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I’m writing a rather… epic? (30,000 words and counting)… Dick/Babs story with amnesia as the plot element du jour. I think I’ve told you guys about that before. My beta’s telling me that Barbara comes off like a sulky child, which serves me right for trying to make this consistent with canon. Dick/Babs is one of those couples that have had so much shit heaped on them that it takes a long time to clean it off in a way that seems organic, at least if you’re me and don’t want to betray the integrity of the story. Because there’s a lot of drama to mine in Dick basically forgetting all the bad shit that’s happened to him and in Barbara trying to protect him from what amounts to his own life. Also, there’s a supervillain plot, because at a certain point you just need a break from the will-they-or-won’t-they? Trust me, you’ll thank me (if you read it, please please please…).
Because the reason Barbara doesn’t just hop into bed with people isn’t cause of the wheelchair… although she could probably rig up a ramp or something and oh God that’s gonna get me in hot water. I hope someone laughed.
And the bad part is that Dick/Babs canon is apparently what the Big Two would like for most comic book romances. Two people like each other, but a series of contrived events prevent them from ever celebrating their love in any meaningful way (no, I don't care how many naughty-bits-concealing sex scenes you throw them into, that's just cheap eroticism. Still, do more of it). Thus the dude gets to keep being a “swinging bachelor” (and don’t tell me that’s not what the Nightwing book was going for, when the issue after he proposed marriage to Barbara he went and screwed some nameless bimbo. Get thee to an editor, Bruce Jones) and the woman doesn’t get her cooties on him. Comic book publishers are really fond of certain kinds of change, the death part. They’re practically in love with that, because it presents the illusion of growth and then you can throw the costume on someone else and it's All Better. But the idea of characters developing on their own is anathema to them. They want characters to fit into the same, tired, stale dynamic for-literally-ever. Because of the kids, you see, though I doubt these writers ever were kids from the way they write, trying to suck all the awesomeness and grandeur out of the stories they've inherited. I mean, there are people who still think Lois Lane should be trying to trick Superman into marrying her! Look at Smallville’s Lana-go-round. Look at Lois & Clark, after it started to suck. At a certain point, same old same old gets… old.
I swear to God, if Fifth World reinvents Barda and Scott as one of those fourth-season John/Aeryn couples who can’t get together because the editor says so, I may have to not pet my dog. Do you want to be responsible for that, DC? That dog loves being petted, I’ll have you know!
See, this is why I like Babs/Dinah. That was organic. So organic the writer didn’t even intend it. Dinah falling in love with a voice on the radio and Barbara coming to reciprocate it just plays right into their characters. It basically cures their issues, which is what a good relationship should do. Dick/Babs is organic to a much lesser extent because at a certain point Chuck Dixon said “these two characters love each other, partly because he used to be Robin and she used to be Batgirl.” But at least he laid the groundwork. Nowadays you’ve got a lot of editorial fiat behind the epic love (gag me) of Dick/Babs, because they have Always Loved Each Other. I’ll pick up on that in my review of Nightwing Annual 2, but basically it does a disservice to both characters and to poor Starfire. And even then, there’s no snogging. We get the worst of both worlds. At this point, DC might as well marry them, because the fans won’t accept anything less and at a certain point Dick leaving a trail of ex-girlfriends behind him starts to look… well, fandom is way ahead of DC on that point.
I was going somewhere with this, I swear.
I’m not even disagreeing on the dissolution of the Dick/Babs marriage, because they hadn’t even been dating when he proposed and the only reason DC went through with it is because they were gonna kill Dick off anyway. Like, what kind of cheap irony is that? What next, Tim gets shot dead one week before he was set to retire and travel the world in his yacht, the U.S.S. Live Forever, with a resurrected Sue Dibny as first mate and Stephanie Brown as sexy cabin girl? Come up with something more inventive. Like Dick and Kory get teleported to a jungle world for a year and when they come back they’re both married and fetchingly attired in leopard-skin loincloths. And Barbara never got a chance to give him her answer! And Dick still wonders what her answer might’ve been! And Kory kinda preferred things on the jungle world, because life was simple there and no one hurt anyone else! You don’t have to be TNT to know that’s drama!
Last word: characters can change in ways that don’t involve deathey deathey DEATH and those ways can also involve committed relationships. Reading this is more satisfying than repeating the same thing over and over and over again. Let’s be honest, if I gave you a choice between a series that will not change appreciably over the course of ten years and one that will be totally different, which would you choose?
