If this is true then forget what I just said lol. Though this doesn't necessarily mean that the Helena coming out of Rebirth will be a completely new character, it's entirely possible that Matron becomes Huntress. But if Matron gets erased so they can insert pre-Flashpoint Helena....just another reason to be weary of Rebirth.

"Fantastic"

More changes done for nostalgia.

Instead she being the face leader of a world wide spy organization, she is relegated to be the suboordinate of a younger, less experienced, and for more than a years sillier Barbara Gordon.

Well that is sad considering Helena Wayne could of easily fill the BoP role.

That seems like a waste more than anything, and i'm someone who doesn't like either intepretation more than the other. Like @the_kidd pointed out you could've thrown Helena Wayne in there if you really wanted A Helena in Birds of Prey. Can't remember, was Helena Bertinelli even that well liked to justify this? Like if it was something akin to putting Bruce back in the Batman costume in place of Jim Gordon or Terry in Batman Beyond over Tim Drake then I get it, because both of those characters are massively more popular in the respective role. But is BoP Helena Bertinelli even popular like that? Always felt like she was kind of the outcast of that group.

It's tough to get a realistic consensus from fandom regarding pre-Flashpoint Birds of Prey because many people look at that team, especially when Gail Simone wrote them, through rose-colored glasses. When I talked to BOP fans, they did like Helena Bertinelli, but unless Huntress was their favorite character beforehand, she was hardly anyone's favorite in the series. I can't quite discern if they like her because of how Helena was written and her contributions to the story, or she just happened to be on the team when BOP was at its peak. It might seem presumptuous on my end, but I do feel as though there are a lot of characters who are elevated amongst fandom by just being a member of a fan-favorite team rather than any particular idiosyncrasies that one character possess, case in point John Stewart.

Personally, I thought that Helena Bertinelli was underused and somewhat underdeveloped in the Birds of Prey, a lot of that can be attributed to the amount of characters that were in the book as well as the tacit acknowledgment that Gail Simone heavily favored characters like Oracle and Black Canary (especially Oracle) over Huntress and Lady Shiva. But I do think that Helena Bertinelli can contribute a lot to a Birds of Prey book, provided that her development doesn't get shelved so that other characters can shine. Since we don't know who is going to write Batgirl and the Birds of Prey (my money is on Fletcher), there's no guarantee that's going to happen.

Now, I'm not going to be a hypocrite and view Matron in Grayson as a modern masterpiece of characterization, however, I do think that some of the best parts of the series involved Helena Bertinelli and her growing relationship with Agent Grayson. It can certainly be argued that her development slowed down once she became the head of Spyral and that in order to become fully realized, SeeKing should have expanded on her backstory more than like not at all. I'm not going to argue with any of those points. But I'm still highly skeptical of her move to the Birds of Prey, especially if they erase Matron and bring in pre-52 Helena Bertinelli. IMO, Spyral Bertinelli actually brings more to the table than pre-52 Helena Bertinelli, though my stance might have been shaped by my bias towards Grayson.

Anyone else see the Checkmate plot twist coming?! I was fighting back the tears when Grayson hopped in his copter after Agent One. T__T

@youknowwhattodo: Would you be more inclined to view Nightwing as a step forward if the mentor "Raptor" turned out to be Tiger? Unofficially he was always Dick's guide within Spyral. I mean he literally called Dick an idiot every issue all the while looking out for him lol. SeeKing(always think of the pokemon when I type that xD) made it a point to establish a camaraderie between them beginning in issue 10 when Dick proclaims he won't let his partner down and sets out to rescue him from the clutches of rogue Agent 8.

He took over Helena's old spot, wouldn't it be a useful tool to subtly introduce him in Grayson as this legendary badass on par with Grayson..? Yet he brings a particular set of skills Dick can benefit from learning. In a boxing gym for instance the cream of the crop aren't trained by other world champions. Usually it's an older coach there, one whom possesses a knowledge to stand on the outside looking in and point out a fighter's flaws. He exists to fine tune the prospect into an elite fighter by undoing whatever bad habits he's develop. In a sense who better to judge Grayson than the guy who shares our hero's motivations(internally bringing down spyral from the inside for the greater good) albeit for different reasons.

Initially the Grayson creative team hinted maybe Dick's adventures in espionage weren't exclusively bound to Spyral. Assuming we live in a parallel world where rebirth wasn't a looming certainty and we were blessed with worshipping a full scope canvass where Seeking had room to paint their ideas to fruition doesn't it almost make sense Dick's next location headed him towards Checkmate? I find it hard to believe Seeley is going to let all that brilliant world building go to waste. King Faraday is a bigger fish than Luka Netz after all.

Seeley confessed Dick was still going to work as an infiltrator as he hops the globe "under a new mentor figure". C'mon. Look at Tiger's face and tell me he doesn't remotely come off as a "Raptor" lol. Dick is freed of Batman/Spyral's service. He's a free agent. Checkmate gives him an incentive to work as a Knight under Bishop five. Going back and rereading the first Minos arc I can't help but feel there are clues laid out in the literature hiding in plain sight. Seriously am I overthinking things? I tend to...

So how does everyone feel about Grayson ending and Dick back to being Nightwing?

About damn time.

It's been a while since I was here.

Personally, so long as Dick can still go globetrotting, has his superspy skills and some gadgets mixed with his Nightwing stuff, and gets the proper solo book treatment as Nightwing, he can be Iron Man for all I care. And I hope we don't trail him having a civilian life honestly. If Grayson showed us one thing, it's that he's best just sticking to herorics thick and thin. Every other superhero has a direction of balancing a normal life with a superhero ones. An all-out superhero like Nightwing is a better idea IMO.

I don't care that much about his reversion but I'm bit annoyed how Grayson ended just to pit Dick against the CoO(or is it the Parliament of Owls now?) as I find them corny.