Series Squee: Grayson

Who wrote this series?

Grayson was a series primarily created by the writer duo of Tim Seeley and Tom King with art primarily by Mikel Janin, colors by Jeromy Cox, and letters by Carlos M. Mangual. There are other writer and artist teams across this series, most notably for the final arc once the main workers were placed on other DC books. We’ll get to them in a minute since naming them will be going in hand with me fussing about them.

What’s this series about?

Following the Forever Evil event that took place across several DC books back in 2013/2014, Dick Grayson’s identity as Nightwing was revealed to the world. As a result of that identity crisis, Dick Grayson goes undercover to hide his connection to Batman/Bruce Wayne at St. Hadrian’s, a private finishing school for female supervillains and spies first seen in Batman, Incorporated. So Dick winds up doing double duty as a spy and as a teacher to the next generation of spies, all going along with Dick’s globetrotting adventures as an agent of the mysterious SPYRAL.

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Grayson #20 and WOC as the “Wrong Choice” Love Interests

Note: You may disagree with this reading. You may think that’s not a valid reading. That’s fine, but as experiencing misogynoir in a comic that I adore and having clear proof that women of color (especially Black women) will always wind up “losing” to whiteness/white women is hurtful to me, I absolutely do not want to hear about it.


Helena and Dick

I knew Helena Bertinelli and Dick Grayson wouldn’t end up together at the end of Grayson #20.Despite my shipping goggles snapped tightly to my head (and you know… the actual content in the book), I knew that they wouldn’t be riding off into the sunset together especially as both characters are going to be in their own books come Rebirth.

But I knew that Dick and Helena were attracted to each other because there are several separate moments in the comic series that shows that their attraction is mutual.

More than that, the comic showed that on some level, they cared about each other as more than friends and it was in a way that could be construed as romantic. A way that could have been fleshed out in the upcoming Rebirth reboot or that would have gotten more focus in the comics had Grayson continued past issue #20 with the original creative team (Tim Seeley and Tom King on writing with Mikel Janin on art).

How do I know this? Well, in Future’s End: Grayson, five years into the future of the DC Universe (pre Rebirth and all of the retcons that’s going to be responsible for), Helena and Dick are together romantically.

So to go through Grayson #20 and basically see the new creative team kind of crap all over that is incredibly hurtful.Read More »

On Grayson, fandom, problematic media, and the drive to “defend” popular male characters

Content notes: This post mentions and/or links to descriptions of sexual assault and harassment as well as racism.


Grayson Header.png

If you were to listen to a certain group of Dick Grayson fans on the internet, you’d probably come to the conclusion that comic book fans are frighteningly intense and that the Grayson series (written by Tom King and Tim Seeley with pencils by Mikel Janin and colors by Jeromy Cox) is rife with orgies and plagued with issues of consent on every single page as Dick is forcibly separated from his friends and family to fight in the war against SPYRAL.

If you were to listen to that weirdly vocal group of fans, you’d also be just as wrong as they are.Read More »

Late Last Night – Helena Bertinelli/Eve Moneypenny

Title: Late Last Night

Characters: future Helena Bertinelli/Eve Moneypenny with mentions of Dick Grayson, James Bond, Q, and The Tiger King of Kandahar

Rating: General

Contains: Flirting, subtle but significant spoilers for Spectre, Grayson #4, and Batman and Robin Eternal #2.

Summary: There are few secrets among spies.

Notes: Instead of writing the Spectre review I took 12 pages of notes for this morning while I was in the theater, I just sat down and wrote a story about two of the most powerful Black women in the spy genre (James Bond‘s Eve Moneypenny and Grayson‘s Helena Bertinelli) having a friendship and maybe (eventually) a little something more. If you squint, there are definite allusions to Moneypenny/Q/Bond and Helena/Dick too. Because that’s how I roll.


There are no secrets in SPYRAL.

Not even for its current director.

No – especially for its current director.Read More »

#NCBD 8/26/2015 – Grayson #11

Spoilers and images for the issue abound. Read at your own risk if you’re not up to date!


“It’s Grayson versus…Grayson? To save Agent 1, Dick must face his most dangerous enemy yet: himself.”

Trsz_1tumblr_nomapq5ezh1qc7r93o1_1280his week, the only book I’m reading for #NCBD is Grayson #11.

Thanks to my ridiculously short attention span, Grayson is the only comic I’m reading that I remember to pick up every month from Comixology.

And boy is it worth it.

I mean, it’s got two of my favorite writers (Tom King and Tim Seeley) on the plot with King taking up writing duties for this month , fantastic art and colors from Mikel Janin and Jeromy Cox, and of course, my actual favorite superhero turned superspy in the starring role.

This issue’s summary had me hyped from the first time we saw solicits go out a few months back and of course, the book lives up to the hype.


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Holy Bondage, Batman

I know you’re not supposed to judge books by their covers (especially comics since what you see might not be what you get) but the cover for October’s issue of Grayson is gorgeous. It’s more than a little bit kinky thanks to the lovingly rendered knots in the rope and the femdom-y vibes to the […]

Friday Four: 3/9-3/13

Here’s what got me pumped this week!


1.  This week’s episode of Empire

empire sinsI just watched Empire episode #10 Sins of the Father and I’m still not okay. It’s been over two hours and I still can’t get over how much the series packs into every single episode. The show keeps killing it and I think it can only go up from here.

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