I have like 2 different posts in my drafts trying and failing to articulate this but third time’s the charm: Bruce Wayne is a reflection of the American ideal of masculinity. This is part of why he is very often a terrible father
Rewatching the live action Transformers Movies and a reoccurring theme is that the Cybertronians are NOT sneaky. Like, at all. Bumblebee literally chasing Sam down the sidewalk in broad daylight, the whole crew 'hiding' by turning into cars on Sam's lawn, Mudflaps and Skids in pretty much every scene they're in, Mirage setting off a car alarm trying to peek into Noah's window, etc. and I've come to the conclusion that the only reason they are so bad at being sneaky is because they're not from Earth.
On Cybertron, they're very sneaky. The tactics they were using would 100% work. But Earth has different things that make different noises and everything is sized differently and it's more delicate so their usual tactics don't work anymore. Bumblebee was a fucking scout, Jazz is canonically head of special ops. Mirage is a spy! They are sneaky bastards! But Earth shit is so fragile and small and random things have alarms that they're out of their element. It means that none of them can go on stealth missions anymore because even if they can learn how to work around everything being small and fragile, 16+ foot robots are pretty hard to fucking miss.
Jaykyle enemies to lovers misunderstanding AU where they hatefuck once during Countdown to Final Crisis and part ways. Jason becomes Star Sapphire from a different mechanism than usual just because he's so powered by love, and forgets to mention it to just about everyone but Carol. Cue a very confused Kyle being accosted by a bunch of curious/angry bats and/or outlaws who think the reason why Jason's struggling with his power (his magic keeps exploding in his face) is because Kyle broke his heart. (It's not, Jason just needs to learn about self-love). Upon learning that, Kyle goes through three different crises in ten minutes and decides that while he still doesn't like Jason he has to "take responsibility" and "make this right" because he thinks Jason loved him and was being defensive of Kyle's hostility and he used and ditched him, so he decides to help Jason with his powers and resolve the situation. Eventually this is what they needed to give eachother a chance and they fall in love, but god does Jason laughs his ass off when he finally learns about the misunderstanding.
The thing you don’t understand is that Bruce knows where all of his kids' safehouses are. Jason’s, Dicks, Tim’s, all of them. Bruce cannot read the signs that show his children are mad at him, or need space, because he’s never really had this relationship before and Dick was his first and even when mad Dick required touch and Bruce’s presence. But when they leave, when they storm off in exasperation and hol up in their safehouses, believing he can’t find them for a bit, he stays away. He knows where they are. But the safe house retreat is enough of a sign to him where he understands. And stays away. Dick tests it once, after an argument, going to a safe house that Bruce himself created for him, and still Bruce doesn’t come. Dick makes sure every camera catches him, makes it very obvious to where he’s going, but either Bruce doesn’t see it… or he’s actually giving dick space. Jason also tests it, unwillingly, promising to visit on Saturday and then getting grievously injured, but the cave is too far for his state so he drags himself to one of his most secure, most secret safehouses and crashes there, only to wake up a day later to an anxious Bruce, just Bruce, not Batman, hovering around him, holding Alfred food and Jason just… has a moment of enlightenment. They share this info with the rest of the birds and… it helps. Because now they understand. And they realize they don’t have to hike halfway to Kilimanjaro for Bruce to respect and leave them alone, they can just chose a nice safe house he bought for them and live in comfort while they stew. It’s not a perfect system, but it works. And for the bats, that is perfect enough.
I think what I love the most about Reverse Robin AU TimJay is the absolute potential for hero worship with Jason toward Tim. In canon we often forget that Tim didn't really care for Jason as Robin, meanwhile as I never shut up about, Jason has been weirdly respecting and obsessed with Tim since finding out about Tim's existence. So if you flip their order, make Tim Red Hood and make Jason Red Robin, there's so much room for hero worship from Jason.
As Robin, Jason has always teetered that edge of being pro-murder or not. Whether you believe he killed Felipe or not, even in his Post-Crisis introduction as Robin, he almost kills Two Face. Those concepts of lethal justice have always been brewing inside him, just reigned in by Bruce. So if you have Robin!Jason witnessing Red Hood!Tim start killing people and quickly making noticeable change in the landscape of gangs in Gotham, Jason would take quick notice. I think Tim as Red Hood would still be lethal, but there'd be a different application than Jason's Red Hood. Heads in duffle bags isn't Tim's style, even if he kills. I think you'd see something much more akin to that time Tim almost killed Boomerang, where it's such an elaborately thought out set up, it realistically doesn't even look like Tim killed anyone. It'd take months for Bruce to connect this string of deaths as anything other than coincidental, let alone link them to Red Hood. And Jason is wickedly smart, even as Robin. Jason, putting those pieces together before Bruce does and witnessing the undeniable positive change for Gotham it's enacting? Robin!Jason would be incredibly drawn in by that, and then even more-so, a Red Robin!Jason who has to grapple with being replaced to make room for the next Robin would I think, in anger, turn to Red Hood. And Tim would push him away at first, his plans don't have room for a scorned teenager who's trying to get back at Bruce and Nightwing!Damian like this- but I think Jason would wear him down. Prove to Tim that Jason can think on his wavelength.
