I never fully liked him, and it makes little sense when you think about it for Batman to let a teenager fight very dangerous criminals alongside him.

But, I guess he has a role to play in making the Batman "world" less grim because of the differences in their personalities.

My preferred version is the O'Neill/Adams "college" Robin. Although it breaks the cardinal rule of aging him, I find him more tolerable if he has an independent life and only comes to the Batcave to work with Batman from time to time.

The rest of the ludicrously large "Batman Family" I don't care for at all... they could disappear tomorrow and I wouldn't miss them.

"Who is the more foolish?...The fool or the fool who follows it?"

Sorry. Couldn't help myself.

I think Batman, like a lot of characters who exist for many many years continously, has fallen prey to writers being bored or just not imaginative/talented enough to write good stories that are actually focused on him. And so they take perhaps the lazy option of extending his 'Bat Family' time and time again. Writing about those characters in his world instead.

For many years, I thought Spider-Man was a better example of a 'loner' character. But in the last decade or so, I think we've seen the same thing happen with him. (I mean just how many variations are there on Spider-Woman/Spider Girl now? Plus he even has his own junior version in Miles now too.)

But getting back to Batman, I suppose the Robins and their history are just too entrenched into the mythos now. So many comic readers are now too attached to them as a part of that world, that I doubt it's even possible to get a solo Batman now. (Or at least not for very long.)

I see this as a problem that the field of comics is almost unique in having. In that there are no endings for characters, when you're committed to keep their adventures ongoing for....well now 80 years in Batman's case. I mean it's not like you would ever have a tv or film character be depicted in relatively the same continuity for that amount of time. Maybe we should be fixing endings for comic characters, given the way the generation of readership is supposed to change every so often? But I guess the boats already sailed on that one.

It is unique indeed. I proposed a "solution" in some other thread here not long ago that the characters should only be written and drawn by their original creators, ending the story the way they feel like or, well, when they died themselves. 

But it's just a thought experiment obviously, that ship has sailed a long time ago as you've said. And precisely Batman would get one of the rawest deals if that were they way things worked.

Another possible solution is to change the periodicity and format. More like european "albums". Speaking for myself, if I could get "just" one or two GOOD Batman stories a year, I'd be a happy camper. I haven't felt the need to buy 4 or 5 Batman comics a month for quite some time now, but maybe that's just me.

"Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?" was supposed to be the "ending" for the classic Superman and JB' run to be the new Superman. I thought of it as a good solution at the time but, as we've said in this thread already, Classic Superman started creeping his way back...

By my calculations there have been now 4 official Robins and two of them died at some point. 

Not to get too Wertham-y but this single billionaire playboy's custom of taking in new teenage boy wards frequently and some of them mysteriously disappearing sure would raise some questions...

I know, I know, time to stop reading comics when you start to think like that, but in this case I think it is kinda too much "suspension of disbelief" to ask for.

 

Haha! A sad reflection of the cynical times we now live in. But oh yes, it certainly would!

Had DC not had a built-in solution to make Batman a solo act again, I'd have agreed that college was an acceptable (if not desirable solution.) But really, all that was needed was a simple statement from Dick that he'd learned so much from Bruce... but he couldn't learn how to be a leader while working with him. Dick would leave to be the full time leader of the Teen Titans. No mention of age required. When sales merited, a team up of Batman and Robin and the Teen Titans could be arranged. I think this a simple solution, and even make Robin's participation more important. I mean, how worried could we get for the Boy Wonder when we knew that in two weeks he'd be appearing in Teen Titans again... sort of like Superboy in the Legion.

One other item... maybe we don't have to consider Batman a loner.140-odd issues of Brave and the Bold, and even more of World's Finest, suggested that Batman didn't like working solo all the time.

*I am reminded of a sequence in the Fantastic Four where Ben is cleaning up after another fight at the Baxter Building, and he has a pile of Kirby machinery in a pile on the floor. He tears open what is apparently the top level of floor, shoves all of it under, and then stomps it flat. Hilarious stuff, even if entirely implausible. Just a little non-sequitur that came to mind...