#but the comics have been showing us the journey of damian learning to have fun

[dickheadcanons]

the secret key to writing in character dick grayson is that dick does not get enjoyment out of relaxing or doing fun things. its a hard mindset to understand because it's the opposite of what you or i as fandom people experience, but Dick is never shown to do things for fun. if he's watching a movie or playing a game, it's almost always to spend time with other people, not because that's his impulse (and lowkey he sometimes ruins it for other people by never being able to turn off his brain)

now, this is not to say that he's unhappy, or that he doesn't experience happiness in his day to day. but he doesnt get that from the things that we, as comic book readers and fanfiction writers, get enjoyment from.

Dick is the definition of a workaholic. His only enjoyment comes from a job well done, helping people, and sometimes adrenaline (as his only real canon hobby is...skydiving)

Further reading: Flash Plus Nightwing (1997) (hating on the Hardy Boys)

Nightwing (2016) #43 (being unable to take a night off)

Nightwing (1996) #140 (skydiving)

The Titans (1999) #3 (being a terrible film watcher)

[kikithegeek]

An Amateur Review of Ridley Pearson’s Super Sons

Please be aware: This will contain some spoilers for the Super Sons graphic novels written by Ridley Pearson. If you do not wish to be spoiled on plot or character development, please stop reading this and come back once you’ve read through the books yourselves. Otherwise, enjoy this amateur review.

INTRODUCTION

As someone who grew up reading comics from Marvel, DC, IDW, and Archie, it was always fun when legacy characters were introduced or focused on. Characters that were students or the children of characters that my parents grew up with always felt nice to me, and even relatable when they were introduced or shown to be growing up in a similar or the same time period as my friends and I. Taking this into account, it’s no wonder that by the time I was in high school, some of my favorite comics involved Damian Wayne/Robin and Jonathan Kent/Superboy. Yes, I was definitely older than them by the time their series came in, but some of the problems they faced, even the small ones, seemed familiar to my own. Problems such as Jon’s reluctance of moving away from Hamilton County to Metropolis where he’d be leaving behind people he’s known for years into what is essentially a foreign environment for him, or both characters having to live up to the examples their parents have set; something I’m sure many of us can relate to as children are always compared to their parents or successful family members. The growing friendship between them was always a highlight no matter what type of adventure they were on.

In 2019, Ridley Pearson and Ile Gonzalez released the first book in their 3-part series starring Jon and Damian in a sort of rebooted universe. Fan feedback at the time was mixed, with some fans unhappy and others just happy they were getting more content featuring their favorite duo. Personally, I wasn’t paying attention all that much; I was in the middle of college and my focus had drifted away from comic books that year to focus on my studies, but with the recent pandemic and more time to read I’ve fallen back into the rabbit hole of super heroes and villains. I remember there being an outcry against the books when the previews began to be released, but after they did release and finished their run, I didn’t hear anything. No one really actively talked about what the books were about and most of what I heard seemed to come from people who read a handful of pages, if at all, and then never finished it. So, I decided to put my two cents in and read them. I’ll be looking at them as someone who has been a fan of their main-like counterparts for years, and as someone who also acknowledges that this isn’t canon to it and is an alternate universe (or alternate Earth in the cases of the DC comics multiverse), if anything to look at it from a neutral perspective.  

It should be noted that this isn’t the first time I’ve read through Ridley Pearson’s work. In middle school and even through high school, I couldn’t get enough of Kingdom Keepers and Peter and the Starcatcher, even getting tickets to see the touring cast of the latter’s theater adaptation when they came to my state. I’ve read a few interviews on his work with the Super Sons before going into the books themselves, and he doesn’t neglect to say that this series isn’t connected to the normal DC canon (whatever that is these days; any comic book reader knows that reboots, especially for DC in the last decade, usually happen quite a bit). Okay, that’s probably a given, and it makes things easier considering the main target demographic are kids aged 10-14. There’s a lot of content to go over when it comes to everything connected to Damian and Jon, even more so for Batman and Superman, so this makes it less difficult for kids who don’t have much experience with DC outside of the occasional tv show and movie to get into it.

But what about the story itself?

THE STORY

(The majority of the story spoilers are beyond this point since I summarize the books. This is your last spoiler warning.)

