Batman Reboot Concepts

Chapter 1: Goodfellow

Meet my idea for Tim Drake's hero self — Goodfellow!

The name is a play on Robin 'The Puck' Goodfellow from Shakespeare. I would foreshadow this by giving him a mischievous ferret named 'Puck', and by occasionally having him quote a Midsummer's Night's Dream. I can just imagine Tim sighing and muttering to himself 'My Lord, what fools these mortals be' in response to some antics or other, you know?

My reasoning for this is twofold. Part one: RED ROBIN IS A VERY STUPID NAME. There's Robin, there's Red Hood, and there's a store named Red Robin. Let Tim have an identity of his own, for Pete's sake!

Part two: Joker Junior. I love how Tim is written in some Joker Junior fanfics. Specifically, I love the idea of Tim being a somewhat-unnerving prankster who laughs a lot.

But since my version of Joker is Lighter And Softer, the Joker Junior plotline can't happen. So I thought, what if Tim Drake was always like that?

Enter Hyperemotional Pseudobulbar Affect Disorder, or Gotham Bug. A fictional and very rare neurological condition that causes one to laugh, sometimes uncontrollably, in different ways in response to different emotions, both good and bad. Joker is one of the most famous cases, giving it a bad name.

My Tim has it. His parents — well-meaning but very, very bad at parenting — taught him to suppress his laughter. All of it. The most you could get from him was polite but very fake chuckles. Because of the nature of Gotham Bug, Tim developed headaches and occasional nausea from constantly holding back his laughter.

Tim is somewhat of a goofball, good at pranks and deadpan snarking, but bad at jokes and spur-of-the-moment banter. He doesn't like close combat, preferring to dodge opponents and take them out with long-ranged attacks or preset traps. And he really, really loves laughing. Bruce knows absolutely none of this at first, because Tim is a self-sacrificing idiot who molds himself into something closer to what Dick and Jason were as Robins, thinking Batman needed that.

But eventually there comes a day where Tim isn't Robin anymore, because he gave it to Damian. A day when he isn't the Drake heir anymore either, because his parents signed him over to Bruce's care. A day when years' worth of 'you are perfect just like this, Timmy' from Dick starts to break through, because he finally has a moment to think about who he is. Goodfellow is Tim when he's no longer shaping himself for other people.

Goodfellow fights with long-ranged attacks, boobytraps, and psychological warfare. He's a goofball and a prankster, who loves freaking people out with his laughter, but he doesn't joke around much. He's still a genius, building his own bostaff/stungun collapsible weapon, and he often hacks villains (though he's no match for Barbara there). His favorite villain to fight is Riddler, because he's easily bored and thinks the mazes/puzzles/riddles are actually really fun.

And that's Goodfellow. What do you think?