Too bad it didn’t last…
Remember when Jason Todd was a good kid? Y’know, an adolescent who sometimes chafed under Batman’s authority but who was overall a well-adjusted teenager for someone whose parents were eaten by crocodiles?
That didn’t last long. Jason the First initially appeared in a cameo at the end of 1982 and lasted until February 1987, when he was given a total douchebag makeover after Crisis. Because by this time, everything had to be ANGSTY. But nobody liked Jason II so fandom killed him off in an infamous DC Comics telephone poll in 1988.
I, for one, voted for him to live. Not because I liked the new, not-improved Jason, but because I just couldn’t buy the idea of murdering Robin. A bridge too far and all that. It just felt wrong.
Jason suits up in Detective Comics #526, by Gerry Conway, Don Newton and Alfredo Alcala. Loved that outfit! Shoulda kept it!
Well, this week DC is publishing the first issue in a four-part What If?-style miniseries — From the DC Vault — Death in the Family: Robin Lives!, by J.M. DeMatteis and Rick Leonardi — that tells the story of what would have happened if Jason survived the Joker’s heinous assault.
Now, I have no illusions that this will be an all’s-well-that-ends-well story, but I’m really intrigued by the possibilities. And I can’t help but think back to that brief period when Jason was actually likable.
So dig these 13 COVERS saluting Jason Todd I. Long live the second Robin!
Gene Colan pencils, Dick Giordano inks, Ed Hannigan layout
Colan and Giordano
Colan and Giordano
Rick Hoberg pencils, Dick Giordano inks
Hannigan and Giordano
Alan Davis pencils, Paul Neary inks
Pat Broderick
Ed Hannigan pencils, Klaus Janson inks
Hannigan and Giordano
Davis and Neary
Hannigan and Janson
Paris Cullins pencils, Giordano inks
Hannigan and Giordano
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MORE
— DEATH IN THE FAMILY: DC to Continue Story of WHAT IF JASON TODD LIVED? Click here.
— REVEALED! New Details of the BATMAN #428: ROBIN LIVES! ‘Faux-simile’ Edition. Click here.
July 9, 2024
Call me old-fashioned, but despite the myriad Bat-rotations of sidekicks, Richard Grayson shall always be the Robin for me–esp. by the time we get to the New Teen Titans Wolfman / Perez era, where–as a reversal of the Denny O’Neil-the-sidekick-is-2nd-rate-to-show-Batman’s-brilliance schtick–the Teen-on-the-edge-Adulthood Wonder shows himself as an incredibly capable as a team leader (making him superior to his mentor) as reinforced by this non-superpowered hero’s top-flight physical athleticism and genius level mental acuity.
I love Nightwing and his popularity is well deserved (as is his maturation beyond a sidekick) , but I miss him in that beautifully classic combo of red, yellow and green esp. very competently leading the Titans.
July 9, 2024
The Barr-Davis run on Detective Comics in 1986-87 was great and remains, for me, the best version of any Robin to date in my opinion.
July 9, 2024
I know I am not alone, but had DC editorial been able to fight off the marketing department and kept Jason in his Don Newton-designed new costume (with maybe a few tweaks and YES, the strawberry blonde hair), I think Jason could have been just as accepted as Tim Drake, eventually.
July 11, 2024
What a pity that pre-Crisis Jason Todd didn’t stick around long. I think I’ll definitely read every “Batman” story featuring that version of Jason.
July 11, 2024
I would love to somehow see Pre-Crisis Jason somehow make his way into the main DC universe (hypertime, anyone?!) and somehow go after post-crisis JT. The utter erasure of this nice guy character still chafes me. Ah well.