batfambyval

[batfambyval]

so originally Jason was buried in Gotham Cemetery, which i think makes his whole ‘disorientatedly breaking out of his own grave’ thing so much funnier. because like. that’s a public graveyard. there’s probably walkways going through it that people take to get to work or school every day. and i know a lot of people retcon that with the excuse of the loa cleaning up the broken grave so that they can keep Jason away from Bruce, but what if they just. didn’t?

Gotham is a fucked up place, and the people that live there are so used to it by now. they don’t bat an eye at the vigilantes, the fear gas, the clowns-, they have been desensitised to the weird and unexplainable. so i imagine with the fact that Bruce Wayne’s dead son’s gravesite suddenly becoming the CLEAR location of a broken out corpse, with the scratch marks on the inside of a burrowed out coffin, mud and dirt bursting up in the way that could only happen if something was emerging from below, the probably muddy footsteps leading away, not to, away from, the grave…

what i’m saying is the general public of Gotham are probably well fucking aware that there’s a zombie Jason Todd walking around somewhere, and they’ve all just collectively decided to mind their own fucking business.

there’s no new zombie-rogues, no people being eaten, and after a week or so the caretaker of the cemetery sighed and filled in the mess anyway, so nobody really thinks to mention it. of course, the Waynes are too overwhelmed by grief to ever go to Jason’s grave, and people are too scared to bring up such a sensitive subject with them, so it gets to the point where literally everyone in Gotham knows that Jason is probably alive…. but his family.

Jason comes back to Gotham as Red Hood and he doesn’t even try to have a secret identity as a civilian. nobody fucking cares. he just gets an apartment and starts walking around during the day and everyone who recognises him as Jason is just like ‘heyy! glad to see you back man, we were wondering where you’d popped off to!’. literally nobody gives a shit.

(Tim knows. he used to walk through that graveyard to get home from school, he’s known from the beginning. he knows that whatever Jason’s staying away for is his own business, and to be honest he really didn’t want to be the messenger for that particular shitstorm of information. politely, he will not be touching that with a ten foot pole.)

(Damian knew before he even came to Gotham. quite frankly, his opinion on his father dropped astronomically when he found out his English teacher knew of his brother’s residence in Crime Alley and Bruce didn’t. it’s more entertaining for him to just sit back and watch anyway. he too, refuses to say shit.)

Eventually the news reaches the upper side of Gotham, who all immediately assume that if Jason’s walking around again then the Wayne’s must of course be aware of it, so they never think to bring it up then, either. but Jason Todd-Wayne is back, and there’s always been a special fondness for that cute little street kid who nervously started getting brought along to galas and tried his absolute best to fit in and be polite, even if half the time he ended up fucking around with Dick or that Drake kid in the corner to pass the time. so if he’s back, then the elites all immediately assume that he is once again going to be a part of higher Gotham society.

so Jason Todd, secretly the Red Hood Jason Todd, hiding from his family Jason Todd, living in a shitty apartment safe house with two pieces of furniture and a lot of swords Jason Todd, starts getting invites to high-end events from all the city elites. he doesn’t even know how they got his address.

but well, he was free that evening… and he couldn’t deny that it might be a little bit funny…

his identity reveal ends up being much less explosive than originally planned, but it sure is entertaining. at least for him. Damian and Tim looked positively suicidal the whole night.

[batfambyval]

Not to mention Camren Bicondova as Selina Kyle being the real main character even though it’s a cop show and she’s a little girl and a minor criminal in the beginning and despite having no connection to anything other than being in all the wrong places at all the wrong times she’s somehow involved in just about every insane plot line going on at all times and associates with every other character on the show without discrimination even if they’re holier-than-thou-cops or bat shit insane serial killers or socially stunted rich kids and somehow despite being the epitome of the shapeshifter archetype she always remains true to herself and her values and has consistent characterization.

half of the writers room for gotham (2014-2019) was fully convinced it was a gritty hypermasculine cable cop show and the other half believed they were writing a batman 1966 spiritual successor for the dark cabaret crowd and all of them had conflicting fetishes and every episode was called something like i brought you my bullets you brought me your love and jada pinkett smith had the ghosts of several silver screen divas within her wrestling for control of her performance at all times and they always set aside some time for the penguin serve segment, where robin lord taylor as oswald cobblepot would appear onscreen with his slicked down spiky bangs and cunt it up in ways that the world hadn’t seen since edmund said now gods stand up for bastards in the very first performance of king lear. and nobody involved had ever seen a tv show before so it can’t be judged within those terms.

[batfambyval]

[batfambyval]

Well parts of the Nolan movies were also filmed in Chicago so….

