Nightwing 17 preview

> blastr.com/2017-3-13/nightwing-issue-17-tim-seeley-exclusive-preview

>Someone wants Nightwing dead, but they want to make him hurt before it happens. Instead of just trying to bump him off, a new villain is going to great lengths to show how well they know Dick Grayson's past. And in Nightwing #17, hitting stands this Wednesday, Dick is hitting the road -- and jumping the pond from Bludhaven to France -- with Damian Wayne in tow.

According to the official word, Nightwing’s quest pits him against his own great, great grandfather: the Talon known as William Cobb! But wait, there's more! Writer Tim Seeley joined me to answer a couple of quick questions about the issue -- and to tease the character Deathwing.

Check that out, as well as a Syfy Wire exclusive preview below of Nightwing #17, published by DC Comics and written by Seeley with art and cover by Javier Fernandez and variant cover by Oclair Albert and Ivan Reis. The issue will be available on March 15.

Set up the action in this issue, and why it's one to pick up?

Tim Seeley: As we found out last issue, Nightwing's girlfriend Shawn has been kidnapped, and whomever did it knew him well enough to lead him to a site associated with his favorite book series, Robin Hood. This issue introduces a couple of important and pretty crazy elements to this series, as we get to know who (and what) Deathwing, Dick's evil clone, is.

What is your favorite panel/page/line in this issue?

Seeley: Page 13. Everyone will know why when they read it.

Tease how this might set up the next issue.

Seeley: This issue directly leads us to a big-time Dick-as-Batman villain next issue!

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Variant

Also I'm glad people are calling out Bruce's shit parenting

>Seeley: Page 13. Everyone will know why when they read it.

someone getting BTFO by Damian hopefully

I'm hoping for Damian admitting to missing Dick, but that would do too.

Damian is going to success in the almost impossible: triggering Dick rage by mere petulant words.

Do people like Damian? I think I've only read one thing with him in it, but that and everything I see on here makes him come across as the most annoying fucking character.

Yeah, he's especially good when he has Dick as his foil

poor Damian :(

Morrison's Batman and Robin
Tomasi's Batman and Robin
his solo series

those make him a lot more likeable

The thing about Damian is that outwardly he is meant to come across as this macho entitled shit stain, while his stories set about humbling and peeling back his facade.

In a nutshell, he wants to be just like his dad and wants Bats to be proud of him. The now underplayed aspect of this is that he feels more comfortable as his own person when with Dick.

Its a bad time for Dick to be handling Damian's assholishness. he's being extra annoying in this.

He's fun to read, and he's sometimes the right voice in the story to put nasty things and trues on the table.

>while his stories set about humbling and peeling back his facade
This why I find him pointless because the writers don't know what to with him besides resetting his development over and over again.

Also, the dynamic between Damian and Dick here are not doing any of them any favors.

Dick, and I must add Jon, too, after reading supes and super sons.

He's great with proper foil. Not so much alone and badly paired.

He works better when he has someone more lighthearted to play off of like Dick, Jon, or Stephanie.

Maps from Gotham Academy as well

Wow, Damian seems like a bigger jerk than usual in this.

this

>Also, the dynamic between Damian and Dick here are not doing any of them any favors
I actually agree.

Damian is acting worse here than he did in his other appearances so far.

Well, they're parting from a bad ground: Dick is nervous as hell because he0s in a new relationship, in a new city, and may end up having to parent his own child, if he can save her, that's it. That's a lot of pressure.

Damian, too, is accommodating himself as a team member of a team of teenagers, in which he's the youngest, and he's way more fucked up than any of them, and he has father issues, and he wants to be recognized and loved. And has a prince complex because, well, he is. Lot of pressure there,. too.

Which is the point in this arc, I guess. I'm assuming they will end up in a better place when the story ends.

So even if the writers are returning to Damian having this kind of issues, if all of then write about it, it's just a matter of time that every writer understands that he's finally grew up from that place into a more mature teen or young adult.

Remember: Wally wasn't always the charming guy that he was as Flash.

