Rekindle App
May. 21st, 2013 09:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
acro_bat_icOOC Information
Player Name: Kevin
Player Age: 22
Player Contact: Aim Plurk and DW – dragon8writer
Player/Character HMD: http://acro-bat-ic.dreamwidth.org/917.html
Other characters in game: None
IC Information
Character Name: Barbara Gordon
Character Canon: The Batman – an animated version of the Batman comics, separate from DCAU, with its own timeline. OU.
Character Age/Gender: 18, female. (It’s worth noting that she looks almost exactly the same as she did at 16, though – Including the same outfit. Side effect of being a cartoon character.)
Canon Point: Following the end of S5 and the end of the series.
Character Canon History: http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Barbara_Gordon_(The_Batman) gives basic information, though it’s lacking a few details. For example, she got her official bat-gear toward the end of season 3, before Dick’s appearance in season 4 – though she wasn’t fully indoctrinated until after Dick joined the group, when Batman revealed everyone’s identities in order to try and make them form a more cohesive team.
The decision to become a crime fighter was somewhat impulsive, as she actually came up with this costume after a debacle with her then-friend Pamela Isley, that turned her friend into the super villain Poison Ivy. Barbara realized that her father would never allow her to become a cop after the fiasco – involving Batman, the mercenary “Temblor,” and Pamela Isley getting accidentally buried under some toxic fertilizer. Giving up on ever wearing the blue, Barbara decided to use a mask and put on purple tights in order to become a super hero.
As for Ivy, Barbara was fairly quick to draw a line between her old friend Pam and her current enemy. Barbara goes from wanting Pam to get better, to seemingly giving up on the idea that her old friend will ever return to her – though that doesn’t mean she’s completely forgotten the history they shared. Merely that she doesn’t hold back in her fights as Batgirl.
That led to a few months of essentially showing up uninvited at cases, after which Barbara finally managed to earn Batman’s acceptance - after saving his life and the city. With the arrival of Dick in season 4, the trio started to become a real team - although Barbara began to appear less often soon after, at least on screen. It’s implied she did solo work, and doesn’t seem to have been any less active in crime fighting despite her lack of screen time. The tie in comics –questionable in their canon though they may be – do show Barbara on more missions, as well as several solo work outs against big name baddies. Barbara also started college in Season 5, which would have led to some shifts in her personal schedule, though at least it would have been easier to fool her dad with her staying in the dorms.
Her day seemed to be filled with crime fighting, gymnastics, and school work. We know of no friends made since Ivy – and she is not shown to have any true social life. She appeared to spend her free time in either the Batcave or Bruce’s mansion, where they would all hang out in their civilian clothes.
Her home life (with her father) is generally nice, with some sorrow over the lack of her mother, who is implied to be dead and rarely mentioned. She loves her father, and it’s because of him that she wanted so badly to be a crime fighter. Unfortunately, he discouraged her from becoming a policewoman, concerned about her safety. Instead, he pushed her into gymnastics, believing she could play in the Olympics.
It is also worth noting that the “circumstances” Batman “manipulated” to maintain his secret – as mentioned in the wiki article - was actually a bump on the head that caused him to forget he was Batman He acted like something of a coward, abandoning Barbara when she tried to save him and convincing her for quite a while that he couldn’t possibly be the hero she admired.
Character Personality: Barbara comes off as a sassy and impulsive teenager, passionate about what she wants and willing to go after it. We don’t see that much of her life as a civilian, but what we do see of her at home isn’t that different from what we see of her as Batgirl.
She’s smart, answering questions in class but not seen as the teacher’s pet. When teased by the self-purported class clown, she sent back a zinger of her own with a far better reaction from the class than the original. She doesn’t make much trouble, that we see, but neither does she always do what she’s told. She makes that clear to everyone from the get-go, skipping gymnastic lessons to protest a company’s treatment of the environment, and lying to her father about it too. Barbara might respect authority figures… but she doesn’t let herself be ruled by them. She’s a willful young woman who isn’t afraid to go after what she believes in. Though, as her father points out, just what she believes in occasionally shifts. The environmental love was new, and most likely inspired by her friend Pamela Isley (later to become Poison Ivy).