The story itself takes place in an alternate future. America is called Coleumbria and the global climate crisis has gotten to the point where it’s a race to find a way to stop the rising temperatures and constant flooding. While Batman and Superman spearhead the projects set to stabilize and then reverse the Earth’s temperature, their sons are moved from Metropolis to a city called Wyndemer with other refugees looking to find somewhere safe from the floods. This causes tensions in the city to heighten as refugees, called “flood runners”, are harassed by locals. Without going too in-depth into the books (otherwise, we’d be here all day), I’m going to summarize them. Certain characters and events might be omitted, but hey, at least it gives you a reason to read them even if I tell you what they’re about.

The first book introduces us to this crisis and shows us how this world’s Jon (who still goes by Superboy in this) and Damian (who is going by Batkid) meet. While there’s some animosity between them at first, with Jon having a not-too-hidden bias against Bruce Wayne, the two eventually start to work together when they realize their individual investigations are connected. Jon and his classmate, Tilly, have been looking into a mysterious illness that’s hospitalized Jon’s mother among many others, and Damian has been investigating sabotages against Wayne Tech dams. They also meet a girl named Candace who is trying to uncover a mystery that’s plagued her since her mom’s passing. After finding clues at a food company called Sage Foods, the group is attacked and manages to escape after Jon is told their attackers were sent by a woman named Arvyc. After finding out that Candace and Damian had set Jon up earlier in the book to be attacked by a few gang members, the group have a short fight before they go to the train station to stop Arvyc’s gang.

The second book opens with the boys helping Candace make it to a boat while escaping a group of girls called The Four Fingers. While they didn’t have as much of a presence in the previous book, had been shown as adversaries of Candace’s. Continuing into their investigations into the virus, Jon and Tilly learn that it was man-made as Candace’s visions lead her toward Coleumbria’s capital. The Four Fingers, meanwhile, are adamant about finding Candace, so they’ve taken to stalking her friends, until they realize they’re “dead ends”, so they choose to follow their own leads. It is revealed that The Four Fingers and Candace all have powers that connects them to certain species of animals; with Candace, she has a connection to birds and she states her grandmother was the same. Tilly comes up with her own vigilante persona, Puppet Girl, and stays behind in Wyndemer as Damian and Jon leave to go to Cinapolis to find the virus’s source. However, the boys get captured and Tilly decides she needs to help them. Candace in the meantime has found an anointing oil her mother had left clues for her to find, which is the key to the throne of Landis, the country she and The Four Fingers come from. It ends with the Super Sons and Tilly saving Candace and helping her get on a boat back to Landis while Arvyc escapes from prison.

The third and final book opens with Jon, Damian, and Tilly trying to track Arvyc down and it’s obvious that they’ve been at this for some time now, but they soon become the hunted. Candace makes it back to Landis and finds one of the rebels her mom had led before she was arrested. As Candace continues on her journey, Jon, Damian, and Tilly are sent by Batman to a LexCorp lab to retrieve a virus sample, only to find it isn’t there. They decide to go to Landis since The Four Fingers were heading there with the virus (and Candace had gone with intentions to stop them), but Tilly needs to stay behind again. The boys and Candace continue their respective journeys through Landis, however a man who’s been pulling the strings from the shadows for the last two books, Sir Reale, has decided to send Arvyc after them along with Talia. Talia and Arvyc attack the boys who manage to outsmart them for the moment, and are reunited with Candace who has been tracking the virus with two warriors named Kizuka and Archer. Tilly, back in Coleumbia, is sent out to retrieve Damian and Jon by Bruce’s assistant, Patience. After meeting up with Tilly, the group find a lab where The Four Fingers have been preparing vials of the virus in order to release it via bombs, and a battle ensues where they learn that sunlight can kill the virus and that Talia is Damian’s mother. Learning that they couldn’t stop all of the shipments, the group gathers the people of the local town to help them in storming the factory. They succeed in killing the remaining virus, save for a vial to be used to create a cure. With Superman’s mission a success and Batman working on a cure, the book ends with Candace being crowned the new Empress of Landis, Jon’s mother waking up, and Batman making Damian Robin.

