book, which are. super good to start, reading order be dammed, but the batfam went through a lot of shit (court of owls, the joker, bruce kinda died, jim gordon became batman, bruce didnt remember anything, dick kinda died and got exposed but came back as a spy, damian died, bruce lost his mind, they kinda went to hell, damian came back, dozens of robins ran around, etc etc etc) so im gonna try to order it as best as i can T__T

Batman, Vol. 4 (Secret City) / DC Comics: Zero Year / Batman, Vol. 5 (Dark City)- Okay so, this wasnt the starting storyline for New 52 but its basically the basis of the batfam and co and introduces Duke and Harper so it’s kinda vital.

Ok so here you can start reading the first volume of.. any of the titles lol. Red Hood and the Outlaws / Batgirl / Batwing / Nightwing / Batman and Robin / Teen Titans

Batman: The Night Of The Owls  

Batwoman (2011-2015) 

Batman INC up to #6 - im gonna be honest this run fucking sucks but uh important stuff happens here

Nightwing / Red Hood and the Outlaws / Batgirl / Batman and Robin / Batwing / Teen Titans Vol. 2 (approx the issue #9 of all these runs were included in the Night of the Owls crossover)

Death Of The Family - this one.. bad.. but ig its important

Nightwing / Red Hood and the Outlaws / Batgirl / Batman and Robin /  Batwing / Teen Titans Vol. 3

Batman INC #7-8 - okay so. Damian’s death. 

Requiem / Batman and Robin: Requiem - the aftermath of Damian’s death. The first one isn’t collected afaik so i liked you to a reading order if you’re interested 

Nightwing / Red Hood and the Outlaws / Batgirl / Batwing / Titans Vol. 4 (here’s Luke Fox’s introduction!)

Forever Evil - the one where shit happens to Dick that i think leads to Grayson and all that spy bs

Yeah.. Grayson now (vol 1-2) - Helena gets re-introduced here!

Red Hood and the Outlaws / Batgirl / Batwing / Teen Titans Vol. 5

Batman Eternal - where Steph gets re-introduced

Batman and Robin: Robin Rises

Batman Endgame (Batman #35 -#36, Batman Annual #3, Batman #37- #39) - Duke is back!!

Grayson Vol 3 

Superheavy (Batman #41-44 / Detective Comics #41-46) - ok so Bruce is gone and now Jim Gordon is Batman.. just nod and smile

Ok so now, Red Hood and the Outlaws and Batgirl don’t get involved in any big storylines anymore, and Teen Titans started from #1 again. 

Teen Titans Vol. 1-2

We are Robin Vol 1 

Batman and Robin Eternal - where Cass gets re-introduced 

Robin: Son of Batman Vol. 1

Red Hood/Arsenal Vol. 1

Robin War 

Grayson Vol 4

Teen Titans Vol. 3-4

Red Hood/Arsenal Vol.2

We Are Robin Vol. 2

Robin Son of Batman Vol. 2 

Super Heavy Part 2 (Detective Comics #47-52 / Batman #47-52 )

OKAY SO. Rebirth is a continuation of New 52, but with some changes bc almost every single damn character got.. lets say nerfed, and people didnt like it so they’re slowly bringing back some elements from pre 52. Here basically just read whatever whenever unless you wanna get into like. the metal event. then i would recommend you to start off the bat with that to get it out of the way as some comics have tie ins. Then heres where the kids appear

All-Star Batman (2016-2017): Bruce and Duke 

Batgirl (2016): Barbara and sometimes Dick

Batgirl and the Birds of Prey (2016): Barbara, Dick, and Helena

Batman (2016): originally Bruce and Duke but now its the Batman and Catwoman show

(if you’re interested in Duke i would say to read those two first as it explains where his character stands on Rebirth)

Batman and the Signal (2017): pretty self explanatory

Batman/Shadow (2017): Damian appears sometimes but.. i heard Bruce is a dick to him here so fuck it

Batwoman (2017): Kate and Julia 

Detective Comics (2016): Cassandra, Azrael, Kate, Tim, and Stephanie

Nightwing (2016): Dick, and sometimes Damian and Helena. 

Red Hood and the Outlaws (2016): Just Jason except for the annual that had Dick too

Teen Titans (2016): Damian.. baby boy leads a team

Titans (2016): Dick

Super Sons (2017): Damian team sup with Jon Kent (Superman’s kid)

and finaaally.. some elseworld stories (basically aus) that have cute batkids interactions

Tiny Titans (2008-2015)

Lil’ Gotham (2013-2014)