Why can’t real life cities be 10 mile tall gothic metropolises with red and black and skulls and statues of weeping saints everywhere

[batfambyval]

Ok but just imagine Barbra Gordon finding out her mom dated Ra’s al Ghul… like how would that even go????? Omg what if Damian accidentally revealed it! That would be hilarious! Honestly Barbara Gordon learning anything about Barbara Kean has so much potential for either angst or humor. Like yeah I know she was raised by her for ten years but I seriously doubt Barbara told her daughter everything she got up to before she was born. I mean how do you tell your kid that you used to be one of the most wanted criminals in the city or that you tried to kill her father multiple times or that you died and came back to life? I just want to see Batgirl or Oracle dealing with the history her name carries with the entire Gotham underground. Omg and what about if Riddler or Penguin found out her identity and suddenly they just have no idea how to feel about her. Like yeah she’s a Bat but she’s also Barbara Kean’s daughter, not to mention Jim Gordon’s and also kinda Leslie Thompkin’s and that’s gotta be really confusing for both of them. Cause Ed was friends and enemies with both her bio parents and used to be romantically involved with her step mom, and Oswald had his crush on Jim and friendship with Babs before she betrayed him and then they were all allies again for a bit during no man’s land and both of them were there for the pregnancy and like how can they fight this kid but also god the HATE her parents sometimes and also she keeps ruining their plans!!!! Omg so much potential!

Someone needs write a fic about Barbara Gordon navigating life as a Gotham vigilante with family ties to like every rogue in the city and no one knowing how to feel about it please please please

[batfambyval]

Tim and Bruce getting into an argument bcs Tim demands to be independent and NOT get involved in the mess of being a legal part of the Wayne family, and Bruce being final on the fact that Tim is FIFTEEN and needs a legal guardian. out of spite Tim asks the person he thinks Bruce would approve of as a guardian the least to sign some guardian papers.

Tim: you don’t have to do anything parental i just REALLY wanna make Batman mad and i get the sense that our wishes align on that specific aspect so if you could just sign here for shits and giggles-

Red Hood:

Red Hood, rapidly changing his plans on how to deal with getting revenge on Bruce because his replacement is actually kinda hysterical: if we’re doing this we’re fucking doing it right, kid

Bruce shows up to Tim’s next parent teacher conference because hey just because he’s being given the silent treatment over this whole adoption thing doesn’t mean he’s going to slack off on his parental duties, only to freeze in the doorway because Tim Drake-Hood is stood there with his shiny new CRIME LORD LEGAL GUARDIAN giving him the most SHIT EATING GRIN POSSIBLE, and he almost has a panic attack on the spot.

Jason’s really getting into this whole caretaker thing. he’s doing school runs, delivering home cooked meals to Drake manor, helping with homework, this was his fucking CALLING. Tim is having the time of his life because him and Hood actually get along really well, but then he realises two weeks in that it turns out Hood is actually Jason fucking Todd, and he has to deal with the existential crisis of causing the very thing he was trying to stop because he is now technically a legal child of the Wayne family.

out of embarrassment for the fact that he failed and amazement at the fact that he’s bonding so well with Bruce’s dead kid and his own childhood hero (who is now a badass crime lord that lets him call for advice about english assignments while organising drug runs and picks up batburger on his way home from weapon shipments, seriously what more could Tim want in a parent), Tim somehow becomes even more invested in hiding Red Hood’s identity than Jason is.

Bruce has just been in a constant state of panic for the past three months and he doesn’t know what to fucking do. Dick was concerned for Tim up until he demanded to have dinner with him and his new ‘guardian’ to vet the guy and Jason, who stopped caring about his identity when he realised how much being a working dad agrees with his mental health and is only actively keeping his identity from Bruce for Tim’s pride’s sake, takes off his helmet to eat and Dick stares at him frozen for fifteen minutes across the table before finally pointing at the two and saying ‘you know what? he didn’t even tell me Jason was dead until after the funeral. whatever the fuck’s going on here? he has it coming. proceed.’

[batfambyval]

Gotham has some of the best most nuanced long lasting female antagonists (and protagonists too to be honest) and I really wish they got more attention in the fandom! Like Barbara Kean (Queen) is RIGHT THERE who cares about Oswald Cobblepot and his pathetic relationship drama full of murder and betrayal and friendship when she’s got all of that but BETTER with Tabitha Galavan?

Why are all the fantastic female characters ignored? What about Selina Kyle, Lee Thompkins, Ivy Pepper, Bridget Pike, Silver St. Cloud, Fish Mooney, or my girl Liza?! Why do the men get so much attention when Babs and Tabs are right there basically carrying the whole show since season 2?!

I’m mad about it okay?!

