#steph meta

[ladyloveandjustice]

I see fans of the white guy Robins arguing about how the single Absolute Batman design document and comic page has somehow slighted their fav, but all I can do is sit here in mild awe thinking of what it means for Stephanie Brown to appear in Absolute Batman, the comic that's attracted the most new comic readers I've ever seen, the comic I saw a bunch of teenage girls just causally gushing about to their parents at the local indie bookstore. Stephanie Brown is in this comic, presented as a Robin of equal importance to the other Robins. She's piloting a fucking mech. How far she's come from "she wasn't really Robin", from being literally erased from continuity, from Didio deeming her a "toxic" character and barring creators from using her even when they asked, from never getting to be in any adaptation while every single other Robin gets to...

Stephanie Brown is in Absolute Batman. And unless they somehow fuck her up so completely she's unrecognizeable, that's such an undeniable win for a character that's been so buried, so mistreated, given so little for so long. I've loved this character for over fifteen years and I remember where she was when I started loving her. I can't not be kind of wowed. So many new people are going to learn her name.

[spite-and-waffles]

I'm going to start taking it personally when people say the girls are less of a disasterfire than the boys. No the fuck they aren't. They're completely dysfunctional, self-destructive, arrogant little goblins who've never met (1)healthy coping mechanism. They're Bats for Christ's sake. What comics have you even been reading.

[ladyloveandjustice]

People will act like Dick is the most tactile of the Batfam, but it's 100% Steph. She is always hugging people and putting her arm around her loved ones. Way more than Dick does. If anyone's likely to be touch starved, it's her.

She'll hallucinate/imagine Cass putting her arm around her! This is her ideal supportive Cass, and it implies she'd like Cass to be more physically affectionate.

Batgirl (2000) #26

And later puts her arm around her very casually. Notable she's actually cheek to cheek with her too. (lmao God this panel is so suggestive every time I reference it I'm like wow)

Batgirl #38

You see a lot of how physically affectionate she is with Tim in particular. She'll throw herself at Tim the moment she sees him sometines.

Robin 80 page Giant

Tim is usually contrasted as more reserved in that area and sometimes oblivious when she's asking him to make out or whatever.

Robin #100

Though there are times he'll approach her, she's usually the one who requests hugs and things like that.

Robin #56

The Brave and Bold time traveling Robin story got this exactly right, with Steph being the one who hugged Bruce out of all the Robins (though I think with Bruce specifically, if you were raised by him and know how distant he can be about that stuff that might affect not wanting to give physical affection that will likely be rejected or made awkward.)

The All New Batman: The Brave and the Bold #13

And though she's not super physically affectionate with her Mom in the early days, showing how strained their relationship was, once it improves she's very affectionate.

Gotham Gazette: Batman Dead #1

Batgirl (2009) #15

Batgirl (2009) #24

So yeah, I get that the exaggeration of Dick's touchy feeliness is because men aren't often show to be super physically affectionate in media, but it would be nice to talk about/depict this aspect of Steph more too. I can see her struggling surrounded by people who are more awkward about physical affection, and we can see a number of times when she reaches out and doesn't get a hug back.

It's kind of sad to think about how she likely grew up not having her needs fulfilled in her family, with her issues with her Mom and her Dad obviously being the opposite of affectionate. Touch-starved Steph is far more likely to be a real thing.

[ladyloveandjustice]

Looking through green arrow #5 for the wiki, and I know this comment is here because Kevin Smith either forgot or didn't know of the absurd state of things of Bruce not telling Steph who he really was despite her being one of the gang and knowing Tim's real name etc....

but it's so funny to imagine that one of the only things Steph knew about who Batman really was during this time was that his Dad was a doctor, because he forgot for a second she doesn't know he's Bruce and said this

[ladyloveandjustice]

A complete tangent about why how the female coding thing is implemented in fandom bothers me (again, obviously transfem headcanons are fine and great, this is different), is that while going through someone's blog I literally saw a post they were refuting that was like "who embodies the female experience more Dick Grayson or Jason Todd", someone was like "y'all do know there's actual women in the Batfam right" and this other person responded "yeah but theyre badly written"

And lmaooo point by point

Ah yes because Dick Grayson and Jason Todd have never, ever been badly written. Ever.

All of these women are great characters who have been in some very well written comics and are just as rich and interesting as these men

please don't pretend you've ever tried to read about any of them, you clearly haven't

As for representing the female experience, Stephanie Brown is condescended to and discouraged and sometimes abused by every man in her life (and occasionally a woman joins in), but finds the inner strength to still pursue her goals and be defiant. She goes through a teen pregnancy. She's treated extremely differently from the male Robins and fired unfairly. She goes through sexual violence.She starts believing that she is lesser, and blames herself for being manipulated. She dies and is victim blamed to hell and back. She is not given a memorial like Jason gets nor is her death treated as important/haunting to Bruce. But then she comes back, and she eventually realizes she doesn't have to be dependent on the approval of men in her life and carves out a place for herself and receives support from other women. This doesn't solve the sexism she faces or her self esteem issues, but she's more confident and happier now.