That didn’t stop Barbara from devoting her all to it, though, sneaking into buildings to confront CEOs. The same ways she devoted herself to gymnastics, despite it being her father’s idea – his goal to deflect her from a career path as a police officer. The fact that she could match Dick, who’d been raised by performers to perform, shows that she clearly took the lessons seriously (despite occasionally skipping them to do other things.)
Her desire to fight crime goes more deeply than most of her impulses, though, and shines clear through to the surface. She’s wanted it since she was a child, practically raised in the police department, and she still wants it to the end. It comes out in the form of her bat costume – and again, she acts about the same in it as she does out.
Though it’s clear she’s intent on and passionate about what she’s doing as Batgirl, she’s also as impulsive as ever. She once leapt onto Batman’s motorcycle while it was on autopilot, turned it to manual driving, and ended up crashing it. Another time she leaped into Batman’s massive battle armor to fight the Joker when he was pumped up on Bane’s muscle-making formula. On yet another occasion, she took the helm of a villain’s flying headquarters to steer it away from the city and crash it into Gotham bay. At no point in of this did she receive one iota of training on how to use this equipment. The motorcycle she saw as a chance to have fun while catching up with Batman. The other two times she saw it as a necessity to stop a crook or save lives. Both times she did it without any real planning, coming up with ideas and acting on them as she went.
That’s not to say Barbara can’t plan. She’s an intelligent person who’s even been known to caution retreat when the odds are stacked too high against her. But she doesn’t always bother to plan ahead, when an idea takes her. Sometimes she’s apt to just leap into the fray of battle and start kicking butt. Once she and Robin left their stationed stakeout to get some snacks from the vending machine in the police office – and while there, they traded joking theories about how a man on a wanted poster had lost his eye. They almost got knocked out when the villains sprung their gaseous attack, but they did have fun; and when Black Mask’s henchmen tried to invade the police department, they stayed calm long enough to plan how to protect the building. They just did it while also cracking jokes at the expense of the villains.
After all, Barbara breaks out the sass on villains as easily as anyone else; whether they’re actually there to hear her or not. The sass is actually the side she often chooses to show the world in order to deflect people from her deeper motivations and to avoid showing off any fear. (Such as when she traded jokes with Robin after Black Masks threats, sharing theories about what he might be hiding under his facial coverings.)
For those more familiar with the comics, it would be good to think of this version as a mixture between the traditional Barbara Gordon, and Stephanie Brown. She even has a theme of purple running through her equipment.
To focus more on the inside, rather than the deflections: One of the most important things to recognize about Barbara is that she truly values justice. It’s the main reason she put on the bat costume. There’s no traumatic event in her past, or run in with the criminal element that caused her to make the decision. Her father is the police commissioner, and his passion for justice had the good luck to rub off on her. She in fact wanted to be a member of the police force herself, at first.
Unfortunately, Commissioner Gordon didn’t really want his daughter going into a job where she got shot at. He actively discouraged Barbara from joining the police force, and she suspected that he’d never allow her to follow the career. That’s why she made herself the Batgirl outfit. She thought it would be a way to fight crime regardless of what anyone else thought.
The second thing to realize about Barbara in fact ties into that first; this particular version of Barbara does everything with a youthful passion. On top of crime fighting, she also has an interest in the environment. She and her fellow redhead Pamela Isley joined together in order to protest companies that mistreated it. Unfortunately the protests turned out to be scouting missions for Pam, who would afterwards hire a mercenary to take out the buildings.
Barbara only learned this later. But she showed a loyalty that matches her love of justice when it happened. Rather than turning Pam over to the police, Barbara went directly to Pamela to try and talk down her friend. When that failed, and an accident with chemicals gave Pamela powers over plants, she still did not go to the police – instead, she went to Batman about the newly made “Poison Ivy,” recognizing the issue and hoping to find a solution. Trying to stop Ivy was in fact her first mission as Batgirl.
