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Boy (And Girl) Wonders: Batman’s 10 Greatest Sidekicks

Despite being the poster boy for lonely, brooding superheroes, Batman has one of the - if not the - biggest supporting cast of sidekicks and allies in all comic books. As The LEGO Batman Movie so insightfully pointed out, Bruce Wayne lost his biological family as a boy and so has made up his own family in adulthood.

1) Dick Grayson

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As brilliant as Babs is, there’s only one who can be named Batman’s greatest sidekick. The original and the best Boy Wonder, Richard ‘Dick’ Grayson. Over his near eighty years of history, Dick has gone through one of the most dramatic evolutions of any comic book character. He’s come a long way since being the orphaned circus acrobat that Bruce Wayne took into his care and subsequently trained up as his sidekick.

Perhaps the big turning point for Grayson’s character was the creation of the Teen Titans, which he formed with a bunch of other child sidekicks, as it proved that Dick didn’t need to be at Batman’s side to save the day. This led to him distancing himself from his former mentor and operating as Nightwing, watching over Gotham’s neighboring city Bludhaven as its protector. Grayson has even donned Batman’s cowl himself a few times over the years, when Bruce has been indisposed/suffering from a broken back/dead, but has never felt truly comfortable as the Dark Knight.

There aren’t many sidekicks who are as famous as their hero, but Dick Grayson, as the original Robin, can claim that rare honour. As both the upcoming Titans TV series and Nightwing solo movie show, wherever there’s Batman, Dick Grayson is never far behind.