Milkimae - Terminally Silly ‪‪❤︎‬

Hey so actually I might be a little obsessed with how Tim is Dick’s only clearly defined brother.

Like let me explain. HEAR ME OUT!

Damian is Dick’s BABY! That is his firstborn! Dick might have had some adoption tendencies pre-crisis with Jason but they realized that shit with Dick’s (Second? Third?) time in the cowl. Dick saw this small murderous child and was like “I can do it better than Bruce” and did. And yes they might be settling into a brotherly role with Bruce stepping the fuck up.* But I promise you having witnessed siblings with a 10 year age gap — even when the parents are perfect and emotionally available — that older sibling quickly becomes a third parent. With Dick, he was the first second and third parent. No way Damian and Dick could ever just be brothers and I love that for them.

Dick’s relationship with Jason is full of regret and guilt. They might be building something now but their past is full of inflicting rotting wounds (metaphorical and often literal) on each other. Dick started the pattern first when he rejected Jason as Robin. And later Jason raging against Dick after his return. Jason’s semi-valid villain crash out ending with Dick putting him in Arkham because Jason was a straight villain pre-rebirth. And even then it takes rebirth remixed canon to allow Jason some family bonding time. I say they have a handful of months — and even then how often did Dick visit! He didn’t start reconnecting with the BatFam until after the Killing Joke and Death in the Family — they got along before shit got worse.

So that leaves Tim! The little baby brother Dick started calling little brother YEARS before Bruce ever adopted Tim.** Timmy, the freak who broke into his apartment to track him down and drag him back to Gotham. Who subsequently spends years breaking into Dick’s apartment to hang out. Because why not continue as you begin lol.

He spent his early 20s with Tim! He comes into his own as Nightwing while Tim is Robin. Hell! The first time Dick was Batman, Tim was his Robin! He literally grows into his adult self with Tim as his witness.

How many lows has Tim helped him pick up after? How many falls has Dick caught Tim after (metaphorically and literally)?

But that’s the sweet sappy shit.

Tim is the one brother Dick doesn’t have to be the responsible adult with. He eats shitty pizza with Tim. He has movie nights and hang outs and poor-tasting inside jokes with Tim. They race each other across rooftops! They play fight in the streets. Dick booby traps his apartment so Tim can have fun breaking in.*** Dick complains about his messy love life to Tim while Tim mocks him!

THEY ARE BROTHERS YOUR HONOR!

There is a reason Dick calls Tim his equal. Dick loves his brothers, he’ll always be there for them. But Tim is the one Dick doesn’t have to watch or monitor or hover over. Tim is his brother, not his regret or his child.

20 years in real time and 4 years of comic time put Tim and Dick through the ringer. No Man’s Land. Knightfall. The nuking of Bloodhaven. Contagion. Try to name a tragedy Tim and Dick haven’t witnessed and weathered side by side! But no matter how they fight or have to disappear for the mission, they always find each other and trust each other and believe in each other. Because they are truly brothers!

(So context… I’m very much reading the 90s and 2000s run. I’m like chronologically in 98. I’ve seen/heard modern comics have dropped this FOR SOME FUCKING REASON (they forget Tim exists, I guess). But I refuse to believe that rebirth got rid of their brotherly bond. Just as Tim’s “friendship” with Kon-El transcends timelines so does Dick and Tim’s brotherly bond! They are family bonded through the fires of time and comic book bullshit!)

TLDR: Dick’s brotherly relationships with Jason and Damian are complicated and the roles they play in each other’s lives aren’t always clear. Dick’s relationship with Tim has had its ups and downs but there has never been any confusion about their roles with each other. They called each other brothers and held on tight and that’s special ❤️🩵

—

* How much this is true take with a grain of salt. I’m not reading modern yet. I’ve read some cause Damian just slaps and I love him. But there’s so much!

** Tim was adopted for like a year before being emancipated. WILD! What fatherless behavior!

*** What feral menaces! I love them!!! I just need to scream. Not important. Carry on. ^>^

Honestly Tim cheating has been blown out of proportion.

Tim Drake’s hasn’t actually cheated in his comics. He has been accused of cheating twice and was once surprise kissed by Steph while dating another girl after he told Steph he has a girlfriend. That being said, Tim having messy relationships is a defining character trait. He struggles to balance his obligations as a hero and a person; work life balance is not in his toolbelt.

He has never had a romance go well and he shouldn’t start now. He will forget your birthday, dinner with your parents, your favorite flower, and if you’re allergic to peanuts and he will not apologize. He’s busy saving the world.

