When Robin persona behind, but he’s veered even farther from the path before.
There have been a handful of times when Dick has allegedly turned to the dark side. However, when he breaks bad as an undercover persona in Nightwing #111, he proves his potential as a supervillain. If he chose to go that route, he might even be a greater threat than Jason Todd’s Red Hood was initially. As a means to infiltrate Deathstroke’s Secret Society, Dick takes on a new costume and a different name, “Renegade,” as seen in Nightwing #114. The persona comes as a result of Ravager pushing him to create a new identity. The series was written by Devin Grayson with art by Cliff Chiang and colors by Ande Parks, Gregory Wright, Phil Hester. The issue echoes the animated Teen Titans in which Robin homages Deathstroke and wears an alternate orange and black costume, emulating Slade.
When Dick becomes Renegade and speaks with Deathstroke about the reason he has turned into a villain, he retorts that he has crossed a line. After permitting the brutal death of the hulking Blockbuster, he denounces any connection to the Dark Knight, saying, "From this point on, none of this has anything to do with Batman." In the moment, it seemed like a very real interaction, as Dick vented to Slade. Later on in Nightwing #117, Batman confronts Dick, saying, "You’ve been trying to kill yourself for the past six months." After Nightwing failed to prevent Blockbuster’s demise, Dick fell into the darkest state he has ever been, even questioning his own allegiance and becoming confused with his Renegade persona.
With these two scenes put side-by-side, it appears that Renegade isn’t just a strategy that Dick has to take down Deathstroke. Instead, it’s a cathartic initiative intended to make sense of his failure. Having believed that he is irredeemable, he embraces his villainous identity, but Batman sees through him. Likely recognizing a part of himself, Bruce sees Dick’s guilt and doesn’t know any other way to reach him aside from bringing up his death wish.
When Nightwing renounced his Robin identity, he similarly took on the Nightwing costume with his new costume to match. In retrospect, it seems that he has a repeated habit of trying to escape from his actions by becoming a new person. In contrast, Batman has generally maintained his name and costume, even after doing something regrettable. In some iterations when Batman crosses the line and kills, he merely becomes a numbed, hardened version of himself, accepting the reality of his current state. On the other hand, Nightwing is in constant search of an escape from himself.
