If the cowl fits......

Everyone likes Batman, yes everyone. He's probably most peoples favorite, because he is basically designed to be a bad-ass loner. I'm reminded of a line in Reservoir Dogs where Mr. Pink complains about his name and wants to choose his own,

"No way, no way. Tried it once, doesn't work. You got four guys all fighting over who's gonna be Mr. Black, but they don't know each other, so nobody wants to back down. No way. I pick. You're Mr. Pink. Be thankful you're not Mr. Yellow."

So who was the best pick for stepping in and taking the cowl once Bruce was "dead"? The one they picked, Dick Grayson. Now I must admit I am personally biased. I like Nightwing, maybe on the same level as Batman. His story has so much more to delve through than I found in the others. I just wish that they would have kept Bruce "dead" longer and really give this a good run, I'm talking close to 10 years.

You had all the elements right there. Dick was the prodigal son, he's the only Robin who ever walked away from under the Bat's cape. You had the perfect arch enemy with Jason Todd. The Joker was Batman's, and he started as the Red Hood. Now you have resurrected Jason Todd running around as the new Red Hood. Trained by the same man, each knows about the other. I could totally see from Todd's perspective;

"This usurper doesn't deserve the cowl. He left Bruce, he forgot that its about the mission, it doesn't matter how much you hurt or lose, its about getting the job done. I gave it all for Bruce, he knew that. If Bruce were alive now he would agree with me, you can't keep using a light touch with criminals. They only come back again. I'm doing more lasting good than he is temporarily."

This kind of mindset I could buy, you've got Todd who possibly has an inferiority complex to Grayson, but also feels that his way of doing things is the best. Maybe even blames Dick for not being there for Bruce, and that if they used his methods Bruce may have survived. So now you can plumb that relationship while hiding the actual Joker ( he does not belong anywhere but with the real Batman, and the funny thing is he probably knows that too ).

It really felt right when my buddies caught me up and told me that Batman had been "killed" and Grayson was now the new Bat. Thematically he is trained by the Bat, finally forges ahead out from under his master's cape. Makes his own mark on the world, and then returns to take up the mantle of his fallen hero. It is a character progression that really only resonates with me once. If they "kill off" Bruce again or have him retire with Grayson assuming the cape and cowl it doesn't have the same punch to it anymore. There must have been a whole lot more steam left in the stories of Grayson and Damien that I would have loved to see.

You have Bruce's adopted prodigal son, caring for and trying to train his biological one. In my opinion this should have had a longer run than it was given. Rather than a lame "time dilation chrono bullet" or whatever they went with that brought Bruce back. Kill him off. Have his body claimed by the League of Shadows, throw it in the Lazarus pit, whammo, now after about 10 years of Dick as Batman, you can bring back Bruce, and remove some of that "Shouldn't Batman be like 60 or something by now" all in one fell swoop. But I am just one consumer of the material, I know that people get upset when the board is shuffled. A friend got really mad when they removed Wally West as the Flash because to him Wally was synonymous with the Flash, and he accepted the irony that Barry Allen was the Flash before Wally. I guess I just hate the soap opera feeling I get when after several story arcs, almost everything must return to its starting point.