[batfambyval]

What people forget about Bruce’s character far too often is that he doesn’t just refuse to kill his Rogues, he also pours money into getting them rehabilitated and the best psychiatric care he can. The money he pours into Arkham isn’t just for security. His refusal to kill the Joker is, in his mind, balanced by the sincere attempts to cure him. He doesn’t give up on people, that’s not who he is. He doesn’t toss them away and try to forget, he monitors their progress and does his best to help.

Depending on which version of the Joker you’re talking about this approach can make more or less sense. In a lot of timelines the Joker’s madness is not his own, it’s not naturally occurring and he was a normal person before being exposed to dangerous chemicals that altered his personality. In these universes it makes sense that Bruce holds out hope for a cure, that he maybe doesn’t blame the Joker as much for what he’s become. In the Gotham TV universe it makes even more sense since Bruce was actually friends with Jeremiah before he became a cartoonishly evil villain.

It’s a really sad misunderstanding of Bruce’s fundamental character. He never ignores the danger the criminals he puts away pose, he just doesn’t see killing them as a valid solution, which also makes sense considering how many of his villains keep dying and coming back to life! He wants to help them not want or need to commit crime because in a city like Gotham where both prisons and coffins have revolving doors it’s actually the most rational response to crime.

[batfambyval]

Dick's commitment issues (?)

Jason: You have the worst commitment issues I’ve ever seen.

Dick: Excuse me?! I don’t have commitment issues... I commit to everything. Jobs? Had like six. Identities? I’m legally at least four different people. Trauma responses? Baby bro, I’ve been loyal to mine since I was eight.

Jason: …That is deeply unsettling.

Tim: *muttering* At this point even the Joker has a stabler identity.

[batfambyval]

This is exactly what happened with Jason and the All Caste lol

[being told they're the chosen one]

Damian: I will not let you down.

Cassandra: Sounds fun.

Tim: K.

Jason: No I'm fucking not.

Duke: Do I have to be?

Dick: Please no, I am so tired.

[batfambyval]

Tim: You know something you two have in common?

Jason: Spite for the ages?

Dick: Crackin’ tits and a fat ass?

Jason: No will to live and yet the inability to die?

Dick: Beauty and grace, like the queen of 50 states?

Tim:

Jason:

Dick:

Tim: I was going to say “an uncanny ability to annoy everyone in this house with ruthless efficiency,” but your answers were… passable.

[batfambyval]

Well of course he’s on the floor, last time he became Batman he went on a murderous rampage and took over half of the US and brought a bunch of othe Titans to the dark side with him. This boy is absolutely terrified of becoming Batman.

Jason: Why is Tim laying face down on the floor?

Steph: He took a "which Justice League member are you" quiz.

Jason: And?

Steph: He got Batman.

[batfambyval]

Ah yes, Jason the Bard, his favorite cantrip? “Vicious mockery” because “it actually works irl!!”

This is what he meant when he said Robin gives him magic. Becoming Robin imbues one’s words with power to deal devastating psychic damage, adding a at least +6 to every roll as well as an advantage.

when I told a friend that I was a devout member of the “English teacher Jason Todd” headcanon, her addition was: “what if he catches one of his students in a gang or something? He begins to deal psychic damage while beating people up”

Jason: YOU DIDNT EVEN KNOW HOW TO INDENT A PARAGRAPH UNTIL A WEEK AGO, JARED. PUT THE GUN AWAY Jared: *runs* Jason: *yelling at his back* YES, GO CRY TO THE MOM WHO WAS WRITING YOUR ESSAYS UNTIL TENTH GRADE

the gangs start avoiding him because they’ve found out that any of their newer, younger recruits will flee at the sight of him. (By god, how did he know about that horrible test score? That awkward boner? That PE incident involving a stinky shoe? How did he have that kid’s MOM’S PHONE NUMBER???)

[batfambyval]

Technically he’s consumed by (or at least has a very strong affinity for) anti-evil. I mean… ther All-Blades only appear in the presence of and work on pure evil.

Robin! Jason: Robin gives me magic! :D

Constantine: *suspicious side eye glaring* Hm....

Bruce: oh come on, just because I have a high chance of being consumed by evil if I do magic -which is why I'm not allowed to do magic- doesn't mean he will! That's just a kid's saying! Constantine: uh huh -------------------------------

Red hood! Jason: *all-blades in hand* Sup motherfuckers guess who's back Constantine: I FUCKING KNEW IT

[batfambyval]

lol I can’t take the credit I got the idea from this post, I just made a post about the JL finding out

*At the Watchtower for some huge meeting*

Superman: hey Red Robin! Happy belated birthday! It was last week right? How old are you now?

Red Robin: 17.

Nightwing: 20!

Everyone: *stares*

Nightwing: RR, we talked about this. You can’t just decide to stop aging. That’s not how it works. You were born 20 years ago so you are 20 years old.

