It’s an exciting time for all things DC, but also one of great change. Superman & Lois, the final remnant of the Arrowverse, has come to a phenomenal conclusion, meanwhile, a whole new era of DC films is about to kick off with James Gunn’s Superman next year. We’ve even had the soft launch of Gunn’s DCU with the animated Creature Commandos series.
Things have been pretty crazy for DC on the comic book front too. Back in October they published DC All in Special #1, which not only launched an exciting new era for our favourite heroes in the main DC Universe, but also saw the creation of the Absolute Universe, filled with fresh takes on classic characters.
Amidst all of this excitement, during such a period of transition, you may have missed one of the greatest offerings from DC this year – the conclusion to Tom Taylor and Bruno Redondo’s acclaimed three-year Nightwing run.
If you don’t know, Nightwing is Dick Grayson, Batman’s original Robin, all grown up. He’s been a popular character for decades, but he’d been going through a bit of a rough patch when Tom took the reins of his series in 2021.
For the previous two years or so, Dick had suffered from amnesia after being shot in the head, which led to a radical departure from the character’s core traits. The man often dubbed the heart of the DC Universe had now become a terrible person who distanced himself from the Batfamily and his past life.
It was a very controversial period for the character and many fans did not enjoy this new direction. Thankfully, Dick’s memories and identity were restored in the final few issues of his predecessor’s run, but Tom still had his work cut out for him.
To bring back the Nightwing of old, Taylor focused on the character’s core tenets – hope, compassion, kindness – as he sought to make Dick Grayson just as much a hero as Nightwing. To accommodate this, the beginning of the run saw Dick receive a large inheritance from Alfred (as in Batman’s butler), who had been killed by Bane a few years earlier.
After working through his guilt over receiving so much money, Dick eventually settled on starting a charitable foundation – The Alfred Pennyworth Foundation – focused on helping the people of Bludhaven, Nightwing’s home city. Unlike many other superheroes, Dick has never been tied to one single civilian career, instead having a multitude of jobs over the years, from model to secret agent.
Being the founder of a charity really suits him and finally gives him a purpose in his civilian life that matches that of his superhero identity. Plus, it achieves something that Tom Taylor excels at: it acknowledges that there’s more to saving a city than just punching super villains in the face.
Through the Foundation, Dick is able to bring real change to the city and work to dismantle its corrupted infrastructure through legitimate means. Through this, Taylor makes Dick Grayson every bit the public hero as his masked counterpart, while also making him just as much a target. Attacking the city’s crime and corruption without a mask means that it’s not just Nightwing who has to worry about being attacked by criminals, but poor Dick as well.
When it comes to Dick’s personal life, Taylor achieved two significant things. Firstly, he reunited Dick with fan-favourite love interest, Barbara Gordon (Batgirl/Oracle), and even had them adopt a puppy together – Haley, a.k.a. Bitewing. His depiction of their relationship was, to put it bluntly, gosh darn cute. They make for strong partners, in both their personal and superhero lives and thankfully their relationship remained free of needless melodrama.
Secondly, he introduced Dick’s long-lost half-sister, Melinda Zucco. She was originally introduced as the daughter of Tony Zucco, the man who killed Dick’s parents, and appeared to be a corrupt politician who was installed by the mob as Bludhaven’s new mayor. However, it was soon revealed that not only was she actually working to bring those crime bosses down, but she was also Dick’s half-sister, through an affair her mother had with Dick’s father.
Not only did this create an intriguing personal arc for Dick, ultimately ending with him welcoming his newfound sibling with open arms, but it also gave him a key ally within the city’s infrastructure. With Melinda quickly learning of Dick’s superhero identity, the two were able to work in tandem to bring down the organised crime families who’d had a stranglehold on Bludhaven for years. It’s a key change to Dick’s lore that will hopefully stick around.
Putting Taylor’s writing aside for a moment, it would be remiss not to give praise to the other half of the creative team, artist Bruno Redondo. Redondo’s work on the run was nothing short of breathtaking, with the characters really feeling like they could leap off the page at times.
The greatest demonstration of his talent came in Nightwing #87, titled, Get Grayson, a unique issue comprised completely of double-page spreads without individual panels, which treats the whole book like one continuous panel. It’s one long chase scene and Redondo utilises some truly brilliant techniques to maintains a frantic pace, while being easy to follow. It’s a little hard to describe, but well worth checking out.
The same goes for issue 105, in which the art presents the story from Dick’s first-person point of view. It’s another fascinating experimental issue which really highlights the creativity of Taylor, Redondo and the whole creative team.
Taylor also gave Nightwing his very own arch-enemy in the form of series-long antagonist, Heartless. It may not be subtle, but given how Taylor really leaned in to Dick’s status as the heart of the DC Universe, it makes perfect sense to give him an adversary who’s the exact opposite of that.
Heartless was introduced in the very first issue of Taylor’s run and would be present to varying degrees throughout the entire run, with it eventually being revealed that he was a man named Shelton Lyle, the founder of Shel Pharmaceuticals, whose life had shared many parallels and intersections with Dick’s.
He’d been born to a wealthy Gotham family, but had been mostly raised by the family butler, Gerald. Shelton displayed psychopathic tendencies from a young age, which were encouraged by the equally psychopathic butler – a dark and clever twist on Dick’s relationship with Alfred. Shelton never spoke or showed any signs of happiness until the day Gerald took him to Haly’s Circus, where he saw Dick’s parents fall to their death. This awakened something in Shelton, who delighted in seeing the anguish on young Dick’s face. Thus, without his knowledge, Dick’s life became entangled with that of a psychopath.
After Gerald orchestrated the death of Shelton’s parents so the boy would inherit their fortune, the pair moved to Bludhaven where Shelton founded his company, while also fitting himself with cybernetic enhancements. However, these enhancements put strain on his heart, so he set out killing people, not just in an attempt to recapture the thrill he’d felt that day at the circus, but also so he could have a steady supply of replacement hearts to switch out when needed.
As Taylor entered the tail-end of his run he really began delving into Dick’s psychology. One of his core traits has always been his history as an acrobat, something which has informed his personality and fighting style. He’s always jumping and flipping all over the place, and he typically feels right at home walking on the ledge of a skyscraper. Yet, without warning Dick began to suffer from a fear of heights, severely limiting his abilities as Nightwing.
This sudden and unexplained fear became a central plot point in the final stretch of the run, with Dick having to explore his own psyche to uncover the answers. This dovetailed with Heartless’ final master plan, framing Dick to make it look like he was actually the masked killer all along.
This all led into a fascinating climax that took Dick on a globetrotting adventure to get to the root of his psychological issues, before heading home to Bludhaven to clear his name and take care of Heartless once and for all. It’s a genuinely satisfying conclusion that rewards readers who had been following Taylor’s run from the beginning, tying up all of its narrative and thematic threads, and leaving Nightwing ready to leap into his next era.
Time will tell whether Tom Taylor’s Nightwing run will stand the test of time. However, for those who were reading along in real time, most would agree that it’s one of the most definitive takes on the character. Taylor may not have been the first one to instil Nightwing with a big heart and caring personality, but he certainly brought those aspects of the character to the forefront again, and arguably made them stronger than ever before.
At a time when the character was adrift, Taylor managed to bring him back and anchor him to a solid foundation. As the character continues to reach new heights in the DC Universe, we should never forget the man who helped him to leap again.
