I ordered these shirts with a great deal of trepidation. Honestly, who wants to be Robin? He's kind of a putz they stuck Batman with to lower his coolness for some reason.

Of course, I am not the only one who feels this way. In "A Death in the Family" Joker beats the hell out of Robin (Jason Todd) with a crowbar and ties him up with a bomb. The issue was left as a cliffhanger and fans could call in and vote whether he should live or die. Death was voted by the narrowest of margins, which means more than half the fans out there agree with me.

On the other hand, I kind of liked Robin on the Teen Titans. I don't know if it makes a difference, but the Teen Titans Robin was Dick Grayson, who later became Nightwing. I guess it could be that he was slightly less annoying.

Robin fits into a weird category that is shared by Tonto from the Lone Ranger and Checkov from Star Trek TOS: they are all the series whipping boys. Whenever something bad but not quite fatal has to happen these poor guys step into the blender and get beat upon. Sidekicks get the short end all the time. I found this article on sidekicks that aren't Robin that is pretty good, although I don't think Fallout Boy belongs on there (or anywhere on the planet. That band sucks).