A solid trade that any fan of DC Comics can pick up and enjoy. Rebirth continues to be just that for DC and a breath of fresh air for the superhero genre.

Since I'm fairly new to the DC universe, I went into reading this book not knowing anything about Nightwing, who he is, who he was before he became Nightwing and why he is so important in the Batman universe.

The artwork was pretty, but I felt like the artist at times wasn't really sure how to draw the characters, as the drawing style changed a bit between issues. The artwork was also a bit darker, fitting the storyline, but I felt the need for some lighter panels here and there.

As for the storyline, it wasn't all that clear. There are funny parts, with him and Babs trying to go out, and with the new Robin and Nightwing himself. But I wasn't really sure what was happening at times. I felt like the plot for this book was driven mostly by the inner struggle of Nightwing rather than an actual bad guy. Yes, there is a bad guy involved, but call it ignorance or whatever, but I didn't feel that connected to the story. Now, keep in mind that this volume has 2 missing issues, 5 and 6, and maybe some of the story makes more sense with those two issues inside, but that's how I read this book.

I would like to read more about Nightwing, probably some of the older stories about him, because it is interesting to see how the old Robin transforms into Nightwing. All in all, the book, while not one of my favorite DC stories so far, it served its purpose and made me curious about the character a lot more than I was in the beginning.

Grayson fans will be pleased with a Rebirth Nightwing series that remains faithful to what came before. That cuts both ways, however, because in many respects Tim Seeley's Nightwing Vol. 1: Better than Batman is about once-reluctant super-spy Dick Grayson finding himself now hesitant to give up the "shoot first and ask questions later" and "consequences be damned" aesthetic of his days with Spyral. Seeley still writes an enjoyable, interesting Dick Grayson; the plot of Nightwing Vol. 1: Better than Batman is good, and Tim Seeley's Nightwing is never dull.

Dick Grayson goes deep undercover into the Parliament of Owls (an international branch of the Court of Owls). They think they have Nightwing under their thumb . . . .uh, wing. Little do they know, Grayson’s goal is to expose the secret society for who they are, and bring the whole court down.

The Parliament partners Nightwing with Raptor, a highly skilled thief who touts to be better than Batman. But, as Dick will discover, Raptor has a connection to his circus past. This back story could be fun to explore in future issues.

This collection is a solid introduction to the new Nightwing reader. The storyline is fairly fast paced, but does end a bit abruptly. For those who enjoyed the Grayson series, the introduction to the Rebirth series provides a nice bridge.

I'm glad to see Dick Grayson back as Nightwing. Unfortunately, one of the writers from Grayson (Tim Seeley) came with him. Dick is written so blandly, there's nothing interesting about him. The only thing he has is the occasional meetup with Batgirl. The art is generic with drab coloring. Raptor has one of the worst designed costumes I've ever seen. He looks like a modern day version of Wild Dog with that stupid velcroed on mask. There's no way he could fight in that thing with the coat that comes down around his thighs and cinched. Nightwing was at his best when Kyle Higgens or Chuck Dixon was writing him. I'd love to see one of them come back and set Nightwing on an interesting path.

Received an advance copy from NetGalley and DC in exchange for an honest review.

Nightwing, Volume 1: Better Than Batman by Tim Seeley is the return of Dick Grayson to the Batman Universe as the superhero Nightwing. The DC Universe has changed and the issues (basically the identity reveal and faked death of Dick Grayson) that forced the character of Nightwing into hiding are no longer a part of the current reality. Now Dick Grayson has returned and can once again be Nightwing.

While this may be applauded by Nightwing fans, it does come as something as a slap to fans of the comic Grayson. This comic was actually one of the better written successes of the New 52 slew of comics. Dick Grayson as a Bondesque super spy for an organization that may or may not be on the side of good, was a very good book. Hopefully the new Nightwing comic will maintain some of the elements of Grayson to encourage that readership to follow the new run.

This new book has Nightwing teaming up with a questionable ally, breaking dates with Barbara Gordon and joining the Court of Owls to solve a mystery that has its roots in the history of both himself and the Batman. We get a glimpse of a far more tragic Dick Grayson, someone whose time away the New 52 run, has him playing catch up with relationships and his place in the Batman Universe. Which is okay since you never get the sense that Dick wants to be part of this Universe. No we start to see a Dick Grayson who is ready to come into his own.

Nightwing is a good book, it runs on the periphery of the Batman Universe but still does not set Dick Grayson free to be his own man. In Nightwing he is still in the shadow of Batman, he is still the first Robin. This is something that the Grayson books gave him a chance to be. His own man. The writing is good and the artwork strong but it will be sometime before we see if this run is strong enough to win over Grayson fans.