Most likely she felt a little guilty about Pam. After all, Barbara was there when the accident happened. She saw when the chemical laced dirt fell atop of Pam, and she was helpless to save her from it when her friend cried out to her. With that, and their past history, Barbara truly wanted to protect Pam. Yet that didn’t stop her from drawing a line between her old friend and this current villain, giving her all to take down Ivy. No doubt it helped that Ivy’s first mission was trying to kill Commissioner Gordon, making it rather clear that her friend had been changed.
I would like to note at this point that it is justice Barbara values, not just the law, and that neither ever entirely eclipses friendship or loyalty in her mind. When Poison Ivy first started up, Barbara did not really want Pamela to get arrested, she just wanted her friend stopped. In fact, when a classmate of hers later joined the Joker in a massive spree of practical jokes, Barbara worked to stop him without having him hurt. She didn’t want him being hurt over what she saw as a mere mistake. This is despite the fact that they did not get along in civilian life, and – unlike with Ivy – it had nothing to do with a previous friendship.
It’s not restricted to crime fighting alone, either, as seen in “attack of the terrible trio.” Even in her civil life, Barbara was quick to berate a bully for picking on a few misfits. She was just as quick to berate that trio for enjoying the pain of the bullying jock, after he was put in the hospital. Cliques don’t matter to her. Friendship does, but not enough that she’ll allow friends or former friends to go on hurting others. There’s a reason she never hesitates to take Ivy down, despite their past. In the end, Barbara has to do what she feels is right: whatever that happens to be.
Truthfully, Barbara is very independently minded - not to mention stubborn. She ignored her father’s protective orders and hid her face under a mask, so that she could go off to fight crime. When Batman told her no, she essentially told him that he couldn’t stop her. She wanted to work with him against crime, and she continued showing up and joining him despite all protests. She continued even when he attempted to ignore her, despite his rebuffing of her status as his partner. She continued showing up, and continued referring to herself as his sidekick with single minded determination to prove herself, until he finally accepted her. Mostly because she saved his life, saved the city, and kept going when everything else was falling apart. This independence and determination of hers is apparent whether dealing with friends, partners, or the law itself.
That said, she obviously values team work and respects Batman, her inspiration for putting on the mask. He’s the hero her father is always thanking. It’s likely that she (unconsciously) sees him as a secondary father figure: desiring his approval of her crime fighting, in lieu of her actual father who is not allowed to know what she is doing, and who has never approved of her desire to go into crime.
This is most likely why she continuously strove to be accepted as Batman’s sidekick, even while ignoring half his orders: always trying to prove herself, always pushing into battle in the hopes of getting a job well done from Batman (not to mention from the unknowing Commissioner – though his approval she could have in every other aspect of her life.)
It also explains why she was so often annoyed at Bruce throughout the series. First because he left her out of the loop, making her practically stalk him if she wanted to find anything out and only revealing information on a need-to-know basis. Then because he brought in Dick. an “official” sidekick, who had gotten to see the Batcave and knew Bruce’s secret identity despite neither being revealed to Barbara up to that point. Not to mention Bruce not bothering to know where she went to college. To quote Barbara, ““He can give you the atomic weight of iridium and the private phone number of the president, but does he remember that I graduated high school? No.”
Bruce did begin to correct some of this at the start of season 5, in the hopes of making them more of a team. He reveals his identity and takes her to the Batcave. It still left her somewhat jealous of Dick, though, not to mention annoyed with Batman for simply scooping up a partner after making her work so hard to earn her place.
Barbara did eventually come to accept Robin as a member of the team, and to work alongside him. Still, the rivalry between them was eternal, much like with actual siblings. Like a big sister, annoyed at how much attention baby bro is gaining for himself, Barbara is caught between annoyance with Bruce over how little attention she gets… and actual affection for the younger partner she didn’t want, but who’s presence she has still come to rely upon. The end result is mutual teasing. It’s something that marks both their rivalry and their bond, and shows up heavily in their quips when they’re working alone together. They reassure each other when afraid, complain about who has to do what, and worry when they think the other is hurt.