Slightly related, what interests me about Red Hood!Tim is how it'd implicate his closeness to Ra's. Jason is taken into the League by Talia in Lost Days and Ra's doesn't necessarily approve of Jason's presence, especially not of Talia dunking him in the Pit, but Ra's has always canonically been A Little Weird about Tim. I think in a world Tim dies as the second Robin, it would be Ra's who dunks Tim to preserve his mind that Ra's thinks shouldn't be wasted, and you have the potential for 'apprentice of Ra's' Tim wrapped up in it all, even without him experience the Red Robin arc. So when it's Jason as Red Robin, instead of him going to Ra's when he's scorned by the Batfamily, he goes to Tim. The person he once idolized, because I think Tim would've been Jason's Robin. Smart, competent, a strong legacy to live up to. And now he's back, and he's pro-killing, an edge that Jason has always teetered on and would feel even closer to when he's replaced by a young Dick. I think Tim wouldn't ever be able to get rid of Jason.
Then on Tim's side, I think his reaction to being replaced after his death would be a complicated one. Objectively, being the Robin who believes Batman needs a Robin, he'd respect the logic and know Bruce was always going to replace him eventually. But still, there's always going to be that instinctual emotional reaction of betrayal and replacement. I think he'd view Jason at first with anger and distance, but then, seeing Jason as this street kid with begrudging potential, I could see Red Hood!Tim testing Jason. Constantly throwing things at Jason, seeing how he reacts, if he lives up to being Robin. Tim has a need for analyzing people, understanding their strengths and weaknesses. And he seems the Robin mantle very uniquely, he'd need to have it proven to him that Jason can handle it.
So you would have this dynamic of Jason hero worshipping Tim, slowly believing in Tim's methodology. While Tim is at first dismissive of him, but then starts to test him, see what makes this kid tick. And I think the TimJay potential of Jason trying to prove himself to Tim could be Neat.
kon is especially fun to me because while obvs ymmv where it comes to figuring out a preferred amalgamation of his backstories, i think of him as a kryptonian with a metagene. as in, to fully depower him, you'd need both kryptonite/red sun and a metagene suppressant of some sort. he is a fucked up and op little freak of nature science.
If Jason and Damian both get to be Talia’s kids, then Tim and Cass both get to be Shiva’s kids. Like…
“Oh Jason’s trained under Talia thats why he gets to be her kid!” TIM HAS ALSO TRAINED UNDER SHIVA
Let Tim and Cass be the chaos twins they were always destined to be
I recently revived my Jason Todd hyperfixation from its torpor and realized I had… Means and Ways of reading as many comics as I want for free, so I made the transition from Fanon Only to having read Lost Days, Under the Red Hood, Teen Titans #29 (where Jason fights and beats the tar out of Tim), Hush, Red Hood and the Outlaws (the majority of both runs), Red Robin: The Grail, Batman and Robin: Streets Run Red, Green Arrow #70 - #73 (where Jason kidnaps Mia), Battle for the Cowl, and a smattering of other bits and bobs, all within the last month.
I have come to the conclusion that the idea that Jason hated Tim before slowly learning to be okay with him is completely backwards.
Jason starts respecting Tim as a fellow combatant after basically their first meeting, and was sympathizing with him even before. Fandom talks a lot about how Jason repeatedly tried to kill Tim, but I think there’s a good argument to be made that actually Jason has never tried to kill Tim, and there’s a better argument that Jason has never tried to hurt Tim out of a dislike for him.
Tim is the one who feels viciously betrayed by Jason, hates his guts, and depending on if you blend in the New 52 either learns to begrudgingly like him or just stays hatin.
Obviously I need some proof here, since this goes completely against the grain of every relationship interpretation I’ve ever seen for them, so approximately seven miles of character analysis under the cut lmao
Keep reading
Sometimes reading Arthuriana feels like reading Alice in Wonderland.
“Well,” said Alice, “these are a dreadfully strange assortment of objects!”
“They all symbolize different aspects of Our Lord’s martyrdom,” said the Fisher King, casting a line into his teacup.
“Indeed. I am sure everything symbolizes something else, for if everything was only itself I should be very confused. Might I ask what the point of the bleeding lance is?”
Alice regretted asking the question as soon as she had done so, for she saw the pun that would likely be made about the word point. Instead, however, the room erupted in applause and shouts of “The Grail! She has achieved the Grail!”
The next castle she visited, Alice resolved to herself as the inhabitants of this one danced for joy, would be more sensible.