#I've even read NTT

[demonbirds-love]

Have some gorgeous fall Damirae by @chaosticbirds

#day one million of loving this ship #I'll never understand how people don't get it #they are perfect for each other #especially in their universe #definitely in character #I've even read NTT #anyway watch the DCAMU movies #highly recommend #damirae #demonbirds #damian wayne #raven #dcamu #dc comics #teen titans #damian x raven #rachel roth #fan art

[beyondthetemples-ooc]

Squeaks and flaps hands!

A Work of Magic is officially up on Ao3!!!

--> https://archiveofourown.org/works/47501014/chapters/119709694 <--

I apparently have to do some editing before I post the rest, because I’ve become a lot more discerning over when to use Little Details. (Prepositional phrases, italics, emdashes, etc. I also like colons and semi-colons now, which adds Variety to the punctuation pool.)

But I’ll be updating it as I edit! It’s the low-spoons kind of editing, really. I might even do another chapter or two before I go to bed tonight...

My goal is to get it caught up with the ffdn posting within the next month, though. Preferably before the trip to NY!

#I'M SO EXCITED #AO3 IS WHERE THE COOL KIDS ARE AT /hj #Seriously though I've been too Nervous to share my stuff on Ao3 specifically because... well. Most of the stuff I write about #is 10+ years old. TT hit TWENTY this year! Nobody really reads Teen Titans 2003 fanfics anymore #and they CERTAINLY don't read NTT fanfics much at all. #So like... Dove's stories. There's ONE REVIEW where someone is SO NICE and likes it so much and asks for an update and??? #AHHH I'M SO GLAD even ONE person likes them on there! ^w^ #The next chapter is going to need Heavily Edited though because it involves a fight scene which is a MAJOR weakness of mine... #But with A Work of Magic I really like what I have going. What I've HAD going! Pokemon is still a fandom that's going strong... #But I write stories about Sinnoh mostly. Sinnoh and Kanto. Do people even care about Sinnoh and Kanto anymore? #Shrugs. I do! And I guess I have faith that the right people will find this fanfic eventually. #Chapter 1 gets off to a bit of a rocket-blast start but when I was 14 I didn't waste time with transitional stuff. XD #chapter 8 NEVER would've happened the way it was finished today if I'd written it back then... #I can't say I'm Intentionally Better at Pacing^tm now but it IS nice to get a bit of a Downtime Chapter after the DRAMA in Chapter 7. #I'm rambling at this point but it's because I'm EXCITED! #rhs fanfics #a work of magic

[roipecheur]

Grant was the same age as Dick...or possibly a little younger

I've been seeing fans interpret Dick's age as the same as Joey's, or somewhere between Grant and Joey, and you can absolutely change up their ages in fic or fan ideas! However, there is a canon basis for how old Grant was when he died and how old Dick was at that time.

The New Teen Titans #1 (November 1980)

At this point, Dick has been in college for at least one semester, possibly two. In Detective Comics #488/5 (February-March 1980), Dick signs up for "another" semester at Hudson University, and then drops out in Detective Comics #495/5 (October 1980).

Dick first left for college in Batman Vol. 1 #217 (December 1969). He was, in his own words, an adult when he went to college, which I take to mean he was eighteen years old.

Batman Vol. 1 #217 (December 1969)

(Also, both Dick and Bruce crying about Dick leaving but not letting each other see it...aw lol)

So...given comics time, I'm not sure exactly how long he was supposed to have spent at Hudson University, but it has to be at least one and a half semesters, making Dick at least eighteen or nineteen in NTT #1.

This is also the pre-Crisis on Infinite Earths timeline, which came out in 1985-1986 and changed some things about the mainstream DC universe. In pre-crisis, Dick was still Robin while in college, and seems to have spent longer there.

In post-Crisis, Dick is 19 when the Joker shoots him in the shoulder and Bruce fires him as Robin (Batman #408 - June 1987). Dick later says that he finished one semester of college, but was distracted and did so poorly that they asked him not come back for a second semester (Batman #416 - February 1988). Following this, he joined (rejoined?) the New Teen Titans as Nightwing rather than Robin, and the events with Ravager, Deathstroke, and the Judas Contract seem to have proceeded as they did in pre-crisis continuity. This would put Dick at 19 or 20 at the time of Grant's death.

Now that we're in the post-Flashpoint continuity...I honestly don't know if Dick's age in relation to Grant's and Joey's was supposed to have changed. Deathstroke 2016 features the New Teen Titans and Grant's death in one arc where Slade has the speedforce and is time-traveling...but Dick's age is pretty unclear.

(DC: "We rebooted the universe in 2011 to make it easier for new readers to get into." Me, a new reader in 2021: "I don't even think you tried at all.")

So, after all this, I'm going back to The New Teen Titans (1980), which has this panel:

The New Teen Titans #2 (December 1980)

The dates on Grant's headstone read 1961-1980, which puts him at either 18 or 19 when he died, depending on whether or not he had a birthday that year yet.

If we are assuming that both Grant's and Dick's ages stay constant in relation to each other as the irl years change--and I think we have to; if comics characters aged in real time, Bruce would be long dead--then they are either the same age, or Grant was in fact slightly younger than Dick.

#dick grayson #grant wilson #new teen titans #comic scans

[fancyfade]

Hi! Just wanted to say that i love reading your analysis and your knowledge on comics astounds me

Question, do you view any of dc's heroes as autistic? (If thats too much just batfam is fine)

Thank you for all your thoughts and mini essays 💚

Ty!! Glad to hear you enjoy it!

