Batman #641 SPOILERS ALERT

[Hobgoblin]

So, now that we really know that the Red Hood is indeed Jason Todd, what do we all think about it?

[rob_react]

I'm happy that I'm not reading it

[deathlok]

discussed

[mitol]

Did anyone else wonder why he's still wearing a mask? With the mask on, is it Robin or is it Jason? Unless they (DC) think that the only way we can identify a grown-up Jason Todd is if he has a mask on.

[Hobgoblin]

Did anyone else wonder why he's still wearing a mask? With the mask on, is it Robin or is it Jason? Unless they (DC) think that the only way we can identify a grown-up Jason Todd is if he has a mask on.

 

I wondered that myself.

[Hobgoblin]

discussed

 

[oneeyedtom-migration]

He is the new red hood. he's like the punisher and batman does not kill so you know there's a conflict. But i hate it. WHY BRING TODD BACK! HOW ABOUT A TOTAL NEW CHARECTER!!!!??!! the story kinda reads like the reaper story in detective drawn by mcfarlane.

[mitol]

WHY BRING TODD BACK!

 

Simple. Using Jason Todd as a villain, the writer and future writers, can write about the torment Batman endures every time he confronts Jason. With a new villain, there's just Batman's fierce determination to stop him. But with Jason, the stories will be about how Batman must stop him and yet always struggling to try to save him.

[Foolkiller]

actually, I don't think Jason is going to be sticking around into the future. I know I've read that Infinite Crisis and the reappearance of Jason Todd are going to be linked. Perhaps we'll get a plausible reason as to why they decided to bring him back.

 

I for one, don't really care either way, but somewhere, DAM60 is wailing to the moon.

[ericc123]

I just read the book and to tell the truth I don't mind Jason Todd being brought back. Was he really that big a character in the first place? I mean who cares if the second Robin is alive or not? If it makes for a good read I say more power to DC. On the other hand I grew up believing in the rule "in comics no one stays dead.....except Bucky." Now this may make me a hipocrite but if he's alive and kicking in the new Cap series I will be seriously pissed. I mean to me 60 years dead versus 20 years dead is a difference.

 

Eric

[Jayman]

On the other hand I grew up believing in the rule "in comics no one stays dead.....except Bucky."

 

Isn't Bucky alive and kicking (albeit an old man) over in the Ultimates?

[Kevin Boyd]

After skimming through Cap 7 I'm convinced that Jack Monroe (Nomad) has been programmed by some element of the government to think that he's Bucky. Jack's blackouts, his visions of Bucky, et al. are all hallucinations brought on by his conditioning and his guilt over the missions performed as the Winter Soldier.

 

Think of the Tyler Durden character in Fight Club. A manifestation of an individual with MPD that acts completely independantly of the core personality....

 

Monroe's murder? A clean break with the old personality. SHIELD and other government agencies have used LMDs (life model decoys) before. Providing a body eliminates a potential suspect. Fury's been "dead" many times over the years.

 

-----------

 

As for the return of Jason Todd, I think it's a great idea. Batman's one major failure is now a living reminder instead of a martyr figure. Jason was an annoying insubordinate Robin who needed to go - and while "killing him" was a bit extreme, it gave Batman more tragedy to deal with, which fuels his rage and his personal war on crime. With Jason back, with even more extreme methods of vigilantism, he's even more of a failure to Batman - he was taken in, shown the Batman way of doing things, suffered the consequences of restraint and now Jason's personal line in the sand is much more extreme that Bruce's. Now Bruce will fight not only to defeat the boy but also to redeem him.

 

Nightwing now has a renegade "brother" to deal with. Robin a temptation of two different paths... very intriguing.

[rob_react]

I just read the book and to tell the truth I don't mind Jason Todd being brought back. Was he really that big a character in the first place? I mean who cares if the second Robin is alive or not? If it makes for a good read I say more power to DC. On the other hand I grew up believing in the rule "in comics no one stays dead.....except Bucky." Now this may make me a hipocrite but if he's alive and kicking in the new Cap series I will be seriously pissed. I mean to me 60 years dead versus 20 years dead is a difference.

 

Eric

 

Bucky didn't die 60 years ago. As Bru pointed out, Bucky's death was one of Marvel's first retcons. There's no comic where it happened in real time.

[Foolkiller]

Eric, you're not that much younger than me... but don't you remember the immense amount of impact the Jason Todd Robin death had... the dial a death phone number? It was a significant event when it happened, and the impact of Jason's death had long standing implications. Any Robin in the Bat-mythos is an important character in my mind.

 

I don't think Bucky is alive. I agree with Kev's assessment.

