Something I think is missed too is when comes to the discussion about Jason wanting the Joker dead, and the reasons why he wants the Joker dead.
It is canon that Jason was essentially erased. For identity reasons Bruce changed him out of his Robin uniformed and cleared up the crime scene. The Joker can never be prosecuted through the courts for the death of Jason Todd because as far as the world knows, he had nothing to do with it.
The other big thing is that his tenure as Robin is essentially erased as well. As far as the world is concerned, Robin went from Dick to Tim, there was no one in the middle. There was no second Robin. Everything good Jason did in the suit is attributed to Tim or Dick. The Teen Titan’s he was meant to join at 16 went to Tim, the recognition went to Tim.
Jason Todd becomes a foot note. A cautionary tale to the few that remember he existed. He is their doomed from the beginning story. That’s all he is. He isn’t remembered. Not as Jason Todd anyway, and in the few ways his tenure as Robin is remembered, they aren’t about him.
Nothing about Jason’s memory is about him.
Jason is angry at inaction. He is angry not that the world didn’t stop because he died, but because everyone acts as though he was never there before. He was buried in a public cemetery next to the woman that got him killed, while Bruce had his stuff packed away and photos hidden. The only thing in the manor that memorialises him is that stupid case, and that’s not even for him. It’s a manifestation of Bruce and Alfred’s guilt.
Jason didn’t expect them to fall apart because of his death, he never wanted that. He wanted to be remembered. He wanted to matter and everything that Bruce and Alfred did after Jason died was the opposite.
There was four people at his funeral. Bruce, Alfred, the funeral director and commissioner Gordon. Four people.
What about Eddie Bloomberg? What about Rena? What about Dick Grayson, his brother, who Bruce never called and never tried to even contact? What about Danny Chase, who he was friends with during his brief run on the titans? What about Jericho, who he was also shown as friendly with? What about any of the adult heroes who had known Jason?
Jason’s anger has never been solely because the Joker is alive. It’s because he died, knowing he was going to die and with the belief that it might serve in causing things to change for the better. But it hasn’t. It didn’t change anything. His death became a footnote in the story of Batman, a little line here and there and nothing more.
When Jason comes back to life the Joker is walking in and out of Arkham like it’s his holiday home. He quite literally still mostly has free run and the cycle of bullshit from before just keeps continuing. People keep dying. He wanted change, and that isn’t wrong.
I’m not endorsing the way he went about everything, but I think it’s pretty fucking understandable why he did. Bruce never offered another solution beyond letting the Joker walk in and out of Arkham’s revolving door as he pleases. Bruce didn’t upgrade Arkham’s security, he didn’t get him into a higher level prison, he didn’t use the phantom zone which he could’ve just asked Clark about. There is no reason that Bruce couldn’t have come up with another way to have Joker secured that wouldn’t have ended with Joker dead.
But he doesn’t give Jason any other viable option. Going back to Arkham doesn’t solve anything and Jason knows that. Jason sees Joker dying as the only viable solution to keeping victims safe. To keeping himself safe.
He wanted Bruce to allow him to kill the Joker. Bruce didn’t have to be the one to pull the trigger, Jason would’ve. What he wanted was for Bruce to prove what he’d said all that time ago, to prove that for once Jason could matter more than the mission.
(He never had. Not when he was Robin. Not when it was Gloria Stanson. Not when Bruce thought he was suicidal and he’d run away and Alfred’s freaking out Bruce still went after the Joker. He still chose the mission. He did it with Dick, he did it with Jason, he did it with Tim and he’s even now doing it with Damian. It’s a cycle, one not specific to Jason at all)
(I know Joker had a nuclear weapon, but Nruce was already talking to the Justice League about the Joker. The JL were helping and there is no reason he couldn’t have asked one of them to locate Jason, or asked that they takeover and handle Joker while he tracks down Jason. Because he never went to Lebanon to find Jason, he went to find Joker and happened to run into Jason while there. He even tells Jason this to his face)
Bruce had, not long before Jason died, talked to him about Felipe and Jose Garzonas. I’m pretty sure anyone who’s looked into Jason as a character knows about The Diplomat’s Son. It’s extremely relevant to DITF and what leads to Jason leaving the manor. In it, after Felipe falls to his death (it’s left ambiguous but I subscribe most to the idea that while Jason didn’t push him, he didn’t try to save him either, but that’s a matter of personal opinion) Jose goes mad with grief. He is hysterical (not whatever Bruce was in DITF) and goes after Batman and Robin to avenge his son’s death.
Jose Garzonas proceeds to die because Bruce knocks a stack of cars onto him, that Bruce then proceeds to turn around and blame entirely on Jason. But I think what matters most here for Jason’s future actions, is what Bruce proceeds to say before the comic ends.
Bruce says that Jose Garzonas actions in trying to kill them to avenge his son are only what could be expected of a father losing his son. That any parent who lost a kid would want revenge on the reason that child was gone. I don’t have the direct quote but that’s essentially the gist of it. Bruce set the expectation for a parent avenging their child, he tells Jason that’s what he should expect.
Except, Bruce didn’t do that.
(Yes I hear your arguments about Clark stopping him and I raise you my recent post about Clark’s involvement in DITF)
I just, there’s so much nuance to Jason beyond just wanting the Joker dead. It’s not just about that, it never has been.
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