MY THOUGHTS ON THE STORY

All in all, the story was okay. Personally, I felt like it was rushed in some places, such as how we’re brought from one character or scene to the next with little to no transition or breathing space. The endings were also kind of abrupt, which I feel really brought down the ending for the final book. We don’t really linger on whether or not Superman’s efforts to reverse global worming worked or have a moment where Jon and his dad are able to reunite with Lois. I was also disappointed to see they didn’t go anywhere with the whole “Talia is revealed to be Damian’s mother he had never met before and barely knew anything about” sub plot they had going in book three. People who know me know that the League of Assassins and any character associated with them are among my favorite villains in the Batman mythos, and to see it be brought in only for it to not have anything done with it was disappointing. Heck, you could have taken Talia out of it and the story would have been the same minus Damian being momentarily shaken before getting back to business. At the very least, an ending scene where Bruce confirms she’s his mother would have been nice enough closure for it. This might have been due to there being a page limit (each book was roughly 151 pages long) which lead to things being cut out, but it’s still disappointing nonetheless, especially since I did find myself enjoying parts that had pacing problems.

Pacing and unresolved plotlines aside, some of the things I did enjoy though involved Candace’s story arc. She’s one of the characters made for this series, and watching her figure out her past and come into her own with her powers was really enjoyable. I also felt like small snippets of character interactions between the boys, Candace, and Tilly were really well written. They actually felt like kids.

THE CHARACTERS

Since there are a lot of characters in this series, I’m only going to focus on the four main characters since we’re with them the entire time.

Jonathan Kent is probably the one out of him and Damian who’s the closest to his original counterpart, and I don’t just mean in looks. While he doesn’t have as many powers as he’s come to have in the main DC canon, he does have some of the powers he has early on in his appearances, such as super speed, super hearing, x-ray vision, super strength, and being able to jump high/far. He’s a bit older here though, 12 instead of 10 making him closer to Damian’s age and allowing him to go to the same school as him and Tilly. He holds his dad’s lessons close and seems to be apprehensive about seriously hurting people, mainly in the beginning. Being older though, he’s a bit more mature than his counterpart was before he was aged up, and I feel that this version of Jon is a good blend between the two.

Damian Wayne on the other hand was given the most changes in terms of backstory and how he acts, which goes hand-in-hand. In the original continuity, he was raised by Talia and the League of Assassins, making him spoiled and a literal killer in the body of a child. Here, he was raised by Bruce (how or why, I don’t know. Talia wasn’t brought up until book 3 so I can only assume she gave him to Bruce as a baby and they agreed to never tell him for whatever reason) and Bruce refuses to let him be Robin, leaving Damian to become Batkid (which is a good reference to past incarnations of Batman’s son in older Elseworlds stories). He’s still arrogant and looks for a fight more than he should, but it doesn’t seem like he wants to kill. Beat up a guy who is already out of the fight, yes, but not kill. One thing people who’ve read the books will notice is I’ve been calling him Damian. Well, that’s out of habit; in this series he is pretty adamant about everyone calling him Ian. Why? Again, I don’t know, and part of me is bothered by it because we never find out why he hates his name. I can only assume Pearson had things planned that would explain this a bit more but had to cut them out due to page constraints.

Tilly is one of the characters made for this series, taking the name Puppet Girl as her secret idenity. She’s Jon’s friend and classmate, and is a computer expert, allowing for her to help the team from home until they need her to fly one of Bruce’s machines to them. She hangs around Jon a lot due to going to the same school and because both of them are interning for the Daily Planet. In all honesty, she reminds me of Kathy from before it’s revealed she has powers and is actually an alien since she acts as Jon’s best friend who isn’t Damian, as well as a girl who Jon might have a crush on or vice versa. The blond hair and the purple-pink outfit scheme doesn’t help.

Candace is our final main character and the second character made for this series. We meet her in the books before we meet Jon and Damian, and her story plays a huge role in the overall plot. Candace has been following a string of clues her mother left her shortly before her death, and we learn as the comic goes on that she’s meant to be the next Empress of her home country, Landis, but was forced to flee to Coleumbria when her family was usurped by a general. Over time, she unlocks her power to communicate and control birds, and later to control the weather. I found myself enjoying her story just as much, if not more than the plots that surrounded the title characters, which helps since her story is intertwined with theirs. If I had to compare her to an existing character in the DC canon, I’d say Wonder Woman due to her super human abilities and her being royalty.