Of course, as much as Barbara relies upon her partners, as much as she wants Batman’s approval, her desire to fight crime predates both of them. With a police commissioner as a father, practically growing up in the station, her desire to fight for justice is still more deeply instilled than anything else.
Character Abilities: A skilled gymnast, she describes herself as an Olympic-hopeful – she’s capable of keeping up with Dick, who spent his entire life training to be an acrobat. Her greatest assets seem to be her dexterity, flexibility and speed – allowing her to jump cartwheel and all around dodge her way out of danger, leaping up to avoid shock waves or moving in time to avoid a punch. Physically, she’s not that buff -but she knows how to kick and punch.
While she’s had occasional training sessions with Batman and Robin, it’s fairly clear she has not had their level of intense training. Still - she knows how to protect herself, and keeps up with them on the field. She’s combined gymnastic training with self defense nicely.
She also rapidly learned how to aim – she is quite god at throwing her batarangs, and hitting her mark.
She is capable of using a computer, though she has hinted that she is not the best with them at this time.
She was able to make her own batarangs, implying she can do some metalworking.
Character Inventory: Estimating:
-Five batarangs – boomerangs shaped like bats that strike against an enemy and come back.
-A grappling hook, shaped like a bat, that can be used to catch hold of things. Contains a motor to pull her up.
-A purple gas mask, used to filter out poisons.
-Three smoke pellets, each capable of creating a billowing smoke cloud – most potent when used together.
-Three ice pellets – they are capable of freezing anything in the immediate vicinity when they explode. They work best in water, freezing the entire area (and often anything inside said water, particularly if it’s wet or susceptible to cold.)
-Three exploding pellets – each making a small blast, enough to blow a lock off a door but not meant to cause serious damage.
-Her bat costume – as seen here - including the utility belt which contains pellets, and is capable of holding other items as well. The cape is fireproof (or so I am assuming, since that is standard practice among batfam.)
Samples: [One third person/introspective sample, and one thread of interaction with at least one other character. There will be a test drive meme open before each application round, but bakerstreet, dear_mun, and previous game threads all count if you prefer to use those for your interactive sample, so long as they are threads for the same version of the character you're apping - so, a meme thread with an OU version of a character would not count if you were apping an AU version of a character, but would if you were apping them as OU.]
Barbara felt her cape fluttering as she peered over the rooftop edge. She tugged it closer around herself, the black material shielding her from the wind while she peered over the edge. There were people everywhere, touching hands – probably trying to stave off whatever strange illness was affecting people here.
If she was smart, Barbara would be doing that too. The costume didn’t just shield her from the wind, though – it shielded her from people. It wasn’t like she could go running among them with that getup on. Besides, right then she needed the thin barrier between her and the rest of the world. She needed the freedom to think.
Pops would be wondering about her by then. Her class mates probably wouldn’t have noticed; maybe Bruce would have noticed, if he wasn’t in Tibet with Robin or something. Robin… was probably enjoying having Bruce to himself.
At least it was for a good cause, she reminded herself. But it didn’t feel like she was making an impact. Not like she did back home… She wished there was someone to talk to; someone from home, instead of a bunch of lookalikes and random strangers.
With a final sigh, Barbara backed up from the roof and ran off of the edge. Landing on the next roof over, she kept moving; leaping from one to another, flipping through the air. She let the cool of night clear her head, as she sent a grappling hook out to let her swing over the streets and summersault her way to yet another building. Without quite meaning to, Barbara found her eyes scanning the streets for signs of crime: a mugger, a supervillain, maybe a bank robbery. She didn’t need Batman to be Batgirl, after all. Every world had its share of injustices for her to help fix. …Maybe she could even get them to call her Batwoman, this time around.
Grinning, the redhead set her sights toward the darker alleys. She’d be almost certain to find someone to bring in there.
