Guys, am I missing something? Because I keep seeing fanon insisting that Nightwing is a ball of rage and implying that you don't really know cannon if you don't know that Nightwing is the angriest member of the batfamily. But I started doing deep dives into the examples I saw of his supposed rage moments, because I hadn't seen that version of him in cannon, and so far, I'm still not seeing it.
Like Grayson trying to kill Zucco? Never happened as far as I can tell, and his time as Robin wasn’t about vengeance, almost every version of his backstory I could find stops to specify that he’s either becoming or continuing past the first case as Robin to help people, it’s compassion and a desire to make sure no one else has to go through what he did, along with a healing moment for him. (he even tries to save his parent's murderers in multiple versions)
His fight with Donna during NTT 1984 #19? He was being brainwashed by Brother Blood, they even say he wouldn’t have been lashing out had he not been brainwashed multiple times during the arc and treat it as weird that he’s acting that way. (brainwashing revealed in New Teen Titans 1984 #22)
Killing the Joker in Joker's Last Laugh? Yet again brainwashing. There was a villain named Rancor whose power is amplifying emotions until they’re uncontrollable, who was in prison for amplifying people’s rage until they committed murders they wouldn't have otherwise committed, who commented about amplifying Nightwing’s rage at the start of the fight, and Nightwing commented after that he didn’t know what happened he just suddenly lost control. (full rundown on Rancor and his powers found in Joker: Last Laugh Secret Files and Origins 2001)
I am still working on a full deep dive of Outsiders because there’s so much context, but that’s the important thing which I think gets missed a lot, the context. It is a direct follow up to Young Justice Graduation day (Donna’s Death and him getting trauma around leadership) and it’s linked to both the Devin Grayson run and Under the Red Hood, so yeah he’s lashing out, because he’s well past any reasonable human breaking point, this is him actively self-destructing, not his baseline personality. (Yes, it is a part of his character but in like the same sense the one-time Bruce attempted murder after Jason's death is, like no being murderous isn't normal for his character it's him at his all-time low)
I know I'm way too far down this rabbit hole with my conspiracy board out studying Nightwing's emotional responses, but I'm starting to feel like this is a case of the fandom gaslighting itself, because this dude is shockingly levelheaded the majority of the time. He does get mad at reasonable moments, where it makes sense to be mad as a human, but not like the fandom describes. If I am missing something, please tell me about it, I have been having fun doing these deep dives and learning about the character, so I'd be happy to have more moments to look into, and I know I haven't read all the older comics, though I am working on it (Modern Nightwing was my starting point so who knows maybe I'm bias and missing something, if so this is a genuine question, tell me about what I'm missing). For now though, I'm just not seeing it.