THE ART

The art is also good, definitely better than what I can do. However, a complaint I do have is that the characters feel stiff and rigid. It might be the art style, but something felt off at times, mainly with the posing. Again, it’s still better than what I can do, but I feel like it could have been better. I did like how the backgrounds were vibrant and you could tell where the characters were just from a look, and the art is more detailed in general compared to other young reader graphic novels DC has been putting out. Art is pretty subjective, so I’m not going to go into this too much and a lot of these are my own opinions.

The art has come into debate as well, though not for the reasons I mentioned above. When previews for the first book started to be released, a lot of people were critical toward Candace and Damian, particularly toward their skin color. In the preview images, Candace was shown to have a blue-ish-gray tint (you can probably see why this didn’t go over well) and Damian was shown to be paler than Jon (Damian is shown in the original DC canon to be half Arabic and even though he was sometimes shown to have pale skin like Bruce’s, he was also shown to have a tanner complexion due to his mother’s side. Most fan interpretations as a result more often than not have him with tanned skin). After fan outcry, this was fixed with Candace getting a more natural skin tone and Damian’s being brought down to a darker shade than Jon’s. With Damian’s it’s more apparent in the second and third books since in the first one I did notices there were a few panels where his skin tone would be lighter than in others which makes me wonder if it was a last-minute recolor for the first book’s release.

FINAL THOUGHTS

All in all, I’d say it’s okay. It’s not great, it’s not bad; just okay. I honestly think that if Pearson and Gonzalez hadn’t been given a page limit then it could have been better since the pacing wouldn’t be as big of an issue and they would have been able to get through all of the mini arcs they had set up. They obviously wanted to tell a bigger story but were only given so much room to work with.

It’s obviously not for everyone, and it’s definitely not the Super Sons people like me have grown up with, but that’s okay. Some of the kids I used to babysit who fall into the range of “I’ve never really read DC comics and only ever saw a cartoon episode on TV” read these books too and they liked it. Same thing for the few kids who did have prior experience with the Super Sons. What dragged them in was the climate crisis and (for the ones who read them after the world went into a lockdown) the fact the characters were trying to find a cure for a virus that was similar to the flu. Yeah, and these were written way before 2020, so that’s actually an achievement on Pearson’s part.

You don’t have to like them; heck, I didn’t really have any interest in them because of the backlash from people like me until my friends started asking me to make this review. But maybe give them a chance. Find a kid in your family or friend group and see if they’d be interested, maybe you can read it together once the craziness of the last year’s calmed down.

[johnnyhasfeelings]

Batman #34 Lacks Longevity, But Hits the Mark Every Time

    Batman #34 is the second issue of the arc “The Rules of Engagement”, and feature Bruce and Selina confronting Talia al Ghul post their engagement. Batman #33 was an amazingly fun romp through the reaction of the bat-sons, included the cameo of Tiger, and was ultimately an amazing set up of character and conflict, all while continuing to highlight the chemistry between the two leads. And while Batman #34 will likely be lost to time, not having the same punch as the issue preceding it, it absolutely hits the nail on the head regarding art, character, and writing. Despite the fact that its only function seems to be a transition and build up to the main confrontation between Talia and Selina, and then Bruce and Damian (hopefully only one of those encounters will involve swords), it is more than serviceable for its purpose.

    Let’s start by talking about the actual format of the comic, referring to the use of cells to tie together multi-page scenes. Which is to say that each scene is marked by a style of cell organization that is drastically different than the scene preceding it. The first scene, which introduces Bruce and Selina fighting Talia’s ninjas, maintains the format of quick ‘cuts’ between Bruce and Selina. Over five pages. The first page has equally sized cells, creating a 9x9 layout. The second and third pages are two full-paged cells. The interesting thing here is that they aren’t splashes. They are distinct cells, separated by white borders. The fifth is a two-page splash. Doing this effectively builds up the suspense of the battle, and introduces the audience to the situation – the banter the whole way through maintaining the air of the relationship between Selina and Bruce.

    Now, I won’t go into every use of cells as unifying tools in this issue, but I will bring up another instance that impressed me. Bruce and Selina were fighting the ninjas over the course of three pages. Each page was interrupted by a page of advertisement. And while this interruption definitely disrupts the flow of story, because advertisements ALWAYS do that, the use of cell structure compensated for it. A format of diagonal cells throughout the entire page, going up and to the right, tied the scene together despite interruption. It was really impressive. Definitely a technique I want to steal when making my own comics. Typically, the diagonal might have been distracting, but it was actually unifying.