And the thread
Player Name: Kevin
Player Age: 22
Player Contact: Aim Plurk and DW – dragon8writer
Player/Character HMD: http://acro-bat-ic.dreamwidth.org/917.html
Other characters in game: None
IC Information
Character Name: Barbara Gordon
Character Canon: The Batman – an animated version of the Batman comics, separate from DCAU, with its own timeline. OU.
Character Age/Gender: 18, female. (It’s worth noting that she looks almost exactly the same as she did at 16, though – Including the same outfit. Side effect of being a cartoon character.)
Canon Point: Following the end of S5 and the end of the series.
Character Canon History: http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Barbara_Gordon_(The_Batman) gives basic information, though it’s lacking a few details. For example, she got her official bat-gear toward the end of season 3, before Dick’s appearance in season 4 – though she wasn’t fully indoctrinated until after Dick joined the group, when Batman revealed everyone’s identities in order to try and make them form a more cohesive team.
The decision to become a crime fighter was somewhat impulsive, as she actually came up with this costume after a debacle with her then-friend Pamela Isley, that turned her friend into the super villain Poison Ivy. Barbara realized that her father would never allow her to become a cop after the fiasco – involving Batman, the mercenary “Temblor,” and Pamela Isley getting accidentally buried under some toxic fertilizer. Giving up on ever wearing the blue, Barbara decided to use a mask and put on purple tights in order to become a super hero.
As for Ivy, Barbara was fairly quick to draw a line between her old friend Pam and her current enemy. Barbara goes from wanting Pam to get better, to seemingly giving up on the idea that her old friend will ever return to her – though that doesn’t mean she’s completely forgotten the history they shared. Merely that she doesn’t hold back in her fights as Batgirl.
That led to a few months of essentially showing up uninvited at cases, after which Barbara finally managed to earn Batman’s acceptance - after saving his life and the city. With the arrival of Dick in season 4, the trio started to become a real team - although Barbara began to appear less often soon after, at least on screen. It’s implied she did solo work, and doesn’t seem to have been any less active in crime fighting despite her lack of screen time. The tie in comics –questionable in their canon though they may be – do show Barbara on more missions, as well as several solo work outs against big name baddies. Barbara also started college in Season 5, which would have led to some shifts in her personal schedule, though at least it would have been easier to fool her dad with her staying in the dorms.
Her day seemed to be filled with crime fighting, gymnastics, and school work. We know of no friends made since Ivy – and she is not shown to have any true social life. She appeared to spend her free time in either the Batcave or Bruce’s mansion, where they would all hang out in their civilian clothes.
Her home life (with her father) is generally nice, with some sorrow over the lack of her mother, who is implied to be dead and rarely mentioned. She loves her father, and it’s because of him that she wanted so badly to be a crime fighter. Unfortunately, he discouraged her from becoming a policewoman, concerned about her safety. Instead, he pushed her into gymnastics, believing she could play in the Olympics.
It is also worth noting that the “circumstances” Batman “manipulated” to maintain his secret – as mentioned in the wiki article - was actually a bump on the head that caused him to forget he was Batman He acted like something of a coward, abandoning Barbara when she tried to save him and convincing her for quite a while that he couldn’t possibly be the hero she admired.
Character Personality: Barbara comes off as a sassy and impulsive teenager, passionate about what she wants and willing to go after it. We don’t see that much of her life as a civilian, but what we do see of her at home isn’t that different from what we see of her as Batgirl.
She’s smart, answering questions in class but not seen as the teacher’s pet. When teased by the self-purported class clown, she sent back a zinger of her own with a far better reaction from the class than the original. She doesn’t make much trouble, that we see, but neither does she always do what she’s told. She makes that clear to everyone from the get-go, skipping gymnastic lessons to protest a company’s treatment of the environment, and lying to her father about it too. Barbara might respect authority figures… but she doesn’t let herself be ruled by them. She’s a willful young woman who isn’t afraid to go after what she believes in. Though, as her father points out, just what she believes in occasionally shifts. The environmental love was new, and most likely inspired by her friend Pamela Isley (later to become Poison Ivy).
