My Bat Academy AU is fun because it's like:

Dick is Luther because he's the leader. Cass is Luther because she was the one caught in the explosion. Damian is Luther because he's the one to who was sent away on an "important mission".

Damian is Diego because he's the one who's still acting as a superhero. Jason is Diego because he's the maddest at Bruce. Dick is Diego because he's got connections to the police force.

Duke is Allison because he's the one not using his powers. Tim is Allison because he's the one who messed with Steph's memories. Cass is Allison because she's the one holding the gun at the end.

Jason is Klaus because he's the one who gets captured. Tim is Klaus because he's our connection to Jason. Cass is Klaus because she's the one struggling with her powers. Damian is Klaus because he's the one everyone brushes off.

Tim is Five because he's the one who went missing. Duke is Five because he's doing the eyeball plot line. Dick is Five because he's the one convinced the world is going to end. Damian is Five because he's the one with a connection to the commission.

Jason is Ben because he's the one who died. Dick is Ben because he's the one with a "Jennifer Incident". Tim is Ben because he was the least interested in being a superhero.

...and Stephanie is Viktor.

(pt 1, pt 2)

AU to add to the list of AUs I'll never write: All of the Robins are de-aged to the age they were when they became Robin. Their memories are also reset to that point, and somehow they're in their Robin suits.

So you have a 16 year old Steph, desperately trying to wrangle 4 feral children who look nearly identical and won't tell her their names because "you do know what a secret identity is, don't you Stephanie?"

Batfamily Chronological Reading List

Here it is, a massive list of Batfamily comics all sorted by issue release date so you can read them in the order they were originally intended to be read in, or easily reference back to what happened when. Do you want to know what Dick was up to during A Death in the Family? Need to know if Cass was around yet when Steph had her baby for your fan fic? Just a completion-ist with too much time on your hands like me? Then this is the list for you!

About six months ago I was trying to read my way through some old comics and getting insanely frustrated trying to figure out the order they went in. There are lots of reading lists online, but none of them gave me what I truly wanted: the order of individual issues rather than comic runs or collections. I also couldn't find any that featured all of the Batkids. So I took all of the reading lists I was using, found the On-Sale-Date for each of the issues mentioned, found a few other lists to fill in some gaps, and complied them into chronological order.

This list features what I consider to be the main 8 Batfamily members: Dick Grayson, Barbara Gordon, Jason Todd, Tim Drake, Stephanie Brown, Cassandra Cain, Damian Wayne, and Duke Thomas. It is by no means every appearance of these characters, but it is hopefully all of the important ones and then some. By no means do I suggest reading all of these (unless you're slightly insane like me), it's more of a reference guide than a read list.

Some Disclaimers:

For any edits you wish to suggest, please do so through this form. Any suggestions given not through this form will not be considered, and as it says in the form, I also will not consider any that don't have an explanation.

Finally I need to say thank you and give credit to the people who's reading lists I used to create this:

cazzam - New and Improved Cassandra Cain Reading Guide

Comic Book Herald - I used both their Complete Robin and Complete Batgirl Read Order Lists.

The Comic Book Treasury - I used both their Robin Reading Order and their Duke Thomas Reading Order

Comic Book Wire - The Signal Reading Order

Daily Jason Todd - Jason Todd's Reading List

Stephanie Brown Wiki Chronology Page

The Unoffical Guide to the DC Universe was also an incredible help with sorting out timelines, and all of my On-Sale-Date information comes from Grand Comics Database (GCD).

I hope you guys enjoy and find this useful! I'm happy to answer any questions, and if something isn't clear feel free to let me know!

I'm making a Batfam reading order list, not of every appearance of every character, but of important appearances & comic runs, organized by issue release date. I'm trying to color code it so you can see at a glance which character each issue is for, but the problem is sometimes more than one character is important to the story. I tried creating a color to indicate multiple characters and then make a note of which characters it's for, but I don't love that and would like input on how other people would like it to look. Here's an example of what the chart looks like:

Here are the options I see:

Also if anyone knows a way to make the box itself multiple colors (like stripes or something) please let me know! That would be my ideal way to handle the situation, but I have yet to find a way that works.

Baffled by the lack of Dark Knights of Steel fan fic about the Robins. Like, the story is sitting there for the taking!

Dick and Jason's stories can be adapted without really having to change anything. Duke and Steph are a little harder, but a few nudges here and there and you've got your story. Cass isn't in Tales of the Three Kingdoms so we can assume she comes later, but again you just need a few touches to adjust.

But Tim and Damian? How in the world did they get wrapped up with the Robins? Is Damian still Bruce's son in this universe? Does he have latent Kryptonian powers? Is he illegitimate or did Talia and Bruce get married? Was he raised by his grandfather to believe he is the rightful heir to the kingdom, only to run away when it got to be to much?

And how does Tim fit in? Are his parents nobles in this universe, and if so are they dead or did he run away? Does he sneak out at night to help the Robins but slip back into a mansion before morning?

And there are so many little details too! Jason has his white streak, where did it come from? How long have Tim and Cass been stationed in the other kingdoms? Where is Damian at the start of Dark Knights of Steel? What about Barbara, how does she fit into all of this? Are the other Robins a little annoyed that Bruce showed up with Cass and said 'she's one of you now' despite them all being a tight nit group, or did they accept her? What are Kal and Zala's relationships with the Robins like?

Thinking about my Batfamily Umbrella Academy Au again and just...

Dick who has the world's worst case of imposter syndrome, because is he really a fantastic acrobat, or is he just manipulating the gravity around himself? Without his powers would he even be able to walk along a balance beam? He'll never truly know.

Cass who can live in a moment for as long as she wants, who can take the time to analyze every single detail and judge her next move. Who can't do anything without analyzing, who freezes time on instinct before every action. She moves through time differently from everyone else, every day lasts five times longer.

Jason who can hit a bullseye from any distance, but knows it will never be enough to actually impress Bruce. With his power set, it's not impressive, it's just expected. It doesn't matter that he didn't use his powers, all that does is make his powers, and by extension himself, seem less useful.

Duke who doesn't trust his own eyes. He only believes in things he can physically touch, because what's to say he's not just making himself see what he wants to? If he can manipulate others perceptions on a whim, how easy must it be to manipulate his own?

Damian who's power is function-less in a fight, and so spent his life constantly training to try and compensate. Who spent so long training and honing his ability that now he struggles to talk with other people. And despite that sacrifice, still can't rise higher than Number Five because of the one thing outside of his control.

Tim who hesitates before he touches anything for the first time because he never knows what he might see. Who had to learn to keep his face natural no matter what he learns, better that than having to explain what he saw to someone who won't understand.

Stephanie who discovers she has powers, that maybe she's not actually the weak link and she can finally help her siblings, just to find out they think she's a villain. That even when they're all the same, she's still the outsider. They still don't believe in her.

The old Detective Comics design for Jason is literally so cute. Like, look at this boy! He's a baby!

He's 15% Puns, 35% Smiles, and 50% cape. I love him.

Reverse Robins!

But specifically Stephanie and Tim (with a little Jason added when it's relevant).

Note: I'm of the opinion that in Reverse Robin AUs they wouldn't actually use Robin as their code name, but for convince and clarity's sake I will be using it here.

The dichotomy between Jason dying because he disobeyed Batman and Stephanie dying specifically because she was trying to follow his rules is so good, and yet so under utilized.