They Just Killed Nightwing’s Best Villain (& Made A Huge DC Problem Even Worse)

Nightwing is DC’s rising star. Dick Grayson has always been a popular character, but in recent years, Nightwing’s popularity has exploded. He always stood at the precipice of being one of DC’s headliners, and he’s finally taken that next step to being one of their biggest names. The original Boy Wonder has shown that he has everything it takes to unite the entire superhero community under him when even the Justice League couldn’t, and has led the heroes to victory from some of their darkest moments. Nightwing is moving to become one of DC’s biggest heroes, but as of right now, he has one major problem: his villains. To make matters worse, they just killed his best one.

Olivia Pearce was introduced in Nightwing (2016) #119 and immediately demanded to be respected. As head of Spheric Solutions, she manipulated the entire city of Blüdhaven into giving her the power to let her killer robots loose in the streets. She was practically Dick’s Lex Luthor, especially given her hatred of him and ties to his past. He met her once before when he was Robin, and she was Columbina, servant of the Zanni. With hate, charisma, and an interesting backstory, Olivia had everything she needed to be a mainstay, recurring villain. But Nightwing #132 just killed her, and it made Nightwing’s villain problem worse.

A Child Turned Villain Lost Too Soon

Issue #132 saw Nightwing fly into a rage after his new partner, Nightwing-Prime, was shot with Kryptonite. Bryce was only a kid, and Nightwing decided enough was enough and confronted Pearce directly. Of course, she was ready for him. Columbina wore the same anti-fifth-dimensional energy suit Nightwing wore to stop Nite-Mite, which scanned his moves and now allowed her to fight just like him. Their fight took them to the roof, with Nightwing demanding to know what Columbina and the Zanni were doing with Blüdhaven’s missing children.

Columbina shouted that she was a kid once, too, but Nightwing never came to save her. The night after she first met Robin, Columbina set up another death trap to lure him in. She reasoned that heroes always save people, especially kids. So she rigged herself to a chair with a guillotine overhead, and waited for Robin to save her. But he never came. Olivia Pearce died that night, but the Zanni preserved her and kept her going, not letting her go until he could get his hands on Nightwing.

Olivia took off her mask and showed Nightwing her true, zombified face, just as the Zanni appeared and informed the Boy Wonder that the children were at the Cirque du Sin. As a helicopter circled overhead, the Zanni took out a slap stick, while Columbina said that birds in the circus signified death. Nightwing rushed forward, and at the same time, the Zanni cut off Olivia’s head, making the entire city think that Nightwing murdered her. With that, the light finally left Olivia’s eyes.

The Best Villain of the Sad Bunch

While Nightwing is one of DC’s new biggest names, the fact of the matter is that he doesn’t have all that many great villains. In fact, even though Batman has one of the best rogues galleries ever, Nightwing’s isn’t all that great. He has a few standout villains, like Blockbuster, Brutale, and Raptor, but none of them have stuck around. Blockbuster has died twice, once in New Earth continuity and once in Prime Earth continuity. Brutale has all but been thrown to the wayside and forgotten about, becoming a villain for other characters like Blue Beetle. Raptor, meanwhile, was introduced with the sole purpose of a single arc, and once that was completed, he was taken down, so his reappearance would feel cheap.

This is the eternal problem with Nightwing’s villains. Either they don’t leave an impact and are forgotten about, or they are written out of the story in one way or another to satisfy a narrative. Like with Columbina. The story surrounding Olivia’s death is fantastic, but she was introduced with the intention of being removed, and so Nightwing’s starving villain roster has lost yet another prominent character. Especially since Nightwing has taken on a bigger role in DC, his stories tend to be written for large narrative arcs rather than typical, self-contained comic issues. There’s obviously nothing wrong with this format, but it typically gives villains definitive arcs with ends, which makes it hard to establish an eternal villain roster.

Much like Wonder Woman, Nightwing is an A-list character with a severely underperforming rogues gallery. The Protector of Blüdhaven deserves to have his own roster that is as universally beloved as he is. After all, good villains bring out all the best and worst traits in a hero, and those make for the best stories. Of course, we still have the Zanni, so we’ll have to wait and see if Nightwing gets any more fantastic villains in the comics to come.

Nightwing #132 is on sale now!

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