ARC from Netgalley.
3.5 Stars.
Finally distancing himself from Spyral, Dick Grayson has put back on the blue and black and reclaimed the title of Nightwing. But he hasn't given up his spy ways just yet.... his next mission is to infiltrate and take down the "Parliament of Owls", a world organization very similar to Gotham's "Court of Owls". Still sticking with his superhero code has them weary, so they team him with Raptor, a thief who seems to have motivations of his own. Raptor, who tries to teach Nightwing that he is "better than Batman", turns out to be on the good side yet his origins stretch back to Dick's childhood in the circus.
Batgirl makes and appearance as well, seemingly trying to date Nightwing, which adds some humor, but just makes me long for pre-Burnside Batgirl all the more.
The Parliament goes down, Raptor gets away, and Nightwing moves on to his next adventure. I'll continue with this title for a bit yet.
Recommend.

Really good artwork on this one! The story is pretty great too, with the undercover spying and all. Former Batman's Robin is now becoming Nightwing. Some may had not seen this coming but what can you do.

It is not super great story at some points, but it is pretty good overall. An enjoyable comic to read.

Dick Grayson is back as Nightwing after his stint as a secret agent for Spyral. He has also been co-opted by the Parliament of Owls as a heavy in their plan to create a country and take over the world. Then Raptor drops in. Another heavy for the Owls, but one with some strange links to Grayson's past. Can he survive all the juggling he is doing? And if he does, will he survive Batgirl?

Considering how I have not read any of Nightwing’s previous books, I found it very easy to pick up where he was at the start.

The storyline is around the Parliament of Owls blackmailing Dick into working for them. We then follow him on a series of missions set by the Parliament of Owls and him trying to get into their organisation so that he can take them down. Whilst a fairly simple plot, I still found it very enjoyable with enough plot twists to not make it boring. I do find that sometimes, having a simple plot that only focuses on one thing (in this case Dick trying to take down the Parliament of Owls) can benefit the story as it does not get bogged down by trying to do too much.

Although the storyline is an important aspect of a comic book, a great story cannot make up for bad artwork. Fortunately, for Nightwing Volume 1, the artwork worked very well with the story. I was able to tell exactly what was going on, and it was easy to focus on the right part of each panel (I do have a tendency to jump panels if the artwork grabs my attention). If was to nitpick, then I would only complain about the facial expressions. I was able to tell what they were trying to get across but they occasionally just did not seem quite right. Now I am no artist, so I cannot say what they should or should not change or even how they should do it; but if the facial expressions were more realistic then for me this would have been almost perfect.

If you know that you do not like Nightwing, then give it a miss but most people will enjoy this.

I really enjoyed this! Nightwing has always been a favorite character of mine. Full of family drama and the more plot lines of the Parlament of Owls. I easily understood this title even though I skipped Grayson's time as an agent of Spyral. I'm excited to read more in the future.

I don’t know exactly when, but somewhere along the line of me discovering more and more of the DC universe Nightwing, or better Dick Grayson, has become one of my favourites in the Batman family. I haven’t read a lot of him yet, sadly, but his charm that I got to know in the Batgirl series hasn’t left me yet. So I decided to pick up the Nightwing Rebirth series, too.

I must admit, I’ve read better stories involving him, but there’s something about this first installment in his rebirth series that I like. It’s definitely not Raptor, because that’s a character I do not understand or like at all.

The plot is a little predictable, but I like Batman’s involvement in it. Him being a big part of Dick’s life makes him so much more likeable for me, although I’ve been a big Batman fan a long time already.

This story arc tells us a lot about Dick and who he is, or who he wants to be. Batgirl (who I LOVE) has some appearances and we get to know a little about his parents, too. Which I must admit I didn’t know anything about before. As I’ve mentioned, this is my first time reading a Nightwing story on its own. But Grayson is still high on my TBR list.

I can’t wait to tell you how it continues with Nightwing because I’ve started collecting the singles and they’re awesome. The story definitely picks up after this one, and in my opinion this is a great way for newbies (like me at the beginning) to get to know Dick Grayson.

Nightwing is the worst Rebirth title I’ve read so far. I don’t know how Tim Seeley’s made the charismatic former sidekick of Batman so charmless, uninteresting and soul-crushingly boring but he’s done it! What a garbage writer.

This book picks up where the New 52 Grayson series ended so I was lost immediately as I haven’t been reading that title (I stopped after the terrible first volume, also written by Seeley). Dick stops being Agent 37 of Spyral and becomes Nightwing again for a crap reason then tries to bring down an offshoot of the Court of Owls, the Parliament of Owls, with a cheap Batman knockoff partner called Raptor. How? By stealing the plans of a labyrinth... or something?! Christ, it’s awful.