Ok right. So I'm thinking in general about DC characters I imagine as autistic. Batfam is easy to start with b/c I"ve read so much, but I'll include other characters as well

Cassandra Cain (Batgirl) - This is kind of a gimme, almost everyone headcanons Cass as autistic b/c she is explicitly textually neurodivergent (but they do not give her a real world diagnosis) and canonically has problems with language.

Damian Wayne (Robin) - another one I've seen a lot of. He has difficulties socializing that COULD be chalked up to being raised as an assassin, but also.... its in a way that's realistic for very many autistic people :P he also generally does not care about gaining the approval of everyone around him, like he's prickly and often unlikable but he's not trying to be liked.

Barbara Gordon (Oracle) - she reads as so autistic to me. Her conflict with Dinah in the beginning of BoP is positioned in the text as right brained vs left brained, which I think doesn't really make a lot of sense neurologically but does work as words the characters are using to describe things - the just think differently. Babs often reads as if she's coming at things from what in her perspective is trying to be analytical and unemotional (tho I do not think she always succeeds in this), and keeps people at arms length socially.

Bruce Wayne - he just reads as kind of autistic to me :P

Talia al Ghul - same :P

Milagro Reyes (Jaime Reyes/Blue Beetle's little sister) - she's not a superhero but she reads as very autistic to me. We have scenes where we see her clearly upset by sudden change, she also acts generally very similar to how I did as a little kid. We see her blocking everyone out by watching the TV when a lot of new stuff is going on in the house.

Raven - NTT Raven reads as very autistic to me as well. NGL just like many other characters this can be explained by other factors (She was raised in a cult in another dimension, taught not to emote, and is fighting off the influence of her demonic father) but also. They keep doing characters that are relatable to neurodivergent people like that ;P

Back when I watched YJ, I had very strong opinions about Kaldur'ahm being autistic. I still do, even tho I don't normally count the animated tv shows in my version of DC

I also feel a case could be argued for Diana of Themyscira/Wonder Woman. But I am still marinating this in my brain.

#maiprim #dc comics #ask #autistic headcannons #raven #bruce wayne #damian wayne #talia al ghul #cassandra cain #barbara gordon #kaldurahm #diana of themyscira #wonder woman

[tzigone]

What age first comes to mind when you think of each of the original NTT?

I've asked this previously with the JLI. It's not about how canonically old they are or you think they should be (absent de-agings, universe reboots, etc.). But when you first think of each of these characters, how old do you think of them as? So much depends on the eras you read with them, and what of that sticks with you, and which eras and aspects and relationships you most value. Not to mention how fast in-universe time was moving in your favorite eras.

Wally, of course, got married and had kids. They never let Dick do so in main timeline, but he has associations with younger Batfam members that make me think of him as older. Poor Raven and Gar were deaged and kept on younger teams even before the universe reboot. And we have Vic and Kory after.

For me, so much depends on the era I read them in. All have eras I just don't read them in, either because I don't like what's going on with them or because of general disinterest in what's going on with DC at the time (that especially covers recent times, as I kept waiting for continuity to settle, then the constant Events, which aren't my thing).

Speed-aging Wally's kids throws him off to me, too, as I'm not fond of speed-aging kids at all (or skip-timing as with Jon Kent). So in my head he ends up a new dad in his mid twenties.

Dick ends up late 20s in my head. Relative ages of other Bats play in, but I sort of cut off for him before New 52 (and I honestly never think of him as Batman) because I've never really gotten into anything of his after that (hate the de-aging). He should be older, of course, but I don't first think of him that way, again probably due to not reading later stuff much.

The others haven't had the same degree of solo work after the team, and I abandoned NTT shortly after Titans Hunt. I've read stuff with them here and there since, but never consistently read a Titans title since.

Raven and Kory pretty much stop for me then. It's hugely important from a storytelling perspective, but I simply dislike the whole concept of Dark Raven or Rachel Roth or the goth-y influences from the cartoon (which I liked when I watched it, but didn't want to influence the comics I didn't read comics then and now resent character being largely remade from it), and even though I know they exist, they don't enter my headspace. So Raven ends up in her early twenties.

Kory, as I said, is in a similar headspace to me. I know other storylines happened, but I'm even vaguer on those than Raven's. Another dead husband, more pain for Tamaran - sounds like basically story on repeat to me, though I didn't read it, so can't speak authoritatively. Don't get me started on having her and Jason (or Roy as Jason) as a team or even worse on putting her on Damian's Teen Titans. Anyway, I always think of her as early twenties, too.

Gar, interestingly enough, I tend to think of in his slightly older, more mature fashion. Not making his obnoxious jokes and sexually harassing female teammates. And operating in a time when Dayton simply isn't around (and Rita is dead). I'm not at all sure it isn't some not just amalgamated, but constructed version of him built out from what I wanted him to grow up to be. Anyway, he sits in his early twenties for me.

Now Vic - I kinda feel in some aspects like I do with Gar and in some aspects like Raven and Kory. Certainly the post Titans Hunt events don't factor in at all (I didn't like storyline even a bit before like, quit reading a few issues after, and forget a lot of what happened after that era with Vic even happened). More like Raven and Kory and less like like Gar, he was older and more mature. I think of him early or mid twenties and having found peace with himself and belief in his own humanity (which happened a couple times before he'd reset on it), but don't think of that as having just happened, so ending up adding a couple years.