Tim Drake shouldn’t cheat on Bernard. He should miss six dates in a row to save New York from a herd of ManBats and have a weird situationship with another hero where they play flirt for six months. But when they ask him on a date, he should say “sorry I have a boyfriend” and then dream about them in a totally homoerotic way that’s weirdly platonic.

Tim Drake haters are so hilarious because, yes, he's an evil little sh!t but from an outsiders perspective THIS is what you hate:

You hate this little guy? He's never done wrong ever. He's just baby. Look at him U_U

(I am the Silco to his Jinx, I see diabolical war crimes and think "He's perfect.")

here’s the other way i make bruce a grandpa: dick has one

not to be a killjoy but it's still crazy to me that it's considered mean to be like "maybe you should read / play / watch the source material before creating fanworks and diving into the fandom" bc every time i see somebody going "i havent played disco elysium or know anything about it tbh but uwu here's harry and kim kissing" idk maybe you should engage with it. maybe you should play the anti-capitalist surrealist game where you investigate the murder of a mercenary who led the gang rape of a foreign girl and process that for a bit? and then you can do cutesy mlm or whatever idc. but like at the absolute bare minimum you should understand what the source material involves otherwise we get the phenomenon of people joining a dragon age server and wanting content warnings for like, mage racism. like it's fine to ship and transform the genre into whatever but if you arent comfortable with discussions of the actual source content itself then maybe the fandom isnt for you and a different one is. peace and love.

i do think we should consider the following though: modern day well off parenting trends are generally about the idea that by giving your children the Best/Most Superior Infant and Early Childhood Experiences your children will 100% grow up into Healthy and Well Adjusted Adults With No Issues like children are a video game character that can be min/maxed for Optimal Outcomes. so rather than showing-love-is-weakness-and-my-business-baby-can't-show-weakness drakes, i suggest we should highly consider the following drakes who are trying to outdo their social class acquaintances and achieve best possibly outcomes for their son the following possible ways instead:

janet read this once on a blog and all her rich friends agree: primary colors are Bad for Babies. instead of having a house decorated only in white because she's an evil mother who is incompatible with having children, their house is filled with neutral colors and various shades of beige because the house can't be too stimulating for tim!! bright colors would be too distracting and detrimental for his overall development. he needs the calming surroundings of neutral colors. he is a sad beige baby.

(the first time tim sees color is dick's circus costume which is why he's so enamored and amazed with it and the backlash against his sad, beige childhood is what causes him to own at least 5 magenta shirts as a teenager)

on a related note, janet obsessed with the idea of montessori for tim. but not, like, real montessori which is actually an excellent and very evidenced based educational philosophy that is supposed to be cheap and accessible to children of all different socioeconomic backgrounds. instead, janet is about rich people montessori, which is all about buying only wooden toys that have at minimum a $150 price tag on it just because it says montessori on it. she rigs up his toy kitchen to the actual house plumbing so that instead of play washing dishes, he's, like, actually washing dishes. because it's not meaningful work play if your kid isn't actually doing a chore, right? he'll never succeed as an adult otherwise.

maybe she doesn't do montessori. maybe she shells out $24k a year for tim to attend forest school instead (at least, until he turns 7 and he goes to boarding school instead)

janet, as an archeologist, is all about raising her son like the ancients raised their children. and the ancients didn't have their children sit inside. no, children are meant to be outside as much as possible like they were in ancient times, not inside sitting in front of the television. when she's not taking tim to museums and art galleries for max educational experiences, she's focused on tim getting 1000 hours outside. now, gotham doesn't necessarily have a lot of green space and and the park gets taken over by poison ivy a lot so it's not necessarily safe, but they do the best they can. other parents might balk at taking their 6 year old out at 3 in the morning to go stalk batman and robin's patrol routes, but this is what tim wants to do and outdoor time is outdoor time, even at night, so janet takes him and marks off 2 hours on her tracker sheet with an air of self satisfaction. she'll make it to 1000 hours before the rest of moms in her mom group if it kills her, just to see to sour look on susan's face that janet was able outdo her parenting and now tim is on track to do better than susan's son jeff.

anyways, the drakes send tim off to boarding school at age 7 secure in the knowledge that tim is now bound for greatness and normalcy and success because they did everything right with raising him up to this point. tim will be completely well adjusted and totally normal. their job is done. they did it. success.

Tim: I'm off the meds, I'm a new person now.

Bruce: they were antibiotics, you don't have a spleen. You're delirious with infection!

old art since I havent drawn them in years but I think of them often

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