A small sampling on how different those portrayals are.
I'm not going to write an essay on this but a few thoughts on the stories/writers that did the retconned parts.
Loeb: Hush had some of the most ridiculously biased statements against Jason to the point I wonder not just why Bruce took him in but why he mourned him. Jason impressed Bruce with his guts, honesty, bravery and skill before he took him in. Yet Hush acts like Jason was some arrogant kid with no skills which doesn't just reflect badly on Jason. It makes Bruce look like a moron that for some reason claims to love a kid he doesn't think highly of and threw him into the fight. Loeb also thinks that Jason is the same age as Dick which makes no sense. He was closer to Tims' age.
Johns: I forgot how negative the others Titans were in this issue. Jasons' time with the Titans was actually pretty positive, on his first mission he was the ONLY member that stayed focused. At one point he had to stop Donna from freaking out. Hell he saved Ravens' mom when she was under Brother Bloods' thrall and unlike the others actually checked to see if she was alive. Yet Johns has Raven claim he was obsessed with being better than everyone else? Or have Jason claim she sensed anger and tried to help?
SHE was the one that needed help back then! And no one even Dick cared enough to give him a statue? Superboy (Kon) even refers to Jason as the "bad Robin" at a later point. Still Johns did show some nice bonding between Jason, Alfred and Bruce in JL. He's learned from his mistakes with Wonder Woman so there's hope that he can write Jason better too.
Dixon: This is from the Nightwing Year One storyline. It has it's moments but Jason is often write as a stereotypical street kid. One example of his out of character writing is him shrugging off school like all that matters is crime fighting. When Jason was Robin he loved school, did an extra credit assignment that he loved and was at the top of his class because he worked hard. It should be noted there were more out of character moments in NYO like Dick not caring about Kory and Bruce being a psycho that kidnaps Jason.
I'm not sure how much of this was the writers disliking Jason, being affected by other retconned storylines or DC insisting Jason was Bruces' greatest failure yet blaming him for his own death. Whatever the reason it's really messed up that this is the way they wrote a kid that died a hero.
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This sort of thing really does drive me right up a wall.
ReplyDeleteMe too. Especially since most writers still write him like he's dumb, downplay his skills, make him a joke, someone always ready to brawl and other stupid clichés. His series (RHATO & RHA) have developed him while staying loyal to who the character was as Robin. The sad fact is writers buy into the lie others have spread without bothering to understand who Jason Todd is.
ReplyDeleteAs a result we get lazy writing that make you want to scream. People complain about Scott Lobdell but he's the only one that's written Jason as a fully rounded character in forever. Even Winick couldn't get past making Jason stay in a rut.
Hello! You have a new reader here. I spent days reading almost everything you have on Jason and RHATO and I love, love your insights as well as other commenters'. Want to reread the series just to catch all the details mentioned here that I missed and if possible, your post on Artemis's costume made me even more excited for the upcoming series.
ReplyDeleteHere will be my refuge when the new RHATO comes if you don't mind. :) Tumblr and comicbook forums are for the most part not friendly places for fans of Scott Lobdell and his Jason.
Hello! Thanks! I tend to go on a lot about this stuff so it's nice to know someone else is excited about these characters. I'm really excited about the potential the upcoming series has.
ReplyDeleteI don't mind, it's pretty brutal on other sites. Feel free to share your thoughts. :D