i feel like tim’s pride special was always going to be disappointing given the fact that the new story was only going to be like 8 pages long after waiting 6 months for it, but it’s still sad to see so many people wishing we could see more of tim and bernard and have their relationship developed IN TIM’S OWN PRIDE SPECIAL. honestly ul #6 should have been the end of us getting this story in bite sized scraps which barely have enough page space to set up a generic one-shot comic plot, let alone give the characters time to have the conversations fans are desperate to see them have in a way that feels genuinely satisfying. it’s disheartening to see the demand for tim’s journey be largely ignored while there are plenty of other bat ongoings that frankly have no momentum or story that is begging to be told the way this one is.
and this hurts other characters too. steph basically has to jump straight to accepting and being totally cool and excited about tim’s new boyfriend, because there’s no time to show her processing the break up, and if she was just shown even being mildly bothered by tim’s new relationship she’d be ripped to shreds for it. i don’t know, it just sucks because it seems like something that fitzmartin might like to explore in depth, but she isn’t being given a fair chance to.
i know at least some of this will be further explored in dark crisis young justice, and i’m really excited for that, but it’s just frustrating that after an entire year tim still doesn’t have his own space to tell his story. i don’t expect bernard to appear in a young justice book, so once again we’ll be stuck with tim saying how happy he is, while we miss out on huge chunks of their relationship which are really crucial for us to actually see. their story in the pride anthology was so touching and beautifully done, but i hate that after a full year it feels like we’re still at square one in getting to know them. even worse, i’m afraid that whether or not we get a solid home for them in the future is entirely dependent on how well a severely under promoted one-shot reprint sells.