That didn’t stop Barbara from devoting her all to it, though, sneaking into buildings to confront CEOs. The same ways she devoted herself to gymnastics, despite it being her father’s idea – his goal to deflect her from a career path as a police officer. The fact that she could match Dick, who’d been raised by performers to perform, shows that she clearly took the lessons seriously (despite occasionally skipping them to do other things.)
Her desire to fight crime goes more deeply than most of her impulses, though, and shines clear through to the surface. She’s wanted it since she was a child, practically raised in the police department, and she still wants it to the end. It comes out in the form of her bat costume – and again, she acts about the same in it as she does out.
Though it’s clear she’s intent on and passionate about what she’s doing as Batgirl, she’s also as impulsive as ever. She once leapt onto Batman’s motorcycle while it was on autopilot, turned it to manual driving, and ended up crashing it. Another time she leaped into Batman’s massive battle armor to fight the Joker when he was pumped up on Bane’s muscle-making formula. On yet another occasion, she took the helm of a villain’s flying headquarters to steer it away from the city and crash it into Gotham bay. At no point in of this did she receive one iota of training on how to use this equipment. The motorcycle she saw as a chance to have fun while catching up with Batman. The other two times she saw it as a necessity to stop a crook or save lives. Both times she did it without any real planning, coming up with ideas and acting on them as she went.
That’s not to say Barbara can’t plan. She’s an intelligent person who’s even been known to caution retreat when the odds are stacked too high against her. But she doesn’t always bother to plan ahead, when an idea takes her. Sometimes she’s apt to just leap into the fray of battle and start kicking butt. Once she and Robin left their stationed stakeout to get some snacks from the vending machine in the police office – and while there, they traded joking theories about how a man on a wanted poster had lost his eye. They almost got knocked out when the villains sprung their gaseous attack, but they did have fun; and when Black Mask’s henchmen tried to invade the police department, they stayed calm long enough to plan how to protect the building. They just did it while also cracking jokes at the expense of the villains.
After all, Barbara breaks out the sass on villains as easily as anyone else; whether they’re actually there to hear her or not. The sass is actually the side she often chooses to show the world in order to deflect people from her deeper motivations and to avoid showing off any fear. (Such as when she traded jokes with Robin after Black Masks threats, sharing theories about what he might be hiding under his facial coverings.)
For those more familiar with the comics, it would be good to think of this version as a mixture between the traditional Barbara Gordon, and Stephanie Brown. She even has a theme of purple running through her equipment.
To focus more on the inside, rather than the deflections: One of the most important things to recognize about Barbara is that she truly values justice. It’s the main reason she put on the bat costume. There’s no traumatic event in her past, or run in with the criminal element that caused her to make the decision. Her father is the police commissioner, and his passion for justice had the good luck to rub off on her. She in fact wanted to be a member of the police force herself, at first.
Unfortunately, Commissioner Gordon didn’t really want his daughter going into a job where she got shot at. He actively discouraged Barbara from joining the police force, and she suspected that he’d never allow her to follow the career. That’s why she made herself the Batgirl outfit. She thought it would be a way to fight crime regardless of what anyone else thought.
The second thing to realize about Barbara in fact ties into that first; this particular version of Barbara does everything with a youthful passion. On top of crime fighting, she also has an interest in the environment. She and her fellow redhead Pamela Isley joined together in order to protest companies that mistreated it. Unfortunately the protests turned out to be scouting missions for Pam, who would afterwards hire a mercenary to take out the buildings.
Barbara only learned this later. But she showed a loyalty that matches her love of justice when it happened. Rather than turning Pam over to the police, Barbara went directly to Pamela to try and talk down her friend. When that failed, and an accident with chemicals gave Pamela powers over plants, she still did not go to the police – instead, she went to Batman about the newly made “Poison Ivy,” recognizing the issue and hoping to find a solution. Trying to stop Ivy was in fact her first mission as Batgirl.
