Robin’s Ego Won’t Let Him Team Up With Deathstroke’s Daughter

Warning! Spoilers for Robin #2!

Damian Wayne, son of Batman and current Robin, is a hero whose egotistical ways won’t allow him to team-up with many people outside of his extended Bat-Family – Deathstroke’s daughter, Ravager, included. But while partaking in a deadly tournament on an island where contestants can be resurrected to fight over and over again, Robin may well need to check his ego by the door, or risk not leaving the island with his life intact at all.

Shown throughout the second issue of the Infinite Frontier related series simply titled Robin by Joshua Williamson and Gleb Melnikov, Damian’s penchant for being the cockiest of Boy Wonders is front and center for all to see. Arriving on an island where new and dangerous forces are pitting a wide array of heroes and villains against one another in a twisted Mortal Kombat-esque tournament, Damian almost immediately proves why his constant inflated ego is a problem.

After being summarily slaughtered in his first attempt to show his worth, Damian is resurrected and approached by Rose Wilson aka Ravager and told that this mysterious island only allows three “lives” in the tournament before being dead keeps, with the winner granted literal immortality. Going on to explain to Damian all the rules he missed out on while being revived, Rose then offers to team-up and work together with him to achieve their separate goals.

Initially intrigued by the idea, Damian quickly does an about-face when Ravager tells him that she’d be willing to help train him for the upcoming battles. Letting an awkward silence hang in the air, Damian gives his usual cocky response by responding, “No, thanks. Son of Batman, remember?” immediately shooting Rose down in a totally unnecessary way. Later on, the conversation is brought up yet again with Ravager rightly saying, “You’re still too cocky to win this tournament,” as well as, “…you take yourself too seriously,” two statements that are spot on for a Robin that thinks he can do it all.

Like his ever-brooding father, Damian is no stranger to pushing help away when it stares him right in the face, often going so far as to mask his need for it with his patented cocky attitude as a buffer. And although it can’t be denied that he can handle his own when push comes to shove, blatantly denying Ravager’s help is a mistake that his ego continually allows him to make, and one that might come back to bite him as this series goes on.

So while Ravager reveals in the final pages that she not only wants to train Damian but also teach him how to have fun, Damian is going to have to allow himself to surrender to the more logical idea of a team-up rather than the cockiness that continues to plague him. And who knows? Maybe Robin will finally realize the power in teamwork and let his one-man army shtick fall by the wayside for the moment – he just better make a decision about it quick.

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