Donna is the wonky one. I tend to stick her in two categories - recently married early twenties or recently separated mid twenties. While I think motherhood and her son were extremely important to her in-universe, I didn't read that era, so it doesn't stick with me. I have the before, when I was reading NTT. And I have some of the time during the separation (when she showed up in other comics I was reading) and cutoff before Robert dying, as that was really part of a soft reboot of the character/origins that didn't work for me. I mean, her origin has always been a mess, and moreso since COIE, but another changeup was not the solution.

#New Teen Titans #NTT #Dick Grayson #Wally West #Nightwing #Robin #koriand'r #Raven #Vic Stone #Victor Stone #Gar Logan #Garfield Logan #Kid Flash #The Flash #Donna Troy #Troia #Wonder Girl #Starfire #changeling #beast boy #Cyborg

[dankovskaya]

hiiiiii this is such a silly question but as the premiere kory enjoyer do u have recommended kory readings? i've only read her in some of her team comics (like ntt and outsiders etc) but i was wondering if she had any standout issues. i trust ur opinion most of all

HI ELLAAAA. I know this isn't exactly what you asked for but just for future reference @/princesskoriandr made the definitive Kory reading list right here.

I'm linking this because you are not going to like my answer to this which is that upwards of 90% of the Kory writing worth reading and taking at all seriously happened in NTT 😭 Like I hate to say it but even with all the issues of racism and misogyny irt her character as written by Wolfman, you're basically always losing SOME degree of nuance or interiority (or just overall interest in exploring her as a character) with essentially any other writer.

It's also been too long since I read any of it for me to remember individual issue numbers off of the top of my head 💀 BUT on a quick skim of that reading list (and assuming you've read at least the very beginning of NTT), I will recommend:

NTT v1: #16, #22-25 + Annual 1 (this arc introduces Komand'r and just expands their lore + that of Tamaran, the greater Vega system, etc), #26 (this is like the aftermath + when Dick and Kory officially start dating I believe)

Tales of the NTT v1 #4 (BIIIIIIG Kory backstory lore dump. Very important.)

NTT v2: #6 (This is the beginning of an arc I don't really remember and don't really care about. Just scroll through the issue until you see Kory wearing the "WE LOVE GAR" shirt and then read everything she says bc I love that scene LMAO), #13-19 (this is the dreaded Kory political marriage arc where Dick loses his nasty mind and he is hella racist to her basically the whole time but you do learn a lot about Tamaran and Kory's family etc. Funnily enough this segues directly into tiny Jason's temporary stint on the team cause everyone was having a mental breakdown.), #22-23 (extension + conclusion of that arc), #39 (literally just koryraven yuri. literally.)

Teen Titans Spotlight: #1-2 (Kory has a journey of self discovery after stumbling upon Apartheid South Africa. You could not make this shit up.), #19 (this is an event tie in but it's also like 100% A Day In The Life of Kory <3)

I'm going to recommend from New Titans very sparingly and with caveats as this is when they started running out of ideas and eventually did a backflip into the garbage disposal but: #71 (Titans Hunt arc is not fucking important but I recommend the first issue purely for reflections on dickkory), #97-109 (I KNOW this is big but bear with me. This is dickkory falling apart to marriage to falling apart again era + koryraven yuri part 2. Literally just skim everything until you see Kory. The actual wedding issue is #100 and after Demon Raven crashes it Kory gets like, possessed/impregnated by a piece of her soul or something and you see the psychological repercussions of that in the background of the succeeding issues until she blasts off in 108, and then 109 is KYNASF'RR. The issue that singlehandedly justifies the existence of New Titans for me. If nothing else read that one. You can keep reading/skimming until #114 if you want but not super necessary it gets. Weird. Basically Kory and Dick just mutually separately realize their relationship is inhibiting their growth as people 😭 #114 is their official breakup issue. Or it would be if Kory didn't stand him up when they were supposed to talk about it on account of not really wanting to see him LMAO.), and #127-130 is one of those arcs that is just confusing to read if you haven't been following everything going on with all the characters involved Lmfao BUT it's another Kory/Tamaran arc and the one where Tamaran goes the way of Alderaan so. Relevant. Raven is still inside Kory also during this time LMAO.

I would NOT recommend reading Titans 99 for any character other than Garth Lmfao BUT #47-50 of that book is an arc centered on her that's like... passable.

She's in Teen Titans v3 as a mentor character but I find that book horribly fucking boring so I haven't read most of it but the popular panels of her tending a garden of Tamaranean plants is from #7

Convergence: New Teen Titans #1&2 is good and also basically functions as a recap of why dickkory did not work out even though in this universe ironically it does. Lmfao

Other than that.... yeah. She's in Outsiders and Titans v2 but the sad fact of the matter is that if Kory isn't on the lineup of a team book, she's relegated to essentially a cameo character, and if shes on a team book that isn't from the NTT era, she's unavoidably going to be mischaracterized, sidelined, flattened, possibly character assassinated, or just generally not prioritized for storylines and character development or treated as a nuanced and multidimensional character.

