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“There is good and there is evil, but the line between can be almost impossible to find. Does one good deed make him a hero? Am I to blame for all of it because of a single mistake? In the end, all I really know is that the answers don't come easy. It's supposed to be simple, but it's not.”
―Robin (Dick Grayson)
Richard John "Dick" Grayson is a fictional superhero appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics, commonly in association with Batman. Created by writer Bill Finger and artist Bob Kane, he first appeared in Detective Comics #38 in April 1940 as the original incarnation of Robin. In Tales of the Teen Titans #44 (July 1984) the character retires his role as Robin and assumes the superhero persona of Nightwing, created by Marv Wolfman and artist George Pérez.
The youngest in a family of acrobats known as the "Flying Graysons", Dick watches a mafia boss named Tony Zucco kill his parents in order to extort money from the circus that employed them. After the tragic murder, Batman (Bruce Wayne) takes Dick in as his legal ward (retconned as an adopted son in some cases) and trains him to become his crime-fighting partner Robin. He is written by many authors as the first son of Batman. As well as being Batman's crime-fighting partner, Dick establishes himself as the leader of the Teen Titans, a team of teenage superheroes. As a young man, he retires as Robin and takes on his own superhero identity to assert his independence, becoming Nightwing. As Nightwing, he continues to lead the Teen Titans and later the Outsiders. In the first volume of his eponymous series (1996–2009), he becomes the protector of Blüdhaven, Gotham's economically troubled neighboring city, the locale the character is most closely associated with. He has also been depicted as protecting the streets of New York, Chicago, and Gotham City over the years.
Dick Grayson has taken on the identity of Batman on a few occasions. In the aftermath of "Batman: Knightfall", Grayson initially declines taking up the mantle of Batman while the original was recovering from a broken back as he feels Nightwing is a hero in his own right and not Batman's understudy, but after the events of the Zero Hour miniseries later that year, he replaces Bruce Wayne as Batman, beginning in Robin #0 (1994) and extending throughout the Batman: Prodigal storyline in 1995. Dick again assumes the mantle following the events of "Batman R.I.P." (2008) and Final Crisis (2008–2009). As Batman, Dick moves to Gotham City following his mentor's apparent death and partners with the fifth Robin, Damian Wayne. On Bruce's return, both men maintained the Batman identity until 2011, when Dick returned to the Nightwing identity with DC's The New 52 continuity reboot. In a 2014 comic story, Dick is forced to abandon the Nightwing identity after being unmasked on TV and faking his death, setting up Tim Seeley's Grayson comic book, Dick becomes Agent 37, Batman's mole in the nefarious spy organization Spyral. Following the conclusion of the Grayson series, and the restoration of his secret identity in the series' final issue, Dick returns to being Nightwing as part of the DC Rebirth relaunch in 2016.
Dick Grayson has appeared as Robin in several other media adaptations: the 1943 serial played by Douglas Croft, the 1949 serial played by Johnny Duncan, the 1966–1968 live action Batman television series and its motion picture portrayed by Burt Ward, played by Chris O'Donnell in the 1995 film Batman Forever and its 1997 sequel Batman & Robin. He stars on the Titans television series for the new DC streaming service played by Brenton Thwaites. Loren Lester voiced the character as Robin in Batman: The Animated Series and later as Nightwing's first screen adaptation in The New Batman Adventures. In May 2011, IGN ranked Dick Grayson #11 on their list of the "Top 100 Super Heroes of All Time". In 2013, ComicsAlliance ranked Grayson as Nightwing as #1 on their list of the "50 Sexiest Male Characters in Comics".
• • • • • DC Universe • DC Universe Online • DC Universe: Legacies • DC Universe Online: Legends • DC Universe Classics • DC Universe (toyline) • Arrowverse
• • • • • DC Universe • DC Universe Online • DC Universe: Legacies • DC Universe Online: Legends • DC Universe Classics • DC Universe (toyline) • Arrowverse
• • • • • DC Universe • DC Universe Online • DC Universe: Legacies • DC Universe Online: Legends • DC Universe Classics • DC Universe (toyline) • Arrowverse
• • • • • DC Universe • DC Universe Online • DC Universe: Legacies • DC Universe Online: Legends • DC Universe Classics • DC Universe (toyline) • Arrowverse
• • • • • DC Universe • DC Universe Online • DC Universe: Legacies • DC Universe Online: Legends • DC Universe Classics • DC Universe (toyline) • Arrowverse
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