How the hell is that not a representation of a female experience. Often completely unintentionally on the writers part, they agreed with her treatment in parts of this, but she's still so resonant because of that (and the fact that the demands of her largely female fans bought her back is another layer to things, as well as the fact that a DC writer said to my face that the women who fought for her to be recognized the same as Jason were annoying and he wishes he could shoot them. That became part of my female experience for sure.)

As I said, Jason and Dick have been through things women can relate to and that's fine, it's fine to discuss that-- but saying they're female coded or a reflection of the female experience and then ignoring actual female characters and their resonance with women's experiences--that's wrong.

(It's also like any kind of suffering is "female coded" sometimes--I remember a post in the heyday of the MCU that claimed Bucky was female coded because he was brainwashed and tortured- my dude, that happens to men in fiction and irl all the time, it is not the same as the character being a stand in for a woman or female role. )

[ladyloveandjustice]

Steph' s Relationship with School/Steph as a good student

I wanted to talk about Steph's relationship with school a bit. There was a poll a while back I saw that had Steph winning as likely to be the worst student of the Bats, and it's pretty much pure misogyny that's not supported by canon at all. Signs point to Steph being a good student if you pay attention.

In Steph's years primarily written by Chuck Dixon, what kind of student Steph was or what kind of grades she got was never directly said, but the mentions Steph does make of school imply/show that she's dilligent and dedicated as a student: She's often remembering she needs to do her homework (contrasting Tim who basically never thinks about it)

Robin #94

This implies she's taken something she learned in history class and applying it to her life, also.

She also does this with science:

Batgirl (2000) #20

It implies school is on her mind a lot (again, contrasting Tim)

The closest we ever see her get to complaining about school is not looking forward to doing math homework while nauseous from her pregnancy.

Robin #59

But it's when she goes to college we get a better look at what kind of student she is, and she's clearly a good and dedicated one despite having a busy life.

It should be noted that she was able to go straight to college despite missing a year in high school when she was "dead" and only having a month of additional high school. It could be Leslie set up a tutor or homeschool while she was with her (seems unlikely it would be consistent given they were going from village to village) but either way, it's pretty impressive she was able to essentially skip a grade and (most likely) get her GED.

Batgirl (2009) #15

The fact that Steph thinks getting all B's in college is like, bad, implies she's used to getting better grades. And the fact she gets B's while being a superhero AND having a part time job is pretty impressive.

She also joins a study group:

(also) Batgirl #15

She also calls the Great Gatsby "awesome" when describing what she's learned in college, showing a passion for her literature studies (though she does not like the Reconstruction era in history class) and that school is on her mind a lot.

(Some issue of Batgirl (2009) actually not sure, I remember it but not the issue #, I got this from another post)

And finally, she described herself as a dutiful college student.

Batgirl (2009) #4

So yeah, I'm not saying she's the BEST student of the Bats, or gets the best grades, but all signs point to her being a good and dedicated student, moreso than Dick and Tim at certain points in their lives where they saw school as a lower priority.

Thank you for reading this certified Stephanie Brown nerd post.

[ladyloveandjustice]

The foreshadowing here is so incredibly subtle so you might not be able to tell, but Detective Comics #790 is trying to delicately hint that Stephanie Brown will become Robin and die and also her death will definitely be her fault just like Jason Todd whose death was also totally his fault. You really have to hunt for these little clues they're seeding in there.

ok so jokes aside, there's something I noticed about this little sequence that fascinates me-- you'd expect in the comparison between Jason and Steph that the comic would twist Steph's narrative to mimic Jason's more closely-- he came first and all--but it actually does the opposite and twists Jason's to fit Steph's. You listen to Bruce talk about Jason here, and how he "wanted it"--being Robin presumably-- "so badly" and Bruce didn't stop him, and if you didn't know anything, you'd think Jason was like Stephanie, he made himself a hero of his own volition, that he volunteered to be Robin (like Steph will) and so on.

But he didn't. It was Bruce's idea, and Bruce was the one who offered him Robin. Jason never had any aspirations of being a superhero before that offer, and yeah, once he became Robin he was dedicated and wanted to do a good job, please Bruce, etc--but no more so than Tim or Dick.

Stephanie's the one who wants it "too much" in Bruce's opinion. Who became a hero without anyone's approval and never gave up when people belittled her.

Bruce claims Jason had something to prove. He didn't though, really. Again, being Robin was important to him, he wanted to be good at it, but not in a way that was tremendously unique.

Steph, however, does have something to prove-- she's stated she wants to prove she's not like her dad, and while she wasn't overly interested in Batman's acceptance when she first became a hero, Bruce giving her acceptance and then taking it back so cruelly and nonsensically made her want to show him she was good.

Of course, there's an easy reason why he does this (probably not consciously), his audience is Cass, who knows Steph but doesn't know Jason-- he takes the tack of talking about Steph's qualities and tries to make them fit Jason, to convince Cass that firing her is the best thing.