#This is basically the speedrun version of her relevant/focused appearances. In my humble opinion. #Like I'm sure I've missed some random one off issues and annuals etc but basically. Everything important from #the only comic book era that respected her at all😭 #AKA. HOW TO GET THROUGH NTT WITHOUT KILLING YOURSELF 👍 #dc #kory #ask

[northoftheroad]

Can you give some Pros and Cons about Marv Wolfman’s portrayal of Dick Grayson, his characterization, capabilities, interactions with those around him and the impact it had on the fandom in the present day?

I don't love everything Marv Wolfman has written with Dick, but I don't think you can underestimate MW/George Pérez and the New Teen Titans' importance for what the character is today. Remember, the bat-office wanted Batman to have a Robin again; without Wolfman & Co, Dick would probably have gone back to the second half of Batman and Robin. Would Robin have become a legacy character without their suggestion to let Dick become Nightwing and create a new Robin? Who knows?

Dick had been without a stable comic book home for more than a decade since Robin split from Batman in 1969. He had a number of solo stories (enough to fill a 900-page omnibus) and sometimes worked with Batman, but he didn't have a book where you always knew you would find him. NTT (#1 in 1980) changed that, making Dick a young adult with many responsibilities instead of an older kid/teenager.

Wolfman also wrote a fair number of Batman stories in the early 80s. Including the Lazarus Affair, where Bruce and Dick butts head (1983); Batman Year Three, where Bruce has to admit Dick had become a man; and A lonely place of dying (with George Perez), where Tim Drake was introduced.

Wolfman created Tim as a likeable guy that had Dick Grayson's support from the start. (This was shortly after the readers had voted to kill off Jason Todd, but DC still wanted Batman to work with a Robin.) The start of the idea of big brother Dick Grayson (because while I always argue against those who claim Dick was an ass towards Jason, he wasn't; but they also never had much interaction).

I don't remember the original Teen Titans book enough to be sure, but I think you could argue that while they were good friends, the NTT made the new team even closer, almost family. The Dick and Donna closeness is, as far as I remember, definitely from the NTT era.

Dick was written dating a few girls in his college days, but the relationship angle was cranked up within NTT (I've sometimes likened NTT to a soap opera...). Relationship problems were an essential part of the stories (not only romantic relationships but also, for instance, Dick and Bruce's relationship). As far as I remember, MW was the first who wrote Dick as reflecting on his love life. He felt strange living with Kory without being married and couldn't see himself sleeping with someone he didn't love.

You can argue this aspect has partly changed, with for instance the Grayson run where Dick flirts right and left etc. As I've said before, I prefer to read Grayson as Dick is playing a part - there are scenes where he is clearly unhappy with his situation. A superhero comic book character can't exist for 80-plus years without having some relationships. While I stand by that Dick Grayson should and mostly is written as someone who feels deeply for people he sleeps with, I don't think he's been written being explicit about this for a good while.

When Marv Wolfman wrote a few Nightwing arcs of volume 2, he introduced more conflict between Dick and Bruce in flashbacks. Dick demanded to be emancipated, he left Gotham and fell in love with Liu, who, it turned out, wanted to use him to rob Bruce. In the comic "now", Dick thought about whether this had influenced his difficulties with his relationships with Kory and Barbara. Personally, I think that's an unfair take because Kory and Barbara were not written as flawless. Also, Wolfman wrote a fair number of the older stories about how Dick stepped out of Bruce's shadow and the relationship with Kory. I don't understand why he did these worse retconns... (thought there's at least one 90s NTT comic where Dick thinks back and blames himself for how the relationship with Kory ended, so maybe I'm the one who is unfair). And I guess it's very in character for Dick to feel responsible and blame himself for everything...?

This brings me to another point - character traits such as being serious and intense about the job at hand, setting a very high standard for himself, and having a tendency to self-blame is very much a product of the NTT era. Also writing him as being... less than nice 😉... when he's very stressed/have mental health problems, for instance because of torture and brainwash.

NTT wasn't the first time Dick was written thinking about his identity as Robin and his relationship as Batman (nor the last...), but it did reach a climax when he decided he wanted to dissolve the partnership and then leave the Robin identity.

I've written before that it was during Wolfman's era that Dick not being adopted became a thing. Dick had been called adopted in earlier comics, and it would have been easy to write him as already being formally adopted, since the laws and customs has changed since 1940. Wolfman also wrote Bruce hitting Dick without ever having him apologize, regret it or think about what he did wrong. Also, NTT is full of sexism, when you read it with modern eyes. So there's things I'm not fond of.

(Yeah, of course writers write things to create drama... But I do think it's sometimes unnecessary, and I don't like when things are left what I would call unresolved, for instance that Bruce never reflects about hitting Dick.)

Now, I'm even less of a fan of the later NTT years. I haven't read them enough times to remember exactly why, but I think it has a lot to do with the endless drama, Mirage in effect raping Dick without it ever being acknowledged as rape, how Dick and Kory split and he left the Titans. It's difficult to know how much of this is on Wolfman and how much was up to editorial demands to get Dick from the Titans and to the bat-book.

Well, I hope you feel you get something out of these ramblings 😎

Ps. I appreciate how you expressed your question. Much as I enjoy thinking about favourite fictional characters as real people, it can go overboard. They are tools creators use to tell a story, and it's sometime tiresome when characters are treated as that they should be held accountable for what the creators have done.