The lack of anything vaguely resembling a clear, compelling plot made this so maddeningly dull. Seeley’s got Dick running around everywhere but who the fuck can follow what’s going on or why - that’s how sloppy his writing is. Someone in the Parliament turns into an actual monster, Raptor is Dick’s enemy then his buddy then back again (it doesn’t matter), Dick’s sorta dating Batgirl, Raptor’s unnecessarily connected to Dick’s ma, and all this nonsense that adds up to nothing. I kept putting it down because I couldn’t read more than a few pages at a time it was so dull and stupid.

I could go on but I’d just be repeating the same thing: this was a badly-written sleeping aid that’s not worth the effort of struggling through. I like Dick Grayson and I want to read a great Nightwing comic but Tim Seeley hasn’t got the talent to give us that. “Better Than Batman”? HA! It’s not even better than explosive diarrhea!

An introduction that tells you about Nightwing. He was originally Batman's Robin. Batman thought that one day Robin would become Batman. Instead he becomes Nightwing after being a spy and working "underground." He is in Greece getting an assignment from the council of the Parliament. He is told that he will be working with a partner -- Raptor. Nightwing goes back to Gotham for advice from Batman. Does he get advice? I don't want to spoil your reading of this graphic novel so I am stopping here, except to say I think Nightwing and Raptor have an interesting work relationship.

The artwork is great! I loved it! The story is a great way to meet Nightwing. It is a well written story. You get to see him in different situations which will tell you more about Nightwing. I can't wait to read the next volume of Nightwing! Don't miss it!

This is the book I have been waiting for. I have been a Nightwing fan since the very beginning of his solo run. Dick Grayson became Nightwing with the blue and yellow suit. These stories were good but I don't feel like Dick really came into the hero he is today until the second run when he changed to the Blue suit which is my absolute favorite. I was bummed when they changed him to a red version of the current suit but the character is who I really like so I moved on.

During New 52 Dick Grayson was captured in a book called Froever Evil and exposed to the world and then "Killed" Of course Batman and Dick found a way to make this fake and give him the ability to live his life. So Dick went off and became a spy for Spiral. I started to read the series about this Grayson, but the story was dull, the character wasn't what I loved and I ended up not finishing the run before Rebirth. I was disappointed and pining for the return of Nightwing. This book is everything I had hoped for and so much more.

I need to thank DC Comics and Netgalley for allowing me to read this for an honest review. It came at a great time. Last weekend I was so sick, I mean I couldn't get out of bed for anything and it was a chore to even hold my iPad. Being stuck in bed I was really happy to have new comics to read to make me feel better when I was like death in a soupy package. In this book we get to see what happened to Dick leading up to where we are now in the story which was great to get that hole filled before it took off. The my favorite pannel in the whole book is not only seeing Dick back in the Nightwing suit but back in the original Blue one. Goosebumps abounded when I got to this page. The rest of the book flew by out of sheer excitement to be reading one of my favorite characters back as he belonged.

So here is where the story gets weird and I couldn't put this down. Dick is working for the Parliament of Owls. Scott Snyder wrote some of the best Batman story lines I have ever read but Court of Owls is somewhat still going on. The Court of Owls has mostly been destroyed in Gotham but the larger Parliament in Europe is still working to control the world. Dick has begun working for them because they are threatening to kill Damien Wayne if he doesn't. What they don't know is that Dick is planning to take them all down from within the organization. To keep Dick in check the Parliament partners him with Raptor who has a creepy kind of feel to him. He is also brash and violent and tells Dick he is going to have to learn a new way of fighting or he wont survive. Together the Parliament sends them on errands to help build a new home for the members of the Parliament of Owls.

This story was amazing. I am so glad I got this book to read for a review. I was on cloud 9 when I got the approval letter for this one. Batman is my all time favorite Super Hero but Nightwing is a very very close second. I'm beyond excited to see him back and I can't wait for volume 2 to come out so I can read what happens next. The story is amazing and it grabbed me from the very beginning and didn't let go. I give this 5 out of 5 stars. This is a must read for any fan of the Batman series.

Nightwing: Vol 1 Better Than Batman (Rebirth) is a graphic novel written by Tim Seeley with art by Yanick Paquette and Javier Fernandez. It collects NIGHTWING: REBIRTH #1 and NIGHTWING #1-6.

He's been Robin, he's been a super spy, a ghost. Now, Dick Grayson finds himself back in Gotham City fighting to reclaim the life that was taken from him. But when a new evil threatens those closest to Dick, as Nightwing he must once again choose whether or not to tear himself away from his home in order to combat this dark force. Everything Dick thought he knew about being Nightwing will be brought to bear, and his relationship to his former mentor Batman will be put to the test.

