Fox’s Gotham might as well include a tagline underneath the title that states, “cramming as many Batman characters in as possible.” The Batman prequel hasn’t reached 10 episodes yet, and many of Batman’s major villains have already appeared or have been announced. Fortunately, the show is trying to balance out that negative energy by adding more good guys into the mix, which may include the family that birthed the Caped Crusader’s future sidekick.
In a lengthy interview, Ben McKenzie, who plays James Gordon, stated the Graysons might be some of the many characters that will appear this season. Here's what he had to say about the potential for the famous family to come on board the series.
“The Grayson’s may appear this season. I’m not 100 percent sure yet, but I think so."
In the interview with The Daily Beast, he didn’t specify whether Dick Grayson, a.k.a. Robin, would be included. In the comics, before Dick became the Boy Wonder, he was an acrobat who performed with his parents as part of the Flying Graysons in Haly’s Circus. His parents were killed after their wires were sabotaged by a mob hitman. Orphaned, Dick was taken in by Bruce Wayne, who wanted to give Dick the direction that he never had as a child when his own parents were murdered.This led to Dick becoming the first Robin, although after years as Batman’s sidekick, he eventually established his own superhero identity, Nightwing.
Bruce is only 12 years old in Gotham, so it’s likely that if the Graysons appear, we will see younger versions of Dick’s parents John and Mary. Haley’s Circus is a traveling circus, so it stands to reason that Bruce saw the performance several times before he witnessed the death of the Grayson parents in adulthood. Gotham has mostly shown us a young Bruce who has been spending all of his free time trying to figure out the conspiracy behind the death of his parents. Perhaps at some point Alfred may force him to have some real fun by taking him to Haly’s Circus.
There, the two of them could watch John and Mary perform their acrobat act. Not everyone watching Gotham is a comic book fan, but most of the viewers should be able to figure out that the parents foreshadow the appearance of Robin, especially if they’re wearing the red, yellow and green outfits like in Batman Forever. That being said, what could this mean for a Robin appearance on the show?
Gotham has already made it clear that it has no problems screwing with Batman’s timeline, which was especially evidenced by making Harvey Dent much older than Bruce. However, there can’t be any leeway when it comes to the age difference between Bruce and Dick. Bruce is an adult when he witnesses the Graysons’ murder, and is well into his Batman career. If Dick is going to show up in the series, we're guessing he won't be any older than a baby. This would still leave a 12-year gap between the two characters, which frankly wouldn't be much, but considering that Bruce and Dick are only about ten years apart in the New 52, 12 years might be plausible. Still, the writers would probably be better off not including Dick this soon. Not every Batman character needs to show up right away, and Dick is one who would benefit from appearing in a later season.
