15 Most Controversial DC Retcons Of All Time

11. Four Robins In Five Years

When DC decided to reboot their universe in 2011 with their New 52 initiative, they wanted to de-age many of their main characters in order to keep them young and spry. Thus at the opening of Justice League #1, the superheroes had only been around for a total of five years. This wouldn€™t have been a problem if DC actually did a proper reboot and started from square one; however, they wanted to keep some of the more popular elements of their previous universe €“ specifically the Batman and Green Lantern franchises. The five-year timeline was particularly problematic for Batman due to the number of Robins he€™s trained over the years. This meant that DC had to scramble to find a way to explain this, as the time line didn€™t make sense. Apparently, while Dick and Jason where actual €œRobins€, Tim Drake was never called Robin but rather €œRed Robin.€ Fine. Whatever. (The timeline still doesn€™t make sense). Things got a bit more creative when it came to Damian, the 10-year-old son of Batman and Talia al Ghul who became Robin only a few years before The New 52 began. Grant Morrison addressed this issue in the second volume of Batman Incorporated, where it was retconed that Damian was bio-engineered from Bruce and Talia€™s DNA. All of these retcons were un-necessary had DC not rushed their reboot and took the time to plan things out.
Contributor
Contributor

Since childhood, Bryant has been an avid fan of superheroes, and he has been reading comic books since 2006. His full name is "George Bryant Lucas"; however, after enduring countless Darth Vader jokes, he has chosen to go by his middle name. Born and raised in the United States, Bryant is currently living with his lovely wife in the country side of Wiltshire County, UK. Bryant does suffer from a mild case of dyslexia; misspellings and homonyms are to be expected on occasion.