damnianalghulnotwayne - Tumblr blog

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

the thing about Damian, especially pre-Robin, is that you have to straddle a line between child and cult assassin. He’s a nuanced character, you can’t dumb him down or simplify him. (On that note: PLEASE stop calling him feral! It’s racist as fuck!)

You cannot make other characters be nice and understanding to him from the start like Dick or Tim or Jason. You cannot make them treat him like a toddler below his actual age.

You also cannot make him a irredeemable psychopath who exists only to hurt Tim and sow conflict. Because that’s just straight up not true. Fanon.

Writing Damian needs to be a balance between these, and he needs this nuance to be interesting.

If everyone treats him softly, then there’s no point for Damian’s personality as it is. He is rude and arrogant and abrasive for a reason. You could argue that he’s spoiled, but he’s also a child who was ripped from a culture he knew and thrust into the arms of a white family who don’t understand him and don’t make the effort to actually teach him their views. He’s rude and angry because there is no place for him there, not until Robin, and even then he is still subject to their judgements. If everyone treats him with kid gloves, then his attitude comes without justification and doesn’t make sense.

Please remember that when Damian first appeared in comics, everyone except Talia disliked him. Bruce wasn’t sure what to do with him, but he also was quick to scream obedience. From Dick’s inner monologue in Resurrection of Ras al Ghul and his very early interactions in Batman and Robin, he didn’t like the kid and thought him a burden to bear in the place of Bruce. Tim never once gave him mercy after the first meeting. His inner monologue and actions all speak of hate and teenage angst - some justified, some way out of line.

Damian’s anger is then reasonably apparent. He doesn’t fit in. He can’t. But he doesn’t seek violence. He doesn’t try to murder everyone in their sleep like some people think. It’s shocking that fanon’s interpretation of him is a boy who goes for the throat in every interaction. He’s snippy, but in every single comic I’ve read he’s never tried to fight someone without a justification. If he was an X-Men level telepath, then I’d argue that his actions would become worse if he really knew what people thought of him at first glance.

If you’re a child that knows he is hated, then you lash out. You test boundaries. You see what will make them exile you, hurt you. You are a brown boy surrounded by a white city in a culture that you don’t understand. You cannot see your mother again. They hate her. You cannot express yourself in a world that expects the worst. You are shackled by expectation and judgement. They won’t let you be, but they won’t let you go.

You are stuck.

And in this, you will always be.

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

baby’s first league uniform

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

I know it will never happen because DC are cowards but the only thing I want from life is to watch Damian grow up and leave vigilantism behind forever.

He was the only one of his siblings who didn’t in someway choose to fight. He didn’t become Robin because he wanted to keep people safe or because no one else was available or because he was watching the hero that he idolised crumble before his eyes. He didn’t see it as magic or some lost connection to his parents or an opportunity to defend people who couldn’t defend themselves.

He’s Robin because it’s what he was told to be. Talia sent him to Bruce to learn from him (and kill Dick I think) but regardless Robin wasn’t necessarily supposed to be a part of that. Damian wanted it to prove his was better than Tim and because he saw being his fathers partner as being the only way to learn from him.

But I kinda want Damian to grow up and realise he doesn’t need to fight anymore. I mean idk how it would go but I think there’s potential for a pretty fucked up angst filled realisation that he died at like 12 years old.

I feel like that’s a good enough reason to stop the whole crime fighting thing.

Me personally, I just want to see him settle down into a civilian lifestyle. Become a doctor or a vet or a zoologist and just live his life.

Also I think the idea of med-student Damian running on coffee and adrenaline a week before finals having like 5 muggers bust into his tiny studio apartment (because this is Gotham and shit happens) just get absolutely floored by a teenager wearing sweats and a hoodie looking like death itself is absolutely hilarious.