#dick grayson #nightwing #robin #batman #marv wolfman

[danny-chase]

do you ever feel like a lot of the pre-crisis origin stories were better than the rebirth or even post-crisis stories? or at least that a combination of pre and post crisis would work best? like IMO with alfred, it'd make way more sense if he served as the wayne family butler when bruce was very young, had to leave for england around the time bruce's parents passed and bruce grew up with his uncle philip, then returned when dick was already taken in around age 8. because then we don't run into the problems that come with alfred "enabling" batman or whatever right? likewise i think it's better to keep events in their actual decade and just pretend 10 real life years are one year in comics time or whatever marvel does. because dick being 8 years old when he started robin makes a lot more sense when you remember child labor was still a thing in 1940 LMAO. also teenagers were a lot more independent in general all the way through the 80s, especially in europe and asia but the usa too (think of all the stuff holden caulfield got away with) so yeah i can believe his adventures way more easily than tim's. your thoughts?

I don't read a ton of pre-crisis stuff, pretty much the only stuff I've read is the Batmanga (which is questionable canon considering it's a manga and not mainline), the Teen Titans 1996 series, and the parts of NTT that are from pre-crisis. I think when choosing what to keep and what to scrap, it should kinda be up to personal preference and whatever makes the story more interesting, which is a lame cop-out answer, and is different for everyone. I personally think Bruce growing up with Alfred is interesting, but that's just me, and if I were writing an origin for Bruce, I'd have him initially hiding the Batman stuff from Alfred, and eventually running away to pursue it. So you don't demonize Alfred completely for it. I think Alfred as a flawed character is interesting, and I think Bruce running away and pursuing it anyways is a good way to have him being an enabler later on make sense, but that's just me

#Alfred as someone who will always put Bruce's well-being above the robins/batkids is so interesting to me #and like he doesn't mean to but he very much does #asks #anon #like i'm talking Batman: Year 3 Aflred who was like damn i can't believe i'm failing Bruce by not speaking well enough at Zuccos parole #hearing and he's being let go and it's my fault... i'm scared of how Bruce will react #and then his hand goes to a photo of Bruce and Dick and the image get's closer and closer to Bruce's face #LIKE GIRL THAT'S THE GUY WHO KILLED DICK'S PARENTS AND THESE ARE YOUR PRIORITIES #anyways i think that's fun

[sarahreadstoomanycomics]

Do you have any Wally West reading recommendations?

Ah asking me about my favorite unfortunately I don't know of any good reading lists for him so I will just list things I like.

I don't think you have to read his introduction in the Flash v1 110 since he'll get an origin story later on in his flash comic but he mostly shows up in cute kid friendly back up stories in the Flash comic when first introduced. Doesn't even really work with Barry at first kind of like on his own like oh now I need to round up all these animals that escaped from a zoo that kind of story.

But I will recommend if you enjoy you know cheesy weird older comics The Brave and the Bold #54 which is where the OG Titans first meet and the 60s Titans run which is a product of it's time and if you don't like old silver age comics I get it. I just think it's fun.

I will not recommend Wally in any of the NTT stuff though Wolfman did not like him and wrote him either as a jerk or just quitting the team or in college or whatever he could do to get rid of him cause he thought speedsters where overpowered and didn't want to write him.

Now for his Flash comic I know most people recommend starting at the Waid run but I disagree. I will not recommend the first writer since his Wally is like peak jerk. But I do think the Messner-Loebs run of the Flash is greatly underappreciated. It's not perfect but he has a lot of fun stories, introduced a lot of Wally's side characters like his eventual wife Linda and whether or not he succeeded at least he tried to beat the asshole out of Wally by giving him Linda as a girlfriend and Hartley as a best friend who both would be instrumental to Wally's development even as the comic passed over to Waid. But yeah I personally would start with his stuff on the Flash comic and go on. But obviously I personally and this is very far into the comic am not a super big fan of the Geoff Johns run but a lot of people like it so idk maybe you will? I just felt like Johns was way more interested in the villains than Wally and also he wrote literally one of the worst pregnancy story-lines I've read in comics so there's that too.

I will recommend Wally's JLA stuff as well but that also has it's ups and downs like I said one day I really should put together an actual reading list.

Now unfortunately Wally was erased from existence in new 52 and the only things from him in post that I will recommend are his return in DC Rebirth, and the current ongoing Flash run by Jeremy Adams.

#one day i will make a proper wally reading list #also i do recommend ntt in general #but not as part of a wally reading list

[mamawasatesttube]

Opinion on the Wonder Twins?

I LIKE THEM!!!!!!

i've only read a little of ntt but from what i saw of them there i really like them. also the way dick talks about donna in nightwing '96 makes me so soft. and i already knew going in i was biased towards liking donna just because a) i am not immune to pretty women and b) i LOVE a space/stars aesthetic, and she certainly ticks both of those boxes, so. i do want to read more ntt and then more wonderfam in general too (so many comics to read... so much adhd in my head...) but YEAH WAHOO. honestly i love how they basically have a qpr in canon even without it being called such. sparks so much joy!!!

#answers #baambastic

[beyondthetemples-ooc]

do you have any thoughts on Raven and Trigon’s relationship?

Great gods, do I EVER! And none of them are Good.

Fair warning, I draw the most from the early 80's comics and a fair amount from 2003 cartoon. As a matter of personal choice, I'm going to disregard the Sons of Trigon storyline, most modern comics in fact, and Teen Titans GO. I put some stock in the DC animated movie universe (after all, I roleplay that Raven now and then), but I'm not too fond of the way that the creators, in the bonus content, said Trigon was just a "mad dad". As if what he does to her every moment he's on screen isn't outright abusive.

