Book Review - Nightwing Vol. 3: Nightwing Must Die

Nightwing Vol. 3: Nightwing Must Die by Tim Seeley
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

**SPOILER ALERT**

I read these is in single issues and I don't know what to think of this volume. I love Nightwing, he's a chipper character with a positive outlook despite his bleak upbringing and his life with Batman, but the writers never seem to do him as much justice.

This series started off well, focusing on Dick's emergence as a person and solo hero, but ever since his move to Blüdhaven, his arc has been stultified by a tacked-on romance. I don't care for romance in the fiction I consume, as it rarely stems from a realistic understanding of chemistry, friendship and love. Romance in popular media is always about putting the two best looking (read: conventionally attractive) people together, irrespective of story arc.

Nightwing gets trapped in the same illogical cycle. Nightwing, Volume 2: Back to Blüdhaven introduced Shawn Tsang (who I originally thought was transgender, but no such luck), and immediately made Nightwing fall in love with her. It gave the impression that looks were more important to Dick than personality - because Shawn isn't written with a personality.

This volume takes off from the previous one where Shawn is kidnapped. But, and I can't believe I read this, it precedes her kidnapping with a message to Dick that implies she may be expecting his child. So, most of the story involves Dick wondering and fretting about what kind of father he'll be. None of it involves the woman who is carrying the child, by the way. Her perspective is never given. She's tied up and off-screen for the most part - which is great, because I don't like the character or her overwrought drama, but just means the writers didn't care enough about her in the first place, other than as the perfect damsel-in-distress plot device. It's super annoying.

Then there's Damian Wayne. Who thought it was a good idea to write such an arrogant, self-entitled jerk as a hero? The entire volume starts with him picking a fight over who could potentially take on the mantle of Batman, once Bruce hangs up his cape. Damian's ready to fight Dick over this! And Nightwing has to put up with it? What were the writers thinking!

I can't stand Damian. They need to reign him in and make the character readable - people aren't always good, but self-entitlement and arrogance are off-putting, doesn't matter what your last name is.

Now, on to the story - Dr. Hurt is making Dollotrons, conveniently resembling Nightwing and Damian. Deathwing, the Nightwing alternative, kidnapped Shawn and keeps trying to beat the crap out of Dick and Damian. They get saved in the nick of time by the Robin dollotron. He's actually a boy named Dinesh, whose vague memories of his past have made him defect from Dr. Hurt's mission.

There's plenty of action, some hairy cliffhangers and all ends well in the end. Trouble with most of the action was that Dick and Damian were saved from particularly impossible situations because the dollotrons turned on their maker. Even after Shawn is rescued she does precious little. Bar one fight scene, she does nothing else. Also, when she's rescued she changes into the outfit worn by the dollotron version of herself. Like... ew. Who does that? Why didn't she just stick to the singlet and denim shorts she was wearing? At least those were her own clothes, and probably more comfortable than the one-piece, pantless swimming costume she steals. And where did she change? How did she have the time? So many questions - this is so needless.

In the end, plot-device Shawn finds out she's not pregnant and Grayson is off the hook. She takes this moment to take a break from their relationship, which is awesome, because I don't want her back in this series at all. Ever. Again. If you have to write women characters, write them as well-rounded individuals with their own storylines and purpose, rather than just as nubile, teenage eye candy love interests for the hero.

I hope the series picks up again, because this went down hill fast. It doesn't even feel like the same person who wrote Nightwing, Volume 1: Better Than Batman created the succeeding two volumes. The writers need to understand that just because you're writing Nightwing - one of the few, if not only, DC characters written for women - you don't need to populate the book with archaic ideas of what a male hero should be. He doesn't need to be balanced out with a hot young woman every panel, he doesn't need a superficial romance to make him seem human and he definitely doesn't need to have women on his mind all the time to be considered male.

Can we just have Nightwing fighting bad guys, doing good deeds, cracking jokes and being gorgeous? Can DC just give their non-straight, non-cis-male readers this one thing?

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