 

I just read the book and to tell the truth I don't mind Jason Todd being brought back. Was he really that big a character in the first place? I mean who cares if the second Robin is alive or not? If it makes for a good read I say more power to DC. On the other hand I grew up believing in the rule "in comics no one stays dead.....except Bucky." Now this may make me a hipocrite but if he's alive and kicking in the new Cap series I will be seriously pissed. I mean to me 60 years dead versus 20 years dead is a difference.

 

Eric

[Hobgoblin]

If any of you bought Wizard this month, there is a small article about "Bucky."

 

Here's a quote from the article from writer Ed Brubaker:

 

"He's struggling to figure out who he is. You can play him as a villain, but at his heart, he could still be Bucky. For the next eight issues, he's going to be the focal point of Cap trying to find out the truth."

 

Sure, this doesn't prove that it is in fact Bucky, but that seems to be at least what they want everyone to think.

[awe4one]

Eric, you're not that much younger than me... but don't you remember the immense amount of impact the Jason Todd Robin death had... the dial a death phone number? It was a significant event when it happened, and the impact of Jason's death had long standing implications. Any Robin in the Bat-mythos is an important character in my mind.

 

Any comic death that asks for the amount of reader involvement, both practical and emotional, that Todd's demise did will be a big deal with those that remember. Readers feel cheated and shortchanged by these resurrections. And stories are damaged as character deaths are seen more as a comics cliché than the emotional event intended.

 

Why should readers care about these deaths and resurrections if comic publishers apparently don't?

 

Jim

[Kevin Boyd]

While I don't completely disagree with you, I think that ultimately depends on the characters themselves, how they died, and whether they make better characters out of the picture rather than in it.

 

Bucky remaining dead makes sense. Messing with Captain America to think he might be alive, if handled properly, can be a fun read and a good story. Actually bringing him back is just breaking breaking a taboo...

 

Jason Todd, either as dead at the hands of the Joker or as a more-extreme-than-Batman vigilante still makes him Batman's greatest failure. It changes things only slightly... in truth Jason Todd was a terrible Robin (and an annoying character) and was Batman's failure before he "died". However, his "death" changed the meaning of Batman's failure - to post-Death in the Family Batman he was a failure because he didn't save Todd from death, not because he was a lousy teacher. Having him show up in Hush was a test of the waters to see what people thought, and the idea of a villainous Jason Todd was met positively enough for them to do it for real.

[Foolkiller]

Actually, Todd pre crisis was really a Grayson clone, and definitely not as annoying as the rat [embarrasing lack of self control] they turned him into post crisis by altering his origin and totally changing his personality. Although acting like an arrogant jerk, he was actually a realistic and sympathetic teenager who acted impulsively (and with nobility) during the Death in the Family storyline.

 

I don't like them resurrecting certain characters because I honestly don't see them needing to be resurrected. Jason Todd and Bucky are those kinds of characters. Now, I agree, it can be interesting to see how the title characters react to their supposed reappearance... but I'm just not a huge fan of doing it with these two in particular. I never minded Jean Grey dying and coming back... or Green Arrow... it just sticks in my craw about these two, probably because they've been dead for so long.

[Kevin Boyd]

Brian, obviously I disagree with you over Jason Todd, probably since the character was useless during his entire career as Robin (and changing his background mid-stream vis-a-vis Crisis was one of the reasons why). His death to me is as meaningful as the gimmick that inspired it, although it did make for an interesting couple of years worth of Batman comics as Bruce's guilt got the better of him and he became more unhinged. To me Todd's no sacred cow, and I'm interested to learn the reasons how he survived and what he was up to. I think he'll make a great addition to the Batman mythos as the one that got away rather than the one that died in the line of duty. He will make an excellent addition to Batman's rogues, one of the few "sane" villains in his gallery.

 

Bucky, on the other hand, IS a sacred cow. And bringing him back does smack of Marvel's current attitude - the same why not attitude that led Gwen Stacy to Norman Osborn's bed. What is fun is this whole "is he or isn't he Bucky" debate.

 

Phoenix on the other hand was a sacred cow, but it makes some sense since the myth of the Phoenix revolves around death and rebirth. Gwen Stacy is a sacred cow. Elektra is the biggest heffer of them all because Elektra was a character that was created to die.

[Foolkiller]

well I agree that Jason Todd isn't a sacred cow (to use your terminology)... but... nobody should be in a league with Bucky. Marvel today seems to like to make the past just totally irrelevant, and there's really no rhyme or reason to the decision making process.

 

But... I'm not so sure Jason Todd is sane... especially if a Lazarus pit was used to resurrect him... and where the hell has he been all these years, because he's clearly aged.