I have always loved comics and graphic novels, but have never had the chance to read any Nightwing issues before. I know enough of his story and the universe to not be completely lost, which was nice, but I think many readers coming in completely cold might be slower to catch up to the characters and their relationships to each other. I liked that even though there was plenty of action and mystery going on, there was a great deal of character development for all the major players as well. I think Nightwing's growth- and the resulting changes in his relationships with those closest to him- were very well done and left the door open for many possibilities in the future. I really like that we get serious development with the not so good guys as well. That is why I have always like the Batman and related stories, because little is clearly black and white, good or bad. The artwork and coloring are exactly what I was looking for in this title. extending the readers understanding of the action and character's emotions while telling their part of the story.

If you enjoy the greyer side of crime fighting, and enjoy graphic novels I would suggest checking it out. I do offer a warning though, if you do and have not been keeping up with the DC comic world this will make you eager to catch up. I know I am now looking for the time to do some serious reading.

Dick Grayson is back to being my favorite of his alter-egos: Nightwing. There always seems to be just the right amount of drama in his life that rounds out the action and adventure. This new Rebirth series kicks off with a roller coaster ride of events. And the characters are fun and vivid. This story arc involves a sketchy Raptor who wants to team up with Nightwing to take down an evil empire. I’ll definitely continue reading this exciting line.

From the publisher: Nightwing is back...in blue!

He's been Robin, he's been a super spy, a ghost. Now, Dick Grayson finds himself back in Gotham City fighting to reclaim the life that was taken from him. But when a new evil threatens those closest to Dick, as Nightwing he must once again choose whether or not to tear himself away from his home in order to combat this dark force.

Everything Dick thought he knew about being Nightwing will be brought to bear, and his relationship to his former mentor Batman will be put to the test in NIGHTWING: VOL. ! written by Tim Seeley (GRAYSON) with art by Yanick Paquette (SWAMP THING, BATMAN/SUPERMAN) and rising star Javier Fernandez (RED HOOD/ARSENAL). Collects NIGHTWING: REBIRTH #1 and NIGHTWING #1-4,7-8.

As a long-time fan of Nightwing, I was happy to read Nightwing Vol. 1: Better Than Batman, by Tim Seeley, the first collection of Nightwing as part of the Rebirth event. During the New 52, Dick Grayson underwent a lot of changes, being thought dead by the public, losing his Nightwing persona, and joining the (somewhat questionable) spy organization Spyral. While I enjoyed those stories, I've always been a fan of Nightwing's superhero adventures, as Dick Grayson has always been a happier version of Batman.

In Better Than Batman, Seeley returns Dick Grayson to Nightwing, but with a twist: Instead of being undercover in Spyral, he is now undercover (of sorts) in the Court of Owls. While working from the inside to bring down the Owls, Nightwing is sadled with a new partner/mentor, Raptor. Raptor is there to make sure Nightwing's morals don't prevent him from accomplishing the goals of the Court of Owls. As the story progresses, with several cameos by other members of the Bat-Family, it becomes clear that there is something more to Raptor than was originally thought.

I really enjoyed this return to Nightwing, and found Seeley's story entertaining. While still loosely working with his former comrades in Spyral, Nightwing is also able to be more superhero-ish. Seeley does a fine job of continuing the natural evolution of Dick Grayson/Nightwing that he began with the previous Grayson series. At the same time, he found a way to add to Nightwing's history in a way that seems organic, and doesn't feel like it retcons any of the things readers love about how Dick Grayson became Robin and then Nightwing. The characterization is great and the story is engaging.

A quick note: Issues 5-6 of Nightwing are not part of this collection, as they are part of the Batman - Monster Men storyline. This doesn't affect the flow of the story; however, due to events in Detective Comics, there are some unexplained references to Tim Drake that some readers may find confusing.

Overall, I enjoyed Tim Seeley's first Rebirth: Nightwing collection, Better Than Batman. It is great to see Grayson back in his Nightwing costume, and to have more of a superhero feel back in his book. I highly recommend this to fans of Nightwing, and it is a fine jumping-on point for new readers. I look forward to discovering where Seeley takes Nightwing from here.

I received a preview copy of this book from DC Comics and Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I've always have been a huge Robin fan, even the one from the terrible George Clooney movie (saw that movie as a kid and it was where my love of Robin started, really). This graphic novel really helps explain why. Dick Grayson is a funny guy. As a kid he was taken in and mentored by Batman because Batman sees himself in him, an orphan out for revenge. The novel doesn't give a whole history of Batman raising Robin, but it is taken into account into Nightwing's tale here. Nightwing really compliments Batman and it jogs my memory of why Batman and Robin/Nightwing are my favorite superheroes. (Actually, I might even be able to say Nightwing is my favorite, but honestly I would need to read more of the comic book character's long running history to be sure, but yeah, this is that good.)

It loses a star because the plot does end up being really predictable. (spoiler)It would've been more awesome if somehow Raptor wasn't a bad guy because Raptor was really cool in the beginning, and boy, Nightwing being right about trusting the person felt really good until it was completely wrong.(/spoiler) But that was necessary to get the other feel-good parts in the end.