Because that's what it is.

Trying to control your child and disregard their agency or right to make their own choices is abusive. Threatening them is abusive, threatening their friends is abusive, trying to separate them from their support system is abusive. Calling them names is abusive. The majority of this is coming from DCAMU, but it's present in the comics and cartoon, too.

No, a "power struggle" in itself between parent and child doesn't precipitate abuse, that's normal, but his intentions aren't for her safety, her happiness, or her well-being. They're all for HIMSELF. It was narrated (in New Teen Titans 4 or 5, I believe?) that the reason Trigon pursues her so much is that, if I have my phrasing right, "Even the demon called Trigon longed for family." But wanting a family isn't the same as wanting to LOVE them.

(Adding a cut here because I am Rambling On. You asked me about Raven. That's inevitable, really...)

I do not, in any sense of the word, believe he "loves" her. He wants to control her, he wants to possess her, and that is not love. He wants to use her to make HIMSELF happy. That is not love. He has literally, on MULTIPLE OCCASIONS, intentionally overcome her and eradicated her will, her personality, her desires, her dreams, her love for her friends. He tried to kill her mother and kill her friends. He FORCES her to give into him.

Yes, I believe some kernel of "the real Raven" is there in Demon Raven too, but to me personally, it always reads as Her Will being overcome by His Will. How many times has she said she doesn't WANT that? She doesn't WANT to become like him? She doesn't WANT to do the things he does? She never wants to be overcome by that part of her. She spends every waking moment of every single day struggling to assure That Does Not Happen.

I've explored this in my fanfictions through my OC that's Raven's half-sister by father, how I believe it's a sort of separate entity inside them, and because that story is about 250k words of said OC struggling against it, it's a thoroughly well-developed concept in my head. (That's DDD, for those who have been paying attention.) As it IS fanfiction, I won't claim that specific aspect is rooted entirely in fact, but I do draw heavily from canon to reach that conclusion.

In the New Teen Titans, Raven doesn't describe Trigon's influence as urges or anything she's ever tempted to indulge in. (Again, note my disregard for Sons of Trigon on this point.) She calls it "the part of her that is Trigon". It's Him, as if it's separate from all her other parts, the parts she DOES care to indulge in (her compassion, pacifism, etc.).

Also in NTT and subsequent series: "the part of [her] that is Trigon" is her soul-self, which is quite literally a separate entity, blatantly and explicitly, whenever it's shown.

In "Nevermore" from the '03 series: His influence is compartmentalized separately along with all her other emotions.

In DCAMU, and drawing a bit from the creators' commentary following the first screening at a convention (stating that in Judas Contract, that was Raven using her father's power): Even the power she inherited from him is something she uses as a separate ability. It's in the red vs. the purple, the sort of liquid texture vs. smooth black, her eyes when she uses them.

And then, I know it's (for some reason) really controversial to say Trigon is abusive to her. But how has he ever talked to her as anything else?

In the 80's comics, he seems to delight in calling her foolish, errant, insolent.

In the '03 cartoon, he simply doesn't care about her after she becomes the portal. He doesn't even care enough to, like, know that she's still ALIVE? He calls her "some remnant of my daughter". When she goes after him, he starts calling her "Wretched, insignificant--" And of course, her famous monologue proving he'd never raised or protected* her.

* (Supposedly, the moment with Juris either didn't happen in the cartoon or someone else stopped him from killing her? But that's a rather heavy thing to contemplate with very, very little canon evidence either way.)

In the DCAMU, we don't know how he treated her while she was with him, but the way he treats her during the carnival is enough. It's not in the argument or disagreement, but in the rays he strikes her with, the "batteries" he sends after her, everything he does to force her to comply.

Oh, and that little moment he calls her a disgrace for losing a sparring match? What the fuck.

How many times has he stricken her on screen? It may be magical, but is it any different from physical abuse with one's hands?

And in End pt. I and JLvTT both, he literally BLACKMAILS her by threatening to kill her friends! How could you POSSIBLY see anything but ABUSE in that?!

I have a lot of very strong feelings on their relationship, and while I can respect that other people have various headcanons on how "grayscale" it may be, I feel my interpretation is very firmly supported by canon. (At least, the canon I care most about.) I've seen fanfiction authors take quite interesting angles on it, but it's not something I care to do for myself.

Abuse is simply not something I can overlook.

#I tried to stay even-keel on this but then I. uhh. Got Emotional^tm #rhs personal teen titans #rhs makes yet another post about teen titans #tt headcanons list #rhs answered an ask #anonymous #There may be some Personal Feelings entwined in it but I am really not strong enough to call upon those today. #Let alone explicate them to an anonymous asker... #....I think I dipped too deep in the Nexus on this one. I'm almost (almost!) trembling. Synpathy: ACTIVATED #raven #trigon

[autisticcassandracain]

choose violence: 3 + 8

3. screenshot or description of the worst take you've seen on tumblr

All three asks I got for this ask meme wanted to know this one lmao. Sadly I have a bad memory so I had to scroll through the takes I've screenshotted and sent to my friends to make fun of, and while I'd like to stress that this is from Forever ago, and that I do not remember who posted it or what the context was: one screenshot stated that after Barbara, Cass's healthiest relationship was with her father. Now, I don't know how exactly you'd have to manipulate to bracket to have David Cain be in the running for 'healthiest relationship with Cassandra Cain', but he'd still lose. Literally the entire batfam, including Bruce and Jason fucking Todd, has a healthier relationship with Cass than David Cain. Lady Shiva has a healthier relationship with Cass. I don't know if this is The Worst Take Ever but it's certainly up there.

