Agree. Even going past the films, I hate how shows like DC Superhero Girls create this divide as well. Batman is an extremely older man with his sidekicks the same age as the main girls, then Superman is like two years older than the cast, then Wonder Woman, Flash, and Hal Jordan are all teenagers. I just don’t get it? What makes it more perplexing is that, in comics, WW has a sidekick that is the age of the other girls, and so does Flash. Maybe GL, you would have to de-age one, which Cruz already is, but they could have chosen a less popular/established Lantern like Kyle or Gardner.
I like Faust’s writing, but the show just confuses me in this respect. Why is most of the cast Titans, but instead of using other Titans for side characters, they choose prime heroes.
Certain media adaptions that aren't going to impact public or eventual comics fandom perception I'm a lot more forgiving on, and DC Superhero Girls seems that way even of course it's pretty charming. And in fairness, Kyle would work fantastic as the Dick Grayson/NTT generation Lantern: he's got the friendship with Wally, dated Donna, and even was on a post-NTT team for a bit with him.
That reminds me of two things:
1) Dick's generation suffered sudden age gaps too. Cyborg being pushed to League founder status was one, but so was Raven and Beast Boy being pushed into Tim's generation despite the success of the '04 Teen Titans and millennials that grew up on it the prime market for superheroes now - why break up a team that they loved? That, at least, seems to have been fixed up on the comics side of continuity now.
2) I like the idea of Power Girl taking up Silver Age Supergirl's slot as Superman' partner in the "early years" of any mainstream DCU and Superman's timeline for several reasons:
>rocketed to Earth not just from Krypton but from another universe
>adopted under the Karen Starr name by loving foster parents, but otherwise functioning in Silver Age Supergirl's status as a "secret weapon" then open partner to Supes
>eventually as a young adult evolving both into the pre-Crisis confident feminist and post-Crisis tech guru/snarker, complete with a codename/costume change once old enough
>the inevitable multiverse shenanigans open up either through a Crisis and/or the native Supergirl of this reality rocketing in causing the typical Peegee angst
>but she gets over it by still being completely loved by Supes as his younger cousin no matter the 'verse and eventually like most incarnations she just becomes the cool big sister to Kara, who adopts the Kara/Linder Danvers name and Supergirl ID
In one swoop you restore a large chunk of Superman's in-universe "early years"/Silver Age history in broad strokes form, tying her completely to the Super-family (which needs all the unique IDs it can get), Peegee keeps the multiverse fun she in particular and comic books in general are known for, you get an equivalent Super in Dick's generation even if she never joins the Titans per se, and of course in marketing terms you keep her and an active Supergirl in action alike. I believe the New52 of all things had Peegee as Supergirl in Earth-2 before graduating to her own identity and then coming to prime Earth, so the concept's definitely existed before.