    Another thing that was really interesting was the color. While the background, and insignificant villain fodder, were all warm colors (even the sky) and tended to blend together, slight costuming decisions in each of the major characters really helped to bring them to the foreground. Bruce was in almost all black, except for a yellow bandana that stuck out in contrast to his typical costume. Selina wore a cool-gray cloak that really stood out. Talia and Damian were both sporting green, and Dick and Clark both wore blue. It was really interesting to see the use of color to actually distinguish characters from each other. Whether or not it was intentional, the characters wearing similar base colors were those who could be connected in one way or another. Bruce and Selina were connected romantically, a unification enhanced in their costumes. Damian and Talia are connected through blood, and, although they are wearing very different shades of green, they both prove to be stumbling blocks in Bruce and Selina’s relationship – both are willing to challenge it (although Damian has much less destructive intentions than his mother). Dick and Clark maintain similar views, as well, which is enhanced in the way that Dick holds Damian back the same way Clark does. Dick continues to be a master of playing the line between Super and Bat in this issue, a reflection of his mentor, his namesake, and everyone in between.

Okay, now onto the fun stuff. Damian.

Despite the fact that Bruce and Selina are ostensibly the main characters of the arc, it has focused a lot on Damian and his reaction to the engagement. Batman #33 spent and equal amount of time with Bruce and Selina and the family – actually dedicating more of the issue to the development of the family and their reactions than the journey of the couple. Now, I’ve already written about how Damian’s reaction is indicative of his inability to understand how and why Bruce would devote himself to a villain, despite shunning his mother. There is the implication of Damian’s realization that his family will never be whole – and Dick definitely picks up on that. This continues into Batman #34, as we see a little bit more of the boys having followed Bruce and Selina. The only disappointing thing here is that we miss out on a great opportunity to see an interaction between Dick and Tiger. Tiger’s appearance in #33 was random and fun, and it was kind of disappointing to see that he was just that – a one cell cameo.

Back to Damian.

First is his interaction with Clark. Damian is being Damian, talking about how he’ll kill Clark. And Clark, to his credit, isn’t patronizing – he recognizes how Damian is probably completely capable of killing him. He also brings up Jon, which shuts Damian up almost immediately. This behavior reflects this notion that Damian doesn’t want more people to leave– it highlights his anxiety that Bruce is finding solace in someone other than him – not only as Robin, but as his son. Damian spent so much of his life trying to prove himself to others – but especially to Bruce. He’s spent his entire live thinking he didn’t need compassion from others so long as he had power. But, starting with Dick, he’s felt love. And now that he’s felt it, he isn’t ready to let it go – ‘break ups’, so to say, or rather, emotional distance post – emotional closeness, I guess, is something that he isn’t equipped to handle. Which is pretty much the theme of Damian’s arc in this storyline. It’s nice that this kind of throw away comment about Jon is actually a sort of metonymy. This smaller piece of Damian’s life being representative of the greater issue of this arc.

Okay. Now, let’s talk about Dick.

Dick is the one who was instantly by Damian’s side in the last issue. Dick is the one that went with Damian to follow Bruce and Selina. Dick is the one who sits on the stairs to wait with Damian for Bruce and Talia to explain themselves.

And Dick hesitated.

Dick can often be seen as this golden boy – especially in his relationship with Damian. He’s the brother that took in this little ball of murderous rage and loved him until he learned to love back. But this comic reminds us of Dick’s humanity as he hesitates – weighing the option of staying with Damian or forcing Damian to come back home with him. Because Dick was never going to leave Damian on his own – we have to be completely realistic about that. Dick hesitates because he knows that the incoming confrontation can only end badly.

But the beauty of Dick’s character is that he’s going to stand by Damian’s side, until the very end. Because that’s how the Dynamic Duo works! Dick is really showing his own passion and understanding of partnership.

The relationships in this were spot on. It ended with a solid cliff hanger – Talia challenging Selina to a sword fight. All in all, an extremely solid issue that shows just how much effort was put into what should have just been a throw-away transition.

But those are just my feelings.