8. common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about

I mean there are a Lot but everyone's heard the complaints about fanon fans' opinions by now so let's do a spicier one. I think it's weird that everyone (on the Deathstroke Hater side of the fandom) unanimously classifies Deathstroke as an abusive/bad dad to Joey and Grant prior to the throat cutting incident.

I'm sure there's canon that contradicts it (I've never read a Deathstroke solo ever because I think it'd be miserable) but in NTT he is literally textually a good dad prior to All That. And I recognize that this is because he's Wolfman's specialest little boy more than anything but I still think it's significantly more interesting for literally the entire Wilson family but especially Joey if Deathstroke was like, legitimately a pretty good dad right up until he weighed his son's life against his ego and found his son's life wanting. The whiplash between 'absent and doesn't quite get Joey but genuinely loving and trying' and 'lets his son's throat get cut for no good reason and then immediately tries to bail without visiting him in the hospital with the full expectancy that his wife will just take this' is really compelling to me. And there seems to be this universal acceptance that Deathstroke was a bad/abusive dad prior to All That and I just don't understand why people state that so confidently when at least one version of canon outright contradicts it.

That said anyone who considers Deathstroke a good or even mediocre dad is even more wrong because he did, in fact, do All That and also we haven't even talked about Rose Wilson so. L. So yeah everyone is wrong about Deathstroke's parenting capabilities except me.

#my posts #asks #i HATE the new tumblr editor i HATE it #it has SO MANY bugs for me like i cannot use the enter key it glitches out when i try to copy paste something half the time #it refuses to let me cut/backspace text half the time it's just legitimately nigh impossible to work with bc it's fucking BROKEN for me #I tried to contact support about specifically the enter key issue bc that's KILLING me and they went 'huh. that's weird.' #'idk what that's about tho. have you tried clearing your cache?' #like wow. thanks. #i guess i'll fucking sit down and see if it's one of my browser extensions causing this one of these days #bc that's the only thing i can think of that might be the issue #until then. hate. hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate

[thevindicativevordan]

You'll probably talk about it in this week's comics, but what do you think about the big reveal of Boy Thunder's identity in this week's Batman/Superman? Is there anything to be gained for that character with this new backstory?

Lots to talk about this week!

World's Finest #10 - Boy Thunder's identity at last has been revealed as Magog, or at least he's the kid who will eventually grow up to be Magog. I actually had predicted the reveal beforehand when I was puzzling over who David could possibly be - Waid had mentioned he was a character he had written before - and suddenly a lightbulb went off in my head. What big story had Waid written involving Superman and the Joker before? Kingdom Come! And someone else even pointed out to me that Magog's civilian name was David! Makes sense that Waid would return to what is arguably the biggest contribution he's made to the Super Mythos in Magog and try to flesh him out as a character. Other writers have made attempts to use Magog as an ongoing Superman Rogue outside of Kingdom Come and it's never worked for me. The takes were too boring or one note, failing to convince me this was someone with more stories to tell. Waid is the first one to grab my attention, Magog as Superman's "Red Hood" is the first time I've wanted to see more of him.

Batman vs. Robin #4 - Waid's portrayal of magic here, and why Batman sucks at it, is a great moment. Makes him writing Shazam even more exciting because it seems like he has thoughts on how magic should work. Otherwise this has been fine, a cut above Dark Crisis, but hampered by how much of it is already well trodden grounds.

Dark Crisis #7 - Sucked. There's two cool moments, Black Adam empowering everyone else to beat Deathstroke and Waller revealing her team at the end, but the rest of the book is a total bore. Nightwing... doesn't do anything really, the multiverse is infinite (again, for the third fucking time) but there's no reason to care, and the legacy heroes failed to accomplish anything of worth. Jace pushed a button and then dipped, Yara didn't get any cool standout moments, only Jon had a good showing taking on all of the DC Big Bads at once. Speaking of them man what a waste of a cool concept, they did nothing, they didn't kill anyone, and Darkseid just goes back to ruling Apokolips afterwards. If this was meant to spotlight the legacy heroes it failed, nobody is reading this and thinking they're all that important. I want to know what Composite Bizarro's deal is, otherwise I've already moved on. What the hell was the deal with “Earth Alpha” anyway? Remember that? Williamson set that up as a major mystery of Infinite Frontier and never resolved it!

Nightwing #99 - Other than whatever is in Nightwing's box in the hold, I'm struggling to think of what plot threads Taylor could do for the big 100 issue. Clearly a marriage is not happening any time soon, will it just be Dick gathering the Titans together for the bold new era of NTT nostalgia?

Stargirl: The Lost Children #2 - It is night and day compared to the Johns writing JSA. This is the good Johns, the guy who loves these C-Listers and can make you fall in love with them too.

X-Men Annual #1 - Good character story that gives Firestar an arc where she comes to terms with her mutant identity.

Strange #9 - Do people care about the Sentry anymore? Feels like the hype from his usage during the Bendis era has long since worn off. Otherwise another great issue, we've seen a lot of wife guys but Clea as a husband gal is refreshing.