But the thing is, Steph and Jason are alike in one sense-- firing them is going to hurt them and make them more desperate and lead them into danger. It's not a good move. This is the one thing Bruce SHOULD have learned from Jason's death and applied to Stephanie, yet the one thing he refuses to learn.

anyway this is all on accident, Anderson Gabrych just never misses an opportunity to victim blame Steph, I think only Willingham as a writer matched him in that (not surprising they teamed up for War Crimes), like I like his work on Batgirl, I liked the StephRobin Tec comic he did, and appreciate Ghost Steph but god reading his War Games aftermath stuff it is RELENTLESS. It's not surprising he'd feel the same way about Jason.

Though I will give the issue credit for this:

It's very on the nose that Bruce is talking about how he feels about Jason here, and the "doesn't it make you want to die" is just. yeah. a good callback to how suicidal Bruce was in the wake of the death. Those feelings still coming back sometimes is realistic.

[ladyloveandjustice]

Okay, I may seem to be beating a drum, but months ago, I noticed three years late I got a direct reply to something I said and it linked to a pretty intentionally bad faith reading of this little sequence where Steph argues with Jordanna on Batgirl (2009) #3. And you know what!!! I reserve the right to finally respond indirectly. Let me have my outlet!

Honestly, the comment got me thinking a lot about this sequence and now that I've recently reread Batgirl, I'm glad for it, because I actually think this is a pretty significant moment for this era.

The reading was that Steph was just restating Jordanna's words to look good and is only pretending this is a personal discussion for her and trying to be a faux-progressive white girl here no I don't know why race is relevant to this but that's obviously a misreading.

The conversation IS kind of confusingly laid out, I do agree with that, but with the context of the next issue, we can see what's happening here. Steph IS actually projecting here, and empathizing with Devil's Square citizens (criminals and supervillains mainly, apparently) because she considers herself to be in a similar position. And the fact she considers herself a criminal or villain says a lot about where her self-esteem is right now.

"Why do criminals keep staying here" becomes "Why do you stay in Gotham, Steph, when you've made so many mistakes, when nothing can change, when no one wants you here?"

Jordanna saying dismissively that their only option is to run or go to jail sets Steph off precisely because she's projecting herself onto the situation-- it feels like her only option is to "run" or to suffer and die all over again. For both her and Devil's Square people, their choices are to become someone else, leave everything behind, or you stay and repeat the same patterns and get punished "like you deserve".

In saying "What if they don't have a choice?" Steph is saying "what if they wanted things to be different, but didn't see any other options?" Steph tried to run, but she hated the feeling of running away. It's not that she wants to come back to Gotham and make the same mistakes, to go through the same trauma, she wants to fix things. But she doesn't know how. Everyone is rejecting her again, she's being beaten down again, and it seems like she's going through the same motions-- but what else can she do?

"What if you don't have a choice?" Is a protest, it's "do you think I want it to be this way?"

So yes, Steph saying she's taking this too personally... because, shocker of shockers, she's taking it too personally.

Now, Jordanna gets mad at her about this later while high on Scarecrow drugs and it's not the most clear line of thought.

I don't know what exactly the "are you poor or something" is referring to. Maybe Jordanna thinks only poor people can sympathize with criminals, which would be pretty yikes. But most likely, Jordanna noticed one of the many signs Stephanie isn't as well off as her classmates-- such as her lack of laptop. And she's just mocking her for it because, in her drugged up state, she wants to humiliate someone who contradicted her with whatever ammunition she can find.

But at the end of issue 3, the reading that Steph was relating to how the criminals were stuck is cemented, and we get the big "I'm Batgirl" moment this all has been leading up to.

She realizes why she couldn't run and become someone else. She realizes why she came back to Gotham, opening herself up to torture and rejection and failure and death and a past she's rather forget--it's not about punishing herself, or repeating the same cycle. She came back to Gotham because she wanted to face herself, face her past, change, and do better.

What's interesting here, and what I wish had been explored more, is that Steph is implicitly sympathizing with the villains in Devil's Square and acknowledging there's a chance they can change too. Steph is seeking redemption-- and she's saying that the criminals could be in the same boat as her.By her logic, she's stating that redemption could be possible for them as well.

This is a big deal for Steph, who never showed any belief that villains can change before--after all, she saw Arthur promise to change over and over only to go back to being a criminal, go back to abusing her Mom. But now Steph has her own regrets and (in her mind) "sins" to carry, and she wants to believe she can learn and grow and change. Therefore, she opening herself up to believing doing something bad doesn't define you forever, that those who've done wrong can become better. And she's starting to extend this to "the bad guys" too.

I like this, and wish it had not been so rushed, and been developed more, because it gives Steph a motivation and reason for following the "no kill" code beyond the "well Batman said so and I'm a fuck up so I better listen to him" thing we got from War Games. Instead, it comes from a belief in rebirth and redemption she formed from her own painful experiences. I think it's a really interesting angle, and in my magical world where all the writers care about Stephanie like I do, someone could pick this up again and show Steph really struggling with these budding beliefs and do a lot of great character work and development with her.