Most likely she felt a little guilty about Pam. After all, Barbara was there when the accident happened. She saw when the chemical laced dirt fell atop of Pam, and she was helpless to save her from it when her friend cried out to her. With that, and their past history, Barbara truly wanted to protect Pam. Yet that didn’t stop her from drawing a line between her old friend and this current villain, giving her all to take down Ivy. No doubt it helped that Ivy’s first mission was trying to kill Commissioner Gordon, making it rather clear that her friend had been changed.
I would like to note at this point that it is justice Barbara values, not just the law, and that neither ever entirely eclipses friendship or loyalty in her mind. When Poison Ivy first started up, Barbara did not really want Pamela to get arrested, she just wanted her friend stopped. In fact, when a classmate of hers later joined the Joker in a massive spree of practical jokes, Barbara worked to stop him without having him hurt. She didn’t want him being hurt over what she saw as a mere mistake. This is despite the fact that they did not get along in civilian life, and – unlike with Ivy – it had nothing to do with a previous friendship.
It’s not restricted to crime fighting alone, either, as seen in “attack of the terrible trio.” Even in her civil life, Barbara was quick to berate a bully for picking on a few misfits. She was just as quick to berate that trio for enjoying the pain of the bullying jock, after he was put in the hospital. Cliques don’t matter to her. Friendship does, but not enough that she’ll allow friends or former friends to go on hurting others. There’s a reason she never hesitates to take Ivy down, despite their past. In the end, Barbara has to do what she feels is right: whatever that happens to be.
Truthfully, Barbara is very independently minded - not to mention stubborn. She ignored her father’s protective orders and hid her face under a mask, so that she could go off to fight crime. When Batman told her no, she essentially told him that he couldn’t stop her. She wanted to work with him against crime, and she continued showing up and joining him despite all protests. She continued even when he attempted to ignore her, despite his rebuffing of her status as his partner. She continued showing up, and continued referring to herself as his sidekick with single minded determination to prove herself, until he finally accepted her. Mostly because she saved his life, saved the city, and kept going when everything else was falling apart. This independence and determination of hers is apparent whether dealing with friends, partners, or the law itself.
That said, she obviously values team work and respects Batman, her inspiration for putting on the mask. He’s the hero her father is always thanking. It’s likely that she (unconsciously) sees him as a secondary father figure: desiring his approval of her crime fighting, in lieu of her actual father who is not allowed to know what she is doing, and who has never approved of her desire to go into crime.
This is most likely why she continuously strove to be accepted as Batman’s sidekick, even while ignoring half his orders: always trying to prove herself, always pushing into battle in the hopes of getting a job well done from Batman (not to mention from the unknowing Commissioner – though his approval she could have in every other aspect of her life.)
It also explains why she was so often annoyed at Bruce throughout the series. First because he left her out of the loop, making her practically stalk him if she wanted to find anything out and only revealing information on a need-to-know basis. Then because he brought in Dick. an “official” sidekick, who had gotten to see the Batcave and knew Bruce’s secret identity despite neither being revealed to Barbara up to that point. Not to mention Bruce not bothering to know where she went to college. To quote Barbara, ““He can give you the atomic weight of iridium and the private phone number of the president, but does he remember that I graduated high school? No.”
Bruce did begin to correct some of this at the start of season 5, in the hopes of making them more of a team. He reveals his identity and takes her to the Batcave. It still left her somewhat jealous of Dick, though, not to mention annoyed with Batman for simply scooping up a partner after making her work so hard to earn her place.
Barbara did eventually come to accept Robin as a member of the team, and to work alongside him. Still, the rivalry between them was eternal, much like with actual siblings. Like a big sister, annoyed at how much attention baby bro is gaining for himself, Barbara is caught between annoyance with Bruce over how little attention she gets… and actual affection for the younger partner she didn’t want, but who’s presence she has still come to rely upon. The end result is mutual teasing. It’s something that marks both their rivalry and their bond, and shows up heavily in their quips when they’re working alone together. They reassure each other when afraid, complain about who has to do what, and worry when they think the other is hurt.