#weekly reviews #magog

[fancyfade]

Been reading your posts and saw the meme about how other dc characters act when they are around a Batfamily member and they loose all their critical thinking skills

Has that been a problem in comics for decades? I noticed that with Damian in titans stuff…to the point I became annoyed because it just making him a mini Bruce rather then played with the potentially interesting dynamics he could have.

Do Dick and Tim suffer from the mini Bruce approach in their titans stuff a lot too? It gotten to a point in Damian’s stuff for me, that there should be an editorial mandate saying “Just because they are Batman legacy characters, doesn’t mean they are clones of him.”

for Damian, it's been a long time since I read his teen titans stuff (and I didn't read a ton b/c most of it wasn't good), but I do remember that in the intro arc it did feel very Damian centric, and some of it was like.. the other characters powers were too easily cancelled out by some random gadget. like the gun that shot kory when introducing the capturing the team part of the plotline. that was stupid. (and in general, characters powers get randomly cancelled out by a gadget is a common thing in the batfam characters stuff). I can't remember WRT critical thinking, been literal years since I read the comic, but I do narrative focus was disappointing.... even for being a Damian fan while reading it.

for Tim in YJ I guess it felt like he was the leader for no reason, but I can't remember who had the general critical thinking skills or if none of them did. But he also got randomly super tough in one plotline in a way that made me give up on the series for a bit (where he was treated as like. the only person capable of standing up to Harm for some reason which was 9_9). However, in Titans / Young Justice Graduation Day Tim definitely felt like he was the only YJ character who was allowed to be portrayed as "right" (in which "right" obviously means listening to Dick, the paragon of reason) , because everyone else's recklessness had to be exaggerated to explain why the YJ team is so terrible. But god forbid Tim be slandered with the rest of the team 9_9

Dick it definitely holds so true, he was part of the inspiration for me reblogging it :P like the whole "robin is the default leader" thing doesn't start except with Dick, and it wasn't just because Dick was such a logical choice. It was b/c the writers decided to not let anyone else have ideas besides him in the original teen titans series. I've heard it as "everyone had one character trait and his was leader" but like... many characters didn't even have one character trait. Donna's was "girl". like the writing was clearly not balanced or good. and it's sooooo conspicuous because even in NTT, which is generally a pretty good series, the other characters will come across investigations when doing stuff while Dick is absent and be like ":C :C :C oh no dick our critical thinking person is gone whatever shall we do". Like multiple times! and IIRC that happened in the 1966 Teen Titans comics I read too in 1 issue where Dick was off screen. but like "dick is the smartest teen titan" "dick is the best leader" "dick could take out the other titans with planning but just won't b/c he's nice" - any of these situations existing is basically because he's writer's pet a la bruce. inb4 - I'm not saying any instance in which Dick is a good leader shouldn't count. but like. him being the obvious choice over other people is writer's pet-ism and Marv does not give other characters a chance to shine in the role, yet gives Dick plenty of chance to shine. So there is no fair comparison or way to say "he's best".

Anyway, I'll say Dick is by far the one I have noticed it being most true of. If you want to just read Teen Titans comics and have fun he is fr like the Batman of teen titans comics.

#ask #dc comics #anon #teen titans #the new teen titans #dick grayson #damian wayne #tim drake #robin

[saintclay]

I'm not sure if your interests even lie in the ntt direction but kory/donna or just good old dick/roy

I'm not huge into the ntt but I have read a little bit! I'm actually looking to get more into them once I have more room in my brain for fandom stuff!

Dick/Roy

The 'in theory' is because, once again, I don't know much about the new teen titans, so I'm mainly working off the few comics I have read, graduation day (which I'm assuming is not the best way to judge their characters considering that they were in a very high stress situation), and secondhand information. with that out of the way

I love the idea of this ship. I love the fact that they have kinda mirrored arcs within their own personal cannons. I would and have read fic for them (I don't know if I'd ever write fic for them, it would probably be really ooc). They aren't OTP but I am a multishipper, and they both currently have two hands. I would 100% be open to seeing more of them and will probably end up shipping them once I sit my ass down and actually read ntt.

Kory/Donna

I know less about these two than I do about Dick and Roy, but I want to know more about them. Honestly this just makes sense based on the vibes alone. I've got no strong opinions either way on them, but if somebody told me that they were dating in the comics I would probably believe it (no I wouldn't, obviously Kori has to stay available to be one of Dick's ever revolving love interests. but if I had no knowledge of comics I would believe it).

now I have to go read the new teen titans look what you've done

#answered #samasuhana #ask game #ship bingo

[amaraudermind]

Also, though, still very much struggling to see how we get from this point that fits Dick reasonably as a character, with him bartending at a cop bar to listen in on the cop gossip and know what's going on in town, to him...becoming a cop?

#dick grayson #ten out of ten most frustrating thing about reading the nightwing solo #is the fact that it starts out in character! sndncjznnx #like i've read a moderate amount of 60s teen titans and a bit of 80s ntt. which is where i fell in love with the comic version of him #you know? and i've seen *some* stuff from his nw v1 nw v2 but not much. mostly later stuff like n52 and beyond #and it's so frustrating because like. 90% of the time he's not even the same character!!!! #and from what i'd seen of this stuff i was kinda expecting it to be the same way yknow? just completely not correct at all for him #but no at the beginning it's making sense! how! it makes me more frustrated because i know how down hill it goes later! #anyway #void posts #void comic thoughts