Pretty sure it's going to lead to an admission of loneliness. He made up an excuse to team up with Dick in the first place and earlier in the book (at least I think it was this book) when he had the bomb in his head he was more chill.

What said its right. They are both going through a lot. I doubt Damian was expecting Dick to have so much drama going on, because he can usually make time for Damian. But this combined with Bruce being a poor Dad has put them on edge. But its fine. All relationships go through problems.

> Damian wants to spend time with his brother, but drama bombs get in the way so he acts like a jerk.

Sounds about right

First arc of this series I think.

He's a tsundere by the book, user. Sup Forums knows well.

Bomb was taken out in the Rebirth one-shot.

>So even if the writers are returning to Damian having this kind of issues, if all of then write about it, it's just a matter of time that every writer understands that he's finally grew up from that place into a more mature teen or young adult
Dude, Damian has been around for more than 10 years. When they will realize that?

And Dick situation is while understandable, he shouldn't have lost his composure like that and Damian shouldn't still be insecure about his position. Him and Dick should already be over it and there's literally no point for this drama.

Damian is a bigger dick now because he's a teenager.
He was 10 when running around as Robin with Dick. His temper has been multiplied 10 fold.

I thought this was just Damian acting out because his favourite big brother might be leaving him. Damian's still just a kid, and sometimes kids act out in shitty ways to hide that they're hurting inside. Dick left for a new city, got a new life, has a new woman and might be having a kid, and Damian is probably feeling hurt that all this stuff is happening without him; so he's acting out in a terrible way.

The whole "I'll be batman and you won't" is just a shitty attempt to get Dick to contradict him. If Dick says he will take over as Batman when Bruce retires (or is killed), it is confirmation that Dick will be staying around and comforting. If Dick says he's leaving, then in Damian's mind it is confirmation that Dick is throwing away their relationship.

10 years are not much, comic wise, to be honest.
At this point you could say he has a consistent characterization only because he's been regularly published. If he were a less prominent character, he would be still struggling to have a consistent personality between different writers.

Like Jason until recently.
Or Tim.
But I must admit I don't know much about Tim.

Jason has been changing recently, in a good way in my personal opinion. Less out and out edge and more black sheep

Tim please.

This, Damian is seriously occ in this book and Seeley could have just come up with another reason about why Damian is in the city.

Also, if he was just missing Dick, then why he keep bringing the "Batman mantle is mine!" to him?

I agree, he has been soften down, but in a way that felt natural, organic. In the core of it, his personality hasn't been much different in the, what, last 5 years? Just more soft and les edgy. I think that may be because he's been written by the same writer for a long time, and other writers happened to care about consistency.

It may be also for a more comical effect. He's bratty, which isn't wrong: just being exagerated.

Jason has been changing since N52 started, it's not a recent thing and he has being alive as long as Damian's existence in the main DCU.

Because you've never sought and made an issue of something when in reality it's a completely separate issue that's bothering you? Damian is a teenager, an already edgy teenager at that. His way of navigating feeling is projecting and dismantling.

In the preview above you even have Damian talking about Dick rescuing him as Batman.

I'm a big fan of the direction they've taken Jason, he comes across as his own rather than simply edgy dick (though the comparison is still there and I think fitting- especially through the lens of a younger sibling trying to live up to and rebelling against the older golden child)

I agree with you two. I don't like the way seeley is writing damian and he is making him more annoying than he usually is.

Jon is the only character who currently is bringing the best in damian which unfortunate because the dick/damian interaction used to be good.

Damian's also afraid of change, so by challenging Dick, he's trying to get Dick to admit that things are still the same

This arc is going to end with Damian meeting Shawn and being on his best behavior, and Shawn telling Dick what a sweetheart Damian is

and Damian embraces his role as cool uncle

then they find out she's not actually pregnant or Dick isn't the dad or whatever

God I hope so, make Dick the dad Bruce never was :^)

Because we definitely want Dick to be a father, right?
Do we?

I really hope they don't fridge Shawn for this. You would think because of [current year], but it is seriously fucking awful writing when they do that

This is the only biological kid Dick should have

Anything else is just boring

Why is Dick always so whiny when he's being Nightwing.