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

it gets funnier the more you imagine the painting

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

Bruce showing up to a meeting a Wayne Enterprises

VS Bruce showing up to one of Damian’s school plays

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

this is Damian’s aesthetic

Imperial passport of Kublai Khan “I am the emissary of the Khan. If you defy me, you die.” 1240 A.D. [886x960]

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

i need the batfam fandom to give damian the same energy we give tom hollands peter parker in fics like

i want Field Trip to Wayne Enterprises fics

fics where damian gets phone calls from his famous siblings in class

fics where damian has to deal with the other kids watching thirst traps of his older siblings

fics where he’s getting bullies and one of them shows up in full vigilante attire to scare the middle school bully

just

damian al ghul wayne fanfic that centers around his school life and protective family

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

bruce: he’s killed people

damian [who’s heard stephanie say this at least 10x a day]: but have you considered that maybe he’s just a teenage girl?

jason: yeah! have you considered that bruce?!

bruce: jason, you’re 22 and a male

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

jason: i'm too drunk to drive

dick: you were the one to get me drunk, so i can't drive

tim: man i am high as a kite right now, i don't think I'm fit to drive unless it's to the wendy's drive-thru, its the only route i know by heart

jason, dick, and tim looking over to 12 year old damian:

damian: i shall be your designated driver just this once

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

"Damian should be a veterinarian when he grows up" this and "Damian should be a doctor" that….I think he should take advantage of his wealth and be an art major

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

he likes the feel of soft feathers

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

you'd think dick would be the renowned 'biter' of the batfam from his early days as robin, frequently biting attackers when not really necessary. then jason comes along and is 10x worse, doing it purely for his own amusement.

you think, surely the next one won't want to bite people for fun, and you're right, tim bites people as a defence mechanism instead.

by the time the 4th one comes around, it's statistically impossible for him to be a biter, but low and behold, damian's worse than all three of the previous boys combined. the cherry on top is that unlike the others who only bit for fun, as an attack, or as self-defence, never multiple, this one's standard reaction to anything is to bite it.

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

“batman you have 48 hours to respond”…

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

The titans 🤝 Batman to Dick about each other: They are not good enough for you

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

The potential of a decade(s) long DickBatman and DamianRobin era literally haunts me at night.

Don’t get me wrong, one of the most interesting things about the Robins imo is how baked into each other they are. I know it’s a joke that Bruce will just adopt any random orphan in reach, but the truth is, especially for the boys, their entrance into the Batman world is predicated on the one before; Jason is only taken in because Bruce misses Dick, Tim only because Jason dies. (Steph becoming Robin is even more of a story choice, and not one I particularly like, but a narrative nonetheless.) Their narrative is tight in a way that “replaced sidekicks” aren’t usually. Somehow, they made a pure narrative choice (Dick needs to move on, readers wanted to see a dead Robin) into a very compelling character choice for Bruce too.

But Damian takes us back to the heart and soul of the dynamic duo. A young boy with a dead family, and a young man with a mission that’s too big for him.

Despite the differences, Dick is working to help Damian in the same way that Bruce worked to help him. And Damian, a wildly different person than Dick, still has really wonderful moments of giving Dick exactly the advice he needs to hear. Their partnership isn’t quite the same as Bruce and Dick’s (Dick and Damian are honestly much less damaged, comparably), but it’s closer than the others imo.

Damian and Dick purposefully take the original duo and flip it directly on its head. The exact opposite inside the same frame. They really felt like a new era. The perfect circle. If only we got a little more time before the close.

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

So the timeline is contradictory in many places, but what makes the most sense to me is:

Dick is fairly newly 9 y/o when his parents die. He meets a 26 year old Bruce, who has been Batman for 1 year.

He is Robin for nearly a decade, until he’s fired at 18 y/o

Jason meets Bruce at 13, and is Robin til he’s 15. He’s 5 years younger than Dick. Note that he is 23 years younger than 36 y/o Bruce, a gap that suits their more parental relationship.

Tim is 13 y/o when he finds Dick again. He and Dick met when he was 2 y/o and the Grayson’s death is his earliest memory (to the point where he thought it was a dream for many years). They have a 7 year difference.

Tim is Robin until he’s 17 and Damian becomes Robin at 10 y/o. Dick is 24-25, and Jason is 19-20.

This allows a couple of fun things. The first is that Jason was a shitty teenager in UTRH which is just kind of funny. The second is that the Damian-Dick-Bruce parallel can exist, but also a Damian-Tim-Dick parallel, which I think is almost juicier. Dick was the perfect older brother to Tim, and yet Tim and Damian’s relationship is nothing like that. Tim is no longer Robin, but he’s also no longer the baby, which is almost harder. And I think is a reminder of how tiny Damian is at introduction. Tim is on the verge of high school when he becomes Robin. Damian is in 5th grade. And Dick is 25 trying to stop them from fighting.

[damnianalghulnotwayne]

It’s so funny that Tim is the Most Likely to Become a Supervillain of the Batfam. Like I agree, this is definitely true. However Jason is Right There and he’s trying his BEST alright?