Of course, as much as Barbara relies upon her partners, as much as she wants Batman’s approval, her desire to fight crime predates both of them. With a police commissioner as a father, practically growing up in the station, her desire to fight for justice is still more deeply instilled than anything else.
Character Abilities: A skilled gymnast, she describes herself as an Olympic-hopeful – she’s capable of keeping up with Dick, who spent his entire life training to be an acrobat. Her greatest assets seem to be her dexterity, flexibility and speed – allowing her to jump cartwheel and all around dodge her way out of danger, leaping up to avoid shock waves or moving in time to avoid a punch. Physically, she’s not that buff -but she knows how to kick and punch.
While she’s had occasional training sessions with Batman and Robin, it’s fairly clear she has not had their level of intense training. Still - she knows how to protect herself, and keeps up with them on the field. She’s combined gymnastic training with self defense nicely.
She also rapidly learned how to aim – she is quite god at throwing her batarangs, and hitting her mark.
She is capable of using a computer, though she has hinted that she is not the best with them at this time.
She was able to make her own batarangs, implying she can do some metalworking.
Character Inventory: Estimating:
-Five batarangs – boomerangs shaped like bats that strike against an enemy and come back.
-A grappling hook, shaped like a bat, that can be used to catch hold of things. Contains a motor to pull her up.
-A purple gas mask, used to filter out poisons.
-Three smoke pellets, each capable of creating a billowing smoke cloud – most potent when used together.
-Three ice pellets – they are capable of freezing anything in the immediate vicinity when they explode. They work best in water, freezing the entire area (and often anything inside said water, particularly if it’s wet or susceptible to cold.)
-Three exploding pellets – each making a small blast, enough to blow a lock off a door but not meant to cause serious damage.
-Her bat costume – as seen here - including the utility belt which contains pellets, and is capable of holding other items as well. The cape is fireproof (or so I am assuming, since that is standard practice among batfam.)
Samples: [One third person/introspective sample, and one thread of interaction with at least one other character. There will be a test drive meme open before each application round, but bakerstreet, dear_mun, and previous game threads all count if you prefer to use those for your interactive sample, so long as they are threads for the same version of the character you're apping - so, a meme thread with an OU version of a character would not count if you were apping an AU version of a character, but would if you were apping them as OU.]
Barbara felt her cape fluttering as she peered over the rooftop edge. She tugged it closer around herself, the black material shielding her from the wind while she peered over the edge. There were people everywhere, touching hands – probably trying to stave off whatever strange illness was affecting people here.
If she was smart, Barbara would be doing that too. The costume didn’t just shield her from the wind, though – it shielded her from people. It wasn’t like she could go running among them with that getup on. Besides, right then she needed the thin barrier between her and the rest of the world. She needed the freedom to think.
Pops would be wondering about her by then. Her class mates probably wouldn’t have noticed; maybe Bruce would have noticed, if he wasn’t in Tibet with Robin or something. Robin… was probably enjoying having Bruce to himself.
At least it was for a good cause, she reminded herself. But it didn’t feel like she was making an impact. Not like she did back home… She wished there was someone to talk to; someone from home, instead of a bunch of lookalikes and random strangers.
With a final sigh, Barbara backed up from the roof and ran off of the edge. Landing on the next roof over, she kept moving; leaping from one to another, flipping through the air. She let the cool of night clear her head, as she sent a grappling hook out to let her swing over the streets and summersault her way to yet another building. Without quite meaning to, Barbara found her eyes scanning the streets for signs of crime: a mugger, a supervillain, maybe a bank robbery. She didn’t need Batman to be Batgirl, after all. Every world had its share of injustices for her to help fix. …Maybe she could even get them to call her Batwoman, this time around.
Grinning, the redhead set her sights toward the darker alleys. She’d be almost certain to find someone to bring in there.
And the thread
