Not for his character or anything, but because I donāt think Iāve seen anyone shoot themselves in the foot with a single character half as badly as DC did with Jason.
He was, during Under the Red Hood, one of the biggest gamechangers they could have thrown at Bruce Wayneās Batman. Here was an intellectual equal to Batman and superior to the Joker and Gothamās entire criminal underbelly. A tactical nuke primed to devastate Batman both emotionally and ideologically. Physically, ridiculously dangerous. exceptionally well-trained. a match for Batman in every way.Ā Heās a character that Bruce canāt fight properly, and, worse, one that punches holes in Batmanās modus operandi in ways that instinctively makes sense to the audience.
Bruceās son, his greatest failure, returned from the grave as an agent of vengeance. Batman, through a mirror darkly.
sounds super interesting, huh.Ā
Unfortunately, characters like Jason are also the agents of introspection and change. He would have forced Bruce to reflect and, worse still, readers to start second-guessing Batmanās morality. How many people walk away from Under the Red Hood thinkingĀ āholy shit, they should have killed the Jokerā? Most, right? Jason would have changed Gothamās status quo irreversibly and, unfortunately, Gotham canāt reallyĀ change. progress canāt be made, villains canāt die forever, Batman canāt beĀ wrong.Ā
Because it sells that way, obviously. The Joker willĀ neverĀ die, no matter how heinous he is, not really. Not while heās selling merch.Ā
So once it turned out that Jason was also super popular, what could DC do? He would shake things up too much if allowed to stay on course. Heās too dangerous, too strong.Ā and so⦠character assassination!Ā Keep the aesthetics of the angry shooty red helmet daddy issues clowns-bad man while changing the internal workings - fans wonāt notice, right?Ā
Strip away his competence, reduce his skillset, make him an idiot, a lunatic, a brawny shoot-first-donāt-think meathead! Heās not a strategist, heās stupid, he charges in headfirst. Change his approach to vigilantism. He wasĀ alwaysĀ a bad Robin - he was violent and petty and dangerous and he and Bruce never jived in the first place.Ā Keep him out of Gotham as much as possible and when you canāt do that, either quietly pretend heās on good terms with the batclan or have him and Bruce run around in circles.
And, most importantly, he has to be wrong. He has to be unreasonable. He needs to be the screwup that needs to be sanitised, put in his place, and come crawling back to Bruce so he can be safely assimilated into the family.
Circling around to Urban Legends, Jason and Bruceās dynamic has completely flipped. Jason is the one that has to change for Bruceās conditional love, rather than Jason setting the terms Bruce has to meet for Jason to trust him again. Jason is the one that has to learn a Very Important Lesson about the flaws in his morality and align himself with BruceāsĀ - bearing in mind that Jason developed his worldview after experiencing, firsthand, the flaws in Bruceās.
Jason is no longer a mirror forcing Bruce to think and develop and grow. Heās one of two things - a stupid, unreasonable villain or Just Another Graduated Robin that Bruce has to control and keep in line just a touch more than the others. His post-reboot arc is him trying to move past his trauma and grow but losing it all and returning, battered and beaten, to Bruceās side. Heās rapidly losing whatĀ made him interesting in the first place and fifteen years later Bruce still hasnāt learnt a damn thing.
jason could never be jason for an extended period of time. villains would die, gotham would change, batman would evolve, and DC is too scared to try (hell, they canāt even let bruce stay dead). a braver industry might have made something amazing out of him but unfortunately DC comics just aināt it