I don't think I mind the idea besides the fact that it has happened so soon. And by fast I don't mean the pacing of the relationship but more that we didn't get to play around in that status quo of them just being together at all. Didn't mind the issue with the relationship fast forward.

But I don't see it actually happening even if it would work. And this page along with the one last issue where Dick was thinking about it himself and mentioned previous scares makes me think it's mainly just to play around with the idea for characterization.

Is that tim?

Kingdom Come Dick. He was Red Robin first.

Yes, we do!

why? why not nightwing

I'm not Mark Waid famalam

>Kingdom Come. Art by Alex Ross

because alex ross

literally only here and the TT comics do people point out he's a shit parent.

He wants to be Nightwing now?

No

Do people not seriously see that Damian is acting out because of change? It's pretty obvious why he's being a jerk.

Why won't Dick just throw him out

The paper people must not act outside of their explained roles and expected parameters.

Being stressed out isn't reason to abandon a child who wanted to see him.

People want Dick to be super patient too, but forget that he has a temper. He always did.

What change? He and Dick hardly interacted in n52 and haven't worked together for so long so why Dick moving to another city is affected him? And if you are talking about him being part of TT, it's something he decided out of his own free will and he himself chosen the members so why he suddenly can't handle it in NW when he is ok in TT? Or do you mean being away from Batman? Which again, it isn't something new because he hardly interacted with him since DCyou.

Ha, looks like the n52 cover

Dick being absent without a mission being the reason and also Bruce basically replacing him with Duke at the same time IS a change.

And it hasn't been that long in-universe especially when you factor in the time they were taking turns being dead or presumed dead.

Ha, I missed that!

>that's_the_point.jpg

>Maximum crotch focus achieved

The timeline is a mess, but it apparently years passed since Damian is 13 now.

And he again, he hadn't worked with Batman or Dick for such a long time or even talked with them much so why it suddenly bother him now?

And no matter how hard you try make up excuses for it, you can't deny that Seeley could have simply avoid the cheap drama and just had Damian show up because he feels like it.

No nipple piercing, no buying

> Such a long time

Wut.Batman and Robin eternl wasn't that long ago. Theres also the Bane stuff in the main book that I believe happened before this.

>and just had Damian show up because he feels like it

That is basically it though. But he's insecure so he came up with the Batman legacy excuse to have something to argue about.

Damian literally only appeared in the end and didn't work with Dick or Batman in it.

So he decided to keep bring it up despite noticing that Dick is obviously upest and even annoyed him farther because he "miss" him.

Damian is acting more childish now than he did when he was 10 where was actually smarter and more mature than that.

Read the preview again. He brings it up this time after being reminded of how things used to be. It's clearly meant to signal to us that nostalgia is what's getting him a little unsettled.

And it's not directly after the last scene. They've been driving for hours and they're both antsy.

> Damian ruining another book

dammit

Why did Seeley choose to use so much inner narration when this series changed from Grayson to Nightwing? It's way more generic and exposition heavy now, Grayson read a lot better.

This scene never happened in "Batman and Robin Must Die." Bruce punched the Joker in the graveyard after he buried Dr. Hurt.

Because a bunch of Dickfags threw a fit every single issue of Grayson because they never understood anything

Adding narration didn't help their bitching because they just look for things to whine about and will continue to until he's off the book

He needs nipple rings.

Cause people are dumb and need it to know how x character feels.

He's a fucking kid, at his age it's hard to get over shit really easily and Damian is anything but mature.

He has daddy issues that aren't resolved, he likes Dick who essentially acts more like a dad than Bruce but he's NOT his dad, then he feels like people view Dick as Bruce's true heir and he feels threatened by it.

B-but user if muh characters aren't perfect flawless and likable all the time then it's bad!

What the fuck is up with Damian's receding hairline/five-head? God that little fuck has a big ass head.

> receding hairline/five-head? God that little fuck >has a big ass head.
> also short

He's not going to grow up attractive is he?

The artist is bad with faces and heads