Just for the sake of argument, we’ll say that this change doesn’t involve several members of the supporting cast dying for the sake of sales, the hero’s girlfriend being tortured to death by a bad guy, and/or the entire universe being reset back to the status quo of the author’s childhood.
I think that’s as good an evidence as any that there’s a difference between change and growth. Superman Blue? Change. Peter marrying MJ? Growth. See the diff?
Because the reason Barbara doesn’t just hop into bed with people isn’t cause of the wheelchair… although she could probably rig up a ramp or something and oh God that’s gonna get me in hot water. I hope someone laughed.
And the bad part is that Dick/Babs canon is apparently what the Big Two would like for most comic book romances. Two people like each other, but a series of contrived events prevent them from ever celebrating their love in any meaningful way (no, I don't care how many naughty-bits-concealing sex scenes you throw them into, that's just cheap eroticism. Still, do more of it). Thus the dude gets to keep being a “swinging bachelor” (and don’t tell me that’s not what the Nightwing book was going for, when the issue after he proposed marriage to Barbara he went and screwed some nameless bimbo. Get thee to an editor, Bruce Jones) and the woman doesn’t get her cooties on him. Comic book publishers are really fond of certain kinds of change, the death part. They’re practically in love with that, because it presents the illusion of growth and then you can throw the costume on someone else and it's All Better. But the idea of characters developing on their own is anathema to them. They want characters to fit into the same, tired, stale dynamic for-literally-ever. Because of the kids, you see, though I doubt these writers ever were kids from the way they write, trying to suck all the awesomeness and grandeur out of the stories they've inherited. I mean, there are people who still think Lois Lane should be trying to trick Superman into marrying her! Look at Smallville’s Lana-go-round. Look at Lois & Clark, after it started to suck. At a certain point, same old same old gets… old.
I swear to God, if Fifth World reinvents Barda and Scott as one of those fourth-season John/Aeryn couples who can’t get together because the editor says so, I may have to not pet my dog. Do you want to be responsible for that, DC? That dog loves being petted, I’ll have you know!
See, this is why I like Babs/Dinah. That was organic. So organic the writer didn’t even intend it. Dinah falling in love with a voice on the radio and Barbara coming to reciprocate it just plays right into their characters. It basically cures their issues, which is what a good relationship should do. Dick/Babs is organic to a much lesser extent because at a certain point Chuck Dixon said “these two characters love each other, partly because he used to be Robin and she used to be Batgirl.” But at least he laid the groundwork. Nowadays you’ve got a lot of editorial fiat behind the epic love (gag me) of Dick/Babs, because they have Always Loved Each Other. I’ll pick up on that in my review of Nightwing Annual 2, but basically it does a disservice to both characters and to poor Starfire. And even then, there’s no snogging. We get the worst of both worlds. At this point, DC might as well marry them, because the fans won’t accept anything less and at a certain point Dick leaving a trail of ex-girlfriends behind him starts to look… well, fandom is way ahead of DC on that point.
I was going somewhere with this, I swear.
I’m not even disagreeing on the dissolution of the Dick/Babs marriage, because they hadn’t even been dating when he proposed and the only reason DC went through with it is because they were gonna kill Dick off anyway. Like, what kind of cheap irony is that? What next, Tim gets shot dead one week before he was set to retire and travel the world in his yacht, the U.S.S. Live Forever, with a resurrected Sue Dibny as first mate and Stephanie Brown as sexy cabin girl? Come up with something more inventive. Like Dick and Kory get teleported to a jungle world for a year and when they come back they’re both married and fetchingly attired in leopard-skin loincloths. And Barbara never got a chance to give him her answer! And Dick still wonders what her answer might’ve been! And Kory kinda preferred things on the jungle world, because life was simple there and no one hurt anyone else! You don’t have to be TNT to know that’s drama!
Last word: characters can change in ways that don’t involve deathey deathey DEATH and those ways can also involve committed relationships. Reading this is more satisfying than repeating the same thing over and over and over again. Let’s be honest, if I gave you a choice between a series that will not change appreciably over the course of ten years and one that will be totally different, which would you choose?
Just for the sake of argument, we’ll say that this change doesn’t involve several members of the supporting cast dying for the sake of sales, the hero’s girlfriend being tortured to death by a bad guy, and/or the entire universe being reset back to the status quo of the author’s childhood.
I think that’s as good an evidence as any that there’s a difference between change and growth. Superman Blue? Change. Peter marrying MJ? Growth. See the diff?
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