Red Robin: no. I’m 17 and I really need you to stop saying I’m not.

Impulse: Yeah! We’re 17 Nightwing! We’re never gonna be older than that!

*yj core four gather round Red Robin menacingly*

Superman: what?????

Nightwing: *sighs*

Batman: *dissatisfied grunt*

Red Robin: we went through a lot of bs to become eternally 17 and I won’t let you ruin our hard work!

Wonder Woman (eternally young and suffering for it): why? Why would you do this?

Superboy: if RR is doing it we’re gonna be right there with him!

Wonder girl: *nods*

Red Robin: believe us, you don’t want to see what happens if I lose my youthful optimism.

[batfambyval]

Especially Tim. Barbara at least had the excuse of traumatizing parental death, Tim's backstory? "I went to the circus once when I was three. Also my parents should prbly have gotten a divorce. I attended a lot of boarding schools."

[batfambyval]

Headcanon that bludhaven hates heroes with a flaming passion bc theyre just cops in tights but love Nightwing and therefore vehemently deny his hero status to anyone and everyone.

Like there is no official Nightwing merch bc he’s a criminal he’s committing a crime okay vigilante justice is in fact not legal and he’s not TECHNICALLY on the justice league and he’s NOT TECHNICALLY the leader of the titans anymore. But there are about 400 different Etsy stores that make hoodies, crop tops, joggers, sweats, sunglasses, bracelets, t shirts with nightwings logo or some art of him on them.

Like they love this guy and will get into beef with any Gotham national who tries to claim Nightwing is THEIR hero.

1) hes not a hero he’s a criminal fuck you

2) you have a hero and just bc he’s shit at his job and needs our guy (who is NOT a hero) to help him sometimes doesn’t MEAN SHIT

people are walking around with tiny v shaped blue tattoos or embroidered on clothing but again NOT A HERO BLUDHAVEN DOESNT DO HEROS

There are coffee shops with bad nightwing pun names nightbird, beanwing, nightwinging it and so on

Every third piece of graffiti is this man’s logo

Every sandwich place or fast food chain has a ‘secret menu item’ that’s not actually secret bc everyone orders it and it’s just one of their normal items dyed blue (sodas, desserts, burger buns, condiments so on) some places will sell wings fried in blue panko bread crumbs and call them them ‘nightwings’ ofc these are ALL off the menu you can’t see these items and if you try to order them out of the city you get weird looks.

Superman goes on tv and says Nightwing is one of his favorite hero’s and bludhaven riots. wtf nightwing is your favorite hero you fuckin poser

1) nightwing isn’t a hero he’s a criminal so back off

2) he’s ours you and your frou frou fancy city that hasn’t been nuked by a sentient pile of radiation can fuck RIGHT off

Naturally the only person in bludhaven who is unaware of this is Dick Grayson bc tbh this man is too busy to give a fuck about what his city thinks of him. They trust him to get shit done. Good that’s all he needs okay he has 22 reports he needs to log he’s busy.

Tim Drake professional nightwing fanboy however is fucking furious about this because.

A) dick was a GOTHAM hero FIRST and bludhaven can suck it

B) fuck you nightwing isn’t just a a hero he’s THE HERO and the BEST hero and don’t be rude bc you have a complex

C) all of the cool nightwing merch only ships around bludhaven so has to get it ordered there and it’s just a hassle and he’d pay double he swears just let him get it delivered to where he is please Everytime he stops by bludhaven he leaves with 10 new pieces of nightwing merch and bc he has so much. Damian doesn’t think he notices when some of his doubles mysteriously go missing. He does.

D) since they are anti hero they are firmly unhelpful whenever he or Steph show up bc a case has lead them to the city

The one plus side was watching Jason Todd having a mental breakdown bc apparently in bludhaven redhood counts as a hero and is therefore hated.

“Yous worked with the bat yous a hero thems the rules”

“I KILL PEOPLE”

“Yeah so do cops and people always call them heroes”

“Okay but I kill people to protect the general public I put down scum”

“Cops say they do that too”

“I- okay you know what I’m a hero fine okay. Why isn’t nightwing a hero”

“Vigilante justice is a crime”

“I’m documentably worse than a vigilante”

“But you have worked with the bat”

“For money yeah”

“See you even get paid, face it you’re a hero which means you suck”

“You realize Nightwing has worked with the bat right like way more than I have”

“Listen that ain’t his fault okay, the bats incompetent and so are the rest to you idiots. He’s a nice guy and a good neighbor don’t mean he’s a hero”

“I- what the fuck is in this cities water”

“I don’t fuckin know but it’s prolly better than whatever gothams got in its harbor”

“I- yeah you’re probably right”